Annual BFA Visual Arts exhibit

Posted on April 16, 2013 by john threlfall

Ania Zientara’s “Every Action has a Reaction”

Hoping to catch a glimpse of tomorrow’s visual artists today? Look no further than the annual Bachelor of Fine Arts graduating exhibit in UVic’s Department of Visual Arts!

This year’s exhibit—aptly titled Work—will fill the Visual Arts building with work by more than 30 student artists.

Work features a wide variety of mediums, including painting, sculpture, photography, drawing, installation and extended media works.

Willie Seo with his paper man (photo: Adrian Lam, Times Colonist)

“It is a true celebration of this moment in contemporary art and shows great promise for the future of visual art,” says faculty curator Sandra Meigs.

There was a good deal of media interest in the show. The local Newsgroup papers sent a photographer up to capture the installation, and the Times Colonist ran a photo and story about graduating BFA artist Willie Seo and his life-size human sculpture made out of layers of newspaper.

“It was a really time-consuming project,” Seo told TC writer Katherine Dedyna, who noted that “the enormity of the undertaking stressed him [Seo] out.” (Interesting side-note: Seo’s sculpture has a new home in the office of the Dean of Fine Arts, where it now looms over Dean’s Assistant Ami Cheli.)

Emma Palm on Shaw TV

Shaw TV also came up to film a segment for their Go! Island South show. Shaw host Nikki Ewanishan spoke with graduating BFA student Emma Palm about her pieces in the show, which were inspired by her brother’s recent suicide. You can watch that segment here.

And finally, the Victoria News ran this online photo and brief blurb, highlighting BFA student Marty McRae in the process of hanging his sculpture, “Primary V.”

Annah van Eeghen’s “The Red String of Fate”

Seen here are just a few of the pieces you’ll see in this show. Be sure to check it out—it’s one of the most-anticipated campus art exhibits of the year!

Work opens at 7 pm Friday, April 19 in UVic’s Visual Arts building. Visitors are welcome noon to 8pm Monday to Friday, and 10am to 6pm Saturday, April 27. Please click here for parking information and campus maps.

Bronwyn McMillin’s “Go back, come back”

“Untitled”, by Mia Watkins

MFA Visual Arts show: 4 exhibits in 1

Posted on April 16, 2013 by john threlfall

The Department Of Visual Arts is pleased to present four solo exhibitions under the banner of 2013′s MFA Graduate Exhibition. This year’s exhibitions feature the works of four Masters of Fine Arts graduates: Hilary Knutson, Chris Lindsay, Yang Liu, and Paola Savasta.

Hilary Knutson’s current installation (photo: Adrian Lam, Times Colonist)

Hilary Knutson’s Au Secours is an installation work that uses elements of domesticity and its comforts as a foil to explore aspects of her own struggles with chronic pain. Often displaying a keen sense of humour, Knutson’s work invites us into her living room/ studio where artworks, set dressing and props conflate into an unsettling environment where the couch is central, offering the viewer a forced sense of comfort. As the artist herself states, “My world revolves around the couch; the couch at home, the couch in the studio, and various couches in various waiting rooms. One must be comfy when one is in pain.”

Knutson’s work also caught the eye of local Times Colonist writer Amy Smart, who featured her in the article “An Art Installation with the Comforts of Home.” “I think pain is incredibly hard to talk about,” Knutson told Smart in the May 3 article. “It’s something as a society that we tend to sweep under the rug.”

A former microbiologist, Chris Lindsay’s research has now turned to what he describes as exploring “the nature of experience and imagination. Through my work, fundamental questions become reified and I propose a challenge wherein the viewer may consider his or her own perception of what it is to be human.” Inside the Outside, is an iteration of Lindsay’s tireless sculptural experimentation in the studio. For Lindsay perception and imagination are two sides of the same proposition, stimulate one and you ignite the other. As Lindsay suggests, “What we know and understand of our physical world is gained through our senses; this is how we have come to define who and what we believe we are in the universe.”

The photo works in Yang Liu’s All the Things You Left Behind are based on his observations and experience as a recent immigrant to Canada from China. “My artworks explore the relationship of identity, memory, personality and a materialized social structure while representing loneliness, fear, and the inherent uncertainty of life.”

Lui’s work is often based on constructions designed by the artist which in turn are made of photographic images by the artist. Through a process of deconstruction and reconstruction Yang produces works that effectively conveys the psychological content of his experiences in a way that is accessible to audiences here.

