Audio Description: ( ♪ mysterious hypnotic music ♪ ) – Electronic and ambient with elements of indie and synthwave. Energy is described as Medium. The description was generated by Musilio.

Exhibition: Mapping Ancestries through Sound, Space and Time, Stina Baudin, 2024

Transcript:

0:00 – [Kay, grunt gallery: ]

Welcome to Mapping Ancestry through Sound, Space, and Time by Stina Baudin, curated by Whess Harman. This exhibition runs from October 3 to November 17, 2024, here at grunt gallery.

Each textile piece in the exhibition is paired with an audio track by Markus Floats, meant to be listened to as you engage with the artwork. At the welcome station, you’ll find Yoto Mini Players—white cubes with large orange buttons. Headphones are available in the first drawer, and an orange carry case can be used if you prefer to wear it on a strap. 

To listen, you can use the Yoto player by following the pictorial chapter guide near each piece. Alternatively, you can scan the QR code, or tap the RFID tag with your phone. Each track lasts about 10 minutes, and full-text transcripts are available in the binder at the welcome station.

• Flag 1 ( Mapping Ancestry )
• Flag 2 ( Mapping Ancestry )
• Flag 3 ( Mapping Ancestry )

Transcript:

0:00 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic music ♪]

5:28 – [ Saidiya Hartman: ] But just kind of pushing against that, and there’s the figure of the ensemble, and I like to think of the ensemble as being something just akin to an assembly, but the chorus was also a way of, you know, pushing against a certain kind of masculine configuration of ensemble as the privileged domain of blunt sociality.

5:52 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

9:52 – [♪ fades ♪]

9:55 -[♪ abrupt percussive hits ♪]

10:00 – [♪ ends ♪]

Transcript:

0:00 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic music ♪]

0:09 – [ Miriam Makeba: ] Now it is absurd to say that we Africans were not in Africa when white people first came. And secondly, the conqueror writes history. They came, they conquered, and they wrote. Now you don’t expect people who came to invade us to write the truth about us. They will always write negative things about us. And they have to do that because they have to justify their invasion in all of the countries.

0:43 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

1:28 – [Jean-Claude Fignolé  ( translated from Haitian Creole): ] We discovered that to link Spiralism to other Caribbean currents, it was necessary to link it to the traditions of Afro-Indian storytelling due to their exploded narratives, or what we called “total narratives.” This means the capacity to simultaneously be a novel, poetry, music, etc., encompassing everyone in the narrative follow-through.

2:16 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

3:58 – [ Jean-Claude Fignolé  ( translated from Haitian Creole): ] In the Caribbean and Africa, the negritude current was marching on triumphantly, although it was denounced as racist by its detractors. At the same time, there was a literary movement in France known as “Noveau Roman,” which claimed to shatter the presence of a direct subject or central character in the novel, thereby disconnecting the account of the story with its principal subject. This led to an explosion within the traditional form of narration to the point whereby the death of the subject within it was proclaimed. At this time, we were also witness to the emergence of the Third World between two hegemonic blocs. In other words, Capitalist and Communist, wherein space for the emergence of a Third World Man was created and allowed to emerge. We in Haiti, therefore, decided that we cannot accept to not be actors, to not be central characters. In addition, we decided this affirmation was not only relevant to just any story but principally pertinent to a story to be created and written together. At this moment, we decided that the death of the character, central to the story, signified the death of the Third World Man as a central actor. So it is between the two postures. In other words, the explosion of the narrative and the death of the subject, we decided to maintain the explosion of the narrative in accordance with its correspondence to Afro-Indian storytelling traditions while rejecting the death of a man in order to affirm our presence as historical actors. From this perspective, Spiralism leaned on Third World ideology based on the solidarity of the Third World to the “exploited man,” and as such, it was grounded philosophically in a Marxist current derived from the fact that all young Haitian intellectuals of the day were from the left. 

6:32 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

7:00 – [ Saidiya Hartman: ] An example for me, because I think that there’s a lot of stuff that we need to refuse that every day we just say yes to, so I wanted to say, look, wow, they have so much to teach us. And they were also so prescient that they understood what was being laid out as a set of reasonable alternatives or well-trodden paths for some hope of upward mobility. They realized that there was actually no future in that when people were trying to convince them otherwise. And often, too often, we say yes to things even when we know that there’s no future and it’s a dead end; it’s exhausting.

7:50 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

8:28  [ Saidiya Hartman: ] You know, Morrison makes this distinction between fact and truth. And so there’s, you know, all of this kind of social forces that go into the production of fact, and often fact is simply as we are, you know, living into, is simply fiction endorsed with state power.

