Win $1,000 in the Community Impact Award!

by | Mar 10, 2026 | Art History & Visual Studies, donor, School of Music, Theatre, Undergraduate, Visual Arts, Writing

Who wants to win $1,000? You do, of course!! Since 2021, we’ve given out over $15,000 to 13 students in our annual donor-funded Fine Arts Community Impact Award! If you’re a UVic Fine Arts undergrad (any year) who has been creatively active outside of your classes, then you qualify to enter the 2026 Fine Arts Community Impact Award.

This sixth annual, entry-level, juried award is designed to reward Fine Arts students who have demonstrated outstanding creative activity with Victoria’s larger creative community. The award is open to any full-time current or graduating undergraduate student registered in Art History & Visual Studies, Music, Theatre, Visual Arts or Writing. (Sorry, Fine Arts must be your declared major, not just an elective you’re taking.)

Entry deadline: A completed submission package — including the submission form and all supporting materials — must be received by 5pm Thursday, April 30.

Enter here: https://finearts.uvic.ca/forms/award/

What qualifies?

  • Any kind of art exhibit or curation project
  • Public readings or literary projects
  • Plays or performances
  • Concerts or recitals
  • Educational, digital or administrative work
  • Fundraisers or drag shows
  • Etc etc etc (we’re all about the etc!)

It doesn’t matter if you were paid or volunteered, organized or participated, are a continuing or graduating student — if you did something creative in Greater Victoria (between Sidney and Sooke) between Jan 2025 & April 2026 and it wasn’t for course credit, then you qualify!

Helpful hints

Our first helpful hint is simple: enter! We usually get less than 15 entries for this award, and give out two $1,000 prizes, so your odds are very good! Other suggestions:

  • if you’ve applied before but didn’t win, you can apply again (as long as your project falls into the current timeframe)
  • you can nominate yourself or be nominated by an organization or other person
  • speak to the awards criteria in your application
  • capture the immediate & overall impact of your project (remember, the jurors don’t know you or what you did, so make sure it’s clear)
  • include reference letters that speak about your involvement (rather than the overall organization or event)
  • help the jury get to know you as a student: what you’re studying, how this project fits into your creative practice or academic journey
  • include some photos of your nominated activity
  • if you received a grade for your activity, it probably doesn’t qualify for this award
  • read about our previous winners: 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021.

Previous winners

Previous students have won for a wide variety of projects, including:

  • directing plays for Sooke Youth Theatre
  • working with the Early Music Society of the Islands
  • creating & painting a large-scale mural for the Island Medical Program
  • producing shows with Timetheft Theatre Society
  • mounting art exhibits at Xchanges Gallery & the fifty-fifty arts collective
  • coordinating youth workshops for Music Discoveries
  • setting up a livestream system for Christ Church Cathedral
  • creating The Vault Gallery at the Rockslide Studios
  • organizing an art show for the ArtSea Community Arts Council
  • working with the Victoria Children’s Choir
  • performing with Pacific Opera’s “Pop-Up Opera” initiative
  • volunteering with VOS Musical Theatre Society
  • interning with Open Space Artist-Run Centre

The fine print

Entry deadline: A completed submission package — including the submission form and all supporting materials — must be received by 5pm Thursday, April 30.

Enter here: https://finearts.uvic.ca/forms/award/

What you’ll need:

  1. A description of your community-engaged creative activity (maximum 500 words), including a title page with your contact information & declared program as of April 30 (ie: Writing, Visual Arts, etc)
  2. A letter from the organization or individual explaining how you were involved (maximum 300 words)
  3. Two letters of endorsement of the project (maximum two pages and from different people than #2: letters must be written by people who are not related to the nominee)
  4. Your resume, CV or short portfolio.

Questions? Email johnt@uvic.ca

About the award

Fine Arts has been the city’s artistic incubator for well over 50 years, helping to produce creative and scholarly talents across the cultural spectrum. Our campus community continues to contribute to the arts locally, nationally and internationally — with many of our students, alumni and teaching faculty now working in forms and mediums undreamt of when we were established in 1969. Thanks to the generosity of our donors, our Community Impact Awards put the spotlight on current students who are reaching beyond their full-time studies.

