Writing professor wins Bill Good Award
Congratulations go out to UVic Writing professor Sean Holman on winning the Bill Good Award at the 2025 Webster Awards on Nov 3! The Bill Good Award is presented to a BC individual or organization that makes a significant contribution to journalism in the province, or...
Call for grad student proposals: 2026 ONC ArtScience Fellowship Program
UVic’s Faculty of Fine Arts and Ocean Networks Canada (ONC) are now calling for graduate student applications for the paid 2026 ONC ArtScience Fellowship program. The application period closes on December 23, 2025. The ArtScience Fellowship strengthens connections...
Music welcomes new professor Sarah Belle Reid
UVic's School of Music is delighted to welcome Dr. Sarah Belle Reid as an assistant professor in technology starting January 2026. A performer-composer and pioneering artist in the field of electronic and electroacoustic music, Reid will bring her expertise in...
Meet Music’s 2025 Concerto Competition student winners
This year’s UVic Concerto Competition celebrates exceptional musicians whose talents span genres, generations, and geographies. The competition finals were held in April 2025 and we can’t wait to hear them perform their winning concertos with the UVic Symphony...
UVic double alumna Lyana Patrick practices the art of health in all she does
Writer-director Lyana Patrick. All images courtesy the National Film Board of Canada, Lantern Films & Experimental Forest FilmsThese days, UVic double alumna Lyana Patrick is a picture of success in multiple arenas. She’s a lauded professor at Simon Fraser...
Danielle Geller named Associate Dean Indigenous for Fine Arts
Danielle Geller in 2025 (photo: David Murphy)Representation matters when it comes to enacting meaningful long-term change in both UVic’s teaching and administration arenas, which is why the Faculty of Fine Arts is particularly excited to announce the appointment of...
Visual Arts MFA student earns Audain Award
Edith Skeard (centre) receiving the Audain AwardCongratulations go out to Visual Arts MFA candidate Edith Skeard on being named one of five BC graduate students to receive a $7,500 Travel Award from the Audain Foundation on Sept 26. As a complement to the prestigious...
Southam Lecturer explores journalism in polarized times
At a time when unity in the face of American threats is crucial, Canadians are increasingly divided. While Americans may be on the brink of civil war, Canadians are sorting ourselves into mutually hostile camps. The fragmentation of our media ecosystem is both cause...
Inaugural JRSP residency showcases new sculptural work
A sculptural installation by Canadian artist Siobhan Humston will be on view exclusively at UVic from October 9-14, showcasing the results of a new artist-scholar residency created in association with the Jeffrey Rubinoff Foundation and UVic’s Faculty of Fine Arts....
2025 ONC ArtScience Fellow debuts exhibit
When Parvin Hasani applied for the 2025 ArtScience Fellowship with Ocean Networks Canada — the sixth Fine Arts graduate student to hold this position — she proposed exploring the extreme ecosystems of deep-sea hydrothermal vents via her sculptural practice. Now, after...
New competition prize for music students
Let’s say it’s 1912 and you’re a young, musically inclined girl who enjoys whistling . . . but your father says it isn’t “ladylike“ to whistle: what do you do? If you’re Eleanor Gray, you embrace the song in your heart and pursue singing lessons instead. Fast-forward...
historicizing the present through art
When Sm Łoodm ‘Nüüsm (Mique’l Dangeli) was hired in 2024 as a professor of Indigenous Arts in our Art History & Visual Studies department, the Ts’msyen scholar knew it would be a good fit. “I liked the fact that it isn’t just about art history here, it’s also...
Celebratory theatre empowers acceptance
Theatre students Simran Kang (left), Isabella Derilo & Alynne Sinnema in the 2024 production of Salty Scent of Home (Photo: Dean Kalyan)It can be hard for people who never experienced immigration to understand the challenges faced by immigrants and refugees, but...
New play by Writing student explores trans joy & resilience
It's always exciting to see student work spring off the campus and into the community. Local playwright and fresh Writing alum Jasper Mallette — who just graduated in June 2025 — is now debuting Expiry Date, a brand new piece of transgender theatre, which runs at...
One-day art action supports Indigenous sovereignty
First it was taking an orchestra onto the surface of a glacier, then it was putting a glittering digital projection into the background of a Metallica video. Now, two University of Victoria art professors are using their unique creative talents to join over 100 people...
Climate professor receives $2.5 million grant to document stories globally
Fires rage, floods devastate, storms surge: every day we hear about the impacts of climate change, with ever-increasing casualty counts and infrastructure damage tipping into the billions. But all too often, climate politics and media reporting favour the voices of...