8:50 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

10:00 [♪ ends ♪]

Exhibition: Mapping Ancestries through Sound, Space and Time, Stina Baudin, 2024

Transcription by Dustyn Krasowski-Olmstead, 2024

Transcript:

0:00 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic music ♪]

0:11 – [ Torkwase Dyson: ] In the slippery wetness of the water laying, against the pressure of movement, against the pressure of his own body. So, the physicality of that architecture, the ship architecture itself, in relationship to the breathless matter of this individual crawling through this hole. Thinking about, you know, in the work, I think about pressure, I think about distance, I think about pulling things tightly. And I can’t imagine what that may have been like. But for me, imaging, and imaging, as you talk about imaging in your book, in particular, sort of thinking about the round, thinking about geometry in that way, and thinking about how that shape allowed a kind of something that I can’t even fathom as a diver myself. I can’t even fathom that kind of moment. But also connecting that moment to Box Brown making the hole, right? And Harriet Jacobs is making the hole, and understanding that the wood, the touch, the grain, the materiality of the self emancipation, right? Is constant, right? And to think about what it means to have, make work in relationship to that materiality, the rope, the knot, the dragging, the pressing, while thinking about spatiality, right? So there was a moment where he’s in the hole, right? And then he’s out in this vast water, then he’s back in, right? What about time in that way, right? And these are things that I’m just trying to think about in, in terms of making objects that keep me in relationship to those consdering. Keep me into a relationship to considering what that time, and space, and objectness, right? So then the work becomes a way that I am, you know, I bind myself to these histories to get at and otherwise, right? To get at a sort of understanding of the critical moment of the now but then future, the kind of understanding of senses and sensoria around these histories that I think are paid so little attention to. So Black sensoria, the haptic and what, how we, you know, how we know? You know, how we know through touch and feeling.

2:40 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

2:41 – [ Alice Walker: ] We’re walking around on the Earth that is actually literally full of ancestors, and we never pay any attention to this fact. I mean, most people don’t. It is as if all of the Indigenous knowledge, all of the Indigenous wisdom, all of the Indigenous everything, is just something that we completely discredit as if it never existed. And this is a deep impoverishment of us as modern people. That’s probably why we walk around looking like we are zombies. I know what it feels like to be supported by ancestors. I lean on them all the time. These are the people who have gotten me as far in life as I am, and that they’re very – they’re there.

4:30 – [♪ mysterious hypnotic electronic continues ♪]

9:57 [♪ fades ♪]

Exhibition: Mapping Ancestries through Sound, Space and Time, Stina Baudin, 2024

Transcription by Dustyn Krasowski-Olmstead, 2024

Position: MPCAS Curator 

Project: Mount Pleasant Community Art Screen

Reporting to: Programming Team

Hours: 15 hours per week. Occasional evening and weekend work. Flexible schedule. This is a 1 year contract position.

Remuneration: $27.00/hr

Start date: July 1, 2023

About the Mount Pleasant Community Art Screen and grunt gallery:
The Mount Pleasant Community Art Screen (MPCAS) is a 7m x 4m outdoor urban screen located at the intersection of Kingsway and Broadway in Vancouver on the side of the Independant building, a mixed use commercial and residential tower. The screen is maintained and programmed by grunt gallery, and aspires to enrich and engage the public through the presentation of media art that reflects the diversity, historical richness and creative capacity of the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood.

Through an annual submission call, commissions, co-productions and partnerships, the screen features works for and about Mount Pleasant and the people who live here alongside programming that connects these local issues to global practices, ideas and concerns. The MPCAS is a place for media and interactive content both home-grown and far-flung, presented through the distinctive lens of the neighbourhood.

grunt gallery has been a part of the Mount Pleasant community since 1984 and has seen tremendous changes over this period. During the past 40 years the area has gone from one of Vancouver’s poorest neighbourhoods to one of its richest. This transition hasn’t been easy and the social costs of thirty years of gentrification have been intensifying, particularly with the Broadway Plan and incoming skytrain stations reshaping the area. MPCAS has been born of this tension and we seek to acknowledge both the Mount Pleasant that is being forced out and the new communities coming into being.

General Description of the Position: 

The MPCAS Curator works with the grunt programming team and Program Director, as well as  community partners to develop contacts and strengthen relationships between the MPCAS and its partners in the community.

