Art Swap event at the VA building - Esther Morand/The Concordian
By proposing events such as Art Swaps, the CSU proposes to serve as a ground for the exchange of supplies among students and the general Concordia community
On Sept. 29, the Art Swap series held its first event in the courtyard of the VA building at Concordia’s downtown campus.
“We figured that having this event in the courtyard would create the sort of traffic that this event would like to cater to,” said Sean Levis, sustainability coordinator for the CSU and co-organizer of this event.
Thanks to a collaboration with Zero Waste Concordia, Art Hives, the Fine Arts Student Alliance (FASA), and Concordia University’s Centre for Creative Reuse (CUCCR), the CSU was able to make this event possible.
Art Hives staff and volunteers preparing their stand – Esther Morand/The Concordian
The CSU decided to organize a four-part swap series building off of the Queer and Kids Clothing Swaps that happen every year during the anti-consumerism week.
The Art Swap is a space “where students are encouraged to either take the art materials that are viable to them or leave any art materials that they don’t use,” Levy noted.
These events raise awareness around the idea of exchanging, rather than spending.
“The purpose of this event is to get students on campus, exchange different materials and promote a culture of sustainability, discouraging the commercialization of specific products, encouraging gifting and trading,” Levis said.
“The whole point is to avoid buying new things and encourage this cycle of reusing and recycling and overall bring more sustainability on campus,” added Julianna Smith, external affairs and mobilization coordinator for the CSU.
“There’s been this culture of individualism with the pandemic. This is a community effort to get people to connect, have fun, and promote sustainability on campus,” noted Smith. “On top of that, a lot of these events are trying to involve students to allow them to share common ideas and feel like they belong to a space.”
People painting and crafting at the Art Hives table – Esther Morand/The Concordian
Other spaces like the Art Nook offer students the possibility to make art and use available materials.
“It’s always open, it’s a free space, where people leave and take supplies, it is an ongoing art supply swapping space,” added Smith.
The Art Nook is located just behind the CSU offices on the 7th floor of the Hall Building.
Three other swaps will occur throughout the year. At the beginning of November, there will be a book swap that will feature events such as “dates with books,” where book covers will be covered in brown paper with only short descriptions to accompany them for people to pick up.
“It’s the idea of not judging a book by its cover,” Levis said. “It’s the idea of the de-commercialization of certain products.”
There will also be a seed swap in April with the Greenhouse, where planting workshops will occur.
Lastly, there will be a Black hair-care products swap in February. The workshops will be for people to be able to make their own hair-care products.
“We are creating specific themes for these events. It’s an effort to reinvigorate student life at the same time,” Levy added.
INSIDE THE 2022 MONTREAL INTERNATIONAL BLACK FILM FESTIVAL, CATHERINE REYNOLDS/THE CONCORDIAN
Racism in the Great White North just isn’t worth denouncing for those who chose the opening movie of this year’s Festival
The opening of the Montreal International Black Film Festival with the screening of Lovely Jackson on Sept. 20 was nothing less than a pure expression of devious Canadian whiteness.
Yes, there is such a thing.
A lot of Canadian identity is predicated on not being American. So when it comes to racism, the white Canadian rhetoric is that it’s simply “not as bad as it is in the States.”
The result is a local form of whiteness that pushes Euro-Canadians to decry racial violence in the United States but harshly deny its existence in their own country, so as to preserve the myth of white innocence, of non-American superiority. I don’t know any Black person in Canada who hasn’t been humiliated by these seemingly contradictory reactions that actually go hand in hand.
Yes, we are familiar with Canadian whiteness.
I expected more from the Montreal Black Film Festival because it established multiple events and opportunities around the theme of Being Black in Canada. I thus decided to give Lovely Jackson a chance despite the fact that it’s produced by a white male — first red flag — , and was suspiciously acclaimed by a white Québécois executive of the Festival (who declared in his speech that it was “just so beautiful”) — second red flag.
The movie tells the story of Rickey Jones, an African American man who spent 39 years on death row in Cleveland, Ohio for the murder of a white man that he did not commit. Two white police officers wrongfully convicted him at age 18 by forcing a 12-year-old Black boy — the case’s sole eyewitness — to write a false statement “proving” his guilt.
He was released in 2014 at age 57, years after the Ohio Innocence Project started investigating his case.
As my heart juggled between rage, sadness and admiration for Jackson who boldly shared his incredible journey towards healing and happiness, I grew more and more disgusted at producer Matt Waldeck who carefully washed away the blood off the white criminals’ hands.
In fact, the Festival’s choice of this movie is far more than just disrespectful in the Canadian context as another strategic focus on U.S. racism that overshadows local tyranny. It’s also full of white saviourism.
That is very clear: all white characters are angels. More blame is put on the poor child who bore the traumatic burden of the officers’ illegal manipulation and coercion for decades than on the policemen responsible for Jackson’s misery.
The movie includes detailed follow-ups on the life and testimonies of the former, but the latter are completely erased from the story, despite Jackson implying the full extent of their guilt in one brief clip.