Paola Savasta’s exhibition The Heir, is actually two shows in one. In two separate rooms Savasta presents two distinct bodies of work. The work in both rooms explore ideas of depiction and display through modes of painting, sculpture and installation. Illusionistic effects including patterning, camouflage, and false shadows confound our immediate perception of Savasta’s unique objects and their place in space. These effects activate the spectator’s experience, as the artist confounds our ability to decode the true shape and nature of the objects she has presented. As Savasta states, “I’m proposing a state of intermediacy, where the two-dimensional and three-dimensional borrow each other’s qualities.”

The University of Victoria Masters of Fine Arts Program is an intensive studio-based research degree, predicated on immersive experiential learning combined with critical discussions and one of Canada’s leading visiting artist programs.

The MFA Graduate Exhibit opens at 7pm Friday May 3 and runs to May 11. The exhibit is open 10am to 5pm weekedays, and 1-5pm weekends.

Writing student named Alumnus of Honour

Posted on April 11, 2013 by john threlfall

Department of Writing student Anna-Maria Landis has been named Alumnus of Honour for Victorious Voices, Victoria’s annual Secondary School Slam Championships.

A high-energy youth poetry festival that is widely recognized in the poetry community as one of the most inspiring and entertaining events of the year, Victorious Voices runs April 15 to 17 in Victoria and will feature performances not only by Landis but also Youth Poet Laureate and fellow Writing student Aysia Law.

Anna-Maria Landis

Landis, a first-year Writing student, has maintained her ties with Reynolds Secondary School through her weekly coaching sessions with their current slam team. “I’ve been encouraging them to keep writing, helping them to become a cohesive team, to think outside the box,” says Landis. “I’m trying to keep that poetry motivation alive at Reynolds; it’s important to have older students going back, for them to have those role models.”

It must be working, as the Reynolds slam team just came in second at Hullabaloo, the annual provincial youth poetry slam. “It’s pretty amazing how supportive other students are of hearing their friends read poetry,” she continues. “It kind of blows my mind.” She says slam is the ideal vehicle for high school expression. “All those hard feelings, those things that make you feel like a melodramatic teenager, you’re able to get out at a slam.”

Landis says she was inspired to begin performing poetry during her years at Reynolds thanks to visits by noted spoken word artists like The Fugitives and Shane Koyczan, who were brought in by English teacher Brad Cunningham. “I wasn’t even in his class,” she laughs, “but then I started going to [local slam collective] Tongues of Fire—that really sparked the interest for me—then we started our own slam team at Reynolds.”

She continues to be surprised by the level of support for spoken word at Reynolds. “We would have open mics at lunch hour and it was insane—a hundred high school students would come out and watch people read poetry,” she recalls. “Having that community from the get go gave a sense of momentum; you could express yourself through poetry. Most people in high school don’t usually perform poetry, it’s more a private thing.”

Landis and Law are not the only UVic students who will be performing new work at Victorious Voices; also among the six others on the bill for the April 16 “Still Victorious” Alumni Showcase is two-time Victorious Voices champion and former Reynolds student Zoe Duhaime, who is now studying “healthy sexuality, women’s studies, philosophy and English at UVic (but admits she spent most of this year “messing around in vague but wonderful Humanities courses”). And Writing grad Danielle Pope is one of the judges for the Finals.

Back on campus, Landis entered this video poem about her at-times difficult relationship with her mother in this year’s UVic Diversity Poetry Contest. “It was a huge risk the first time I performed it,” she admits. “But you get that taste of writing about people you know, which is scary, because of how it can affect them. Then it became the poem I was really known for, and I heard from a lot of moms who said they needed to hear things from that perspective.”

As for her career in the Writing department, Landis says it was a foregone conclusion. “My goal in life is to write and I knew if I was going to do anything academic that wasn’t writing, I’d get distracted from that goal,” she says. “Writing is my priority, and I’d heard so many good things about UVic’s program.”

But surprisingly, she isn’t focusing on poetry at this point. “I don’t know if I could do poetry in an academic setting,” she says with a chuckle. “A lot of the skills I’ve been learning seem to lend themselves more toward fiction. I find it really hard to confine poetry to the page; I like spoken word as a venue better.”

