About the project

You used to call me Marie… is an epic Metis love story which begins in creation and ends in the present. The story follows Iskwewo (Woman), Napew (Man) and Mistatim (Horse) through eight interwoven historical Metis love stories as we watch the love, the loss and the fight of Treaty’s 6’s Metis women and men.

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artist

Tai Amy Grauman is Metis, Cree and Haudenosaunee from Ardrossan, Alberta. She is an actor, playwright and emerging director. Tai recently received the Metis Nation of Alberta’s award for Outstanding Youth of 2020 for the work she is doing to unravel the stories of Metis women in Treaty 6. She also received the Jessie Richardson award for Most Promising Newcomer in 2018 as well as Vancouver’s Mayor’s Emerging Theatre Artist of 2015, nominated by Margo Kane. Tai is an artistic associate at Savage Society, through which she has been developing her play You used to call me Marie… . Tai is working on commissions with Nightswimming Wiwimaw, Axis Theatre Where did all the buffalo go… and the Arts Club My father is the greatest man in the world.

Selected Acting Credits include: Honour Beat (The Grand Theatre), Thanks for Giving (Arts Club) and Battle of the Birds (Savage Society). Recent directing credits include: Pull Fest (Speakeasy Theatre) and the assistant direction of The Taming of the Shrew (Bard on the Beach).

About the project

Halt: No Distraction is a performance art installation performed by Jordan Hope Kaltenbruner that serves to give visibility to the boxes, pods, bubbles, containers, minds and bodies we live within, during quarantine times and not. Paired with fractals and poetry, the installation gives space for connection and daydreaming, places a request for personal recalibration and offers intimacy. The performance happened on April 30, 2020, with respectful peace and praise to the lands of the Kwanlin Dün First Nation and Ta’an Ta’an Kwäch’än Council.

EXCERPTS FROM PROJECTED POETRY

Imagine yourself being

In your mother’s womb

As an embryo.

Stay in the position for a while.

Ask yourself if you still wish to come out

Into the world with all the knowledge

You have of what happened to you

And how you affected others.

-Yoko Ono, Life Piece IV, Acorn

I came to Earth a small seed

I’ve changed lives many times

and here we begin again

“we begin our journey as The Child who longs to know The Self.”

Change came this spring

thank God it’s not November

but I may be more familiar with my inner darkness

because the sun is shining

where does darkness sit in your body

what’s its name?

If everything is unravelling as it should

why does it feel s o s l o w

I am frail today

I am strong today

I cried for no reason today

I am laughing today

the Earth spins holding spectrums of truth

a mother misses the child

and I miss my mother

These times are a new breed

I’ll send you the zoom link

I’ll join that workout challenge

was there any flour at the store

I saw somebody near somebody else

covid-19 is going to the dogs

it’s killing a disproportionate amount of poor people

this pandemic knows to discriminate

I don’t remember normal

it feels like I’m distracting myself

it feels like a new life

so why am I acting the same?

Listen to the sound of your voice singing yourself from one place to the next. Hear how beautiful it is.

The swans are flying overhead

I imagine I can fly and honk

to get myself a space in the V-shape

right where I know I fit

freedom floats under my wings

Rarely, if ever, are we healed in isolation. Healing is an act of communion.

-bell hooks, 1990

RESPONSES

…how it played on a loop reminded me that it’s not always continuous progress but often cyclical…

Claire Siderman, watched on IG live

…it illustrated so well these changing times and how it brings so many internal conflicts but also a sense of peace and memories…

Annie-Frederique Pierre, watched live

performance art

Jordan is sitting in a box

performing social distance

painting her nails cherry

and eating cereal

An eerie recall of

the ennui suspended

in my bedroom mirror

Moments amassed in

the shape of a day,

teetering

It’s BYOB as in

bring your own boundaries

Two metres muddled with

sandy sunbeams

on coils of wind

I tell Jordan

it’s my happiest day

in weeks

Gabrielle Plonka, Yukon

I didn’t know what to expect. The box seemed too small, the evening too cold for us to sit there and ponder living in the time of COVID-19. And I thought pondering was the last thing I wanted to do when I was spending all day every day fighting anxiety.