This point-of-view remains unexplored. However, the white prosecutor who was the director of the Ohio Innocence Project gets heroic attention — never mind the fact that he admitted to believing all prisoners were evil until the project’s creator went on sabbatical leave, forcing him into the job.
The movie does not name “racism” or the prison-industrial complex, let alone the roots of the colonial capitalist system that rips families apart and instills planned suffering into Black people’s existence.
I went from being frustrated to holding back tears at the cruelty of this world, exhausted by Waldeck’s distortion of reality that was further empowered by the Canadian whiteness of the Festival.
A scene from FOR LOVE - Image courtesy of Touchwood PR
Mary Teegee’s film explores a breaking of the imposed colonial linearity
Mary Teegee’s breathtaking documentary For Love delves into the issues that Indigenous folks across Canada/Turtle Island deal with, through the constant erasure of their culture, language, and ways of knowing.
The documentary was released on Netflix on Sept. 21.
The film’s introduction announces a harrowing tale. Somber music sustains the presenters’ voices while installing a sentiment of discomfort among viewers.
The only people who have a voice in the introductory scenes are white politicians, while the Indigenous children filmed in later scenes are voiceless.
The clips are soon replaced by numbers and statistics, hoping to give a factual understanding of different issues within Indigenous communities.
Though this film’s purpose is to expose truths about Indigenous healing and resurgence, the opening scenes support a colonial mindset.
They discuss themes such as child overrepresentation in the health system, deep poverty, and rates of suicide, rather than concentrating on representing Indigenous ways of knowing.
While English dominates the first 20 minutes, it is refreshing to finally hear some Micmac.
The trailer to this film paints a picture of different cultural practices, such as throat singing or language revitalization programs, yet the beginning of the documentary frames a colonial perspective in the imagery that then follows.
Images of throat singing, for instance, would have been more powerful as stand-alone pictures, not as objects of what could have been if the colonial agenda had not produced such high erasure.
“The numbers speak for themselves,” says narrator Shania Twain. These words only serve to further silence the broader political settler context regarding high mortality rates, poverty, and suicide within Indigenous communities across Canada/Turtle Island.
Twain offers a historical context to the colonial project on “the Indian problem.” A series of interviews are intertwined with stunning imagery of Kahnawake, Whitefish Lake, Attawapiskat, Nisichawayasihk, and Puyallup, which demonstrate the beauty of nature and our need to conserve it.
The images would often need trigger warnings, as academic parallels and uncontextualized sufferings are spoken about as if they were facts. Maps are shown with colonial names, such as Alberta or Quebec. Even on reserves, only the British names appear.
Twain discusses an idiom that has entered the English language: 60 scoop, meaning “the practice of taking of Indigenous children from their families,” emphasizing the deeply-ingrained colonial roots present in the settlers’ language.
The first 20 minutes of the film are misleading; they paint just another colonial picture, yet when the voices of the interviewees become centered and when the screen only leaves space for breathtaking imagery and Indigenous voices, the film starts to become unique and truly representative.
It is only after this dehumanizing introduction that the documentary paints a vivid picture of Indigenous peoples. The sounds of canoes on water, wood chopping, and resistance music by Mathieu Carratier announce a documentary distancing itself from colonial understandings.
Themes of solidarity, cultural appreciation, healing, and medical knowledge are reflected in interviews, while clips of politicians offer a humorous twist. Though given attention at the beginning of the film, during the rest of it these clips serve to satirize white voices describing an “issue”settlers have produced themselves.
There is a focus on sounds, which brings the film away from its grim context. Paddles on water, children’s laughter, and plates clinking at meals metaphorically demonstrate the resilience of Indigenous peoples.
A mundane scene at the supermarket shines a light on the humanity of different Indigenous peoples. It strives to universalize experiences on the ground of basic needs, such as food.
The film ends on a resistant note and shows the importance of conserving languages, and culture and centering the voices of the children in the process of resurgence.
The City of Laval's public art project, Zoom Art, in Montmorency metro station. ESTHER MORAND/The Concordian
Zoom Art is a project that recommends people to look up from their mundane routines to discover public artwork
Curator Geneviève Goyer-Ouimette’s Zoom Art Project, presented by Ville de Laval Art Collection, is on display for its third edition until Oct. 16. The theme of this year’s edition is “être ensemble” which loosely translates to “being together.
The artworks will be accessible until Oct. 16.
The artworks are presented on astral panels, bus shelters, posters in the Montmorency metro terminus, as well as in light boxes on metro platforms. These works replace advertising, displaying artwork instead of ads.
“The idea at the beginning was to allow a break from advertising and to have a kind of artistic oasis in the spaces where there usually is something to sell.”
Here, nothing is sold. People are invited “to reflect on their state, to have time for themselves, to be addressed as human beings, not as consumers,” notes Goyer-Ouimette.
The project was born three years ago, in the midst of the pandemic. Goyer-Ouimette explains that “museums were closed, people had limited access to culture.”
The first edition, curated by Anne-Sophie Michel and Anick Thibault, was organized in less than two months, with a selection of artists whose works were posted in bus shelters and on astral boards.
Previously, the project served to help emerging artists, but for the second and third editions, pieces were chosen around a specific theme.
