Category Archives: Arts

The Elephant Mountain Review Launch

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Chris Halderman, Creative Commons

Press Release:
Elephant Mountain Launch
The first issue of a new literary journal: The Elephant Mountain Review will be launched
on Saturday, march 17, from 7 to 9 pm
at SelfDesign High 402 Victoria St. (upstairs in the Legion Hall) in Nelson.
Come for the readings, snacks, music and to buy your personal copy of the new journal!

It feaures new writing by Elena Banfield, Pippa Bowley, David Bracewell, Ellen Burt, Olindo Chiocca, Linda Crosfield, Alvin Ens, Denis Foley, Robert Banks Foster, Joel Guay, Tom Hardy, Kathryn Hartley, Sandra Hartline, Margaret Hornby, Paula Hudson-lunn, Glyn Humphries, Sean Arthur Joyce, Anna Kirkpatrick, Don R Law, Volker M, Phil Mader, Mark Mealing, Jordan Mounteer, Bree Switzer, Doug Wilton & Caroline Woodward.

Future launches soon in the valley and in Kaslo, Dates TBA

Arts, Culture & Heritage Funding deadline looming

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Creative Commons - WestWave Dance Festival – Pictures

The deadline of March 5th is rapidly approaching, so don’t miss the opportunity to apply for arts, culture & heritage funding through the Columbia Basin Trust Community Initiatives program. Last year the City of Nelson distributed over $40,000 towards this sector, helping to create a stable funding base to sustain our vibrant arts community.

Applications can be downloaded from www.rdck.bc.ca/corporate/grants/cbt.html.

For more information, please contact:
Judy Madelung
Project Coordinator
Phone: 250-352-8170 / 1-800-268-7325
Email: jmadelung@rdck.bc.ca

or, contact:

Joy Barrett
Cultural Development Officer
City of Nelson
cultural@nelson.ca
tel: 250-354-9169

More Education at your fingertips

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Press Release:

 

If you are a high school learner seeking collaboration and community engagement, and you’ve got a passion for exploring things through conversation and action, then check out the Workshops at SelfDesign High!

Workshop(s) groups usually meet 2 to 3 hours a week for 12-14 weeks at SelfDesign’s Nelson Learning Centre, and all workshop courses are 4 credit high school courses. In the workshop courses, time is spent deepening learning through reflection and journaling, carrying out an independent research project, along with producing a creative piece (film, slide show, etc.) to demonstrate each participant’s learning.

Workshops for this term have been chosen based on expressed interest and the skills of mentors available in our community. Whether the subject is plant biology, electricity, or raku pottery, learners will be immersed in a experiential learning environment where understanding is promoted through participation, conversation, reflection, and action.

All workshop courses are 4 credit high school courses.

 

High School learners in B.C. are free to choose where and how to complete their high school requirements, and these workshops are ideal for learners who benefit from the structure and rhythm of a schedule and who crave connections with others in order to realize their individual learning. (While) SelfDesign High has prepared a full slate of workshops for learners to select from, and (we) will also find a suitable mentor and create a workshop around a topic that six learners express an interest (to us) in taking.

Choose the learning you are looking for, and let SelfDesign help guide your way.

Visit www.selfdesignhigh.org/workshops for a detailed list of workshop courses available.

Kootenay Literary Competition Chooses Best Writers

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Cricket Carrol (left) and Kristen Sommerfeld (right) first and second place winners in the creative non-fiction category

By Sean Brady

Despite a late launch, the Kootenay Literary Competition saw its highest turn out since its inception, and in front of a full house on Friday night at the Hume hotel, twelve competitors in a variety of genres were awarded their prizes.

Anne DeGrace, an author from Nelson whose latest book Flying with Amelia launched across the country this past fall, spoke about the non-competitive nature of the writing community that she has been a part of in the Kootenays, offering “win or lose, nothing is ever wasted” to the attentive room full of writers, students, friends and family.

The new youth category, divided into grades 7-9 and 10-12, joined the usual categories of poetry, fiction, creative non-fiction and emerging writers, a category aimed at those who are unpublished and have never before received contest winnings.

