Programs & Events
Programs & Events
at Centre A, 229 East Georgia St.
Free Admission
As various pipeline debates continue to rage on in British Columbia, Centre A is honoured to screen the late Jesse Nishihata’s Inquiry Film: A Report on the MacKenzie Valley Pipeline (1977) in conjunction with the Nikkei National Museum and Cultural Centre’s current exhibition Jesse Nishihata: Visual Storyteller. An independent production, The Inquiry Film is considered one of Nishihata’s most important works. Highlighting First Nations voices, this un-narrated documentary provides a visual report of the Mr. Justice Thomas R. Berger Inquiry into the social, economic and environmental impacts of a proposed pipeline in the Western Arctic region of the Mackenzie Valley.
Nishihata’s Inquiry Film is a prescient film to screen, in terms of its representation of the artistic practice of a member of the Japanese Canadian community, and perhaps most importantly in its present contribution to a number of vital and ongoing conversations of relevance to the Asia-Pacific Region, of which British Columbia and Canada are key participants. Namely, how we work together through our colonial inheritance and, how, as cultural beings, we contemplate the opportunities and consequences of our energy choices.
Some opening remarks will be shared by Ms. Drew Ann Wake, a former CBC journalist who covered the MacKenzie Valley Pipeline Inquiry and acted as a researcher on Nishihata’s Inquiry Film. Currently, she is curator of the Inquiry exhibit a travelling exhibit about the Berger Inquiry that offers a viewing opportunity to school groups in communities across Canada.
This event is occurring in collaboration with The Nikkei National Museum and Cultural Centre and the generous cooperation of Mr. Nishihata’s family.
Please join us! Doors open at 6:30, screening begins at 7pm. Discussion to follow.
PRESS COVERAGE
“Jesse Nishihata Visual Storyteller“, The Bulletin, April 2, 2014.
Artist Talk
Saturday, February 15: 2pm
at Centre A
Free Admission
Please join us for a talk with Follow Suit artists Kotama Bouabane and Henry Tsang.
Artist Curated Dinner with Henry Tsang, Andy Yan, and Gerry Shikatani
Saturday, March 8: 7pm
Members $40
General $60 (includes membership)
Only 12 seats available! To reserve a ticket, or for any questions, please email us at [email protected].
Saturday, November 16: 2pm
at Centre A
Free Admission
Please join us at Centre A on Saturday, November 16 for an artist talk with “A Chorus of Lungs” artists Leila Sujir and Maria Lantin!
Laura U Marks, Dena Wosk University Professor,
School for the Contemporary Arts, Simon Fraser University, and
Dima Alansari, film-maker, producer, community activist
in conversation with Haema Sivanesan
Saturday, October 12: 3pm
Hajra Waheed’s art practice responds to strictly imposed restrictions on photography during her years growing up in Saudi Arabia. This panel discussion examines histories of aniconism in the Arab-Islamic world, and its tense relation to visual cultures and photo-practices that are ubiquitous in the West. This discussion will consider the role of photography and film/video with relation to the rise of modernity in the Gulf region, with implications for questions of history, memory and the imagination.
Centre A & SFU’s Vancouver Office of Community Engagement host talk with Hammad Nasar, Head of Research and Programmes at the Asia Art Archieve (AAA) of Hong Kong, September 19, 2013 at SFU’s Goldcorp Centre for the Arts.
Visiting International Speaker:
Hammad Nasar, Head of Research and Programmes
Asia Art Archive, Hong Kong
Thursday, September 19, 7pm
Djavad Mowafaghian World Art Centre Room 2555
Goldcorp Centre for the Arts
Simon Fraser University
149 West Hastings Street, Vancouver.
Presented with the support of SFU Woodwards Cultural Unit, Vancity Office of Community Engagement and the Contemporary Art Society of Vancouver.