It was important for the curator to find an accessible theme that spoke to a large audience, where people could make links and think about the artworks without having necessarily studied fine arts. She wanted to find a theme around the term “to gather” without explaining it further.
“With the theme ‘être ensemble,’ contrary to the notion of ‘vivre ensemble’ there is no intent given, it is more of an observation,” Goyer-Ouimette notes.
“Being together can reach the intimacy of conflicts between people, that it be in love relationships, power relationships, indoctrination, or even very positive ones, such as relationships with a family, or being bored of being together.” The theme is thus reflected in the chosen pieces.
There are reproductions of artworks put into photography; sometimes they are digitized because they come from real photographs that have been enlarged.
What is particular about Zoom Art is that “you can discover it by walking around randomly, but you can also discover it by day or by night. The works are very different depending on the time of day,” Goyer-Ouimette said.
She notes that the project resembles a catalog, but that the result is a display in a public space.
“One of the crucial steps in producing a catalog is to ensure the quality of the images. We often had to rework the size of the images.”
In choosing what artworks to represent, Goyer-Ouimette wanted “all the works [to] have a very strong visual appeal. In the bus shelters they contain details that will allow people to reflect,” because they have more time to wait for a bus, whereas in the metro it has to be effective more quickly, so that the piece can convey itself effectively.
“Often people think that the worst that can happen is that people don’t like art, but the worst is when people don’t see it, don’t identify it as art, simply ignore it.”
The curator did not want to have to explain what artwork belonged to which artist, so
the graphic designer selected a color inside each work to write the name of the artist.
“What this does is that we will associate the image with the name without it having to be explained,” Goyer-Ouimette notes.
Two of the 17 artists, Jim Holyoak and Matt Shane, work in synchronicity. Their work through the project is present on a bus shelter.
“One draws, and the other adds to it, they are truly working together,” notes Goyer-Ouimette. “It’s a visual folly, the more you look at their work, the more you notice details. The drawing of one leads to the intervention of the other.”
On the other hand, Rafael Sottolichio’s work — displayed on a highway poster — deals with the theme of family coming out of the pandemic and external family reunions. Such works are a reminder of what we have just experienced throughout the pandemic .
The artworks intersect with the theme of togetherness through different meanings and mediums.
Finding alternative means of fundings in the cinema industry crucial more than ever before
As new cohorts of young creatives, freshly graduated from CEGEPs and universities are developing their own audiovisual works, the world of independent cinema is undergoing a revolution, both creatively and technologically.
New faces are entering the business with the modernized technologies and social networks that have revolutionized the distribution and communication around films and series. One of the challenges that awaits these young people in the film industry, however, is the question of funding.
When Catherine Quesnel read the script for what was supposed to be a short film sent to her by her friend and classmate Eléonore Delvaux-Beaudoin, she decided to co-direct it with her in the form of a mini web series. One of the obstacles she quickly discovered was the issue of production.
While the inspiration to write and create was not lacking for these two CEGEP students, the question quickly arose as to how they would finance their project.
The duo asked for help from their classmates Lu Sergei Denaud and Léa Desjardins, who became producers on the project. Soon, they were joined by other fellow students to create a production team for the web series Léo au féminin.
They explained that the first thing that was on their mind when starting was to clearly define how they were going to merge the artistic side with the production side.
“It was always about constantly defining, ‘How many people do we need? What are all the steps? This takes money, how do we find it?’ ” explained Desjardins. “There is no set rule to follow, you have to constantly be looking, searching for the information.”
The team already had some technical notions of organization and production that they had learned in school during their film classes.
“We tried to give ourselves a good structure, an organization as soon as we started the pre-production and then we had to ask ourselves the question of how to find funding in Quebec,” said Denaud.
The team first looked at funding opportunities throughout Quebec’s state-funded organizations for the development of arts and culture, such as the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec and the Société de développement des entreprises culturelles (SODEC).
“At the beginning we thought we would go for subsidies, but it was not easy,” said Desjardins. SODEC does offer a funding program for people starting out in the industry.
However, it proved to be too complicated for the young team to apply for financial aid: “It’s very complicated: you must fill out a lot of documents, you must know which team you have, and you must have UDA members for the actors,” explained Desjardins.
L’Union des artistes (UDA) is a professional union tasked with representing artists who speak French, or any language other than English within Canada.
However, the team had decided to hire people from their network of young actors and directors to work on the series. None of them had a foot in the door yet and were by no means already unionized. The team’s inexperience was therefore the defining factor that did not make them eligible for the grant.
The production team decided to register the series as an “amateur” not-for-profit production and not a “professional” one, which wouldn’t allow them to ask for subsidies but would give them more freedom.
“We decided to be amateur officially, but as professional as possible in practice. We wanted to give it all anyway,” said Desjardins. Denaud also added that this gave them more freedom on shooting, and release dates.
This freedom, they discovered, was also obtained from the rejections they had received from numerous production companies. This allowed them to stay independent and make the series the way they wanted, without any obligations from a company.
Nonetheless, from these rejections came the precious help of a producer who decided to be their mentor. They also found the help of a professional film editor who was willing to edit the series voluntarily.
