arts advocacy
Alliance for Arts and Culture pushes legislature’s finance committee
B.C. ranked last in the country among all provinces and territories in per capita operating funding allocated to arts and culture even before recent cuts. And it would take a $75-million annual provincial investment to bring B.C. up to the national average, according to the Alliance for Arts and Culture’s submission to the legislature’s committee [...]
Submissions highlight B.C. government’s dismal funding of the arts
The 10-member, bipartisan legislature committee on finance and government services has heard some comprehensive arguments for increasing the provincial investment in arts and culture. In the committee’s prebudget hearing in Vancouver on September 15, the Alliance for Arts and Culture and Headlines Theatre founder David Diamond each submitted thoroughly documented reports that showed how poorly [...]
B.C. art attack: Interview with Judith Marcuse
Judith Marcuse is the founder and Co-Director of the International Centre of Art for Social Change, a partnership with Simon Fraser University. She is also founder and artistic producer for Judith Marcuse Projects. Am Johal: The BC government restored some funding recently to the arts. To what degree does it make up for the devastating [...]
BC ART ATTACK: Interview with Alliance for Arts and Culture’s Amir Ali Alibhai
Amir Ali Alibhai is the Executive Director of the Alliance for Arts and Culture in BC. Q – The BC government this past week restored some funding to the arts after heavy advocacy by supporters of the arts. To what degree will this make up for the cuts that happened? In terms of the recent [...]
The Alliance for Arts and Culture calls on arts minister Kevin Krueger to “moderate his comments”
The following is a formal response from the Alliance for Arts and Culture to Minister of Tourism, Culture and the Arts Kevin Krueger, after his comments yesterday likening the group’s tactics to “a junkie waving a needle”. The alliance represents about 330 arts groups and artists from a variety of disciplines. The Alliance for Arts and [...]
Triumph for BC arts community
Just two weeks following the resignation of Jane Danzo, Chair of BC Arts Council, the Government reorganized its funding to provide an additional $7 million to the BC Arts Council, increasing the council’s budget to just over $16 million for this fiscal year. Following BCs devestating series of arts cuts, Danzo felt it was necessary to [...]
Dancer Ziyian Kwan takes her protest to the Vancouver International Airport
Dancer Ziyian Kwan [1] will take her unusual arts-advocacy protest to the Vancouver International Airport. She told the Straight that between 6 and 8 a.m. on Sunday (September 5), she will dance and talk to people about B.C. arts cutbacks in various areas of the airport. She also plans to hand out pamphlets before hopping on a [...]
Performer turns busker to raise awareness, Dancer Ziyian Kwan takes her concerns about B.C.’s arts funding to the street
Facing an uncertain future as a dancer in Vancouver, Ziyian Kwan decided to do what she does best. She started dancing in public as a protest against the provincial government’s cuts to arts funding. What surprised Kwan is how her very individual action has snowballed. Her two hours of dancing at Kingsway and Main on [...]
B.C. arts community “galvanized” over funding cuts
Jane Danzo’s resignation last week from her position as chair of the B.C. Arts Council and her ensuing criticism of provincial cuts to the arts have prompted a wave of other individuals and groups to go public with their calls for reform. “We need champions and advocates in our community,” said Kevin McKeown, spokesperson for [...]
See Seven suspends season amid cuts to Vancouver theatre groups
See Seven Performing Arts Society is taking a political stand against provincial government cuts that have disrupted Vancouver’s independent theatre scene. Established in 1997, See Seven has been dedicated to promoting independent, professional theatre in the city, in part through annual package-ticket sales. But board member and cofounder Diane Brown said several See Seven participants [...]
Tom Durrie asks Assembly of B.C. Arts Councils to refuse to disperse spirit festival funding
Former B.C. Arts Council member Tom Durrie has written an open letter to the president of the Assembly of B.C. Arts Councils. Durrie wants Joan Richoz to refuse to disperse funds for B.C. spirit festivals to be held in the month of February. To read the letter: http://www.straight.com/article-339897/vancouver/tom-durrie-asks-assembly-bc-arts-councils-oppose-kevin-kruegers-spirit-festivals
John McLachlan: What I really think of the B.C. Spirit Festival idea
Somebody has to say it. The arts community has been stuck with the most idiotic and stupid arts-grant program I’ve seen in the close to 30 years I’ve been involved in the arts in British Columbia. Very few are speaking about it because they fear they will lose out on potential grant money. Here’s what’s [...]
Canadian Conference for the Arts president rips into B.C. arts cuts and praises Jane Danzo
The president of a national arts-advocacy group has written to Premier Gordon Campbell to express “deep concerns about the devastating cuts of provincial support to the arts and culture communities of British Columbia, as well as about the resignation of the widely respected BC Arts Council Chair, Ms. Jane Danzo”. In the letter dated August [...]
Dancer Ziyian Kwan and others dance their frustration over B.C.’s arts cuts
A veteran Vancouver dancer and her colleagues are taking their frustration over B.C. arts cuts to the streets. Ziyian Kwan is dubbing her protests “what i am dancing sundays”. She’s organizing impromptu dance/rally/busking sessions in front of the Gene Cafe at Main and Kingsway. Her next dance-protest is this Sunday (August 15) from 4 to [...]
Nanaimo: Director uses YouTube to send message
A Nanaimo theatre company’s artistic director has taken to the Internet to pressure the B.C. government to increase funding to the arts. Frank Moher, artistic director for Western Edge Theatre, uploaded the first in a series of video letters to Parksville-Qualicum MLA Ron Cantelon on YouTube. “Sometimes one needs a novel way to get a [...]
