“The gift of art is that it allows anyone to express themselves in their own way.” – Richard Marcus By Leonni Antono Richard Marcus, the president of the Sculptor’s Society of BC, is one of the pioneering sculptors who works with mammoth ivory. With great artistic insight and creative vision, he draws on its exoticism to transform it from its discoloured and ancient state into modern masterpieces brimming with unique antiqueness. When working with this unusual type of ivory, Richard combines the use of semi-precious stones, gold alloy and exotic hardwood for embellishment, and the obsolete prehistoric material is reborn as inimitable mosaic artworks – beautiful syntheses of the past and the present.  Every day, Richard works up to sixteen hours in his cozy art studio to create an array of magnificent sculptures and artworks one after another, from porcelain-like plaques of breathtaking scale, to stylish aesthetic bracelets that are individually crafted. Stepping into Richard’s workplace and beholding his artworks, one would be overcome by a sense of awe inspired by the splendor they exude: each of them is unique like no other, an assembly of patterns of different shapes and sizes that bespeaks of its own artistic tale. Even to the untrained eye, it is obvious that they are exquisitely the product of immense effort and dedication.  One of the reasons for their uniqueness is perhaps the unusual type of ivory used – mammoth ivory – instead of the comparatively more common elephant ivory. Compared to elephant ivory, mastodon ivory are shattered and less consistent due to the weathering of time, and stained by the minerals in the soil in which they were buried in. As to why Richard chose the more ancient and unstable ivory, it is because using elephant ivory goes...

By Susan Tsang Photography by Kenta Motoike Artists In the Garden hosted by the Vancouver Arts Colloquium Society was not all about organic pies and fresh Italian pizza made straight from the Kits CC Collaborative Garden, rather it was a celebration of “Eye of The Beholder”.  This was the second year that Artists In the Garden a perfect addition to the Kits CC’s Summer Garden Party.  This year’s theme entitled, “Suggestions From Nature,” brought together a group of seven local artists, both amateur and professional, to showcase their arts that had drawn inspirations from everyday’s life. The beautiful day outdoor and the pleasing paintings were enhanced by the vibrant edible plants at the background and energized any visitors dropping by. Artworks were everywhere around us. Artists could be spotted in all walks of life.  “I did painting when I was in highschool, but then I stopped. I went into another field (law),” said Sylvia Andrews while she stood in front of her group of distinctive floral paintings. “I didn’t have time to do it. It’s better painting during the day when you have natural daylight coming into the room. If it’s at night it can be a lot more difficult to really see what you are doing.” Sylvia’s story mirrored with other artists who were present. They truly proved that artists exist everywhere. Renetta Nagel was an interior designer. Marilyn Bowman was a clinical psychiatrist. And Georgia used to be a registered nurse. Some of them could only reunite with their passion again after retirement. There were also the ones who found their passion for arts later in life and were already owning their styles after painting for six or seven years. Their effort and talent were admirable. There was always room for growth and to discover hidden skills regardless of how...

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  Dear Readers, “Are you still remarkable?” – the wonderfully witty first line from Mayor Gregor Robertson when I ran into him at Musqueam on the National Aboriginal Day. I grinned and pondered about my last 2 years or so.  On that day, I chatted with many truly remarkable women (and men) from our community as well as our beloved Adriane Carr and Andrea Reimer – women for whom age has only reinforced their desire to have an impact and their ability to be a positive influence.  I am in awe of their devotion to the community. “Just be who you are (is all you need)” as Adriane kindly advised me on my growing concern about living happy and fullest life as we (women) age.  Elsewhere in the issue, we highlight the secrets of “Learning To Just Be” that can be hard to do for some of us who especially want to keep pace with our fast-changing city. Summer is here. Keep gardening and keep growing your passion.  Happy Canada Day!   Cheers, Keiko Honda Chair, Community Engagement Editor-in-Chief   ...