Jonathan Beaulieu-Cyr, a young independent producer and director from Montreal, explained that it is complicated to find funding for a project as a fresh graduate starting out in the industry.
“Organizations such as SODEC and Telefilms give generous amounts of money, but you must be very advanced in your career,” said Beaulieu-Cyr. “I know that I am very lucky personally to be able to make a living exclusively from film, it is very rare.”
Wiebke von Carolsfeld, a film director, writer, editor, and a teacher at Concordia’s Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema agreed with Beaulieu-Cyr.
“You have to pay up before you get paid and that can drag on forever,” she said. “It does put an interesting dilemma in the beginning, for example, how are you going to get experience to get hired?”
Von Carolsfeld added that she believes that the most important thing for young creatives is mentorship and access to professionals in the field who are willing to offer their help to navigate the complicated industry.
This is exactly what allowed the team of Léo au féminin to produce the series. Quesnel explained how creating connections worked to their advantage.
Louanne Caron/Léo au féminin
“For example, we had a friend who was going to be one of our actors who had friends who did lighting,” said Quesnel. “And those people rented a studio so connecting with them allowed us to have some kind of headquarters and people that were good with lighting and good with equipment.”
Through a call for donations on GoFundMe, the team managed to raise funds, gather a social media following in the process and develop a solid network of friends, classmates, and people in the industry that finally led to the success of their project.
The mom-and-pop second hand books and records shop finds a way to stay alive despite various adversity
In the early 90’s, Sean Madden, a young Concordia graduate, began buying books and records from local yard sales and auctions, eventually sparking his interest in selling them. As his hobbies pursued, his father — playwright Peter Madden — joined him, setting his literary passion ablaze.
“We often buy things from the community, and then it’s a nice process because it returns to the community. I always feel like I work really hard to keep Encore open because what we do here isn’t as much about selling as being a space for works of art to find other lives,” said Madden, the dedicated owner of Encore Books & Records.
Shawn Madden, owner of Encore book store Kaitlynn Rodney/The Concordian
The two would trade from all sorts of stores across town, namely S.W. Welch, The Word, and Odyssey. “Eventually we had so much stuff piled up, we were getting too good at it,” said Sean Madden.
“We stopped supplying other stores and looked for our own. It took us a year and a half to find this location. We lived in NDG, and we wanted something from NDG.” Thus, Encore Books & Records was opened in 1999 on Sherbrooke West and Harvard.
Madden was keen on finding unusual records from niche genres. “People were throwing out all kinds of things, and it’s always so fun to find somebody’s collection and learn about who they are, what they enjoy.”
Encore Books & Records has well over 100 genres of books, and over 40 genres of music on vinyl. However, running a second-hand bookstore on a busy street is no simple task.
“Our profit margins are fine, but it’s a lot of work and I think it’s difficult, because our customers are also our suppliers, and people aren’t used to selling things to us,” said Madden. However, the team is always looking for great finds, and people can make their own contributions in their own way and pick something up for themselves.
Caitlin, waiting at the cash for her next customer. Kaitlynn Rodney/ The Concordian
The owner disclosed that he was not planning on expanding the franchise, especially after how COVID-19 affected small retail businesses over the past couple of years.
“I hope Encore is here forever.”, said Caitlin Van Fossen, an Encore Books employee and a student at Concordia. “I think folks do love supporting local, and Sean likes to emphasise that we want to support the local community, unusual gems that you’ll never find elsewhere.”
Kaitlynn Rodney/ The ConcordianEncore bookstore, is a used and new book store they carry all kinds of genres, as well as records , cds and cassesttes. Kaitlynn Rodney/ The Concordian
“I guess I’m telling my story, the experiences I’ve had, the travels I’ve endured, the places I’ve been and the people I’ve met. Also hearing other stories and bringing people together.”
Sampson McFerrin is a Montreal based artist who is currently studying his third year in Print Media at Concordia University. In April, he held his first art exhibition in which he presented to the public his work, which clearly reflects his journey as an artist.
Checarré is an exhibition that reveals the trajectory of McFerrin as an artist throughout the years. He has covered over 50,000 kilometers in nearly 30 countries. He claims that this unique experience has not only influenced his art but has also shaped him into the person he is today.
“Before I was born, my parents travelled around the world for two years, and when they had me they wanted to keep that lifestyle. I was introduced to it from a really young age and it was just how it was. Now I’ve taken it as a passion of my own, it made me the person who I am.”
Being a mixed word and at the same time denoting the creativity of the artist, Checarré signals different meanings and tonalities.The first part of this word means “checking-in” since McFerrin is in his third year and has a desire to give criticism a place in his work. The second part, carré, comes from the French and literally translates to “square” since he claims that for some reason, his works continue to end up in squares, something that has worked for him. The third and last part of this word––originally suggested by his brother––also comes from the French; the expression chez moi, denoting the reason behind McFerrin’s decision to hold his exhibition in his own apartment. This makes the spectator’s experience feel much warmer and closer to the message of the works.
How unique it is to be able to encounter the mixture of one’s oldest and latest works as is the case with Checarré. McFerrin explained that he has been painting since grade four and has been more serious about it since grade ten when he started selling his work. However, for five years, he feels that in his latest work he only notices very small differences. That’s one of the reasons why he decided to switch to print media:”I was ageing for something more or just some new technical skills to learn.”
