Victoria arts
Victoria: Pianist overcomes challenges to win competition
Victoria News, January 30, 2011 His talent flows through his fingers. He literally rocks to the rhythm of the music he plays with an expert’s touch on the grand piano. Yet Sky Mundell is blind, profoundly deaf, is autistic and has cerebral palsy. The 19-year-old pianist wowed the judges and audience alike at the finale [...]
Vancouver: VAG building should be as good as its collection, painter argues
By Marsha Lederman, Globe and Mail, January 20, 2011 B.C. painter Gordon Smith issued a passionate plea to Vancouver city council on Thursday, urging councillors to create a new Vancouver Art Gallery that is worthy of its collection. “It’s so urgent. I like the old building very much, but it’s inadequate.” Mr. Smith was speaking [...]
Canadian Heritage: Minister Moore Announces Federal Support for Official Languages, Arts, Culture, and Heritage on Vancouver Island
VICTORIA, January 14, 2011 – The Honourable James Moore, Minister of Canadian Heritage and Official Languages, today announced funding for nine arts, heritage, and official languages projects in Victoria and Nanaimo. Minister Moore made the announcement at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria in the presence of community representatives. The funding is intended to support [...]
Victoria: Bridge inspires art
In the early-morning fog, the bright noon sun, and the fading day’s light, Big Blue will be framed in all its rusting glory by the camera lens over the next 12 months. “We want to catch it in all weather,” Jack Copland of the Victoria Camera Club said. “When it’s peeing down rain we want [...]
Greater Victoria arts groups grapple with uncertainty on grants
In the last 18 months, the Victoria Conservatory of Music managed to lop nearly $1.5 million off its accumulated debt of $2 million. That’s a lot of lopping. But in the midst of that big-time belt-tightening, the B.C. Arts Council cut the conservatory’s grant to $55,000 this year from $110,000 last year. Then it restored [...]
Victoria: Life found in alley brought to stage, Journals and photos in abandoned suitcase raised privacy issues
Actor/writer James Long was initially squeamish about opening the hard-shell, baby-blue suitcase. He noticed it in 2005, abandoned in an alley near his home on East 14th Street in East Vancouver. “It was mildewy,” he said. “It was ugly. It was dirty.” Fearing the 1970s-era suitcase might also be a repository for dog urine, Long [...]
Legendary Victoria Hotel Welcomes Artist in Residence — David Goatley, SFCA, CIPA
The Fairmont Empress is delighted to welcome international artist, David Goatley, to the legendary Victoria hotel’s inaugural Artist in Residence series, which begins November 5, 2010. Goatley, who is widely regarded as one of North America’s leading portrait painters, was born in London, England, and trained at London’s Camberwell School of Art before settling with his [...]
Victoria: Emily Carr statue to be unveiled
One of Canada’s most eccentric and well-known artists is being honoured with a bronze statue in a prime Victoria location near the B.C. legislature buildings. Emily Carr’s statue will overlook one of the city’s most popular tourist areas, which includes the stately Fairmont Empress Hotel. The larger-than-life statue shows Carr with two of her most [...]
Victoria: City scans art scene
Art enthusiasts, creators and organizers can now benefit from an online directory and map of cultural venues and groups. The City of Victoria compiled the database thanks to a $10,000 B.C. Legacies Now grant. The city matched the funds. “Our intent is for it to begin to evolve more deeply,” said Terri Askham, city manager [...]
Victoria: First Peoples Festival returns
After a five-year hiatus, the First Peoples Festival is back, thanks to new $10,000 sponsorship by the City of Victoria. 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 [...]
Victoria: Johnson Street Festival brings community unity
Johnson Street was packed with skateboarders, hula girls and shoppers as people flocked downtown to the first Lower Johnson Street Festival yesterday. The downtown thoroughfare was closed to traffic from Wharf Street to Broad Street to accommodate pedestrians, dogs, street-food vendors, sidewalk chalk artists and yoga practitioners. Local skateboarders had a captive audience as they [...]
Victoria: Kaleidoscope Theatre taking new shape, Management changes lend fresh vision to theatre company
A whole new face is on the bill for Kaleidoscope Theatre. With its new general manager Anthony Edgington in place, a swap of artistic directors after December and the whole operation moving into new digs nearby, the company’s horizon is changing. “I have clear visions for our future based on the company’s history and where [...]
Capital region could host Junos in 2013
The organization responsible for bringing the Juno Awards to Vancouver in 2009 released a report yesterday outlining plans that would bring the event to the capital region in 2013. Vancouver-based Music B.C. compiled the report, which supports a potential multimillion-dollar bid that would see Victoria host the annual music industry awards show for the first [...]
Victoria: Robert Amos: Community arts teeters on fiscal brink
Rumours abound about the end of the Community Arts Council of Greater Victoria. Faced with a concatenation of higher expenses and decreased funding, can this vital local arts advocacy group be pulled back from the brink? The council was founded in 1969 when Pat Martin Bates convinced the Canadian Forces to hold off the demolition [...]
Victoria: Coast Salish project takes shape, colour
Bonnie Quaite fine tunes the painted borders of a spirit in the sky, blowing a ship to shore. 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 [...]