Hammad Nasar is a curator and writer, and recently moved to Hong Kong as Head of Research and Programmes at the Asia Art Archive, where he plays a strategic role in developing AAA’s collection and shaping initiatives, partnerships and programmes that generate new thinking around the material in the collection and about the art of the region. Earlier, he co-founded and was Curatorial Director of the London-based arts organization Green Cardamom. He was a Fellow of the Clore Leadership Programme, Research Fellow at Goldsmith College, and Arts Director for the UK’s Festival of Muslim Cultures (2006-07). His recent projects include: Safavids Revisited at the British Museum (2009); Where Three Dreams Cross at the Whitechapel Gallery, London (2010); Beyond the Page: Miniature as Attitude in Contemporary Art from Pakistan at the Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena, CA (2010) and Drawn from Life at Abbot Hall Gallery & Museum, Kendal, UK (2011). His ongoing curatorial projects include Lines of Control: Partition as a Productive Space (2005-ongoing) and Mashq: Repetition, Meditation, Mediation (2009-ongoing). Prior to entering the art world, Nasar worked as a management consultant and banker.
Nasar will speak on questions of geography, region and nation with insights into developments in contemporary art from West Asia or the “Middle East”, and with relation to the current exhibition at Centre A, “Minutes from a Second Story” by Hajra Waheed.
Asia Art Archive is an independent, non-profit organization dedicated to documenting the recent history of contemporary art in Asia within an international context. Founded in 2000, AAA is widely regarded as one of the world’s leading public resources for contemporary art in Asia. It continues to grow through a systematic program of research and critical engagement.
HAJRA WAHEED’S MINUTES FROM A SECOND STORY
Free Admission
Exhibition
September 13-November 2, 2013
Gallery Hours: Tuesdays – Saturdays, 11am-6pm
Montreal-based artist, Hajra Waheed, grew up in Saudi Arabia, within the gated headquarters of Saudi ARAMCO, the largest transnational oil corporation in the world. ARAMCO enforced strict restrictions on the use of photography and video, which, combined with Saudi cultural proscriptions on photography and film, has meant that there is limited documentation of this place and its history.
“Minutes from a Second Story” is a comprehensive body of work that draws on Waheed’s experiences of growing up in Saudi Arabia. The exhibition includes two major bodies of work, The Video Project (2012), a series of small format video works recently commissioned by Centre A, which reflect broadly on contemporary life in the Gulf region; and The Scrapbook Project (2010-2011) a 34 page visual diary comprised of found images, collage and drawings that provide a personal reflection on a period of Gulf history between the end of the Cold War and the beginning of the first Gulf War, during which time the artist lived in Saudi Arabia. Recollecting the memories and geographies of her childhood in ways that are part autobiographical, part imagined or partially remembered, Waheed reflects on the mood and experiences of the everyday.
Hajra Waheed completed a BFA at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2002) followed by an MA (2007) and doctoral studies at McGill University, Montreal. Her work has been included in numerous international group exhibitions, including “Lines of Control,” Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY (2012); “In the First Circle,” Fundacio Antoni Tapies, Barcelona (2011-12); “Changing Stakes: Contemporary Art Dialogues with Dubai,” Mercer Union, Toronto (2011) and “Different Abstractions,” Green Cardamom, London (2011). Her debut solo exhibition, “The Scrapbook Project” took place at Green Cardamom, London (2012). Her first major Canadian solo exhibition, “Fieldnotes and Other Backstories,” was held earlier this year at the Art Gallery of Windsor. Her work can be found in a number of permanent collections including the Museum of Modern Art, New York, the British Museum and the John Jones Collection, London.
An exhibition brochure with essay by Haema Sivanesan will be available at Centre A.
hearts and arrows by Khan Lee
Public Programming
Soap Diamond Cutting Workshop and Conversation with the Artist
Saturday June 15, 2:00 – 5:00 pm
at Centre A, 229 East Georgia St.
Free Admission
Learn how to carve clear soap into a brilliant cut diamond, with step by step instructions by the artist, Khan Lee.
All tools and supplies will be provided. Refreshments will be served during the workshop.
Limited to 20 participants! Please reserve your place by RSVP to [email protected], or call 604-683-8326 before June 14.
*Note: due to the set-up of the workshop, the video ‘hearts and arrows’ will not be available for viewing during the workshop. We apologize for the inconvenience.