Artists have often reflected on the role failure has played into their career’s evolution. Nonetheless, it is very difficult to define the role that failure has had when this term is so subjective. Having spent much of his life painting, McFerrin has become a very open-minded person. Proof of this mindset can be observed through the response he gave to The Concordian when asked about the role of failure in his own artistic process: “I don’t think failure has ever been an option.”
Learning from mistakes, falls and success is just part of the learning process, as the artist explained “Even if I fail, it is okay. It is what you learn from that and what you have to do to make sure you pass to the next one. Failure has never been an option, make it work! If you’re biking and the bike breaks down you’ll get a tiny moment of ‘oh no!’ But then it all is about what’s next. There is always something to do. If something does not go as you wanted, make it work in the best way for you.” That is McFerrin’s message.
His flexible mentality is noticeable in his art in which he also draws the image of his passion for bicycles––Rain Pants Party is his favourite work, an acrylic-based painting. A very personal work and even an “extension of self” as he commented.
Through Checarré, he presents his most unique side, a life experience that results in a narrative of his experiences which have not only transformed him as a person but have led him to create meaningful connections with people who can see themselves represented in his work.
Through a refreshing conversation with the artist, one can not only get an insight into his career in the world of painting and printmaking, but also an admirable glimpse into a unique lifestyle that has helped him keep an open mind, a fundamental skill for life.
After observing Checarré, it is very easy to realize that, as the artist himself said, art is everywhere. This project can precisely serve as an inspiration for youth who are doubting the veracity of the path to art so that they take the leap. “Do what makes you happy, switch to what makes you happy, don’t give up on that,” McFerrin encourages. Through his work, McFerrin sees his most recent and older work living together and admits to still learning how to use print media, which he denotes through his art the importance of patience in the art world.
Nine Concordia students will be presenting their work at this 4-day event
Concordia’s Painting and Drawing Student Association (PDSA) is wrapping up the winter semester with a multidisciplinary exhibition. For this event, they decided to collaborate with Studio 7, a club from the university’s contemporary dance department. The organizers selected artists from both disciplines who will be presenting their work at Galerie 2112 from May 3 to 7.
Titled Sensitivity, the exhibition brings together work from five visual artists and four dance creators. “The goal was for two different art forms to meet in an exhibition to create a dialogue between the artworks, but also to create a dialogue between the art pieces and the theme,” said Justine Bellefeuille, events coordinator for the PDSA. For Bellefeuille and the other organizers, the theme of sensitivity came about because it related to both art forms.
The theme of sensitivity is interpreted in many different ways by the artists submitting their work. For Bellefeuille and the PDSA team, it was “about touch, about textures, everything that is related to the senses.” But the event organizer also saw a link with the current context. “I think that it is also unavoidable to mention the pandemic. It created an atmosphere in the arts field that makes everything more precarious, more sensitive.”
One of the selected artists, Elyanne Desaulniers, decided to apply to the Sensitivity exhibit because the theme really spoke to her practice. She describes herself as a multidisciplinary artist who mixes several mediums in all her creations. Desaulniers left Trois-Rivières to start a degree in Studio Arts at Concordia this year. While she currently focuses on painting, collages, drawing, ceramics and photography, poetry is often central to her work.
Desaulniers relates to the theme of sensitivity as it informs her creative process but also the way she sees her relationship with the audience. “My goal as an artist is that people who look at my work feel an emotion, a sensation, resentment, anything,” explained the artist, adding that “if someone is completely indifferent while looking at one of my artworks, I did not complete my mission.”
The artist will be presenting a diptych titled I am a wandering vessel 1 and 2. Desaulniers was inspired by her experience as a newcomer in Montreal. She created the arts piece based on poems she wrote on her way to school. The work speaks to the feeling of being a stranger in this city that is her new home. “The city is really strange for me and it’s not the place where I’m most comfortable, so I tried to reverse this by giving attention to the most interesting details instead,” said the artist.
On the performance side, Santiago Lopez will be presenting a solo performance inspired by paintings he created. A first-year theater student, Lopez centres his artistic practice on dance, film, and theatre creations. For the exhibition, the emerging choreographers perform A letter to my multiple existences, a piece based on a painting that has been recreated. Lopez first made the artwork when he was 13 and painted a new version of it last year using his latest life experiences as inspiration for the adaptation.
“This is basically a solo I made in order to create this kind of sensitive bridge as I call it between my past identity and my possible future identity,” explained Lopez. The dance solo he presents is inspired by the shapes and lines on the newest painting.
The artist also wishes to encourage the audience to take on a journey similar to his, exploring the differences between their past and present selves, and embracing the transformation we all go through in life.
For Éléonore Emond, coordinator for Studio 7 and dance curator for the exhibition, the event answers to a need for more collaborative work between Concordia’s Fine Arts departments. Studio 7 organizes performances every month at the contemporary dance department. They invite students from all arts disciplines to participate. This year particularly, the team wanted to encourage a variety of performances to be presented, therefore the event was an opportunity to fulfill their larger mission.