The MPCAS Curator is a planner, implementer, and relationship builder who is responsible for maintaining existing programming and developing new initiatives that reflect the multiple and diverse communities in Mount Pleasant. They will take the lead in the curatorial vision of the screen, coordinating our annual submission call while cultivating partnerships with other art organizations and local festivals year-round. We expect this to take the shape of developing new projects and applying for funding opportunities to support them and in in-kind exchanges with community partners.

We are looking for a candidate who prioritizes developing local relationships and familiarizing themselves with the neighbourhood’s history, businesses, community organizations and art communities. They will work with grunt staff to develop strategies that bring community content to the screen, promote visibility and encourage broad access.

The MPCAS Curator is expected to work independently, but will play a key role in the grunt programming team, alongside the Program Director, curatorial staff and the technical manager.

Required Competencies:

Collaborative
Reliable
Committed
Independent
Community Minded
Resourceful
Creative
Flexible
Social
Communication

General Responsibilities: 

• Work with staff and committees to develop strategies and enhance contacts within the Mount Pleasant community in conjunction with the MPCAS’s vision for programming and the neighbourhood.
• Design and implement a curatorial vision that builds strong, long-term, and loyal relationships with audience members, supporters and communities.
• Develop programming for the MPCAS engaging heritage and cultural communities as well as community groups, seniors, youth and more.
• Continue to develop relationships with partners and collaborators from the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations as well as the wider Indigenous communities of Vancouver.
• Collaborate and communicate with neighbourhood organizations to develop activities that promote the MPCAS’s presence (eg. community events and festivals such as Car Free Day, and organizations such as the Mount Pleasant Neighbourhood House, Tonari Gumi, the Native Education College and many others). Previous partnerships have included limited run screenings with the Capture Photography Festival, VQFF, Room Magazine and other community based programming.
• Create content around programming and community engagement for the MPCAS’s social media and website. Collaborate with grunt’s Communications Manager as required.
• Update the MPCAS website and internal content management system.

Required Skills and Education: 

• Awareness of and experience working within the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood.
• Strong knowledge and commitment to bridge-building within diverse community frameworks.
• Strong written and oral communication skills; ability to target outreach materials to varying audiences and age groups; ability to listen, and bring strong awareness of interpersonal/ intercultural dynamics.
• Good understanding of artist-run culture.
• Ability to (or interest in developing skills to) write grants, and find alternative funding support for innovation.
• Post-secondary education or experience in community engagement, public programming, communications, activist organizing or arts-related disciplines is an asset.
• Some knowledge of media art practices and production requirements.
• Familiarity with Media and Video Arts.
• Some knowledge of public art (and public messaging in relation to art in the public realm) an asset.
• Some experience with social media content creation and CMS/Wordpress.
• Familiarity or interest in project development and management.
• Ability to perform well in a team environment and collaborate with others.
• Strong organizational skills, able to identify and prioritize tasks with minimal supervision, work independently, and take initiative.
• Resourceful, hands-on and pro-active.
• Proven ability to act in an assertive but professional manner and to represent oneself and an organization in a positive manner.
• Ability to work flexible hours.

Ethics and the Workplace: 

• The MPCAS curator must be invested in open communication and collaboration.
• Acknowledging that most accepted definitions of professionalism have racist origins, the MPCAS curator will be able to be present and engage in their work in a manner that is dedicated and as consistent as possible.
• We envision this role as one best served by working artists and creatives with their own on-going practices to consider this role; we hope to develop a working relationship wherein artists can exist both as artists and arts workers, and will be in conversation with the successful applicant on what grunt can do to support their on-going career.
• As a junior position, we strongly encourage emerging artists and curators to apply.

To apply: Please send cover letter and resume to Whess Harman by email at whess@grunt.ca

Application Deadline: May 26, 2023 @ 5:00 pm PDT

You are invited to grunt gallery’s memorial for Hillary Wood (December 25, 1948 – March 2, 2023), a dear friend, founding member, and beloved presence in the Vancouver arts community. All are welcome.  

The memorial will take place at grunt gallery located at 350 East 2nd Ave, Unit 116 in Vancouver (street parking available) on Sunday April 30th, 2023, from 1pm – 4pm. Remarks at 1:30pm, open to all. Drinks and light refreshments provided.

There will be a virtual gathering option as well. Please click here to join via Zoom, and enter the passcode 156732 for access.

grunt will prepare a slideshow presentation with images of Hillary and her artwork. If you have any digital images you would like to contribute please email them to Dan Pon, dan@grunt.ca. If you have any hard copy images you would like digitized and included please email Dan to make arrangements as soon as possible. You are also welcome to send quotes, memories, or other written tributes which will be included as text slides to the email above.