Victorious Voices: Semi-finals are at 7pm Monday, April 15, at the Victoria Event Centre on Broad Street. Still Victorious, the Alumni Showcase, starts 7:30pm Tuesday, April 16 at Solstice Café. Finals, featuring an opening poem by Victoria Poet Laureate Janet Rogers and the Alumnus of Honour Showcase, starts 7:30pm Wednesday, April 17 at the Event Centre.

Summer Music courses rock!

Posted on April 11, 2013 by john threlfall

Want a fresh soundtrack for the summer semester? Check out these special courses offered through the School of Music.

If you like movies and music in movies, you’ll love Let’s Go to the Movies (Music 391). Think about some of the classic moments in cinematic history and you can’t help but hear the music that goes along with them: the ominous, lurking theme from Jaws, the shrieking violin in Psycho, the pulse-pounding excitement of the James Bond theme.

Let’s Go to the Movies will examine the role of music in movies, drawing mainly upon American movies of the past 75 years. You’ll look at how music is used to support the development of characters and story, how music creates atmosphere and more, all illustrated by a select series of visual and audio clips. A music background is not a prerequisite—the main requirement is a willingness to listen carefully and articulate what you hear. Not only will you develop critical listening and viewing skills, but it’s guaranteed to change the way you hear movies!

Let’s Go to the Movies (Music 391) runs 2:30-4:30 daily July 8-30 in MacLaurin A169.

MUS 391 is taught by Anita Bonkowski, who has a wide range of expertise in theory, history and orchestration in both jazz and classical music. Since earning her Masters in Music, she has continued to work nationally and internationally as a drummer, bassist, composer and arranger, performing in jazz and R&B bands, musical theatre and show bands. Her pieces can be heard on radio stations around the world.

But if you’re more interested in rock music, why not give either The Top 20 Albums (Music 208) or The Beatles (Music 308) a spin?

The Top 20 Albums looks at the album as an art form. Once merely a change of format in the ever-competing music industry, “the album” has evolved over time to be the medium for some of the most remarkable music of rock history. Through close listening and consideration of context, you’ll explore production, songwriting and the phenomenon of lists, comparisons and biases as well as their ramifications on the artists, musicians and composers in their careers. The criterion for what makes this particular top-20 list is the album itself as a “work of art.” That guarantees great variety and good listening.

The Top 20 Albums (Music 208) runs 2:30-4:30pm daily May 1-24 in MacLaurin A169.

It’s an understatement to say The Beatles were no ordinary rock band—they were part of a revolution of thought in a world reinventing its values. They were talented, charismatic and riding an unbelievable wave of music and social history; and while they achieved mythic proportions, they also suffered the consequences. From poverty in Liverpool to such wealth and fame: their story and their history are the subject of this course. Their music is a profound legacy that has affected every musician who has ever heard them. Together with George Martin they were innovators in the world of recording. The Beatles had a chemistry about them, an openness, and honesty, an innocence and sense of humour that conquered the world.

The Beatles (Music 308) runs 2:30-4:20 daily June 12-July 5 in MacLaurin A169.

Both Top 20 Albums and The Beatles are taught by singer/ songwriter/actor Colleen Eccleston. Colleen has enjoyed a multifaceted career as a performer ranging from various theatrical productions to fronting a six-piece rock band and touring with the Ecclestons for the past 14 years playing traditional and original music. She has also toured extensively as a solo performer. She has been a songwriting mentor for the BC Festival of the Arts, a novelist, a voice instructor and a sessional instructor in the School of Music for many years. Maclean’s magazine even rated her one of the most popular profs at UVic!

Luminary Limner exhibit online

Posted on April 4, 2013 by john threlfall

Andy Warhol called him the “master of instant retrospectives.” Now anyone can view the works of Karl Spreitz as part of a new online virtual exhibition launched by UVic Art Collections.

Myfanwy Pavelic in her studio

The collection covers more than three decades and consists of over 100 reels of 16 mm film. It includes everything from a scene of Limner artist Myfanwy Pavelic talking to her friend Katherine Hepburn on the phone to the totems at Skunggwai (Anthony Island) in Haida Gwaii.

“Karl Spreitz is a compelling character—both for his larger-than-life personality and his accomplishments in film, photography and the arts,” explains Caroline Riedel of UVic Art Collections. “He was a pioneer and mentor in documentary and experimental film-making in BC as well as one of the founding members of the Limners Society, an art group that virtually defined the modern art scene here in the 1970s.”

