Author Archives: Robert K Stephen (CSW)

RKS 2023 Wine: What is Going on at the Second Annual Wine and Travel Week in Porto?

What is the annual Wine and Travel Week? A conference and a key wine tourism event bringing together influential professionals and decision makers from around the world. It is a week of intense networking for vendors seeking to sell wine tourism products and buyers that are in the market to buy wine tourism products. ItContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: What is Going on at the Second Annual Wine and Travel Week in Porto?”

RKS 2023 Wine: Canadian Wine Tourism Falling Behind the Pack: Inattentive Guys Finish Last

The concept of wine tourism involves more than simply visiting a winery sampling wines and perhaps taking a tour of the vineyard and the cellars. Pardon my triteness but if you visited a few wineries have you visited them all? Terribly boring and repetitive after a time. Wine tourism necessitates businesses, tourist authorities, restaurants, wineries,Continue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: Canadian Wine Tourism Falling Behind the Pack: Inattentive Guys Finish Last”

RKS 2023 Film: “The Job of Songs”: A Beautifully Layered Documentary

Seeing the promo material for “The Job of Songs” and the words “traditional Irish music” I experienced very Canadian flashbacks of television shows “Don Messer’s Jubilee” and “The Pig and Whistle”. Teen PTSD! Forcing myself to watch this Irish documentary was not easy. It took me three days of “yes watch” and “no watch”. AsContinue reading “RKS 2023 Film: “The Job of Songs”: A Beautifully Layered Documentary”

RKS Literature: Pain and Humour (Ken Kesey)

“Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy. He knows there is a painful side: he knows my thumb smarts and his girlfriend has a bruised breast and the doctor is losing his glasses,Continue reading “RKS Literature: Pain and Humour (Ken Kesey)”

RKS 2023 Film: “Rose”: Danish Epic Film Exhausts: Travels with a Schizophrenic

The Danish film “Rose” is an epic physical and spiritual journey of Inger (Sofie Gråbøl) on a bus trip from Denmark to Paris. Inger is institutionalized with schizophrenia but she is sufficiently functional (if not driven) to travel with her sister Ellen (Lene Marie Christensen) and husband Vagn (Anders W. Berthelsen) on a group coachContinue reading “RKS 2023 Film: “Rose”: Danish Epic Film Exhausts: Travels with a Schizophrenic”

RKS Literature: Aggravate Your Adversaries (Ken Kesey)

“Even McMurphy doesn’t seem to know he has been fogged in. If he does, he makes sure not to let on that he’s bothered by it. He’s making sure none of the staff see him bothered by anything: he knows that there’s no better way in the world to aggravate somebody who’s trying to makeContinue reading “RKS Literature: Aggravate Your Adversaries (Ken Kesey)”

RKS 2023 Wine: Bachelder Wismer Foxcroft 2021 Gamay Noir: Ontario Gamay Noir Establishing Itself in Ontario

I encountered Thomas Bachelder last Sunday at Toronto Hot Docs Theatre for a showing of “Crush; Message in a Bottle” and we exchanged brief pleasantries. Bachelder, Kelly Mason, Shiraz Mottiar and Anne-Marie Saunders were expressing their views as to growing grapes and making wine in the Niagara region of Ontario. I expressed my agreement withContinue reading “RKS 2023 Wine: Bachelder Wismer Foxcroft 2021 Gamay Noir: Ontario Gamay Noir Establishing Itself in Ontario”

Keith Haring’s “Art is For Everybody” at Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario

Fotini Stephen (Toronto, 9November2023) The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) has collaborated with the Broad Los Angeles to assemble a major exhibition of Keith Haring’s work. The exhibit displays a broad range of Haring’s work created in the short and highly prolific 10-year period in which he painted. The last AGO exhibit of his workContinue reading “Keith Haring’s “Art is For Everybody” at Toronto’s Art Gallery of Ontario”

Keith Haring at the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Exhibit “Art is For Everybody”: Behind the Scenes

One of the perks  of membership in the arts media is “the sneak preview” and in this case it was with the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto on 7November2023 which included a panel discussion and then a leisurely and uncrowded walk through the exhibits for the Haring exhibition, “Art is for Everybody” the firstContinue reading “Keith Haring at the Art Gallery of Ontario’s Exhibit “Art is For Everybody”: Behind the Scenes”