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Full Circle: First Nations Performance presents the 10th annual Talking Stick Festival: a 13 day, citywide celebration of Aboriginal performance and art. In celebration of our 10th year, the 2011 festival will play its opening week (February 1 – February 6) at the Roundhouse before moving into the Commercial Drive area of East Vancouver (until February 13) and will feature diverse programming, highlighting the talents of local, national and international artists in a fusion of cabaret, music, dance, theatre and storytelling.

Don’t miss the traditional Gala Opening Celebration on Tuesday Feb 1 – a jam packed night of traditional and contemporary Aboriginal arts; drop into the ever popular Ab-Original Cabaret – featuring performers like Leanne Goose (Yellowknife), Digawolf (Yellowknife) and Murray Porter (Vancouver) and comedians Ryan McMahon and Elaine Miles; be sure to catch contemporary dance piece Fragments, by Lara Kramer (Quebec); stomp your feet, clap your hands and kick up your heels at our Métis social night; cool out to a soulful evening of jazz; stop by our slam poetry night, From Talking Stick to Microphone; get involved in one of our many Professional Development workshops; sit in on an Artist Talk; and keep your eyes and ears open for non-stop events for the whole family!

Also – on exhibit at the Roundhouse from Feb 1 – Feb 9, a photographic exhibition by Nadya Kwandibens of Red Works Studio (Toronto). Nadya Kwandibens is of Ojibwe (Anishinaabe) / French heritage from the Northwest Angle #37 First Nation in Ontario, Canada. She is a self-taught, dynamic photographer specializing in artistic natural light portraiture, fashion, promotional sessions, and event photography.

Plus, be sure to check out our TSF Poster and Colouring Contest display. Keep your eyes peeled for the work of emerging young visual artists whose work will be on exhibit in select schools and venues citywide from Feb 1 – 13.

Come and join Full Circle for the 10th Annual Talking Stick Festival! Everyone is welcome! Featuring artists from as far as Ontario, the United States and the Yukon Territories, and as near as Vancouver’s back yard! You name it – we’ve got it!

Talking Stick Festival Schedule

Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots for Aboriginal Youth is asking groups to create a mini-documentary about issues related to their peoples, animal and the environment that are important to them!

Even better, we will provide you with a free flip camera!!

Please see the flyers for more details.

Contact the Aboriginal Project Coordinator, Tanya, at aboriginal[at]janegoodall.ca or 416-978-3711 to find out more information about the process, deadlines, expectations and for any other questions or help!

Start Rolling!

Download Making a PSA pdf!!
Download Wisdom Keepers and Storytellers pdf!!

Tanya Muthusamipillai
Aboriginal Project Coordinator
Coordinatrice de Project Communautes Autochtones

L’Institut Jane Goodall Institute
P.O. Box 309, Station P
Toronto ON M5S 2S8
t 647.381.7498 / 416.978.3711 f 416.978.3713
aboriginal[at]janegoodall.ca

www.janegoodall.ca

Installing a new art exhibition is always exciting but Two Rivers Gallery curator George Harris is particularly proud of this one: Eagle Transforming: the Prints of Robert Davidson. The works are by one of Canada’s most respected, important contemporary artists and they span four decades.

“We are very fortunate indeed in getting this exhibit as one of just two galleries in B.C. (along with Surrey Art Gallery). Robert Davidson is a very important figure in the history of Haida art. He has actually taken it beyond traditional Haida art into the more contemporary,” said Harris. “His work is very highly regarded. He’s been honoured with the Order of Canada (1996) and Governor General’s Award for Visual and Media Arts (2010).”

Read the complete article here.

The new $12 million Sto:lo Resource Centre opened Satuarday with a series of celebrations, including an address Saturday by B.C. Lieutenant-Governor Steven Point.

“The new Sto:lo Resource Centre will be an essential part of the local community for business, cultural, educational and community services,” said MP Chuck Strahl.

The project earned the Minister’s Award of Excellence and Innovation from Western Economic Diversification and Community Futures. It is also striving toward LEED gold certification for its green features like a storm-water management plan, geo-exchange heating and cooling and design choices that will reduce water usage by 30 per cent.

