Small central lake and bridge in the Japanese Garden section of the Devonian Botanical Garden, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

WHAT: The Digital Botanical Garden, FCCS Research Series
WHEN: Wednesday, November 13, 2 to 3:30 p.m.
WHERE: CCS 142, UBC Okanagan Campus
ADMISSION: Free

As part of the FCCS Research Series, Emerging Visions: Digital Media and Culture,  Dr. Dene Grigar, Dr. Lee Foote, and Dr. Hussein Keshani, will discuss the work of the Back to the Garden research team on Wednesday, November 13 from 2-3:30 in CCS 142.

They will discuss their  work on how botanic gardens, which are increasingly asked to take on greater social roles, can be reimagined in the 21st century. Using the case of the forthcoming Islamic garden at the Devonian Botanic garden at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, the ways digital interpretive technologies can help botanic gardens promote social cohesion and intercultural understanding through the enhancement of public knowledge of the cultural and environmental heritage of the Islamic world will be discussed.

Dr. Hussein Keshani, is an Assistant Professor in Art History and Visual Culture who researches architectural and garden histories of Islamic India.

Dr. Dene Grigar is Director of and Associate Professor in the Digital Technology and Culture Program at Washington State University Vancouver who works in the area of electronic literature, emergent technology and cognition, and ephemera.

Dr. Lee Foote is Associate Professor and Director of the Devonian Botanic Gardens at the University of Alberta. Foote’s research focuses on waterfowl habitat creation, disturbance and reclamation using adaptive management, wildlife habitat manipulation and using natural processes, and sustainable use of renewable resources. Secondary interests include sustainable use of northern wildlife, social sustainability in African savannah ecosystems and trophic dynamics in wetlands.

Emerging Visions: Digital Media and Culture is sponsored by Green College UBC and the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies, UBC Okanagan. For more information on the research series, visit www.ubc.ca/okanagan/fccs/research/areas-of-expertise/media/emergingvisions.html

On Thursday, November 14th, Dr. Grigar will host another lecture, Leading by Practice: Creative Approaches to the Digital Humanities and Media Arts from 10am to noon in ART 203.  

Initially trained in Classics, Dr. Grigar is an innovative researcher, teacher, new media artist and administrator whose work crosses the boundaries of literary studies, media arts, media studies, and digital humanities. Drawing on her experiences, Grigar will speak on the importance of practice-led research and her successes in building research and teaching programs that both enhance the humanities and arts while preparing students for the digital workplace. The session will be followed by an open discussion on how to integrate teaching and research in digital humanities, computer science and new media art at UBC’s Okanagan campus.
Grigar is currently the President of the Electronic Literature Organization and also runs two labs: Motion-Tracking Virtual Environment lab (MOVE) and Elit Lab.

Greg Younging, Assistant Professor of Indigenous Studies facilitates symposium on Misrepresentations of Indigenous Peoples

Last Saturday’s symposium on the Misrepresentation of Indigenous Peoples was attended by a diverse crowd of over 40 people, including Kelowna community members as well as UBCO students and faculty.

The event, facilitated by Greg Younging (Indigenous Studies, UBC Okanagan) and Kelly Mitton (English MA student in the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies), was the second in this year’s AlterKnowledge Series—a discussion series co-organized by Allison Hargreaves and David Jefferess of Critical Studies. The series is designed to foster critical public dialogue about the way colonialism shapes relationships in both local and global contexts.

The symposium explored the role played by harmful and inaccurate representations of Indigenous peoples in perpetuating colonization–whether through film, television, literature, or even in Halloween costumes.

“The violence of colonization that takes place in policy and legislation would not be possible without the colonization of minds, both Indigenous and non-Indigenous, and negative representations of Indigenous peoples play a crucial part in this process” says Hargreaves.

The symposium was an important opportunity to explore the very real and lived effects of harmful representations, and to imagine solutions. As one participant remarked, the event was “empowering and inspirational.”

The day included a film screening of the documentary Reel Injun, as well as presentations by visiting scholars Lisa Monchalin and Jena McLaurin, and Critical Studies professor Allison Hargreaves.

McLaurin, a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, researches how Indigenous peoples are portrayed in modern popular media, and has developed a Native film course at her institution.

Monchalin, the first Aboriginal woman in Canada to hold a PhD in Criminology, teaches criminology at Kwantlen University. Her research on Aboriginal peoples and justice in Canada analyzes misrepresentations as contributing to the alarmingly high rates of violence against Indigenous women.