Read about our previous winners here: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021.

The awards will be presented as part of the ProArt Alliance’s annual Greater Victoria Regional Arts Awards gala in fall 2026. Winners are expected to attend and receive their awards in person from the Dean of Fine Arts.

2025 Impact Award winners Sophie Hillstrom (left) and Sage Easton-Levy (right) with Fine Arts Dean Allana Lindgren

Visiting professor Mike Ananny reckons with Generative AI

by | Feb 25, 2026 | Art History & Visual Studies, Events, Orion Series in Fine Arts, Research, School of Music, Theatre, Undergraduate, Visual Arts, Writing

Faster than many predicted (or wanted), Generative Artificial Intelligence is upon us. It brings a mix of emotions, a shared sense of uncertainty and a persistent question of what we can and should do — individually and collectively — about technological change that feels powerful, inevitable and beyond our control. Visiting guest professor Mike Ananny will offer ways to define and reckon with Generative AI that might help navigate controversies, intervene with integrity at different scales, and debate the perils and promises of “good enough” technologies.
Presented by the Orion Series in Fine Arts, during his six weeks on campus Ananny will speak to students in various classes as well as host a pair of small, focused workshops on March 11 & 25 and a March 26 public talk, the latter of which is being presented in partnership with UVic’s Kula: Library Futures Academy. 
 
 
 
 
 

About Mike Ananny

Mike Ananny is an Associate Professor of Communication and Journalism (and, by courtesy, Cinematic Arts) at the University of Southern California (USC). He studies how people build digital infrastructures, algorithmic systems and artificial intelligence that create public life — and he tries to intervene to make cultures of production, regulatory initiatives and system designs better serve public interests.

At USC he co-directs the interdisciplinary collective Media as SocioTechnical Systems (MASTS) and the AI for Media & Storytelling (AIMS) initiative of the Center on Generative AI and Society, and is an Affiliated Faculty of Science, Technology, and Public Life.

He is the author of Networked Press Freedom (MIT Press), co-editor (with Laura Forlano and Molly Wright Steenson) of Bauhaus Futures (MIT Press), and publishes in various interdisciplinary academic communities including Journalism Studies, Science and Technology Studies, and Critical Internet Studies. He was a postdoctoral scholar at Microsoft Research, holds a PhD from Stanford University (Communication) and a Masters from the MIT Media Laboratory (Media Arts & Sciences), and has been a Visiting Professor at the University of Helsinki, a Berggruen Foundation Fellow at Stanford’s Center for Advanced Studies in the Behavioral Sciences, and an expert advisor to the Minister of Canadian Heritage on the future of CBC/Radio-Canada. He has written for popular press outlets including The Atlantic, WIRED, Harvard’s Nieman Lab, the Columbia Journalism Review, and the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
 
Read Mike’s recent Globe and Mail story about the Stephen Colbert censoring by the US government, and how that impacts Canadian viewing — and values — as well.
 

About the workshops

Workshop 1: “Journalism & Generative AI: Exploring histories, power & synthetic futures of news language”
2:30-4:30pm Wed, March 11 • Fine Arts room 108 • Free
 
In this small workshop, students will explore a domain (journalism) and see how GenAI works (or doesn’t work) for that domain. Open to all, but may be of most interest to people studying and practising journalism or writing longform nonfiction.
 
Workshop 2: “Crafting your Own Perspective on Generative AI: Drafting first-person statements of synthetic media principles & practices”
2:30-4:30pm Wed, March 25 • Fine Arts room 108 • Free
 
In this small workshop, students will learn how to create first-person statements of practice by understanding, using/refusing Generative AI in your practice, and how to describe yourself and your work in relation to synthetic media. Open to all, but it may be of most interest to creative practitioners and artists of all backgrounds, methods and media (not only writers).
 