Music student releases debut album
Mixing his studies with his passions, Music & Computer Science student Maxwell Sorensen wrote, produced & just released the ambitious chamber-rock album Bad Luck Pearl — which he recorded in the School of Music’s own CReaTe Lab studio. "The recording happened...
Sean Holman wins BC journalism award
Congratulations go out to UVic Writing professor & Climate Disaster Project founder Sean Holman on being named the 2025 recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation's Bill Good Award. Presented annually by Western Canada's preeminent journalism foundation, the Bill...
UVic theatre grad headed to London for MFA
El Newell receives the Spirit of the Phoenix Award from professor Peter McGuire (photo: Sadie Kupery)With over 200 students graduating from Fine Arts on June 12, we're not able to profile everyone but Theatre student El Newell is an outstanding representative of her...
Climate Disaster Project play wins award
Congratulations go out to the Climate Disaster Project on winning Silver in the "Environmental and Climate Change" category at the Canadian Association of Journalists Awards on June 1 for Eyes of the Beast:Climate Disaster Survivor Stories, a documentary play about...
Music professor Lauren McCall keen to extend realities
Lauren McCall (photo: Shannel Resto)When it comes to attracting new talent to our faculty, national borders are no barrier. Hailing from Atlanta, Georgia, Lauren McCall is the newest professor to join our School of Music faculty. Music technology a draw An assistant...
Hidden networks spark ONC artistic residency
From the human body’s neural connections to unseen water channels sustaining life in arid landscapes, the mysterious nature of invisible systems has always fascinated artist Parvin Hasani. “Hidden networks have always sparked my imagination and fueled my exploration...
Inaugural JRSP Artist-Scholar Residency announced
In partnership with the Jeffrey Rubinoff Sculpture Park (JRSP), Fine Arts is pleased to announce that Canadian artist Siobhan Humston has been selected as the inaugural recipient of the UVic/JRSP Artist-Scholar Residency for 2025-2026. During her time at the Rubinoff...
Instructor & Lehan Lecturer wins $25K award
Congratulations go out to Theatre instructor and 2025 Lehan Family Activism & the Arts Lecturer d’bi.young anitafrika, who has been awarded a $25,000 Johanna Metcalf Performing Arts Prize. An internationally acclaimed Black-queer-feminist non-binary dub poet,...
Writing grad Kyeren Regehr is Victoria’s newest Poet Laureate
Once again, the City of Victoria's Poet Laureate position has gone to a Department of Writing alumni. Writing grad Kyeren Regehr was recently appointed as the City of Victoria's latest Poet Laureate. Regehr (MFA ’13, BFA ’11 + a Fine Arts Victoria Medal recipient) is...
Across Lands & Waters CERC gathering
The Qiaqsutuq installation will be on view at Across Lands and WatersVictoria may not immediately come to mind as the obvious location for an international gathering of 60 circumpolar and Pacific artists and curators, but that’s one of the advantages that comes with...
New Phoenix season announced
While the 2024/25 academic season is coming to a close, it's the ideal time to pick up a subscription to the 2025/26 mainstage season at UVic's Phoenix Theatre. This year, we saw a remarkable season highlighted by productions of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling...
Annual Visual Arts BFA exhibit opens April 11
Once a year — and for one week only — UVic's entire Visual Arts building gets transformed into Vancouver Island’s largest pop-up gallery of emerging artists! Don’t miss your chance to see If Traces Remain, an exciting exhibit of contemporary art by 35 graduating...
Distinguished Alumni Awards: Tania Willard
We congratulate 2025 Presidents’ Alumni Award recipient Tania Willard, a mixed Secwépemc and settler artist whose research intersects with land-based art practices. A graduate of the Department of Visual Arts (BFA, 1998), the work of Kamloops-born Willard activates...
Sean Holman presents at My Climate Story summit
When 20 of the best climate storytellers from around the world present their ideas at the international My Climate Story project on April 10, UVic will be in the room as well: Writing professor Sean Holman was selected out of nearly 100 submissions to share a...
Distinguished Alumni Award winner: Chari Arespacochaga
Chari Arespacochaga is an acclaimed theatre director and educator at the College of Fine Arts at Florida State University (FSU) where she is the Director of the MFA Directing Program. Her theatrical direction credits include Rent, Kinky Boots (Short North Stage), The...
Submission call for $1K Student Impact Awards!
Are you a current or graduating Fine Arts student who’s been involved with some community-engaged creative activity between January 1 2024 & May 31 2025? If so, you could qualify for $1,000 via our annual juried, donor-funded Community Impact Awards. Since 2021,...