Welcome to ReIssue Digestif, a bi-weekly-ish round-up of events on our radar. All times in PST.
If you are BC- or AB-based and have an exhibition, event or job posting to submit for consideration in the next Digestif, email details to admin@reissue.pub
as the wind blew: the ground beneath me, at the water’s edge, in its path: Through the lens of artist Sarah Crawley
Comox Valley Art Gallery, 580 Duncan Ave, Courtenay BC
Now–May 27, Wednesdays–Saturdays 12–5pm
Free
Artist Sarah Crawley shares three bodies of work tracing grief and healing through the fluid medium of photography, combining analog and digital methods. Her exhibition is part of the CVAG’s convergent programming in | at | on : RETURN TO WATER 2023, which also includes a video and audio experience from Scott Smith and Nettie Wild titled GO FISH, and a floating camera obscura by Donald Lawrence that can be visited by kayak!
Karice Mitchell
Wil Aballe Art Projects, 1129 E Hastings St, Vancouver BC
Now–June 3, Tuesday–Saturday 12–5pm
Free
Karice Mitchell is a Toronto-born, photo-based-installation artist whose practice utilizes found imagery and digital manipulation to engage with issues relating to the representation of the Black femme body in Western visual culture and pornography. By reappropriating erotic images of Black femme subjects, Mitchell reasserts the agency of such in the frame to subvert a history and narrative from elsewhere that attempts to categorize the Black female body. This exhibition is part of Capture Photography Festival.
Charles Campbell: An Ocean to Livity
Surrey Art Gallery, 13750 88 Ave, Surrey BC
Now–June 4, gallery hours here
Free
Large-scale metal sculpture and a multichannel audio installation are just two of the ways Victoria-based artist Charles Campbell engages with themes of Blackness, breath, and diasporic imagination in An Ocean to Livity. Locating that diasporic breath in the Surrey area itself, the audio installation Black Breath Archives shares breath recordings of Black Surrey and Lower Mainland residents. Campbell will be leading a free tour of this exhibition on Saturday May 13, from 2–3:30pm.
Seattle Art Bookfair
Washington Hall, 153 14th Ave, Seattle WA
Saturday May 6, 11am–6pm and Sunday May 7, 11am–5pm
Free
Okay, this one’s not BC or Alberta based, but we know for a fact that car-loads of artists are heading down the I5 for the first-ever Seattle Art Bookfair—and so is ReIssue! We will be tabling with UNIT/PITT Projects and Dyke News, hope to see you there!
Feet in Water, Head on Fire
The Cinematheque, 1131 Howe St, Vancouver BC
Sunday May 7, 7:30pm
Vancity Theatre, 1181 Seymour St, Vancouver BC
Saturday May 13, 3:45pm
Tickets and info here
Screening at this year’s DOXA Documentary Film Festival, director Terra Long’s feature debut portrays California’s Coachella Valley through the specifics of place and community, while freely exploring the limits of cinematic time and space. Shaped by seismic forces of the San Andreas Fault, the Coachella Valley is home to an agricultural community built around the date palm trees introduced to the region in the early 1900s. Today, the land and its people face combined threats from economic upheaval, US immigration policy and climate change. Shot on 16mm film and featuring hand-processing techniques that incorporate plants native to the Coachella Valley into the film, Long’s documentary is grounded in place even on a material level.
Kite Zo A
Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema, SFU Goldcorp Centre for the Arts, 149 W Hastings St, Vancouver BC
Saturday May 13, 7:30pm
The Cinematheque, 1131 Howe St, Vancouver, BC
Sunday May 14, 7:30pm
Tickets and info here
“Vodou is the culture we’re born into because we used Vodou to gain our independence,” explains a Vodou priest. The story of colonial oppression and unrest is told through archival footage and spoken word, while the story of resilience is shown through rollerblading and musical processions. Directed by Kaveh Nabatian, featuring poetry by Wood-Jerry Gabriel and music by the Lakou Mizik group and Joseph Ray, the film builds up to Kanaval, culminating in a cathartic celebration of joy and endurance.
CAARDI: Kai Cheng Thom
Centre A, 205-268 Keefer St, Vancouver BC
Friday May 12, 1–3pm
Free, register here
Join mediator, author, and healing justice practitioner Kai Cheng Thom for a skills-based presentation on working with conflict in social movements. How can we understand conflict as an opportunity for relationship growth and transformation? How can community organizers and leaders respond to conflict in a courageous, loving way? And crucially, how do we de-escalate and respond to conflicts that threaten to destabilize our communities? Kai Cheng will present several key concepts for analyzing and working with conflict grounded in a trauma sensitive, abolition based approach.
Transmissions
Art Gallery at Evergreen, Evergreen Cultural Centre, 1205 Pinetree Way, Coquitlam BC
May 13–July 23, gallery hours here
Free
Within the spun fibres of yarn, the warp and weft of a weaving, the blocks of a quilt and the bond of indigo dye to fabric, textiles hold boundless knowledge, transmitted over generations. Artists Jonathan Alfaro, Katherine Boyer, Roxanne Charles, Emily Hermant, Damla Tamer, and Valérie d. Walker create textile-based works using a variety of organic and manufactured materials—from animal fibres and plant material to wire, rubber silicone and plastic. Relating to the body, three-dimensional space and evolving technologies, the artworks draw on complex histories and rich cultural and personal practices connected to textiles to build sculptural works that move away from the gallery wall.
Jobs / Calls
Visual Arts Exhibition at Vancouver Civic Theatres (Vancouver), apply by 06/14
F/T Program Director, grunt gallery (Vancouver), apply by 05/19
F/T Communications & Marketing Associate, Contemporary Art Gallery (Vancouver), 05/18
P/T Performing Arts Programming (Surrey), until filled