"The disparate artistic visions and literary voices are painstakingly (and successfully) sewn together with the finest thread of subtext. The organization of the whole seems to be a carefully orchestrated juxtapositioning of elements – or in leaner prose, The Windsor Salt is a superbly edited anthology!"
– Cynthia Conrad / Co-Editor of Dirigible

"A rich variety of image, photography, comic, poem and prose... superbly done."
– Umbrella / Volume 21, Number 2 (July 1998)

• Read a review in Splendidzine of the The Windsor Salt project here

Salt To Taste
by Mark Lefebvre (Skirt Magazine: Vol 01 Issue 06, May/June 1998)

What's the deal with Windsor?

So many of us openly hate living in this toxic hot spot, scratching out a cultural existence when obviously greener pastures beckon.

Many do manage to leave, but have you noticed how many return? Is it that pastures elsewhere aren't so green after all or is there a perverse magnetism at work here?

A friend once reckoned that Windsor must have the highest per capita concentration of weirdos in Canada. Now I know why. Windsor Salt.

We are living above a gigantic crystal, and like the old religion's key lines of power which criss cross the earth, our curse is also our blessing.

Speaking of curses, editors Mark Laliberte and Gustave Morin must be feeling a huge weight lifted from their shoulders after it seemed like the project would never happen. But happen it did and Gus and Mark along with fellow jurists Julie Sando and Dermot Wilson have compiled a book "full of diverse, divergent and dynamic points of view."

The great thing about anthologies is that there is always something appealing for everyone. On the first perusal my personal faves included Dave Fine's landmark photos, words and images by Mark Laliberte and poetry by Lori Market.

Dermot Wilson's 'A Dirge for Jell-O Evenings at J.T. Wing Building' coupled with Mr. Fine's photos gave me the weirdest dreams for I was one of the lucky who breathed art there before they tore it down to gamble with our future.

Having read the book a few more times now, I'm struck less by individual shards of brilliance than with an over-archingly morbid sense of humour. Stories, poems, photos and artwork juxtaposed in such a way that if we could bottle it, then we might have a product as widely used as Windsor Salt itself. For I really think that those far off pastures are just as shitty as ours in their own way, and someone might just as well laugh at themselves as at us, having read in the poem 'Hometown': If you only have a year to live, spend it in Windsor and it will seem like twenty."

Common Ground Gallery has spent at least two years mining, processing and packaging The Windsor Salt for your consumption. Go ahead and pick it up. Sprinkle generously all over your favorite foods. Just add water -- it makes its own sauce. Yum!

Creative Project Contains a Pinch of Salt
by Gail Robertson (Windsor Star, 1998)

A feast of poems, drawings, short stories and photographs comes with a heavy dose of salt. The Windsor Salt, that is. And it all dates back to seeing that icon box of salt sitting on a shelf above a toilet somewhere in Windsor a few years back. The bronze and blue dots plus the role salt plays in the city's reputation captured the attention of the art community. In turn, they pulled together an anthology of "cultural activity." "It's an important tool to the community," says The Windsor Salt book co-editor Mark Laliberte. "The artists dilaogue among themselves and this is a vehicle to present their work in a manner that the public understands." And in a twist on the usual anthology of artists' work, no names are written next to individual pieces, although there is a table of contents matching creators to their results. " We try to give the book a thematic flow. ... This book is an attempt at expression. By leaving out names you can look at a work as a whole."

Veterans and Novices
Both up and coming artists as well as veterans are part of the compilation so works by Eugene McNamara, Peter Stevens and Susan Gold are mixed in with pieces by Lori Market and Leesa Bringas. It's the second time Market has had her work published in an anthology. "It looks great and it's high quality. It's something this city has needed for a long time, beyond the bingo halls and casinos. People are still making efforts to have art and culture. It's a really good thing." As well, a few people who have made careers outside of the local market like Aaron Linton and Marc Gabanna are also included. "Fine arts is kind of foreign to the work I do," says Gabanna, who does a lot of commercial work in the United States, including designs for the movie Spawn. But with encouragement from his girlfriend Michelle Angers (another artist), he submitted a piece to the project. "A lot of what is in the book is more fine arts but it's a good showcase." Angers, who also has a couple of pieces in the book, says she thinks people need to know about the wealth of talented artists in the area. "Any exposure is good exposure. I'm going into commercial illustrations and it looks like I'll get more response elsewhere, " she says. Laliberte says the book project is exciting for younger artists who have yet to have any work published. "It's part of the mental formatting in a product-oriented culture," says Laliberte. "I think there's something about the feel of a real book, it somehow legitimizes all your efforts."

Creative Metaphor
So you'll find short stories like I'm With Stupid by J.C. Cook, or a cartoon by George Rizuk, nude photographs by Barrie Jones mixed in with commercial work by Gabanna and A.G. Smith. The book is dedicated to Don Polson, a Windsor psychiatric social worker and writer who died in 1989. In his lifetime he wrote eight volumes of poetry. "We found his widow and we solicited some of his material to consider. He had eight unpublished poems and we used four," says Laliberte. "There are people who know about his work but maybe a particular generation doesn't." And while the book itself is a take-off of a Windsor Salt box, Laliberte says it is meant as a metaphor to represent Windsor's creative community. "It's almost an homage, it's good natured, " says Laliberte. Linda Iler, a spokeswoman at Windsor Salt says the company hasn't seen the book and couldn't comment further. Common Ground, the book's publisher, is an artist-driven community space founded in 1986. The Windsor Salt, is released by Common Ground Editions and sells for $13.