It’s a unique project given that museums tend to digitize images of objects, not film, says Riedel, who curated the exhibit with technical support from UVic’s Fine Arts Studios for Integrated Media and some much-needed student assistance. ”This project wouldn’t have been possible without the assistance of Fine Arts graduate intern Dorothy June Fraser in History in Art, and former grad intern Kim Reinhardt, as well as co-op students Alex King and Margaret Weller,” says Riedel. The project was partially funded by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre at UBC.

Spreitz, who was born in Austria in 1927 and immigrated to Canada in 1952, did not follow a linear career trajectory. In 1944, he fled across Germany on a stolen bicycle and ended up after the war holding a 16 mm movie camera to film European track and field events while serving as an Olympic coach. In 1959, he moved to Victoria where his distinctive filmic and photography style began to flourish, as a staff photographer for Beautiful British Columbia magazine in the late 1960s and especially at the height of the “underground” film movement of the 1970s.

Macauley Point outfall pipe construction, 1968-70

The online collection offers a fascinating mix of footage, from scenes with local artists to archival images of the infamous 1896 Point Ellice Bridge disaster (which utilizes the “Ken Burns effect” of having the camera move along still photographs long before Burns was making his documentaries) and the construction of the Macauley Point sewage outfall—sure to be of interest in these times of heated sewage debates.

Happiness is . . . a good production of Charlie Brown!

Posted on March 19, 2013 by john threlfall

If you’ve got kids or grandchildren and are looking for a fun show, don’t miss Phoenix Theatre’s current production of You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown.

The Phoenix cast of You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown (photo: David Lowes)

Based on Charles M. Schulz’s popular Peanuts comic strip, this high-energy, fast-paced musical follows the strip’s format of presenting humorous snippets and funny scenes rather than offering a more formal plot. And while this 46-year-old musical has an enduring charm that will appeal to any musical fan—the show has had recent revivals on both Broadway and at Ontario’s famed Stratford Festival—it really works best for families with kids aged six to 12.

In his review for CBC Radio’s On The Island, critic David Lennam says, “This version at the university is really good, particularly in that way that long after you’ve left the theatre you’re thinking about it again . . . . When you slip it on, it feels like a favourite sweater, that pure nostalgia that you’re bathed in. And it has something to say to today’s audiences because deft social commentary is what made Schulz’s comic strips so endearing.”

Noting the production is rich in sentimentality and familiarity, with vibrant choreography by busy local veteran Jacques Lemay, Lennam says “the acting and art direction are where it really succeeds: everything pops with colour . . . like a Roger Rabbit universe. The ensemble cast play well off each other.”

Snoopy (Kevin Eade) sings to the moon (photo: David Lowes)

Under the headline “Phoenix Theatre’s Charlie Brown Sure to Please Fans,” the local Times Colonist says, “the University of Victoria’s theatre department has done a superior job with this 1967 musical.” True, reviewer Adrian Chamberlain admits he’s not a fan of musical creator Clark Gesner’s material, but he praises this production nonetheless: “The cartoon-ish set and costumes are great. Jacques Lemay’s choreography is just dandy—the dance is simple, yet sufficiently complex to engage and entertain. Fran Gebhard’s sure-handed direction is bold and brisk.”

He also points out that the “well-rehearsed student cast did well overall. And Adrian Bronson, accompanying on grand piano, was excellent.” As for favourites, Chamberlain says, “Tea Siskin, playing Lucy, emerges as the show’s standout. Her performance was theatrical without being over the top; she somehow manages to create a strong, warm character who’s simultaneously irritating and endearing.”

The Peanuts gang with Charlie Brown (Kale Penny) (photo: David Lowes)

Reviewing for CVV Magazine, Anna Kemp describes the production as “all good, no grief” and “fun right from the rousing opening number.” Noting her five-year-old son “loved it, and it was just the right length for him,” Kemp says “the performance by UVic’s Phoenix Theatre makes it easy to see why the show has enjoyed such popularity over the years.”

Kemp also enjoyed the cast overall. “Tea Siskin (Lucy) and Christie Stewart (Sally) really steal the show, both with powerful voices and strong dramatic presences,” she writes. “Kale Penny as Charlie is well-cast as the kind-hearted, somewhat gormless guy who never quite gets things right. Better still, all the actors seem to be enjoying themselves on stage, which really infuses the performance with a sense of joyfulness.”