The next event in the series which will focus on the issue of Aboriginal Health in the Okanagan, is scheduled to take place on Friday, November 22nd – 7-8:30 pm at the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art, 421 Cawston Ave.

Visit the Alterknowledge series website for more information.

“Portrait of native American woman in front of teepee”
Robert Dennis Collection of Stereoscopic Views, MFY Dennis Coll 90-F394
http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/id?g90f394_024f

The next symposium in the AlterKnowledge discussion series focusses on the Misrepresentations of Indigenous Peoples.

The second annual AlterKnowledge Discussion Series brings together faculty and students affiliated with the Cultural Studies program at UBC’s Okanagan campus, as well as members of the Kelowna community to foster discussions about topics related to Culture, Power, and Identity.

Facilitated by Gregory Younging (UBCO, Indigenous Studies) and Kelly Mitton (UBCO, English MA student), the Oct. 26th symposium features film screenings, presentations, and open discussions on the misrepresentation of Indigenous Peoples. The free events are held at the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art, located in the Rotary Centre for the Arts, 421 Cawston Ave., downtown Kelowna.

Negative images of Indigenous Peoples serve to justify the subjugation of Indigenous institutions and territories. These misrepresentations take many forms and range from “savages, pagans and infidels” in the early colonial period, to “inferiors in need of state subjugation and protection” in the mid-colonial period, to “corrupt beneficiaries of state funding” in the later colonial period.

AlterKnowledge provides a venue for so-called “alternative” knowledge to be shared and valued, and for dominant systems of “knowledge” to be altered. The Discussion Series aims to foster community-based knowledge-making, bringing people together to discuss, share, and (un)learn.

The AlterKnowledge Discussion Series is organized by Allison Hargreaves and David Jefferess in collaboration with the Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art.

For more information about the Alterknowledge Discussion Series visit the web page for more information.

2013-14 AlterKnowledge schedule of events:

• Friday, Sept. 6 | Truth and Reconciliation: At the BC National Event and in the Okanagan

• Saturday, Oct. 26 | Symposium on Misrepresentations of Indigenous peoples

• Friday, Nov. 22, 7-8:30 pm | Reconciliation as Land, Ecology, and Health

• Friday, Dec. 13, 7-8:30 pm | Do they know it’s Christmas? The Question of Global Poverty

• Friday, Jan. 10, 7-8:30 pm | What does it mean to be a global citizen?

• Friday, Feb. 14, 7-8:30 pm | Reconciliation as Gender Justice

• Friday, March 14, 7-8:30 pm | Schooling the World: The White Man’s Last Burden

• Friday, April 11, 7-8:30 pm | Reconciliation as Revitalization in Language, Literature, and Art

• Friday, May 9, 7-8:30 pm | Imagining Kelowna’s History (and Present)

Grade 8 students working on their watercolour painting for the Concrete in the Creek exhibition

Kelowna École K.L.O. Middle School students, in partnership with artist and FCCS student Shimshon Obadia, are trying to restore a wetland habitat on their school grounds.

The tranquil Fascieux Creek that runs beside the school was covered with concrete pads during construction of the school grounds. Five years ago, Michelle Hamilton, the Kelowna École K.L.O. Middle School class teacher, and her grade 8 class became aware that there were turtles laying their eggs in the long jump pit near the creek bed, and began investigating ways to bring the creek back to its natural state.  The Grade 8 students were told to raise $100,000 by the School District if they wanted the creek restored. Five years later, they’re only $15,000 away from their goal.

”I was completely blown away by the dedication they had to their immediate natural environment and how aware they were of the connection between it and their own education,” says Obadia, a student in the Interdisciplinary Performance program at UBC’s Okanagan campus.

Over the past five years the students have been protecting the turtle eggs, and planting indigenous plants along the fence that runs along the creek.

Shimshon working with the Grade 8 students

Obadia has been working with the group for the last five months to use art as a means to attract attention to the work these students have been committed to. He is also providing a creative outlet for the environmental concerns directly impacting their education.

The aim of this project is to get a natural learning environment conducive to embodied, practice-based learning through building enough support for this project in the community.

The tireless efforts of the students are being showcased in an exhibition, Concrete in the Creek, at the Alternator Gallery for Contemporary Art. The installation features school desks atop a large watercolour painting created by the students using imagery of the creek as they envision it being one day soon.

Each desk has a chalkboard slate and chalk so audience members can contribute their ideas and opinions on the project. There is a live feed that projects the images from the slates onto one wall in the gallery. Tree branches are suspended on wires from the ceiling; on the remaining three walls of the gallery is a projection of the creek on Casorso Road close to the school where the habitat has not been disrupted from its natural state.