But then, she crawled into a glass box. Suddenly I was in tears. Suddenly the isolation and confinement that had been trapping us all were made visible. The collective experience I had been trying to avoid, it was in front of me.

She painted her nails, she ate cereal, she got bored and made faces at the glass. We watched, we talked, we huddled under blankets. The sun set. Swans flew overhead.

The best, I think, was just before she emerged. Only a few of us were left, but we were relaxed, laughing, comfortable in that park overlooking the river. It was time for it to end, but I think, if we’d had to, we could have stayed a long time.

Emily Tredger

…the slides flipped through different thoughts on our current reality […] the artist gave us a personal window into her pandemic life at home…

Selina Heyligers-Hare, watched live

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artist

Jordan is a performance artist, singer, mover and organizer. She studied performative storytelling at Quest University Canada in Skwxwú7mesh, Squamish. Her work is fuelled by a respect for humxns, a desire to reconstruct her whiteness and a feeling of praise towards the synchronicities / mysticisms of life. She likes the idea of freedom. If you want to get in touch with her, her Instagram is @johopekaltenbruner. She does not bite.

*This video was filmed on May 20, 2020.

About the project

Spooky

Claire and Gillian Clark are real life mother and daughter and live in different cities. Like so many of us during this moment, they are trying to find meaningful ways to connect while being away from each other.

Spooky is a home video made on Zoom by Claire and Gillian filmed on May 20th, 2020. They built blanket forts in their respective living rooms and came together on video call to create a story about a Queen and a Princess. They came together to talk about caring for loved ones as they are sick. They came together to talk about beginnings, middles and ends. Spooky is what Claire and Gillian made. Together.

Where Spooky was filmed

Gillian resides Tiohtià:ke/ Montreal and filmed her portion from her living room which is on the traditional land of the Anishinaabe, Huron/Wendat, Haudenosaunee and Abénaki nations. The Kanienkéha:ka Nation are now the caretakers of the land and water in Tiohtià:ke.

Claire’s part was filmed in Gillian’s childhood home, which is in Moh’kins’tis/ Calgary. This home is on the traditional territories of the Treaty 7 region of Southern Alberta. Treaty 7 includes the Blackfoot Confederacy (Siksika, Kainai, Piikani), the Tsuut’ina, the Îyâxe Nakoda Nations, the Métis Nation (Region 3), and all people who make their homes in the Treaty 7 region of Southern Alberta.

Gillian and Claire are both settlers to these beautiful places and are grateful to all past, present and future stewards of the land.

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artists

Gillian Clark – she/her – collaborator/ performer

Gillian is a multidisciplinary theatre creator and the artistic co-director of Keep Good (Theatre) Company. She resides in Tiohtiá:ke/Montreal, with a large part of her heart in K’jipuktuk/Halifax. She is a recent graduate of the National Theatre School’s playwriting program. Her work has been presented across Canada, England and India. Her plays include: The Ruins (Two Planks and a Passion Theatre), Harmony Mall (Runner-Up for the Playwrights Guild of Canada’s 2019 RBC Emerging Playwright Award), Drums and Organs (commissioned by Dalhousie University for the 2018 graduating acting class) and Let’s Try This Standing (her touring solo show and winner of Outstanding Performance at the 2017 Summerworks Performance Festival). She has held residencies with Outside the March and 2b theatre. She is also a two-time nominee for Best New Play at the Nova Scotia Robert Merritt awards. Upcoming writing projects include The Game and Adventures with Keep Good (Theatre) Company.