The recipients of the $2,500 awards are Haida jeweller and carver Alvin Adkinds of Vancouver, Haida weaver Lisa Hagerman of Massett, Tahltan visual artist and educator Peter Morin of Victoria, Nuu-chah-nulth carver Tim Paul of Port Alberni and Kwakwaka’wakw carver Richard Sumner of Victoria.

Besides showcasing native culture to the public, it employs K’ómoks Band members and provides a vehicle for native artists to sell their creations, explains I-Hos manager Ramona Johnson.

Before I-Hos existed, Johnson took the resort management course at North Island College before working at a great lodge on the Pinkerton Islands in Barkley Sound near Tofino for two years.

She returned to the Comox Valley and discovered the K’ómoks Band planned to build a gallery.

Hirst, believed to be the wealthiest artist in the world and for years the enfant terrible of the British art world, found what he was looking for at the Douglas Reynolds Gallery on South Granville. After initially picking up few pieces Northwest Coast art, Hirst moved on to a commissioning a sizable project from the gallery.

By the time it was completed in November 2008, the commission had grown to include five 10-metre totem poles, several smaller totem poles and bent boxes and a number of panels, all of which were shipped to England. Gallery owner Douglas Reynolds wouldn’t reveal its total value, but put it between $2 million and $5 million.

The art committee chose Point from a list of artists that was provided and approved by the Washington State Arts Commission. The art committee unanimously decided on hiring a Native American artist to create the artwork for the Salish Hall.

On that list of several hundred, only about five were Native American. The next step came down to just finding out who was available and whose artwork the committee liked. After spending a day looking at different pieces from the Native American artists, the committee voted for Point.

Hesquiaht artist Tim Paul was named one of six winners of the 2010 B.C. creative achievement award for First Nations’ art.

B.C. premier Gordon Campbell and B.C. Achievement Foundation chair Keith Mitchell announced the winners on Wednesday.

“We are proud to celebrate the outstanding work of these First Nations’ artists,” Campbell said.

“In their work, they tell their nations’ stories and in doing so, preserve the great cultural traditions of our province’s First Nation’s heritage.”

The project supports employees’ commitment to give back to the communities where they live and work. The project also includes a $30,000 company donation. The Klahowya Village in Stanley Park is run by the Aboriginal Tourism Association of British Columbia and is a showcase of Aboriginal arts and culture that has drawn visitors from around the world.

At a ceremony titled The Spirit of Our Ancestors Has Returned Home, elaborately carved masks, rattles and other cultural treasures are to be returned to Nisga’a Nation leaders, elders and descendants of the artisans who crafted the relics.

The ceremony is scheduled for Wednesday, Sept. 15, at the Nisga’a Museum in Greenville, about 100 kilometres northeast of Prince Rupert.

The event features performers and an artists’ market.

Under tight timelines, organizers aim to keep the reincarnated festival “humble but memorable,” said Leslie McGarry of the Victoria Native Friendship Centre.

Gone is the big salmon dinner from festivals past at the Royal B.C. Museum, when the event attracted 50,000 people.

Some elements from the early days will stay the same, however.

The 7,600-square-foot scene on the wall of a Downtown Eastside hotel celebrates native culture and its history, but it’s also aimed at bringing together natives and non-natives.

“It touches a little bit on everybody, so I think when people look at it they’ll recognize something that comes from their [background],” said artist Jerry Whitehead, co-creative director of the project.

The mural, named Through the Eye of the Raven, was officially named and blessed Thursday morning at a gathering of first nations artists and community members, politicians and onlookers.

The idea behind the image, Quaite says, “is that you’re always surrounded, looked over and watched – taken care of in a way.”

Quaite is the team leader of a group of six youth spending their summer painting mural to be mounted along the Ogden Point breakwater.

Using a projector, they transfer the original work of art onto large panels.

This is phase two of a multi-year project whose aim is to eventually run along the entire 1.1-kilometre span – likely the largest in the world.

Last year’s mural displays a unique Coast Salish designs from the land and sea on each panel, each with its own story