She also credited director and Department of Theatre professor Fran Gebhard for putting together “a great creative team”—including pianist Adrian Bronson, percussionist Katelyn Clark, choreographer Jacques Lemay, musical director Jim Hill and the design team of professor Allan Stichbury (set) plus Simon Farrow (lights), Allyson Leet and Shayna Ward (costumes), noting “the cast really look like the comic strip characters, right down to their amazing stiff wigs and rolled-down socks.”

Director Fran Gebhard also spoke to the Victoria News in this interview, noting that “Charlie Brown has already stood the test of time. He doesn’t need to be changed to be relevant. Everything these kids go through—depression, anxiety, existentialism, bullying—still plague us today, and the Peanuts gang do a beautiful job of exploring how to overcome these problems on their own.” Gebhard was also interviewed in the March issue of Island Parent magazine, which is currently available around the city.

You’re A Good Man Charlie Brown runs to March 23 at UVic’s Phoenix Theatre. Click here for tickets and showtime information.

Alumni names in the news

Posted on March 18, 2013 by john threlfall

There’s been a flurry of Fine Arts alum popping up in the media of late. Here’s a quick roundup.

Who will win in the Gaston versus Thanh showdown?

It’s Gaston versus Thanh! Who will win?

Writing grad Yasuko Thanh has been named as finalist for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize in the BC Book Prizes for her debut collection —and she’s up against none other than Department of Writing chair Bill Gaston. Thanh has been tapped for her debut collection of stories, Floating Like The Dead, while Gaston is named for his latest novel, The World. Also on the shortlist for the BC Book Prize’s Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize is Writing alum and former Writing instructor Patricia Young for Night-Eater, her 11th book of poetry.

Thanh also continues to make news thanks to the revealing news about her appearance in the 2014 PEN nude author’s calendar. The latest coverage appeared in the Times Colonist, hooked to her participation in The Malahat Review‘s upcoming WordsThaw event on March 23.

Jessica Kluthe (photo: Edmonton Journal)

Three other Writing alumni in the news: grad-turned-Writing professor Joan MacLeod‘s new play The Valley was just announced in the Globe and Mail as being part of the lineup for Tarragon Theatre’s new 2013-14 season. CBC CanadaWrites Short Story Prize shortlister Eliza Robertson now has a Q&A up about the story that landed her a spot in the popular CBC writing contest; this is her third time entering, and first time as a finalist—fingers crossed for the whole “third time lucky” thing! And Jessica Kluthe continues to attract attention with her first book, Rosina, the Midwife—check out this Edmonton Journal article.

Nathan Medd

Over in Theatre, busy Phoenix alum Nathan Medd was just announced as the new Managing Director of the National Arts Centre’s English Theatre in Ottawa—a real feather in anyone’s cap. “I feel extremely honoured to be taking on this role with the National Arts Centre—the Team Canada of the performing arts!,” he says.

The move sees Medd leaves his position as managing producer of the nationally recognized Electric Company Theatre in Vancouver—whose artistic director and founding member is none other than new Department of Writing prof Kevin Kerr. Among Medd’s other achievements (theatre program coordinator with the BC Arts Council, the Canada Council’s Theatre Assessment Committee, Vancouver’s arts assessment juries, etc.) are stints with both the Belfry Theatre and Intrepid Theatre, where he helped establish downtown Victoria’s immensely popular Metro Studio.

Will Jasleen Powar make it to MuchMusic?

In other Phoenix news, current Theatre student Jasleen Powar has made it to the top 40 in MuchMusic’s VJ Search competition. (Phoenix alumna Melanie Karin had also been on the longlist, but got knocked out.) Will Powar make it to the top 20? Vote for her here and help her make the cut!

Also on the television beat, Phoenix grads Peter Carlone (half of the sketch comedy team Peter ‘n Chris) and Mack Gordon have applied to be on the first-ever Canadian edition of The Amazing Race—you can watch their hilarious audition video here. The cross-Canada version of the race-around-the-world reality show will air later this year on CTV. And Phoenix grad and Theatre SKAM co-founder Amiel Gladstone is back in Victoria directing Pacific Opera Victoria’s upcoming production of Tosca.

