Yellowknife (Jun 30/06) - A visitor's centre is often the first stop for tourists, bleary-eyed from long hours of travelling and looking for some direction.

The Northern Frontier Regional Visitor's Centre in Yellowknife is looking to direct those people towards some good art, as it holds its artist-in-residence program for a third summer.

Photojournalist Brent Reaney poses with his photo collection, A Few of China's Many Faces, in the Northern Frontier Regional Visitor's Centre. He is one of several artists featured in the centre's Artist-in-Residence program this summer. - Adam Johnson/NNSL photo

"The idea is to showcase the artist community in Yellowknife," executive director Denie Olmstead said.

"Once (visitors) make the drive up, we want them to know there's more to Yellowknife than the drive."

Every week until September, the centre, in co-operation with the Aurora Arts Society, will dedicate space to a different Northern artist - from painters to multimedia artists to photographers.

Featured this week is photojournalist, writer and former Yellowknifer reporter Brent Reaney, as he shows off A Few of China's Many Faces, a exhibition of pictures and words drawn from a September trip through the world's most populous nation.

He said his digital pictures, which include a number of candid portraits of day-to-day life in China, are meant to step outside the normal boundaries of tourist photography.

"There's no shots of terracotta warriors, and no pictures of the Great Wall," he said. "This is the kind of real life stuff that's important for people to see."

There is one picture set near the Great Wall, however, of a man smoking with his shirt pulled up to expose his midriff.

Of course, that's just part of the story.

A quick glance at Reaney's write-up reveals a funny tale of mixed cultural expectations, as the man, with a little coaching, began to yell "How are you?" at every non-Chinese person he saw.

"He was so excited," Reaney said with a laugh.

"That's why it's words and pictures," he said of the showing, Reaney's first.

Rosalie Power, who co-ordinates the showing with the Aurora Arts Society, said the showing runs from the second week of June to the long weekend in September.

While nine artists, including painter Sandy Craig and mixed media artist Monique Robert, are on the list, Power said there was room for a few more.

"They can give me a call and we'll fit them in," she said of interested artists.

Reaney said he appreciated the chance to show off his work.

"If they didn't have the space, I don't think I'd be able to have my first show."

A Few of China's Many Faces will be on display until Sunday, July 2.