Masks are encouraged and provided on request.

Image: Hillary Wood with Joe Haag, Aiyyana Maracle, Edmund Melynchuk, Kempton Dexter, Barbara Seamon, Polly Bak, Phillip Beeman, and Glenn Alteen, For the Life of Art March/Arts Awareness Day, 1993. Photo by Pat Beaton.

grunt gallery Tactile Residency 2022-2023

The tactile residency is a dynamic opportunity that provides space for participants to explore non-visual and tactile (touch) responses to works in the grunt gallery exhibition space and archives. grunt gallery offers the tactile artist residency as a co-learning opportunity for its staff and community to explore how tactility can exist and play-out within predominantly visual spaces where touching and interacting with work is discouraged, forbidden, or not considered. For this prototype year,  we welcomed two local artists, Johnny “Tiger” Tai and Jen Yakamovich, as tactile artists-in-residence to engage with us in conversation around what it means to be non-visual within a visual arts community.

For the past season, we have been in conversation about the artists’ practices, what it means to be paid to work behind the scenes, and how to share knowledge without it being extractive; something that is common when institutions reach out for insight from the Disabled community. This program was designed to encourage artist growth and confidence, while being in conversation about the real barriers facing non-visual artists within visual arts spaces. We have benefitted as much, if not more, in having access to working Disabled artist, and hope to continue this program next year. In particular, inviting our residency artists to our accessibility committee and programming meetings has allowed us both to have candid conversations about access, but also provides artists a behind-the-scenes look at the structures within artist run centres so as to inform artists of what happens when they apply or submit work to exhibition spaces.

In April 2023, grunt gallery will be hosting a closed conversation, facilitate and lead by Carmen Papalia, around navigating the visual arts world non-visually. Invited participants from the Blind, Non-Visual, partially sighted, and low-vision communities will gather to discuss. Following this closed event, an edited transcript will be provided to the participants, and should we receive consent, the transcript may be shared more widely.

Building on the knowledge that has been shared by Jen and Johnny in this inaugural year, we hope to continue to support the growth of local Disabled and Blind, DeafBlind, Low Vision, and Partially Sighted artists and community members in an inclusive and supportive way.

Johnny Tai  (1982) is a Blind, partially deaf, emerging artist, musician and martial artist currently living in Richmond, British Columbia. He was born in Taiwan and immigrated to Canada in 1989. He went blind due to Steven Johnson syndrome at the age of three and lost hearing in his right ear shortly thereafter. His first foray into art was at a young age, recreating everyday objects (vacuums, tables, animals, etc) out of Lego, clay and other materials. In adolescence, he branched out with aluminum etchings and three-dimensional works in clay, wood and soapstone, leading to a scholarship from the Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design (ECU) in 2000. He studied Psychology at Kwantlen Polytechnic University (KPU) and received a Social Work degree from the University of British Columbia (UBC) in 2006. Due to his visual and hearing impairment, tactility is a core function of how he navigates the world. His current artistic practice focuses on tactile drawings on metal, and in making music. You may visit his website at johnnytiger.com

Jen Yakamovich (1993) is a drummer, composer, and improviser currently living and working on Coast Salish territories (Vancouver). Drawing from creative music and movement lineages and the environmental humanities, she  explores the relationship between sound, embodiment, and social ecology. She performs under the solo moniker “Troll Dolly.” She regularly plays drums for Niloo Farahzadeh, Walgrin (Tegan Wahlgrin), and Miguel Maravilla.  You may visit her website at jenyakamovich.com

NOTICE OF ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

Visible Art Society (dba grunt gallery)

DATE: Thursday September 29, 2022
TIME: 6:30pm
LOCATION: Online
Join Zoom Meeting: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/86067695351

Meeting ID: 860 6769 5351

ADDRESS: #116 – 350 East 2nd Avenue, Vancouver, BC, V5T 4R8, Mainspace Building

Please join us for a fast and fun Annual General Meeting of the Visible Art Society (dba grunt gallery) by Zoom.  We will be meeting for the following purposes:

1. Presentation of the 2021 – 2022 audited financial statements
2. Board of Directors’ report
3. Program Director and Operations Director reports
4. Election of the society’s officers

Click here to access the 2022 AGM package. 

As a member, you are invited to attend virtually and vote.  If you are not a member, please go to grunt.ca and sign up for our newsletter by 5:00pm on September 28, 2022. There is no cost to membership.