By Susan Tsang At one thirty-eight in a clear May afternoon, steady streams of nine to twelve-year-old students participating the Vancouver Regional Heritage Fair filed into the Seniors’ Lounge at the Kerrisdale Community Centre. They were all armed with folded poster boards that were half their sizes and equipped with presentation models that they had prepared for months, ready to present their research topics on Canadian history to the visitors. The visitors’ questions and the presenters’ answers outperformed each other generating an escalating hum like rushing water. At the edge of the floor, I met Elwin and the story of Hudson locomotives of the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) from the nineteenth century.  After detailing the origin and contributions of the trans-Canada railroad, Elwin said, “We need to pass knowledge on. How would anyone know the steam engines existed if we don’t pass it on?” A question immediately rose to my mind: why do we need to impose our history onto someone else? Steam engine is an old technology, why do we bother to learn about it? It seemed like it has a commonsense and straightforward answer, but I wanted to take the opportunity of being at a history event that allows me to dig answers from our young generation. I, too, had a research question and wandered through the corridors of the past.   Elwin with his Royal Hudson project. As I was getting lost in my thoughts, the lively presentations invited me to learn about the residential schools, Cirque Du Soleil, and the evolution of the Canadian stores. My editor also suggested to me to have a conversation with Isaac and the blacksmiths. Right away, Isaac asked me what I had already known about blacksmiths. He then invited me to do a simulation...

By Sean Yoon A lifestyle that promotes healthy living by integrating nature into our daily lives, permaculture is an ongoing dialogue in our community. Last summer, Vancouver Arts Colloquium Society, or VACS began its permaculture project around Vancouver called placemaking, transforming public spaces like front boulevards into gardens. One of these spaces was a front boulevard site converted into a pollinator garden on 23rd and Mackenzie.  VACS has begun a new permaculture project for this year called Permaculture InAction. As one of the project’s leaders, Patrick Colvin was born and raised in a small city in Northern Ontario. He then went on to complete his bachelors of honours in engineering at Queen’s University in South Ontario. Throughout his degree, Patrick was discovering and wanting to address issues that are currently afflicting our society. In particular, he was concerned with the environmental issues arising from the chemical industry, which in many cases, has produced chemical waste destructive to our environment. The city of Sarnia in Southern Ontario for example, close to where Patrick studied, is a region that is host to numerous chemical facilities. And in Sarnia, there is a river called the St. Clair River that has a history of having chemical waste being dumped into it by local chemical facilities. The St. Clair River is currently still being listed as an area of concern because of chemical pollutants.  “Permaculture is interesting because it provides an alternative way of thinking. It’s a different way of looking at what we do as a people on the planet. It brings together plants, our land and us as stewards of the land – it allows us to reimagine this world that we live in. For me there’s a lot to learn about and I feel like I...

By Susan Tsang “Skillsharing” might sound like a strange, and even confusing term when you first stumbling upon it. To simply put, people skillshare when they exchange their skills with one another, whether they are singing, improvise acting, or cooking. Skillshares is only a part of a bigger picture of connecting the community through meaningful interactions. Vancouver Arts Colloquium presents a series of skillshares workshops that link people in one place to build our skills as well as the community. On June 18, as soon as the Upcycling Fabric workshop led by the creative Colleen Rhodes had been completed, people trickled into the room for the Musical Voice Lab to learn from the skilled Dramatic Soprano Jane Perrett. Our group consisted a wide range of people aged from ten to sixty but we openly shared our experiences (or lack of experiences) with one another. We got to know each other as past choir members, curious people, some who had taken lessons before and ceased singing for years, and I belong to the last group. Like everyone else, I was excited to pioneer the unexplored territory of our voices. Most of us had found out about the workshop through Jane. We were attracted to her uplifting voice and exhilarating opera performances. Along with her friend Leo (also a singer and an instructor) who played the piano and offered tips, we were set to generate music together. First, we touched base with the basic Italian “i” (pronounced “e”). Jane instructed that saying “i” correctly is the foundation of singing; knowing how to imitate properly with our voices is helpful for beginners to polish the basic skills. The process was a novel and interesting one because it was like learning a new language, we tightened our lips...

