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Ottawa, September 15, 2004 – Students at NSCAD University (Nova Scotia College of Art and Design) in Halifax have been given a special gift by the Canada Council Art Bank. Through the Art Bank’s donation program, NSCAD University has received 164 films and videos by artists from across Canada.

Thanks to this major contribution from the Art Bank to the university’s Visual Resources Collection, students at NSCAD University will have a unique opportunity to enrich their knowledge of film and video art. This very valuable collection includes works of outstanding Canadian filmmakers and video artists such as Pierre Falardeau, Zacharias Kunuk, Sara Diamond, as well as Nova Scotia’s Jan Peacock and Doug Porter.

“We are most indebted to the Art Bank for this generous donation”, said Kenn Gardner Honeychurch, Senior Vice President, Academic and Research at NSCAD University. “Our institution has a long history of interest in film and video and we have just graduated our first class of students with a Bachelor of Arts, Major in Film. The range, diversity and quality of works in the collection will be of exceptional value to our students, to the faculty, and to the university community as a whole.”

“We are delighted that NSCAD University has so enthusiastically accepted the Art Bank collection of film and video, and that it has created a new resource centre for its use”, said Victoria Henry, Director of the Art Bank. “After several years of discussions with artists, distributors, and other collecting organizations, NSCAD University was the most understanding of the rights of the artists and most willing to undertake the care of the collection as a whole.”

Faculty and students can screen these films and videos for educational, teaching and research purposes and thus develop their techniques in the media arts.

General Information
The Art Bank was created in 1972 with a mandate to develop a collection of Canadian artworks for lease to federal offices and public buildings; in recent years, the Art Bank’s services have also been extended to private sector clients. Today, the Art Bank has the world’s largest collection of contemporary Canadian art – some 18,000 works, one-third of which are leased at any given time. The Art Bank gifting program’s objective is to expose works by contemporary Canadian artists to a broader public.

NSCAD University is Canada’s oldest independent university dedicated exclusively to the study and practice of the visual arts. Founded in 1887 as the Victoria School of Art, NSCAD has granted undergraduate and graduate degrees for more than 30 years, and has a current enrolment of about 1,000 students. For more details, see www.nscad.ca.

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Tous les documents du Conseil des Arts du Canada sont offerts en français et en anglais.

Media contact: Canada Council for the Arts
Carole Breton
(613) 566-4414 ext. 4523 or
1-800-263-5588 ext. 4523
carole.breton@canadacouncil.ca

Donna Balkan
(613) 566-4305 or
1-800-263-5588 ext. 4134
donna.balkan@canadacouncil.ca

NSCAD University
Marla Cranston
Coordinator of Communications
(902) 494-8244
marlac@nscad.ns.ca