The PDSA is a Concordia club dedicated to all Fine Arts students who are interested in painting or drawing. The group organizes events all year long including talks with artists, workshops, and exhibitions.
Five visual arts pieces by Desaulniers, and artists Dan Yang, Maurane, Darius Yeung, and Aimée Lebeau will be showcased from May 3 to 7. At the vernissage night on May 4, all four performances will be showcased. This includes the solo performance by Lopez, and a solo improvisation by Marie-Laurence Deschênes who will be inspired live by another artwork in the space. There will also be duos by Kristina Hilliard and Bronwyn Robert, as well as Eva Myers and Xdzunúm Danae Trejo Boles. Each performance will also be presented on one other night. The PDSA published the performance schedule on its Instagram page. The Sensitivity exhibition will happen at Galerie 2112 at 2112 Atateken St.
Visuals courtesy Justine Bellefeuille and Elyanne Desaulniers
Why Do We Dream? was the fifth mini-opera put on by RISE, an intersensory performance inspired by lucid dreaming. CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian
The performance featured improvisational dancing, singing, and digital orchestrating. CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian
By Lily Cowper and Ashley Fish-Robertson
The RISE Collective’s fifth experimental mini-opera explored lucid dreams as the last frontier for the unsupervised imagination
(Editors’ Note: This article was originally published without mentioning the original creator of Why Do We Dream?, Valentina Plata, who is a second-year Electroacoustics student at Concordia. Why Do We Dream began as a final project in Plata’s independent study, later coming to fruition after collaborating with RISE, and she is officially credited as having “sparked and driven” the show. See more of Plata’s work here.)
On Thursday, March 17, a performance in collaboration with Concordia’s Music Department and the Concordia Laptop Orchestra (R) sought to explore and recreate a lucid dream state using improvised sound, lights, and movement.
The fifth performance in an ongoing series of mini-operas, Why Do We Dream? was put on by RISE, the newly-developed research cluster tied to Le PARC Milieux (part of Concordia’s Milieux Institute). RISE, which stands for Reflective Iterative Scenario Enactments, is led by Dr. Eldad Tsabary, co-founder of Le PARC as well as associate professor and coordinator of Concordia’s electroacoustics program.
Dr. Tsabary also works at the graduate level with students in Concordia’s Individualised Program (INDI), many of whom participated in the show. The applicant-led degree path allows students to combine interdisciplinary subjects to forge unique research paths, making connections between diverse genres of study. It makes sense then, that their collaborative efforts would result in performances like Why Do We Dream?, described on the Facebook event page as “intersensory” and “massively collaborative.”
All RISE performances are meant to operate in this way. Once an idea sparks interest, a research-creation team made up of Concordia professors and graduate students collaborate to combine many different mediums and techniques into one show. Each RISE performance re-envisions a different fear-based “cataclysmic” disaster through the lens of an opera, while simultaneously pushing the boundaries of what it even means to create an opera. The intention is to investigate both human consciousness surrounding various modern disasters, as well as the opera’s collaborative production experience itself.
Every mini-opera in the RISE series has been executed differently. The first two premiered digitally during the pandemic lockdowns. Mixed messages, No Pantswas highly experimental, taking form as a live-streamed computer orchestra where COVID-related memos sent out by the university were used as libretto. In contrast, Personal Pandemic was a full-scale planned film production with developed characters, scripts and composers. The third performance, Returning to the Trees was a stageless performance using experimental recordings taken deep in the forest. A fourth opera, Cyber Identity Crisis, premiered privately last month to a small group of Art History students.
Why Do We Dream? was the natural next step for RISE organisers to challenge the traditional opera format.
The recent performance focused on an AI-controlled future and cyber surveillance, exploring the lucid dream as the last frontier of unsupervised imagination. This in-person format integrated many of the previous operas’ elements, complete with music by the CLOrk orchestra, strange costumes and masks by PhD INDI candidate Oonagh Fitzgerald, and live coding by Dr. Tsabary, a type of performing art where images and sounds are dynamically projected by writing computer codes in an improvised manner.
CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian
Upon entering, it’s clear that Why Do We Dream? was meant to replicate what it might feel like to walk through someone else’s dream — or nightmare, depending on how you choose to look at it.
“It’s a dream,” Dr. Tsabary explained. “It’s supposed to be unexpected. I want whoever’s coming in to be overwhelmed by it.”
Wandering between the three rooms, actors, some masked and some not, sang and recited lines that sounded as if they’d been plucked directly from someone’s mid-sleep garble. According to Tsabary, the libretto was written using phrases pulled from actual dream journals.
Visitors who paid special attention to each room were afforded the chance to appreciate small, and at times unusual, details. In one room there were several dice, all positioned so that the number five was facing upwards. Several inquisitive visitors could be seen reflecting on these details, with some attempting to make sense of their presence.
The first room, with its profuse darkness, featured an individual sitting inside of a tent, surrounded by string lights. From inside the tent, the performer treated visitors to a simultaneously captivating and perplexing sonic experience consisting of eerie sound effects. These effects included squeaky violins being played, the distant sound of alarms, and clicking noises. A breathtaking view of Montreal’s skyline served as the backdrop, complementing the performance.