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Dear Readers, Spring is a time for renewal!  A time to begin new, exciting initiatives that will impact our city.  For community organizers, spring is a time to re-energize and enhance our entrepreneurial and engagement skills so we are better prepared to help our communities succeed.  Vancouver Foundation Neighbourhood Small Grant (NSG)  & Greenest City Neighbourhood Small Grant (GCG) projects are about to take off. As one of the Resident Advisory Committee members for the Westside, I am delighted to announce that in 2016 there was 25% increase in applications from those submitted in 2015 and so many new and exciting projects are being funded this year. What a great time to share creativity, gain perspective on community sustainability issues, and connect with more people in the neighbourhood! Check the NSG/GCG website for the upcoming project announcements. As part of the Kerrisdale Community Centre’s Community Engagement initiatives, we are open to NSG/GCG projects for free meeting spaces on a availability basis in order to play an important role in helping our citizens to continue to grow and our residents to thrive on their own terms. Together, we will reach hundreds of westside residents through such community-led local initiatives in an effort to ensure that the opportunity of creativity and social connection is available to all.  Another exciting new initiative to connect more people is Vancouver Arts Colloquium Society (VACS)’s SkillShare project funded by the federal government. The Kick off event is just around the corner – Sunday May 15, 9pm – 3pm at Kitsilano Community Centre. Please come out to see what it is all about! And, finally, we are hosting the Vancouver Regional BC Heritage Fair 2016 at Kerrisdale Community Centre on Saturday May 21, welcoming Vancouver’s top 120 students who will be presenting their research...

By Lara Boleslawsky While Upcycling may be a new comer on the sustainability scene, it is unjust to simply call it a trend. Upcycling is a way of life. Upcycling breathes new perspectives, new ideas, new life into everything it touches. But what is Upcycling?          Just ask Colleen Rhodes, the creative and executive genius behind Meins Designs, a local sewing business that promotes Upcycling in the fabrics of its design.          “Upcycling to me means taking something that you would normally throw away and making it into something new. It means making something new out of the old,” says Colleen. To showcase this amazing new concept, Colleen will be participating in the new Skill Share series; a new and exciting community engagement project brought together by the Vancouver Arts Colloquium Society. Colleen and Skill Share have partnered in order to promote and teach local communities about the social and environmental impact of Upcycling.        Skill Share is an initiative centered around the mandate that everyone has a skill, an art, a talent that they can nurture and grow and eventually develop for the purpose of teaching others. Colleen is one of the featured artists in Skill Share, as she will be teaching and supervising sewing workshops, all of which circumvent the main theme of Upcycling. The workshops take place once a month, with each catered to a specific project. These include: leg warmers made from an old sweater, skirts made from unused jeans and wine or produce bags made from unwanted shirts and sweaters.          “You don’t need to get everything brand new. Today everyone thinks the bigger the better, but it doesn’t need to be that way,” Colleen remarks. Through ‘Upcycling’ unused, and perhaps even unloved, clothes becomes re-purposed and...

By Susan Tsang For Artists In Residence (AIR) Series session 104, the guests transform Keiko’s cozy home to a salon that is of fluid conversations and ideas while appreciated the vegetarian lasagna and wine. The guests who have already attended the previous sessions are welcoming to everyone, including the first-timers like myself. Amongst the new guests, there are Misha’s students who come for their teacher’s presentation. Michael (Mikhail) Pertsev is a figurative sculptor from Moscow, Russia. He has a studio at Parker Street and teaches at Emily Carr University. He inspires his students to master their skills in sketching and sculpting. They would practice their drawings because Misha likes to make drafts on paper before sculpting. But the one who has a significant presence in Misha’s life is his father who was an artist from the Soviet Union. Misha’s story begins with his father’s artwork, drawing inspiration from the arduous times of the Communist Soviet Union. Seeking to capture the oppressive lives of the Soviet labourers on canvas, his father’s works were marked by strong strokes of dark green, red, and other saturated colours. The images left an impressionable imprint from the distinct lines that are sharp and angular to the subjects’ eyes that are hollowed out by black shade. Yet Misha’s father was not only an artist but also a part of the browbeaten citizens who needed to have his voice heard. He wished to draw the spine-breaking domestic lives of the Russians instead of the style of multi-figure, male-centric artworks. While his piece of drawing might have been controversial since it reflected the reality of the iron-fist governance, his intrinsic disposition to his cultural background made the occurrence of that drawing to be almost inevitable.             Under the influence of his father,...