Claire Clark- she/her – collaborator/ performer

Originally from Grimbsy, England, Claire Clark immigrated to Canada through Pier 21. She is now a retired teacher based out of Moh’kins’tis /Calgary. Currently, Claire volunteers singing with Dementia residents in a care facility. Claire is a lifelong learner. She is part of a group called the”Calgary Association of Lifelong Learners”, which offers lectures and classes to seniors. She is studying Islam, Canadian Law, is part of an Indigenous interest group, and is taking a series of classes on meditation. Claire has always been an avid outdoors person. She enjoys snowshoeing and hiking in the Rocky Mountains. Claire shares her love of the mountains with her husband Bob, and their three children, Sandy, Peter and Gill.

Tech support was graciously offered by Bob Clark. Aka. Dad. He has too many accolades to list.

Click here to watch a recording of the live performance!

About the project

Have you ever wondered; “Is this the safest way to do this?” OR “What would actually happen when you do that?”

Vertically Unchallenged presents Puppet Safety Videos.

Do you remember all those old 20th century Safety Videos, of why Bill shouldn’t lift that heavy box? Or else he’ll hurt his back? Or why sitting at a computer for hours on end without getting up to stretch can lead to arthritis or carpel tunnel. With Puppet Safety Videos, the puppets get hurt so that you can see why not to do it that way or use and climb that ladder the correct way so you don’t fall.

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artist

Chris graduated from the National Theatre School of Canada in 2015. Using Montreal as a home base, he hasn’t stopped learning. After School Chris went to Williamstown, Massachusetts to learn more about puppetry at the New England Puppet Intensive, Programming Lighting Board Consoles with ETC, Maya introduction and Rigging with École NAD. He will continue learning and improving himself indefinitely. Before & after COVID-19 Chris was / will be working for The Segal Center as Lead Programmer with multiple Guest Lighting Designers. Currently he is working towards his own small company – Vertically Unchallenged Where he hopes to create a mixture of Puppetry and Video related content. Chris’s past design productions include; Plant Myself (Puppetry, self Created), Mutement (Puppetry, Written by Chris Wardell, Director – Hannah Kirby), Macbeth D’Apres Müller (Sylvain Belanger), The Gondoliers (Lighting Design, by Gilbert & Sullivan, Director – Stephania Bertrand).

This show will be performed live on Zoom, on June 4, 2020, 8:30 PM ET. All spots are now booked.

About the project

One Filipina. Thousands of racist internet trolls. One deep dive into the comment section. Award winning Filipina storyteller and accidental comedian Monica Ogden sheds light on activism in the age of the internet, mixed-race identity, and why white feminism is like Lays chips. From Lilang’s immigration (Grandma in Illocano), her mother’s rise to stardom as Miss Kapuskasing, to navigating racist internet comments as a feminist YouTuber, Monica finds herself in the reality of intergenerational trauma, and coming to terms with how it affects the lives of the Filipina women who raised her. Monica vs. The Internet is a multimedia storytelling stand-up show that will leave you in tears, both the laughy kind and the heart ones.

Join the award-winning creators KP Dennis and Monica Ogden for a live community talk back after the viewing of Monica vs. The Internet: Tales of a Social Justice Warrior. In this talkback we will be prioritizing BIPOC voices, reflections, and questions and speaking to our experiences of being BIPOC creators on tour, and in theatre in “Canada”. Please be advised Monica vs. The Internet has a longer content warning list than you may be accustomed to seeing, due to the nature of vitriol and oppression on the internet. This list of content warnings is available at the beginning of the recorded show, and you are welcome to step away and mute anytime you need to. Let’s take care of each other, and we will hold space for you at the end of the show.