2011 Kootenay Literary Competition winners:

Youth 7-9

1st Place: Rebecca Bracewell for The Wooden Boy

2nd Place: Gillian Wiley for Charlotte’s Scientific Belief

Youth 10-12

1st Place: Trilby Buck for Mrs. Shaw

2nd Place: Kevin Milde for The Apotheosis of Man

Emerging Writers

1st Place: Shelby Cain for Enter Chaos

2nd Place: Cindy McCallum Miller for Chaos in the Kootenays

Poetry

1st Place: Jordan Mounteer for actaeon sound

Honourable Mention: Elena Banfield for Teleology

Creative Non-Fiction

1st Place: Cricket Carroll for Keep Your Promises

2nd Place: Kristen Sommerfeld for Reminisce With Me

Fiction

1st Place: Martina Avis for The Louisiana Alligator Purchase

2nd Place: Bill Macpherson for In Country

Judges for the competition were Susan Andrews Grace for the poetry category, Rita Moir for creative non-fiction, Almeda Glenn Miller for fiction, Heather Shipitt and Patty Humphries for youth, and Sarah Butler, a 2008 Kootenay Literary Competition winner, for the emerging writers category.

All of the entrants in the youth category also received feedback on their work from the contests’ judges, with the hopes that they will continue writing and submitting their work.

Selkirk College students also had a notable role in the event. Students from Almeda Glenn Miller’s second-year writing class helped to short-list entries for the competition and provided feedback for the judges to review. Other Selkirk students had a strong showing in the competition itself, with Cricket Carroll and Kristen Sommerfeld winning first and second place in the creative non-fiction category of the event.

When asked what it meant to place in a competition like this, 2nd place creative non-fiction winner Kristen Sommerfeld said “It is amazing considering where I came from to where I am now to think that it might just be possible for me to get my story out there and try to have a positive impact on people reading my work.”

Looking forward, Kristene Perron, chair of the Kootenay Literary Competition committee and event organizer, said that next year she hopes to see twice as many entries, and was impressed with this year’s turnout despite the late launch of the event.

The Kootenay Literary Competition 2011 Anthology entitled Chaos, the theme for this year’s event, will be available at Otter Books and contains all winning entries to this year’s competition.

Ida named Nelson’s cultural ambassador

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PRESS RELEASE from the City of Nelson

The Cultural Development Commission (CDC), on behalf of the City of Nelson, is proud to announce Hiromoto Ida’s appointment as Nelson’s 2012 Cultural Ambassador in the category of Dance. Sponsored by The Royal Grill & Lounge, the award comes with a $500 cash prize.

Photo submitted.

“We are delighted to have Hiro represent Nelson this year,” says Stephanie Fischer, the Chair of the City’s Cultural Development Commission. “He has been an important and valued presence in Nelson’s artistic community for years with his impressive, talent, diversity, and not least of all, humour.”

Ida is a nationally recognized director, choreographer and performer. Moving to Nelson in 2000, he began creating new pieces under his own company Ichigo-Ichieh Dance. His works, such as Please Dad, SENTAK, KESSA, and The Gift have all been performed at international dance festivals. Last fall he held his first contemporary dance workshop here in Nelson, where the newly-created piece Seven Stories was performed with local Nelson dancers.

Ida originally studied drama and performance in Tokyo, then moved to Vancouver in 1987 and joined the Karen Jamieson Dance Company, performing at the Canada Dance Festival in Ottawa, Nouvelle Dance in Montreal, Dancing on the Edge and the Kiss Project in Vancouver. In addition to dance, he is an accomplished actor. His first film debut in 1994, as the lead in the movie Tokyo Cowboy, won the People’s Choice Award at Vancouver International Film Festival.

Ida takes over the position as Cultural Ambassador from writer Anne DeGrace, who represented the Nelson Arts community in her travels throughout Canada and Europe, and recently received a rave review from the Globe & Mail for her new novel Flying With Amelia.

