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Edify, October 2024

The Art of Design

The opening page: Kira Chankasingh in a cream dress in her studio, her paintings behind her
The facing page, The Art of Design, her name set on its side beside the introduction

Ryan Parker photographed artists Kira Chankasingh, Oksana Movchan and Gary James Joynes for The Art of Design, a feature in Edify’s October 2024 issue, and Movchan again for the issue’s Final Shot page.

The story

The Art of Design

The Art of Design profiles three Edmonton artists whose work runs from portraits and abstracts to video and sound. Chankasingh, who studied at Emily Carr University of Art + Design, paints blurred portraits pieced together from family photographs. Movchan, born in Ukraine and holding a PhD in printmaking, came to Toronto for a solo show in 1996, stayed in Canada, and now teaches painting at the University of Alberta. Her partner, Joynes, a visual and sound artist who performs as Clinker, built the Wave Driver to make the shapes of sound waves visible.

Magazine
Edify
Issue
October 2024
Ran as
The feature across four pages, and the Final Shot page
Words
Tom Ndekezi (Kira Chankasingh), Hiba Zaidi (Oksana Movchan, Gary James Joynes)
Art direction
Kim Larson
Photographs
Ryan Parker

As printed

The cover, and the pages.

  1. 01Edify, October 2024

    The opening page: Kira Chankasingh in a cream dress in her studio, her paintings behind her
    The facing page, The Art of Design, her name set on its side beside the introduction
    The next spread: Oksana Movchan in a red suit among her canvases, and Gary James Joynes at his synthesizers in blue light
    Final Shot: Oksana Movchan in her studio, holding her cat, Kitsia

The frames

The photographs, before the type.

  1. 01The photographs

    Kira Chankasingh in a cream dress, standing among her paintings
    Oksana Movchan in a red suit in her studio, canvases on every wall
    Oksana Movchan in the same studio, holding her cat, Kitsia
    Gary James Joynes seated among his synthesizers and speakers, lit blue

How it got made

The brief, the room, the frame.

Three artists, two days, all at home. Kira doesn’t have a studio and paints in her kitchen, so we leaned into the kitchen. Gary and Oksana each work out of a small bedroom in a 1950s bungalow, so I photographed them separately, each in their own room with a piece of their work. I brought my spotlight with its internal barn doors, so I could throw a hard-edged circle or cut the light into slices and shapes for a little drama, and that look made it into the magazine.

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