Content Warnings: discussions of racism, sexism, misogyny, anti-blackness, anti-indigeneity, colonization, anti-asian sentiment, racist slurs, ableism swearing, rape/rape culture, intergenerational trauma, PTSD, brief mention of death

Credits
Written and Performed by Monica Ogden
Directed and Co-created by K.P. Dennis
Photos by Sortome Photography

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artist

Monica Ogden (she/they) is an award winning disabled Filipina, Polynesian, British storyteller, actor and comedian. Her Lilang migrated to Kapuskasing ON from Santa, Illocos Sur, Philippines in 1966, and Monica and her family are uninvited visitors in the unceded territories of the Lekwungen and WSANEC peoples. Her solo show Monica vs. The Internet: Tales of a Social Justice Warrior ( ★★★★★ Winnipeg Free Press, ★★★★★ Saskatoon Star Phoenix) directed by K.P. Dennis toured 6 cities across Canada in the summer of 2019, was the co-runner-up for the TD Fringe Forward Award at the Vancouver Fringe Festival, and was presented at Second City Toronto in November 2019. She is one part NickelPumpernickel (★★★★ Edmonton Journal) and a member of ColorQoded, a QT2BIPOC artist collective. She is an anti-racist activist and public speaker, past guest panelist at Sche’chulth: Decolonizing the Arts in Victoria (Primary Colours), Emerald City ComicCon, and the creator of Fistful of Feminism on YouTube. She holds a BA with distinction in Gender Studies from the University of Victoria. Her newest co-production 100 YT GUYS IN AN HOUR will be created as part of the Incubator projects at the Belfry Theatre, and the Tremors Festival with Rumble Theatre.

K.P DENNIS (they/he) (the artist formerly known as Ann-Bernice Thomas) is a black, trans-masculine, multi-disciplinary artist, producer, director, and activist. They were the 2016 Youth Poet Laureate of Victoria and are currently the artistic director of COLORQODED, QTI2POC arts collective. In 2017 they were the recipient of the VACCS Community Recognition Award, and they just finished a cross Canada tour with their critically acclaimed shows, Monica vs. the Internet & LUBDUB.

About the project

Papa Records Everything is a new Canadian play written by Chantal Dobles Gering and directed by Sarvin Esmaeili. Papa Records Everything follows the story of Giselle on their 18th birthday, trapped in a zoom call and must re-discover how to connect with family. Through music and nightmares, this story explores communication, ownership and healing.

Excerpt:

Memory of a Birth

Blurry fantasy

Movement Sequence / Pantomime – Contemporary

Song: Bajo la Luna by Holly Collis Handford

Birds chirping. Silhouette lighting.

Nannies sing in Spanish offstage.

Mother enters SL. Shadowed Figure enters SR. Both carry briefcases.

They shake hands.

Nanny enters with a baby. Followed by Grandma, Papa, and Sister.

Family portrait centre stage.

Nannies in flowing white robes dance around the family portrait.

Circular Patterns. Ceremony.

Black out.

Lights up.

Family Portrait is missing Shadowed Figure.

Shadowed Figure lurks at a distance with a briefcase.

The world distorts into a nightmare. Nannies sing a creepy lullaby.

Nannies pull around Giselle. Echoes of fragments of news report about Shadowed Figure. Nannies move like disjointed puppets. Lights flash.

Nannies are dragged away.

Stage goes black.

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This project received financial support from the National Theatre School of Canada via the Art Apart program, an emergency fund for emerging artists who are affected by physical distancing due to coronavirus (COVID-19).

About the artist

Chantal (she/they) is a queer artist in the University of British Columbia (UBC) BFA Acting Program working on the Coast Salish Territories. Chantal is a choreographer, actor, singer, dancer, writer, theatre artist, poet, feminist, and healer. Chantal’s previous training: Arts Umbrella, Musical Theatre Intensive at Arts Club, Acting and Shakespeare at the Drama Centre London, and Riotous Youth at Bard on the Beach. Chantal’s previous acting credits include Concord Floral 2017 Push Festival, One of a Kind International Children’s Festival, Centurions by Sally Stubbs, Isle Dell’arte and The Changeling at UBC. In 2018, they founded the 24-hour playwriting competition Play4Change to bridge the social gap between academic, business and theatre communities to address societal issues such as environmentalism, destructive capitalism, mental health. Chantal’s art is about sharing truth and healing.