Amy Wood

Staying in the media spotlight, recent School of Music alum Amy Wood made it through the first three rounds of voting in CBC’s Searchlight competition for the Best New Canadian Artist, earning a spot in the top five for the Victoria region before getting bumped. While at UVic, Amy studied voice with Music prof Benjamin Butterfield, but started playing and singing at the piano at a very young age. She now describes songwriting as an “obsession,” saying, “I can’t not write and lately it hurts not to sing for others.”

Wood is currently planning the release of an EP as well as a full-length album and is in the midst of covering song requests on her YouTube-based Sunday “Request Booth”. (Interesting side-note: Wood’s Searchlight submission was actually recorded in the UVic studios and mixed by one of School of Music Audio Specialist/Recording Engineer Kirk McNally‘s student recording techs.)

Finally, three Visual Arts alumni—Stephanie Aitken, Katie Lyle and Shelley Penfold—are featured in Drama of Perception, the latest exhibit at Deluge Contemporary. Aitken currently teaches at Langara College and Emily Carr University in Vancouver, Penfold lives and paints in Vancouver, and Lyle received a fair bit of attention last year when she was named the honourable mention winner in the 14th Annual RBC Canadian Painting Competition for her oil painting, “White Night.” She earned a cheque for $15,000 and her painting was added to RBC’s 4,000-piece corporate art collection.

Drama of Perception is also curated by Visual Arts prof Sandra Meigs, and runs to April 13 at 636 Yates.

Writing grad makes CBC shortlist

Posted on March 12, 2013 by john threlfall

Department of Writing grad Eliza Robertson has been announced as one of five finalists in CBC’s 2013 Short Story Prize.

Eliza Robertson (photo: Will Johnson)

Robertson’s story ”L’Étranger” was selected from over 2,400 short stories that were submitted from across the country. Her name appeared on the longlist in the company of fellow Writing grads Yasuko Thanh, Judy LeBlanc and former Writing instructor Holly Nathan, but only Robertson made the final cut. She is also the only BC entry, with two each of the other four shorlisted English-language authors coming from Alberta and Ontario. (French entries get their own contest, which you can check out here.)

The winner will be announced on Monday, March 26, but you’ll able to read the shortlisted stories on the Canada Writes site, where one new story will be published each weekday morning alongside a short Q&A with the finalists—and you can read Eliza’s Q&A here. Once all five stories have been published, you will be able to vote for your favourite (voting begins March 15).

The winner, as selected by the CBC Short Story Prize jury, will be announced on Monday, March 26. Jury members this year include fellow UVic Writing grad and Giller Prize-winner Esi Edugyan, plus Lawrence Hill and Vincent Lam. The Grand Prize winner will receive a cash prize of $6,000 (courtesy the Canada Council for the Arts), plus a two-week writing residency at The Banff Centre and will be published in Air Canada’s enRoute magazine. The other finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts.

This is hardly the first time Robertson has made the news. After picking up The Malahat Review’s 2009 Far Horizons Award, she was shortlisted for 2010’s Journey Prize and won the 2010 PRISM International fiction contest; Robertson was also one of the student creators of the 2011 Leo Award-winning web series, Freshman’s Wharf, and received the Booker Scholarship to attend England’s University of East Anglia.

According to their website, the “CBC Literary Prizes are the most important prizes awarded to unpublished literary work in Canada. They bring visibility to authors who are beginning their writing career and help promote the careers of well-known Canadian writers.”

The legacy of Michael Williams explored in new Legacy exhibit

Posted on March 12, 2013 by john threlfall

Talking about art takes on a whole new meaning with the opening of Creating [Con] text, the latest exhibit at the Legacy Gallery.

“Biomorphic” by Jack Shadbolt (1988)

Creating [Con] text activates works of art in in UVic’s Michael Williams Bequest Collection through the oral history research of Dr. Carolyn Butler Palmer and her graduate students. Over the course of a number of years, Butler Palmer—an assistant professor in Modern and Contemporary Arts of the Pacific Northwest for the History in Art department—and her students have gathered an extensive array of interviews with people associated with the late downtown businessman and art supporter Michael Collard Williams and the artists he collected.

“Untitled; Four Figures” by Angela Grossman (1984)

Featuring paintings by Angela Grossman, Jack Shadbolt and Emily Carr—all eminent British Columbia painters whose careers span more than a century into the present day—Creating [Con] text allows the stories of artists, dealers, collectors, and viewers to infuse the works of art with more deeply understood meaning.