The exhibition runs Oct. 18-25. The opening reception is this Friday, Oct. 18th starting at 7 p.m.

Shimshon Obadia and Michelle Hamilton will run informal tours of the exhibition on Oct. 26th. They will also be accepting donations to help support the students’ cause to restore their lost educational resource.

The Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art is located in the Rotary Centre for the Arts, 421 Cawston Ave., downtown Kelowna.

Digital Media and Music, the second talk in the Emerging Visions: Digital Media and Culture research series  will be held on Wednesday, October 9th from 2-3:30 pm in CCS 142. Dr. Keith Hamel and Dr. Bob Pritchard, both from UBC Vancouver, will discuss recent advances in digital media technology, and how computers have become an integral component of live music performances.

Hamel and Pritchard have been working in the field of interactive computer music for several decades and have developed a variety of tools and techniques to facilitate the creation, rehearsal and performance of new media works. Their research includes topics such as alternative controllers, score following technology, and gesture tracking. This talk presents some of their recent research and provides examples of how they use this technology to create highly innovative multimedia works.

Dr. Keith Hamel

Dr. Keith Hamel is a Professor in the School of Music, an Associate Researcher at the Institute for Computing, Information and Cognitive Systems (ICICS), a Researcher at the Media and Graphics Interdisciplinary Centre (MAGIC) and Director of the Computer Music Studio at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Hamel has written both acoustic and electroacoustic music and has been awarded many prizes in both media. He has been commissioned by some of the finest new music organizations and performers in Canada and abroad. Many of his recent compositions focus on interaction between live performers and computer-controlled electronics. As a computer music researcher, Hamel is recognized as one of the foremost authorities on music notation software. He is author of the NoteWriter and NoteAbilityPro software programs which are used around the world for professional music engraving and publishing, and he has developed interactive environments for live performer and computer interaction.

Dr. Bob Pritchard

Dr. Bob Pritchard’s works are performed and broadcast worldwide and his research includes interactive performance, gesture tracking, and gesture-controlled speech synthesis. He has received multi-year research grants from SSHRC and CC/NSERC and he has contributed chapters to books dealing with the body in performance. He creates video, software and music for his interactive works and in 2007 his interactive piece Strength received a Unique Award of Merit from the Canadian Society of Cinematographers. His short film Crisis is part of Cathryn Robertson’s cancer documentary 17 Short Films About Breasts which received five Leo nominations, and is in international distribution. He teaches in the UBC School of Music where he co-directs the Laptop Orchestra and is a member of several research units.

Emerging Visions: Digital Media and Culture is sponsored by Green College UBC and the Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies, UBC Okanagan. For more information on the research series, visit www.ubc.ca/okanagan/fccs/research/areas-of-expertise/media/emergingvisions.html

Audience members at Comedy on Campus

Theatre26, a student-run group that works with faculty members in Creative Studies to organize events at the University Theatre, was busy all spring and summer working on the lineup of upcoming performances.

The Sunday Service, an improv group based in Vancouver and winner of the 2012 Best Improv Troupe in Canada, were first brought to UBC’s Okanagan campus by Theatre26 last fall. Their performance was such a success with students that they were invited back to perform during the first week of classes this year.

Filling up almost every seat in the house in the University Theatre, Comedy on Campus’s Summer School Edition was a large success. The evening featured a line up of Kelowna’s best amateur comedians and a crowd of tourists mixed in with local audience members.

Dean Krawchuk, a Performance major in Creative Studies, created a theatre piece in Butoh style based on the life of the legendary Russian monk Grigori Rasputin. Entitled 22 Sins to Salvation, the performance was well received by a full house on August 29th.

This year, Theatre26 continues to book events in the University Theatre — and is also working in collaboration with the Rotary Centre for the Arts (downtown Kelowna) for its first theatre season in the RCA’s Mary Irwin Theatre.

Upcoming events include:

FCCS noon hour music – Tenor Paul Moore accompanied by Pianist Graham Vink | Wednesday,September 25, 12pm, University Theatre, UBC Okanagan Campus
Comedy on Campus | Friday, September 27, 6pm, University Theatre, UBC Okanagan Campus
The Shakespeare Show by Monster Theatre | Friday, October 18, 7pm, University Theatre, UBC Okanagan Campus
Loon by The Wonderheads | Friday, November 29 & Saturday, November 30, 8pm, Mary Irwin Theatre, 421 Cawston Ave.