About the public talk 

“Reckoning with Generative Artificial Intelligence”

5 – 6pm Thursday, March 26 in the Phillip T. Young Recital Hall, School of Music (MacLaurin A-wing) 

Free & open to all • Find out more here

T’uy’t’tanat Cease Wyss speaks at Activism & the Arts lecture series

by | Feb 13, 2026 | donor, Events, indigenous, Research, School of Music, Visual Arts

Save the date for our annual donor-funded Lehan Family Activism & the Arts Lecture Series: this year, we present ethnobotanist, artist and community-based educator T’uy’t’tanat- Cease Wyss speaking on the topic of “Diaspora of Ancient Technologies and the Future Herstory of IndigiFuturisms”.

Technology has been part of humanity since the earth was formed, yet many people have lost their connectivity to “temexw” or “earth” and have attempted to find their way through digital technologies. But the connections have always been there on both ends of the technological spectrum: how we play and create today reflects this, and how we interact is our connection to the beginning.

All are welcome to join us for this free public talk in UVic’s gorgeous new Indigenous Law Wing: 5pm Wednesday Feb 25, in room B142 of the Fraser Building.

T’uy’t’tanat-Cease Wyss (Sḵwx̱wú7mesh/Sto:Lo/Hawaiian/Swiss) is an Indigenous matriarch and interdisciplinary artist who works with digital media, writing, performance and land-based remediations in her multi-disciplinary arts practice. A community-engaged public artist, Indigi-Futurisms developer and ethnobotanist/permaculture designer, for more than 30 years her works have focussed on sustainability, permaculture techniques and Coast Salish cultural elements, including themes of ethnobotany, Indigenous language revival, Salish weaving and digital media technology. She currently holds the MST Fieldhouse artistic residency in Vancouver’s Stanley Park.

Wyss is currently working on bridging the healing sounds of plants and fungi with Indigenous languages, and creating conversations between them all using biosonification with modular synthesizers. During her time on campus, she will also be visiting various classes and engaging with our students.

Wyss and her IM4 Media Lab — which cultivates Indigenous innovation at the intersection of tradition and technology — will also be holding a ReciprociTea & VR Workshop from 1-4pm Tuesday, Feb 24, in UVic’s Taqsiqtuut Indigenous Research-Creation Lab in the Visual Arts building. Come experience her storytelling told through a ceremony of tea and seen through an oculus lens.

Previous guests in our Activism & the Arts series include Charles Campbell, Gord Hill and d’bi.young anitafrika, and you can watch their public talks here.

Black History Month in Fine Arts

by | Feb 10, 2026 | Faculty, Graduate, School of Music, Undergraduate, Writing

From left: Shane Book, Junie Desil, Wayde Compton

February is Black History Month. It provides an important opportunity to explore and celebrate the historical and current contributions of Black people in Canada. At UVic, we recognize the many achievements of Black faculty, staff and students.

We also acknowledge ongoing work is needed to support racial equity, diversity and inclusion. In December 2021, UVic signed the Scarborough Charter on Anti-Black Racism and Black Inclusion in Canadian Higher Education. Work is underway to meet commitments outlined in the Scarborough Charter through community engagement, the collaborative efforts of the Scarborough Charter Steering Committee and committeed actions through the Equity Action Plan. There are also many individuals and groups across campus working toward these goals. Learn about Black inclusion and flourishing at UVic.

Among the many UVic events celebrating Black History Month in February, a number feature members of the Fine Arts community, including both students and professors:

Before the Rain Falls immersive exhibition
Feb 4 & 5 in the SUB Upper Lounge.

Experience art, reflect and engage in discussions of migration, heritage, identity, memory and home via pieces of art by five Visual Arts students, as organized and curate by Theatre student Divine Mercy Ezeaku as part of the Phoenix mainstage production A Sudden Violent Burst of Rain (running Feb 12-21).

 

My Black History is Poetry, is Jazz
7:30pm Tues, Feb. 10 at the School of Music’s Phillip T. Young Recital Hall

Sonnet L’Abbé will offer an experience more musical than a poetry reading, more literary than a jazz vocal performance, sharing some of the Afro-diasporic music and poetry that helped shape them into the artist they are today. Nick Peck will play jazz piano. Presented by The Malahat Review, with the departments of English, History, and Writing.

 

Celebration of Black Authors
1:30-2:30pm Wed, Feb. 25 in Fine Arts room 103

The UVic Writing department is hosting a reading and discussion from a favourite Black author, open to faculty, staff and students to participate or simply attend as audience.