“Oral histories provide dynamic primary source materials that describe a history not found in textbooks,” says Butler Palmer, UVic’s Williams Legacy Chair. “These interviews give us new ways of interpreting the past and shed light for viewers on the relationships and influences that a single scholarly interpretation may not provide.”

Drawing upon recorded excerpts from the Oral History project, the exhibition commemorates the life of Michael Williams and his passion for art. It also illuminates the connections between the BC artists in the exhibition—artists who share many links despite the generation gaps between them. Finally it provides meaningful access to the stories around the art, preserving them for future generations.

Creating [Con] text runs from March 13 to June 15, 2013, at The Legacy Gallery, 630 Yates (corner of Broad and Yates). Free and open to the public Wednesday–Saturday, 10 am-4 pm.

Phoenix helps light the SPARK

Posted on March 7, 2013 by john threlfall

The Belfry Theatre’s annual SPARK Festival is back and, not surprisingly, some Phoenix Theatre staff, students and alumni are involved.

Jan Wood

First up on March 11 is Department of Theatre prof Jan Wood, who will be presenting a staged reading of her new work Sacrifices. Here’s the official description of Sacrifices: “Each person makes allowances and negotiates compromises in order to exist…but at what cost? Sacrifices examines the choices that an ordinary woman makes to balance career, family and self-fulfillment. In revealing her story, Medina exposes the tiny sacrifices that have led her to commit her ultimate sacrifice, an act universally condemned and abhorred. Part myth, part mystery, Sacrifices tells of a struggle for personal fulfillment in a world where a thin veneer can separate sanity and madness.”

Sacrifices will be read by Wood and noted director and playwright James Fagan Tait (The Life Inside) at 7pm Monday, March 11 at the Belfry—for free!

Wood also recently appeared in the Belfry’s December 2012 production of A Christmas Carol alongside husband Brian LInds—who is doing a miniplay installation at SPARK called Story With Sound: A Lucid Moment. And their daughter, Shayna Linds, is appearing in Belfry 101 Live at SPARK. Talk about a family affair!

Taddei, Ogden & Macaulay (photo: Peter Pokorny)

Meanwhile, current Phoenix students Kathryn Taddei, Monica Ogden and Charlotte Macaulay—all past Belfry 101 students—are collaborating on a new miniplay for the Belfry Leadership Training Program called Kid Psychic. All the miniplays this year are inspired by the senses, so Kid Psychic looks to the sixth sense and opens the door to another world.

Michelle Monteith

Phoenix alumni are also on deck this year, with Michelle Monteith appearing in Little One by acclaimed playwright Hannah Moskovitch (whose The Russian Play was a hit at SPARK 2010). Little One is described as “a stylish little lullaby-nightmare” and is a welcome return for Monteith, who previously wowed us with Revisited, which she co-created with 2B Theatre. Monteith is interviewed in this Times Colonist SPARK preview.

Jennifer Lines

Also appearing at SPARK this year are Theatre SKAM’s Matthew Payne (in Zopyra Theatre’s When Time Was Young), and busy Phoenix grad Jennifer Lines, who will be reading the new play by Carmine Aguirre, The Trial of Tina Modotti. The Jessie Richardson Award-winning Lines, who last appeared locally in The Real Thing at the Belfry, is a frequent face at the likes of Vancouver’s Bard on the Beach and Arts Club Theatre. Aguirre, a graduate of Vancouver’s Studio 58 who won the 2012 Canada Reads for her book Something Fierce: Memoirs of a Revolutionary Daughter, also wrote Blue Box, which was an audience favourite at 2012′s Uno Fest.

Carmen Aguirre

The Trial of Tina Modotti is a one-woman show exploring the life of the famed 1920s photographer and activist. Born in Italy in 1896 to an impoverished working class family, she moved to San Francisco in her teens, and then later lived in Mexico, Germany, the former Soviet Union, and Spain, where she ran a hospital for the Republicans during the Spanish Civil War. Renowned and remembered for her photography as much as for her activism, she died in 1942 of a heart attack in Mexico City. Aguirre’s play examines themes around art as a tool for change, the personal and artistic cost of absolute commitment to a political cause, and ultimately asks the question: what is the purpose of art in the face of human suffering?

Artsy Type

UVic's Faculty of Fine Arts: Thinking with the right side of your brain