Allan Bealy grew up and studied art in Montreal. In 1975, he moved to New York. While in Montreal, he published Davinci, and later in New York City, Benzene, both of which were ‘downtown’ art and literary magazines. Davinci was published out of the Véhicule Art artist-run gallery and performance space in Montreal between 1972-1974. Davinci was also, briefly, an imprint for some artists’ publications. It ultimately served to create

ARCMTL is proud to be a part of the Contre-Culture : Existences et persistances conference. Image: davinci Vol. 1 no. 3 autumn 1974, © Allan Bealy / © Suzy Lake   Montreal’s davinci magazine, Counter-Culture and the Visual Arts 1975 / 2015 Saturday, October 17 at Artexte ( 2 Sainte-Catherine E., suite 301 ) From 15h – 16h: One Hour, One Book: davinci magazine (Montréal 1973-75) by Louis Rastelli, Director,

Erik Slutsky is a longtime Mile End native and veteran visual artist, who we met through his hosting of the New Penelope Facebook group – a group that since 2013 has become a lively place for nostalgia about the 1960s music scene, centered around the legendary venue. He kept his copies of old New Penelope Café newsletters, concert posters and many clippings about the wider music scene of the time,

MONTREAL SHOWS 1965 – 1975, Concert Posters, Photos and Ephemera Exhibit, September 16 – 20 2015, ART POP, 3450 St-Urbain. Vernissage: Wednesday Sept. 16. Hours: Sept. 16, 17-20h; Sept. 17-18, 11–20h; Sept. 19-20, 11-18h. SPECIAL GATHERING after exhibit Friday Sept. 18, 8 p.m., and Saturday September 19, 6:30 p.m. at site of former New Penelope Café on Sherbrooke west of Bleury. Click here for the Facebook event. Archive Montreal presents

Montréal Insolite was a local guide to nightlife and the underground that may have only been published once or twice at the time. It belongs to a family of underground guides that seem to have only existed in the 1970s, encouraging tourists and locals to explore the new sex, drug and rock-and-roll post-60s hedonism. The guide is along the same lines as the Peoples’ Yellow Pages reproduced elsewhere on this

SECOND PART: OUR TASTES… FOLLOW THE GUIDE… In the second part of this small guide you will find a list of places we recommend visiting. This list is far from complete because we would almost need to publish a mini phone directory to describe all the restaurants, hotels and nightclubs of Montreal. We apologize in advance to the owners of the locations we missed. For those who love to eat,

BLUE METROPOLIS: MONTREAL 1975 / 2015, A different imaginary A round-table discussion organized by Arcmtl for its Montreal Underground Origins project, held on April 24, 2015 at the Blue Metropolis International Literary Festival in Montreal. The discussion explored two Montreals: the city that local writers wrote about in 1975 and the entirely new city in 2015. Featuring the authors Endre Farkas, Anna Leventhal and Ralph Elawani and moderated by Bryan

At our annual Expozine small press fair, specifically on November 16, 2014 a round-table discussion on the early days of the contemporary Montreal small press scene was held. The panel consisted of the founding members of Véhicule Press, Simon Dardick and Nancy Marrelli, and the founder of Montreal’s long-running independent bookstore The Word, Adrian King-Edwards. Véhicule Press began in 1973 on the premises of Véhicule Art Inc.—one of Canada’s first

BLUE METROPOLIS literary festival 20h-21h, Friday, April 24, 10 Sherbrooke W. (corner St-Laurent), PETIT SALON, Free admission! MONTREAL 1975 / 2015, A DIFFERENT IMAGINARY Round-table discussion featuring Bryan Demchinsky, Endre Farkas, Anna Leventhal and Ralph Elawani. Click here for the Facebook event. Local small press promoters and archivists ARCMTL / Expozine present a reading and discussion exploring two Montreals: the city that local writers wrote about in 1975 and the

Montreal Underground Origins is being undertaken by Archive Montreal, a non-profit organization that since 1998 has actively collected and preserved artifacts from the city’s past independent or “underground” arts scenes as well as promoted the contemporary milieu. It has accumulated over the years several thousand audio recordings from Montreal artists, bands, musicians, poets and more, in just about every format there is, ranging from reel to reel tapes, acetates, DAT

Live from Earth: Prince Arthur, 1970, Montreal’s Haight-Ashbury ? Prince Arthur St. east of St-Laurent heading towards Carré Saint-Louis was one of the most popular parts of town for the counter-culture crowd of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Even today’s Fodor’s travel guide to Montreal refers to this past : In the 1960s rue Prince-Arthur was the Haight-Ashbury of Montréal, full of shops selling leather vests, tie-dyed T-shirts, recycled

Here is an issue of a 1974 Véhicule Press publication by various authors, Da Vinci, volume 1 number 3, edited by Allan Bealy. All contents copyright the authors, 1974. This issue features works by Keith Abbott, Michael Abbott, Suzy Lake, Tim Mancusi, Allan Shute, Stephen Bobb, Joan Thornton, Allan Bealy, Klaus Groh, Comet Nirvanno, Frank Ferguson. The title appears to have only appeared a few times and is notable for