By Sean Yoon   Every life is sacred. Choosing to embrace non-violence, peace and love as a way of life, Magdaleno “Leno” Rose-Avila is a human rights activist. After Martin Luther King Jr.’s death in 1968, someone came to him and said, “You have to stand up today. If you love Martin Luther King, then you have to defend what is right.” That is when Leno made a promise to himself that he would dedicate his life to helping people. From that moment forward, he became an activist and started demonstrating and defending human rights.   “If you don’t value other people’s lives, why should they value yours?”   For over a decade, Leno has worked with former gang members in El Salvador and LA through the organisation he started called “Homies Unidos,” or “Homeboys United.” Homeboys United worked with former gang members and youth to help them break away from violence and gain life skills through education programs, employment programs and various forms of mental health support. Leno recalls listening to former gang members for 90 days before he even said anything to them. “How can I talk to them if I don’t know their reality?” He said. “Most of the time we don’t take the time to listen, we always have an answer for somebody. What about listening? What is your pain, what are you thinking, where are you?” Leno came to discover that the people he met with were often very smart, but they were poor and have had very few opportunities to lead lives other than through violence.   What is the value that we place on a person’s life? Leno once had 70,000 dollars in his retirement account. He spent it all to start Homeboys United, and then put...

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Dear Readers, Time for Spring cleaning and skill sharing!   I have been fortunate to work with a talented, highly collaborative, and passionate team in my non-profit and community partners to start a pilot skillshare program in the community…..yes, it’s passion that’s the strongest force on Earth! At the heart of community engagement is the process of building a grassroots movement involving communities and the practice of moving communities towards change. And skill-sharing, part of the asset-based community development (ABCD), is one of the effective tools to harness and leverage the individual and collective knowledge, resources and experience found within the community for sustainable development. I am looking forward to seeing multi-generational community of learning and new friendships emerging from skill-sharing. The first kick-off event will starting in May 2016 at the Kitsilano Community Centre, and I will surely keep you all posted.  For any inquiries, contact me: hondakeiko@gmail.com. Speaking of cherry blossoms, please come out to our Sakura Festival, enjoy yourself, and sense the preciousness of our connection with nature! Happy Spring! Keiko Honda Editor-in-Chief Chair, Community Engagement Committee    ...

By Lara-Sophie Boleslawsky (Vancouver Arts Colloquium Society) Photos by Noriko Nasu-Tidball Walking in, one is greeted by a jovial atmosphere; the afternoon sunlight filters into the room, illuminating the dark wood of the piano at the front of the room. There is a small buzz, with the audience waiting in anticipation for the concert to begin. We begin with the classics: Jane Perrett’s soprano voice is soars as she sings ‘Quando Me’n Vo’, teasing her lover as Musetta in Puccini’s La bohème. It is then Gerard Satamian’s turn to take the stage, and the tone immediately shifts as he laments love in Poulenc’s heartbreaking ‘Les chemins de l’amour’. Each performer embodies not only their respective characters, but also the songs themselves. It is a truly magnificent spectacle, and the brief intermission is needed, if only to refresh after the emotional outpour of each performance.      Indeed, we are treated not only to Jane Perrett and Gerard Satamian’s brilliant voices, but also to breathtaking piano instrumentals by Jane’s son, David. Performing classics such as Chopin’s ‘Prelude in B Minor’ and Beethoven’s first movement of ‘Leichte Sonate in G Major’ he brings a voice to these songs, flitting about the room as if truly alive.      Following the intermission is a brief performance by mezzo soprano Ayako Komaki. She beams brightly before beginning her performance, only to transform before our very eyes, becoming the tragic Queen Dido, mourning her own lamentable future whilst singing ‘When I am Laid in Earth’. The intensity present in the room soon reconstructs, with Jane Perrett’s rendition of the classic Disney tune, ‘When You Wish Upon A Star’, whereupon everyone is urged to join in. Continuing along this nostalgic frame, Gerard Satamian ends the concert with ‘If I Were A Rich Man’...