 

Between Weight and Witness
7-9pm Wed, Feb. 25 online via Zoom

Acclaimed poet and Writing professor Shane Book (All Black Everything) together in conversation with current Writing graduate student Junie Désil (Allostatic Load): two powerful voices in contemporary Black Canadian literature reflecting on on their writing practices, the intersections of art and activism, and what it means to tell Black stories in the current moment.

 

 

BC Black History Awareness Society Keynote
7-9pm Fri, Feb 27 at the Baumann Centre, 925 Balmoral

Join Writing professor Wayde Compton in conversation with current Writing graduate student Junie Désil at this free public event, also featuring a musical performance by Caleb Hart. Compton co-founded Vancouver’s Black-led Hogan’s Alley Society and also Commodore Books, Western Canada’s first Black Canadian literary press, while Désil is an award-winning poet and author.

Small data Gen-AI workshop

by | Feb 6, 2026 | Art History & Visual Studies, Graduate, Research, School of Music, Theatre, Undergraduate, Visual Arts, Writing

Training the Muse: A workshop on small data Gen-AI for artistic practices

Generative AI tools have become increasingly visible in artistic practice, however, most artists encounter AI through large-scale corporate platforms trained on massive, opaque datasets. These systems often obscure authorship, flatten aesthetic diversity and embed cultural biases. This workshop offers an alternative approach: a small-data, artist-centred methodology that emphasizes control, transparency, and cultural specificity. Participants will work with their own datasets, gaining creative autonomy while learning ethical and technically accessible AI workflows grounded in personal and situated artistic practice.

Join us February 28-March 1 for a no-cost, two-day workshop on the Autolume software, a visual AI system from SFU’s Metacreation Lab. Led by lab director Philippe Pasquier, participants will craft personal datasets, sculpt custom GANs and explore real‑time generative play, gaining creative control impossible with corporate, large‑scale platforms. Past editions include Toronto, Montréal, Berlin, and online.

Register here to join this growing movement of artists redefining authorship, cultural specificity and artistic agency in AI. Bring your images, your vision and your curiosity! Maximum registration for this workshop is 32. Watch this November 2025 UVic talk with Philippe Pasquier.

This workshop is made possible through the generous support of UVic’s Office of the Vice President Research & Innovation, Kula: Library Futures Academy and the Canada Research Chair in Emergent Digital Art Practices with the Faculty of Fine Arts.

Join us for student wellness day Feb 9

by | Feb 5, 2026 | Art History & Visual Studies, Events, indigenous, School of Music, Theatre, Undergraduate, Visual Arts, Writing

Feeling stressed or overwhelmed? Need a break between classes? Don’t miss Fine Arts Student Wellness Day, running 8:30am-4:30pm Mon, Feb 9. Everything’s free! Activities and events will be happening around the Fine Arts complex, so drop in for whatever best works for your schedule.

Here’s a quick breakdown of what’s going on:

Drop-in activities (all day)

  • Wellness Info Fair (Fine Arts lobby)
  • Adult colouring pages (Fine Arts 108)
  • Comedy on loop (Fine Arts 106)
  • DIY puzzles (Fine Arts 115)

Timed activities (various locations)

  • Morning bird walk: 8:30 – 9:30am (Finnerty Gardens)
  • Dog café/pet therapy: 11:15am – 12:30pm (Fine 
Arts 104) with Pacific Animal Therapy Society
  • Nature journaling: 12:30 – 1:30pm (Finnerty Gardens, meet at Multifaith Centre) with Angela Wood
  • Somatic Sanctuary: 1:00 – 1:20pm (Fine Arts 108) 
Qi Gong movement with Catherine Harding
  • Dance/movement session: 1:00 -3pm (Theatre 136) 
with DJ Codex (Christine Walde, Fine Arts Librarian)
  • Art meditation: 1:30 – 4:30pm (Visual Arts 146)
  • Yoga For Meditation: 3:30 – 4:20pm (Multifaith Centre)

Wellness Info Fair (Fine Arts lobby)

  • Healthy snacks table
  • DIY gratitude messages
  • Wellness messages & reminders
  • Office of Student Life info & campus resources