The second room was much more spacious, and featured a brilliant mix of artistic practices consisting of dancing, painting, acting, playing music, and more. Walking into this room was disorienting to say the least. There was a lot to take in. Despite the diverse display of mediums all occupying the same space, the performance in this room maintained a remarkable unity.
The final room appeared to pay tribute to the enigmatic and even spiritual nature of our dreams. One person wandered around the room handing out tarot cards, while two actors sat on the floor of the room observing their own choice of cards. It was unclear whether they were satisfied or discontent with their choices. Additionally, another person made the rounds of the room, handing visitors small white pieces of paper. Each of these papers had a message scrawled on them. For example, one of them, in delicate handwriting, read: “dancing is like painting but with your body.”
The opera’s libretto was written using phrases from dream journals. CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian
It’s impossible to not appreciate the amount of work that went into bringing this interdisciplinary event to life. Each space offered a unique opportunity for visitors to lose themselves in the unfamiliar, while perhaps reflecting on and attempting to decipher their own dreams in the process.
RISE is one of several interdisciplinary initiatives at Concordia where researchers with diverse interests can come together using their unique expertise to explore artistic mediums while investigating important issues in society. Why Do We Dream? subtly showcased the in-depth works of both undergraduate and INDI graduate students who seem to not only be interested in the RISE experiment, but in collaborating with each other.
For this reason, the subject matter for this show was particularly fitting. The convergence of so many different talents may have appeared odd or disorganized, like dreams tend to be, but that messy network of connections is likely the key to a more holistic understanding of our modern world.
“I don’t see things as messy, I see them as [..] multiplicitous,” explained Dr. Tsabary, on the collaboration process behind Why Do We Dream? and previous RISE performances. “[It is] something involving a lot of people, each one contributing their own thing, and it comes together to be something very interesting.”
The next mini-opera in the RISE series will take place on April 7, and is an “opera about personal losses due to technological failures,” as described by Dr. Tsabary. The play will explore the immortality of online presence.
Justine Beaufeuille at the ceramics studio in Concordia's VA building. CATHERINE REYNOLDS/The Concordian
The studio arts student sat down with our assistant arts editor to discuss ceramics, working with chicken flesh, and more
Multidisciplinary artist Justine Bellefeuille is in the process of obtaining her BFA in studio arts at Concordia, where she previously completed the contemporary dance major program. Her practice revolves around the themes of feminism and violence against women, ideas she explores in both of her preferred artistic mediums. Bellefeuille is currently working on the dance piece OVERLOAD, which will be presented at Tangente from April 9 to 12. The choreographer first created this piece for five dancers in December 2019, and will now present an evolved version on stage.
Comfortably seated on a wooden stool, with her elbows resting on the marble counter top of a café, Bellefeuille shared her current passions and fascinations with The Concordian.
The Concordian: How would you describe your artistic practice?
Justine Bellefeuille: I do dance, as a choreographer more than a performer. I am also a visual artist. I work a lot in painting, oil painting more specifically. And recently, I have started to work with ceramics.
TC: How did you decide to develop those two artistic practices?
JB: It was really instinctive. In CEGEP, I studied visual arts. When I completed my degree, I wanted to study dance and to dive into this other medium, but visual arts was always in the back of my mind. I really liked it; I was very passionate about it. So, it is passion that led me to mix both. I think they inform each other. I don’t necessarily use visual arts objects in my dance projects, but in the movements’ aesthetic and in the costumes I create, my visual arts background appears. On the other side, movement can be very present in my paintings, and in my sculptural pieces.
TC: Have you created projects that mix both disciplines?
JB: I think both disciplines are omnipresent in one another, but my ultimate goal would be to purposefully combine them. For instance, [for] my piece Pulpeux, which I created in March 2020, I started with painting. My goal wasn’t to work with dance, it was to create an image. Finally, after talking with a friend who is a dance performer, I realized that we could use [the painting] to create movements. Movement appeared from the shapes, the in-between spaces, the negative spaces that were created between the shapes and lines of the painting. The performer really followed those shapes to create other shapes in her body.
TC: What themes are you interested in?
JB: More and more I’m developing a feminist approach. Currently, I’m interested in violence against women, be it extreme aggressions or imperceptible daily aggressions. Recently, I also started to question myself about my own relationship with my body as a woman. I am questioning myself about if we perform our femininity, what defines this femininity, what is it exactly. Is it influenced by the pressure of men’s gaze, or is it a pressure that we constantly put on ourselves?
TC: You are currently working on the dance performance OVERLOAD. How does your feminist approach appear in this work?
JB: For this piece, I am interested […] in the violence against women, how we experience this and how we perceive this personally. Some of the performers in the piece may have experienced such violence, others may have only witnessed it. But to be a witness is also something that is very hard to deal with. […] In the dance piece, each of the performers explores what this means to her. There is a lot of rage that comes out, there are a lot of contraction movements, spasms. During most of the piece, the performers are grouped together, which brings forward this idea of solidarity. They are a group, and they are [in] solidarity, but they also all live different things.