Keep up to date on upcoming events in the University Theatre via the FCCS website or the Theatre26 Facebook page.

Curtis Bahn and Tomie Hahn

The Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies (FCCS), along with Green College UBC are launching an exciting new research series, Emerging Visions: Digital Media and Culture.

Digital media are rapidly changing the exploration and creation of arts and culture.  Artistic experimentation and cultural research have adopted a dazzling array of digital tools and technologies to make art and examine cultural practices.  This series presents innovative artists and scholars from across North America who are pushing the boundaries of contemporary creative and critical practice.  They will share their ideas, innovations, and original perspectives.

The first talk, Embodied Sensibilities – Between Research and Creativity, will happen this Wednesday, September 11 from 2-3:30 in CCS 142.

In this talk Curtis Bahn and Tomie Hahn will reflect on the relationships between tradition, creativity, technology and innovation in their artistic practices.  They will discuss how cultural identities are projected through performance and how these identities extended through technology.

Dr. Curtis Bahn’s research interests are firmly grounded in the development of techniques for the performance of interactive music in an intercultural context. His research has established itself in a number of significant outcomes in interactive performance of electroacoustic music; he has developed, performed and written about gestural and motion capture interfaces for dance and movement performance including work as a featured composer and collaborator in the NSF funded Motion project at Arizona State University, performed widely playing his extended electronic sitar with gestural sensor interface, recording 2 DVDs at the Los Angeles Roy and Edna Disney Concert hall as performer and composer for the intercultural robotic “Machine Orchestra,” and conducted research on a number of relevant issues in electronic performance including physicality, haptics and tactile feedback, robotics, acoustics of the sitar and Hindustani musical ensemble.

Dr. Tomie Hahn is an artist and ethnographer and is an Associate Professor in the Arts Department at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in New York. She is a performer of shakuhachi (Japanese bamboo flute), nihon buyo (Japanese traditional dance), and experimental performance. Her research focuses on the transmission of embodied cultural knowledge, the senses, and creativity. Her wider research interests include the relationship between technology and culture, identity, gestural control,  endeavoring to find new vehicles for how contemporary performance can “tap” into embodied knowledge for new forms of expressivity.

For more information on the series, visit our web site: http://www.ubc.ca/okanagan/fccs/research/areas-of-expertise/media/emergingvisions.html

Dean Krawchuk, creator of 22 Sins to Salvation

22 Sins to Salvation explores our sticky relationship with sin in this Butoh dance inspired piece of theatre. Sin to drive out sin!

Who: Performance by Dean Krawchuk and Shimshon Obadia, with direction by Janelle Sheppard, and music by Jordan Leibel.
What: Theatre performance – 22 Sins to Salvation
When: Thursday Aug 29 l 7 PM
Where: University Theatre, ADM 026, 3333 University Way, UBC’s Okanagan campus, Kelowna

WARNING: MATURE CONTENT

Dean Krawchuk, a Performance Major in Creative Studies, was awarded $2,500 from the FCCS Undergraduate Student Research Award fund to create a theatre piece based on the life of the Russian monk, Grigori Rasputin.

“The impetus behind this project started when I was writing a play about Rasputin for one of my Creative Writing courses.” says Krawchuk, “I was compelled by his character and how a simple peasant managed to become a very powerful figure in Russian history.”

Through this research Dean stumbled upon The Khlysty, an underground religious sect that was rumoured to tie Rasputin with the dark arts. The Khlysty was known for using sin to drive out sin in order to gain salvation, and a majority of their meetings took place in forest clearings, in brothels or cellars.

“One of the things I wanted to accomplish prior to my final year of studies was to create a show that I can add to my repertoire and continue to perform in various incarnations in the future.”

22 Sins to Salvation will be performed in Butoh style, a Japanese form of theatre that started in the 1960’s.  Dean and his two collaborators, Shimshon Obadia and Janelle Sheppard were able to attend a private Butoh workshop on Whidbey Island this summer in preparation for the performance.

“It was a definite asset having some financial assistance for this show,” notes Krawchuk, “I am grateful to FCCS for providing me with support to create this project.”

22 Sins to Salvation, hosted by Theatre26, will take place on Thursday, August 29th in the University Theatre.

The University Theatre serves as a venue for the Department of Creative Studies for study, rehearsal and public performances, both for the campus community and the general public.  Theatre26 is a small company of BFA students in Interdisciplinary Performance that work to run the theatre throughout the school year.

Keep up to date on upcoming events in the University Theatre on the FCCS web site or on the Theatre 26 Facebook page.