The CDC established the Cultural Ambassador honour three years ago in recognition of local individual artists, groups or collectives who have achieved a high standard of excellence in their artistic discipline and who are active not only in Nelson’s cultural community but extend their talents to other communities and countries. The Cultural Ambassador is expected to represent and promote the City of Nelson on their travels, increasing the visibility and cultural reputation of Nelson.

Decide where public art will go in Nelson

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Photos submitted.

Nelson’s Cultural Development Commission has a question for Nelson residents: Where do you want the Heron’s Landing sculpture to go?

Working with the Nelson Post, the commission has made that an easy question to answer. The commission has provided digitally altered photos that show what the Heron’s Landing sculpture would look like at one of three options on Nelson’s waterfront and the Nelson Post has created a page showing those three location on a map, as well as offering several ways to view the photos.

The options include Heritage Inn Point, the West Kootenay Arboretum and the Waterfront Amphitheatre.

You can see the three options, their photos, and the map showing the location at this page.

Then vote.

There’s a poll at the bottom of that page or you can vote at the Nelson Post‘s Facebook page.

Voting runs for the month of December.

Storyteller’s Saloon gala fundraiser supports library and museum

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PRESS RELEASE from the Nelson Public Library

Nelson was a wild and woolly place at the start of the last century, where characters with names like Cayuse Brown, Roughlock Perry, Weary Willie, and The Yellow Kid might sidle up to the barstool next to yours and order up a shot of something strong enough to curl the hair on a tenderfoot’s chest.

It’s in the spirit of these times that the Nelson Public Library and Touchstones Nelson: Museum of Art and History have teamed up to present Storyteller’s Saloon: a Wild & Woolly Evening of Tales & Ales & Food.

Kootenay Hotel circa 1899. Photo from the collection of Touchstones Nelson.

The gala fundraiser takes place Saturday, October 29, 6:00 pm at Mary Hall, Selkirk College. The evening benefits the historical archives of both organizations.

CBC Radio’s BC Almanac host and guest author of The Trail of 1858: British Columbia’s Gold Rush Past, the wild and woolly Mark Forsythe, MCs an evening of tales tall and true.

Corky Evans tells the tale of feisty labour organizer Ginger Goodwin. During World War I, Goodwin was deemed unfit for military duty due to miner’s black lung, but after Goodwin led the strike at the Trail smelter in 1917, the conscription board reversed its decision and hunted Goodwin down for draft evasion – to a bitter end.

Carolyn McTaggart brings to life Gunpowder Gertie, Pirate Queen of the Kootenays. As a young woman in Kaslo, Gertie found herself saddled with her dead father’s debts and facing starvation. So she cut her hair, dressed as a man, and became a coal hand on the sternwheelers. When her disguise was discovered and she was sacked, she swore vengeance on the steamlines, and Gunpowder Gertie was born.

Richard Rowberry entertains with the story of Three Fingered Frank, a true but cautionary tale of the old west in which liquor and bravado takes our hero into water well over his head. Those who remember the Theatre Energy version of this tale from a more recent era will welcome this trip down memory lane.

Delectable fare will be served up by the inspired grub-slingers at Selkirk College’s Professional Cook Training program, with atmosphere provided by the Resort and Hotel Management Program. Blues and Honky Tonk piano by Danielle Corbin, and legendary organic ales by Nelson Brewing Company round out an evening in which heritage costumes are optional, but good times are guaranteed.

Folks are encouraged to book a table of eight with friends, or just turn up and rub shoulders with other friendly folk. Tickets are advance only until Wednesday, October 26 at $45 per person ($20 charitable receipt included), available at Touchstones Nelson and the Nelson Public Library.

For more information call 352-6333 or 352-9813.

The Nuppet Show

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PRESS RELEASE from Nelson Youth Theatre

Photo source: Official Star Wars Blog, Flickr, Creative Commons.

It’s time to play the …..

It’s time to light the ……

It’s time to to meet the ……. on the …… …. tonight!

If you know the lyrics of the above theme song, then you know the inspiration for Nelson Youth Theatre’s next fun play, to be performed Saturday, February 25th, 2012, at the Capitol Theatre!

Nelson area youth actors x famous puppets = “Nuppets”!