TC: How would you describe your creative process for this dance piece?
JB: For OVERLOAD, the initial idea was rage. I was looking at harassment at first. With the performers of the initial piece, we worked a lot with improvisation. There were more sensorial improvisations and more formal ones related to images. We tried to represent something, harassment for instance. It slowly diverged towards something more minimalist, more abstract. That was the beginning of the process. Now at the start of every rehearsal, we sit together to chat. We share situations that we have witnessed, information we have seen, statistics related to violence against women.
TC: Can you tell me about your recent discovery of ceramics?
JB: There is a very physical and tactile aspect to ceramics that I really like. There is also the aspect of reconnection with nature. I am currently taking a class during which we talk about the origins of clay, and where it comes from since it’s a material that comes from nature. Working with this material and knowing where it comes from creates a connection to the body, and to Earth. It’s very physical. Also, with ceramics, there are no limits. I can create what I want. It is a very fluid material. I can work however I want. And the glazes give me even more options. I am interested in the texture of chicken flesh. Therefore, I work with glossy glazes that can give a flesh-like effect. I had been looking for a long time for a material that could create this kind of effect and now that I’ve found it, I explore it.
TC: How did you start working with chicken flesh?
JB: I have been working for a long time on this and I still question myself about it. It started with a project I did with chicken flesh in 2020. I took pictures of a raw chicken. I used these photographs to edit and cut them in Photoshop. I then recreated this new image in a painting. Since then, I [have been] fascinated with it, for its colour, for its connotation. I titled this first piece Cocotte. There was a connotation, a critique of women’s place in society. Through my current explorations, I try to understand why I’m so fascinated by chicken flesh. I think it is very, very visceral. There is something cruel, since it is raw, it is dead. I think there is something very violent also. It is sensual and delicate, but also violent.
TC: Do you have artistic projects in mind for the future?
JB: I want to rework Pulpeux. I would like to go back to this creation, there is really something to explore there. Also, the ceramics aspect was recently added to my explorations. I would like to combine dance and ceramics. Ceramics also have a historical aspect related to women and their work and I would like to do more research on this side and to see how it can articulate itself in a more formal manner.
Here are nine noteworthy events that are worth keeping on your radar!
With the end of another school year approaching and the onset of warmer weather, more people will be flocking to the city’s cultural venues. As The Concordian wraps up their last print issue of the school year, our arts editor and assistant arts editor share nine events to kick off springtime.
Edward Hopper’s famous painting displays a scene at a late night diner, depicting life in the city as an alienating experience despite being in the constant company of others
When Edward Hopper’s painting Nighthawks reached the public eye in 1942, many art critics observed two common themes: isolation and apathy. The painting, on display at the Art Institute of Chicago, is one of the best examples of Hopper’s fascination with American realism. To this day, it remains one of the most well-known paintings of the 20th century.
The painting features a small diner, lit up by abrasive fluorescent lights that spill out onto the dark and desolate streets of New York. Inside the diner are a young waiter, a man and a woman who may (or may not) be a couple, and a mysterious man who faces away from the viewers. The scene, at first glance, resembles something a late night passerby might observe in the latest hours of the night. But when we start to look a bit closer, the scene is unsettling.
While Hopper admitted that isolation wasn’t a key theme he had in mind when he created this painting, he explained that “unconsciously, probably, I was painting the loneliness of a large city.” In 1942, many were grappling with the devastating effects that WW2 was producing. Some have speculated that a newspaper rests beside the faceless man, one that may have announced ample amounts of tragic news taking place during the time. This would also explain why the diner’s occupants appear so glum.
Hopper, perhaps unknowingly, managed to do a spectacular job of capturing the feeling of urban ennui and loneliness with Nighthawks. Through the diner’s large window, we are granted a glimpse into a world where interactions appear strained and the subjects are more preoccupied with their thoughts or worries than they are with one another. They share the same space, but they appear worlds apart.
Life in the city has a way of both uniting and alienating people, especially in the darkest hours of the night. The man and woman who sit together in this painting are a prime example of this: despite sitting very close to one another, their body language emits a palpable distance. They both appear reluctant to talk to one another or meet each other’s gaze. The woman’s attention is focused on something green that she holds in her hand, while the man stares straight ahead, looking bored. Have the two been in a fight? Have they both received some bad news? Is one of them thinking of ending the relationship? Are they even in a relationship? For years, questions like these have plagued Hopper’s fans.
Another key feature of the painting lies in the exterior of the diner. The dark streets are desolate, and without the diner’s fluorescent lights, the exterior would be completely dark. Across the street stands a building, with the bottom floor occupied by what appears to have once been a store. The storefront has been cleared out, with only empty shelves serving as proof that a store ever existed here. Additionally, above the store, there are several apartment units. In one of the apartment windows, there is an eerie figure that is barely distinguishable from the dark. Many have argued that it could be a human or a cat, though on closer inspection, it resembles neither. Some have concluded that it could also be the reflection of a street light.
Despite Nighthawks’ enigmatic nature, many have resonated with this painting for its accurate depiction of what life in a metropolitan setting is like, even if Hopper never meant for viewers to interpret the painting this way.
