Bob Chelmick, host of The Road Home on CKUA, is known for curating radio programs that blend music, story-telling and poetry, with the occasional ambient nature sounds (birdsong, thunder, dogs barking) at his cabin studio. The Road Home is a favourite program with CKUA’s audience, and it’s particularly beloved by those who start their day very early! Now Chelmick is sharing a collection of gorgeous photographs with our friends at Levis Fine Art Auctions. The collection, featured in exhibitions across Canada and beyond, is called Flying Colours.
Each artist-printed archival photograph is a numbered print, and the sale of these art works will support CKUA. Always keen to explore the natural world and its wonders, Chelmick says that these photographs had their beginnings in his work as a CBC television newsman. While on assignment at what is now the Royal Alberta Museum he saw in the museum’s collection of moths, butterflies, and beetles great photographic potential. Chelmick made close-up photographs exploring in great detail the brightly-coloured wing patterns and more. As Chelmick says, “These images go beyond what the normal eye can see to the point of abstraction—yet are rooted in solid form, shape and colour.”
For Chelmick, “The exploration was a joyous exercise in finding powerfully arresting vantage points that could be shared in photographic prints. What I see in the tiny is nothing short of the infinite intelligence of the universe.” This Flying Colours collection of prints was last installed on Capitol Hill in Washington DC. And now—for the first time—these photographs are up for auction.
Andrea Lowe and Cheryl Sonley, co-owners of Levis Fine Art Auctions, spoke with us about the company’s connections to CKUA, and what this set of photographs means to them. The company was started in 1992 by Doug Levis. When Sonley started working there in 2008, she asked about the music she was hearing in the office. Levis told her it was CKUA. Lowe started working there in 2015, and the two women brought the business in 2020 when Doug Levis retired.
Says Sonley, “We listen all day. We donate personally and corporately. We love the music and the things CKUA promotes.” Lowe is enchanted by the Bob Chelmick photographs that are up for auction. “There are parts of them that can look abstract, even though they are wings. Then, you can move forward and see what they are. They are dynamic. You notice different things every time you look.” And she adds, “We have them in the building and can pull them for people to have a look in real life, too.”
Sonley agrees. “They are so vibrant and so detailed,” she says, adding, “It’s an auction! So it’s not where it starts, it’s where it ends up. And people can bid from anywhere in the world.”
Bob Chelmick is excited about the auction. “It is a beautiful way to support CKUA. My first love and last love in broadcasting is CKUA. If there is any connection that people have made with me and with The Road Home, they might be inclined to acquire one of these pieces. I would love that.”
“CKUA is unique, just as these images are unique. CKUA deserves and needs to be supported in the most generous way. It’s lovely that these works will not only be in institutional collections, but for the first time be available to individuals. I’m very happy about that.”
Visit levisauctions.com to see the collection and bid on these gorgeous archival Cibachrome photographs.