“The Nuppet Show!” is a live theatre tribute to beloved puppet sensations you have probably heard of. In “The Nuppet Show”, a group of Nelson youth theatre actors band together to create and perform a variety show, with them playing the world-famous fuzzy creatures on tour here in the puppet-friendly Kootenays. Laughs. Music. Stars. More!

Actors age 8-16 interested in being in “The Nuppet Show!” on the Capitol Theatre stage should contact Nelson Youth Theatre via jeff@forstmedia.ca. This will be Nelson Youth Theatre’s twelfth awesome show, following smash hits like “The Portal”, “Monster Mash”, and “The Tempest”!

The rehearsal process for “The Nuppet Show!” begins this November, in Trafalgar Middle School’s Fine Arts Centre (#306), running Mondays and Fridays weekly, 3:30pm-5:30pm, through the new year into February, with time off for all the usual school district holidays and pro-d days.

Lead actors will rehearse all possible scheduled times – while supporting, cameo, and chorus roles will rehearse around half that amount, with the option to primarily attend either Mondays or Fridays only, if they wish.

“The Nuppet Show!” actors all receive a commemorative show t-shirt, a souvenir program, and a party thrown in their honour after the show!

There are a lot of fantastic roles in the “The Nuppet Show!”, plus many funny skits which will serve as the basis for the adapted script. So, tons of actors can be cast this time round, which means the word can be spread out into the hills and beyond.

Lit competition underway

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PRESS RELEASE from the Kootenay Literary Competition

There is “chaos” in the literary community! The Kootenay Literary Competition is now open and the theme this year for the adult competition is “Chaos” in all its forms.

Photo source: photosteve101, Flickr, Creative Commons.

This popular annual writing event is open to all writers in the entire Kootenay region. This year there will be two distinct competitions: one for adults and another for youth. Youth can enter the Grades 10-12 category or Grades 7-9 category. Grades 10-12 should use the following first line : “It wasn’t that I meant for it to happen….” . Young people Grades 7-9 but must include the following words in their piece: “tricks”, “seventeen cents” and “sweet.”

Adults can enter in four categories: Fiction, Creative Non-fiction, Poetry and Emerging Writer.

There will be great cash prizes and an awards ceremony, winners readings, and free food.

Prizes range from $50 up to $200 depending on the category.

Competition Details

The 2011 Entry Fees are as follows:

$35.00 for each submission in the Adult competition (4 Categories)

$15.00 for each submission in the Youth competition (2 Age Categories)

Information, rules, category descriptions, details and entry forms are available on the main website with all the rules and regs at: litcomp.inthekoots.com.

Deadline for submissions is Tuesday, Nov. 15.

Festival association launches

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PRESS RELEASE from the Kootenay Columbia Festival and Events Association

Recognizing the growing economic impact of special events, five West Kootenay festivals have joined together to spearhead the Kootenay Columbia Festival and Events Association, a new organization whose members will be stakeholders interested in the successful promotion and delivery of festivals and events within the Columbia Basin region.

Photo source: 5chw4r7z, Flickr, Creative Commons.

Potential members are organizations that sponsor a festival or event or other individuals, organizations, government agencies, or incorporated companies with an interest in supporting these events. The five founding members are Kaslo Jazz Festival, Starbelly Jam, Nakusp Music Festival, Shambhala Music Festival, and Hills Garlic Festival who have been working together since 2009 with the goal in mind of formalizing their association.

Incorporated under the Societies Act of BC, the KCFEA will enable participating organizations to have a united voice in issues of mutual interest, facilitating effective communication and advocacy with government and regulators in the development

of strategies, legislation and policies. The Association will facilitate marketing and promotion of festivals and events in the region. By working together, members will be able to raise skill levels of employees and volunteers while developing and sharing best practices which will be especially helpful to new event organizers.

The first General Meeting of the KCFEA will be held Sunday, October 16, at 12:00 pm at the Hume Hotel. There will be a guest speaker on a topic of interest to all attendees. Interested organizations and individuals can reserve a seat by emailing KCFEA.info@gmail.com.

More information about the KCFEA and the upcoming meeting is available by sending an inquiry to KCFEA.info@gmail.com.