As a musician, performer, activist, collector, John David Lawrence has long held an important, if underrecognized, position in Vancouver’s creative community. After settling in the city in the mid-1980s he participated in and advocated for performance spaces and artist-run centres, building deep roots in the community, and since 2000 he has been the proprietor of DoDa Antiques. Over several decades, Lawrence amassed an idiosyncratic personal collection that includes ceramics, Indigenous art, jewelry, folk art, photography, and plant life. Through the stories of some of these pieces and of Lawrence himself, as well as extensive new photography of his holdings, The Place of Objects illuminates the rich cultural production that is often overlooked by Vancouver’s established artistic community.
Released to coincide with a Vancouver Art Gallery exhibition of 300 ceramic works from Lawrence’s collection, The Place of Objects opens with an engrossing conversation between scholar Michael Prokopow and Lawrence that uses specific objects and the diverse areas of his collections to reveal Lawrence’s enigmatic biography and ponder the broader cultural obsession with things. The second half of the book features texts by artists, scholars, friends, and curators who highlight objects of art with historical, cultural, or personal significance. The publication also includes a visual index—a two-dimensional genogram of the objects in his collection—to map the tentacular threads that have informed Lawrence’s collecting practices over the decades.
Contributors:
- Glenn Alteen
- Grant Arnold
- Daina Augaitis
- Jonathon Bancroft-Snell
- Nicholas R. Bell
- Dave Carlin
- Allan Collier
- Diana Freundl
- Tyler Fritz
- Mandy Ginson
- Donna Hagerman
- Carole Itter
- Jenn Jackson
- Corey Larocque
- Hilary Letwin
- Carol Mayer
- Siobhan McCracken Nixon
- Edmond Melnychuk
- Michael J. Prokopow
- Esther Rausenberg
- Stephanie Rebick
- Debra Sloan
- Mr. Smith
- Carolyn Stockbridge
- Jordan Strom
- Andrea Valentine-Lewis
- Jan Wade
- Laura Wee Láy Láq
Artists:
- Hans Coper
- Olea Davis
- Walter Dexter
- Beau Dick
- Denny Dixon
- Pat Dixon
- Ed Drahanchuk
- Axel Ebring
- Gathie Falk
- Ken Foster
- Ken Gerberick
- Kathleen Hamilton
- Ben Houstie
- Avery Huyghe
- Tam Irving
- Elsie John
- Charmian Johnson
- Thomas Kakinuma
- Zoltan Kiss
- Roy Kiyooka
- Danny Kostyshin
- Zeljko Kujundzic
- Corey Larocque
- Bernard Leach
- Janet Leach
- Glenn Lewis
- Luke Lindoe
- Brian Lynch
- Mad Dog
- Pat McGuire
- Edmond Melnychuk
- Philip Melvin
- Grace Melvin
- Santo Mignosa
- Carel Moiseiwitsch
- Ellen Neel
- Wayne Ngan
- Oraf
- Davide Pan
- Randy Pandora
- John Reeve
- Bill Reid
- Bill Rennie
- Hilda Ross
- Debra Sloan
- Russell Smith
- Gordon Thorlaksson
- Ron Tribe
- Jan Wade
- Jean Marie Weakland
- Laura Wee Láy Láq
AuthorDr. Michael J. Prokopow is a cultural historian and curator whose areas of expertise include architecture and design, material and visual culture, and critical and postcolonial theory. His many publications include, most recently, Hurvin Anderson (2021) and Smith House II for UBC SALA West Coast Modern House series (2012). Between 2004 and 2008, he was curator of the Design Exchange, Canada’s only museum of twentieth-century industrial design. In 2011, he curated an exhibition on the work of architect and theorist George Baird at the John H. Daniels Faculty of Architecture, Landscape, and Design, and in 2016 he co-curated the touring exhibition True Nordic: How Scandinavia Influenced Design in Canada. He sits on the boards of the Arthur Erickson Foundation, the Canadian Society for the Decorative Arts, and Studio Magazine, and holds a PhD from Harvard University. Born and raised in Victoria, BC, he now divides his time between London, UK, and Toronto, where he is a faculty member at OCAD University.
More About Michael J. Prokopow, PhD
Stephanie Rebick is a curator, editor, writer, Director of Publishing and Content Strategy at the Vancouver Art Gallery, and frequent collaborator with Information Office, a Vancouver-based art book publisher and design practice. Rebick has curated and co-curated numerous exhibitions, including Fashion Fictions; Where do we go from here?; Modern in the Making: Post-War Craft and Design in British Columbia; Robert Rauschenberg 1965–1980; Out of Sight; Guo Pei: Couture Beyond; Cabin Fever; MashUp: The Birth of Modern Culture; and Grand Hotel: Redesigning Modern Life. She has contributed to a number of publications, including MashUp: The Birth of Modern Culture (Vancouver Art Gallery and Black Dog, 2016); Grand Hotel: Redesigning Modern Life (Vancouver Art Gallery and Hatje Cantz, 2013); Unreal (Vancouver Art Gallery, 2010); Visceral Bodies (Vancouver Art Gallery, 2010); and KRAZY! The Delirious World of Anime + Comics + Video Games + Art (Douglas & McIntyre, 2008). Most recently she has edited volumes on the work of Jan Wade and Omer Arbel. Her curatorial interests include visual culture, new media, and the intersection of craft, design and contemporary art.
More About Stephanie Rebick
PressUpcoming EventsVancouver Art Gallery Exhibition
Written in Clay: From the John David Lawrence Collection
May 25, 2025 – November 9, 2025
