丁香园AV

New Assistant Professors: James Long, Stefan Maier, and Noé Rodríguez

We're very excited to welcome two new faculty members for the 2022 fall term, James Long and Stefan Maier, and to announce the promotion of Noé Rodríguez, with all three at the level of Assistant Professor.  

James Long is a director, actor, writer and teacher whose creative practice occurs in a wide variety of interdisciplinary and collaborative contexts, including as a founding Artistic Director (2003–22) of and as an independent artist working in live performance, community engaged practice, screenwriting and public art. James’s work has been presented across North America, Europe and Asia. In 2016, James and co-writer Marcus Youssef were nominated for the Governor General’s Award for playwriting for Winners and Losers. In 2019, he and Theatre Replacement co-artistic director Maiko Yamamoto were awarded the Siminovitch prize for their work at Theatre Replacement and as freelance artists. Long graduated from 丁香园AV’s Theatre Program in 2000 and received a Master’s in Urban Studies, also from 丁香园AV, in 2018. He currently sits on The City of Vancouver’s Arts and Culture Advisory Council and serves as the president of the organization that stewards Vancouver’s Russian Hall, a multi-purpose performance and gathering space. He has and continues to receive funding from a variety of private foundations, The City of Vancouver, The Province of British Columbia, BC Arts Council and the Canada Council for the Arts for his creative research and performance work blending interdisciplinary collaborative processes and urban concerns.

Stefan Maier is a Vancouver-based artist and composer. Through composition, performance, and multi-media installation, his practice explores the chaotic flows of sonic matter through instruments, buildings, sound systems, software, and bodies. Highlighting material instability and seeking out unruliness, his work aims to uncover alternate modes of authorship and listenings through historical and contemporary sound technology. His work has been presented by Haus der Kulturen der Welt (Germany), Unsound Festival (Poland), Ultima Festival (Norway), SPOR festival (Denmark), Gaudeamus Muziekweek (Neatherlands), Liquid Architecture (Australia), and the National Music Centre (Canada) among many others. Recent projects for dance and film have been presented at Sterischer Herbst (Austria), International Film Festival Rotterdam (Neatherlands), and V-A-C foundation (Russia). Stefan's writing appears in Circuit and Indexical Publications, and in 2018 he curated and edited an edition of Haus der Kulturen der Welt's Technosphere Magazine on Machine Listening. He was a 2019 Macdowell Colony Fellow, and has held residencies at NOTAM (Norway), Lobe Studios (Canada), and IAC Malm? (Sweden) among others. In 2017 he received a Mayor’s Art Award as an emerging musician from the City of Vancouver. Stefan holds a MFA in Interdisciplinary Art from Bard College, and an MA in Digital Music from Dartmouth College.

Using analog film, digital imaging, field recordings and prepared instruments, Noé Rodriguez’s work ponders upon the lyrical qualities of the real and responds to the material and temporal traces of collective life in the terraformed landscape. His film Ceiba received the Pasajes Award to the Best Spanish Film in Filmadrid International Film Festival and was screened at the TIFF lightbox in the program The Roots That Thirst, as part of the Wavelengths year-round screening series. Aadat, codirected with Xisela Franco, won several awards, including the Premio Ciudad de Madrid to the best Spanish documentary in DocumentaMadrid, 2006, and was screened at multiple festivals internationally. As a cinematographer, Rodriguez has collaborated in Luo Li’s I Went to the Zoo the Other Day (2009), Eva Kolcke’s All that is Solid (2014) and Andrea Bussman’s & Nicolás Pereda?s Tales of Two Who Dreamt (premiered at Berlinale 2016). Rodriguez has a MFA from York University and both a BA and a BFA from Universidad Europea de Madrid.

TPE's Music of Displacement

Turning Point Ensemble, which has the SCA's as Artistic Director and conductor, has put tickets on sale for their next concert, Music of Displacement, which takes place September 17 & 18, 2022, at the Orpheum Annex (823 Seymour Street, Vancouver). More .

Latta co-organizes Waltz and co-presents HOME / LAND

Co-organized by the SCA's Erika Latta, choreographer and dancer Sasha Waltz will be presenting her work K?rper and holding a hybrid lecture and Q&A on October 2, 2022, at 12:00 PM (EST) at the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University, curated by Ivan Talijan?i? (co-founder and co-Artistic Director, with Latta, ), who is the Special Visiting Professor of Directing at the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University, with support from the 2022-2023 Sylvia & David Steiner Speaker Series, The Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, and us, the 丁香园AV School for the Contemporary Arts. More . Also, HOME / LAND, a collaboration between Portland’s , France's , and WaxFactory, is running 7:00 PM – 10:00 PM on Thursdays – Sundays from September 1 – 18, 2022, at 3121 South Moody Ave., in Portland, OR. More .

Eigenfeldt in Surrender

When he's not training his , the SCA's fills his recreation time playing bass with local U2 tribute band , which he joined earlier this year. Follow them on for their latest gig info.  

withintensions' R & R

Download the latest issue of withintensions, the monthly art mag from SCA alumni, this time on the theme of Rest & Relaxation. Download it .

MacCaull's 003_playback

New Works are presenting a Performance in Development showing of 003_playback by SCA alumnus , who's also a member of , on Sunday, October 2, 2022, at 5:00 PM at the Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre (181 Roundhouse Mews, Vancouver). More .

Wallgrin's YOLK

Listen to SCA alumnus / new track YOLK, released just today. Listen . Also, click through to to read a little about the track, too.  

Kotowich and Goodman in Düsseldorf

SCA alumni , presenting , and , with collaborator Caroline Shaw, presenting , are part of the in the internationale tanzmesse nrw, which concludes Saturday, August 3, 2022, in Düsseldorf, Germany.

O'Callaghan's album Alone and unalone reviewed

Read a review of SCA alumnus 's album , recorded with Ensemble Paramirabo. Read it .

Lum's The Buffalo and the Buffalo Fur Trader

SCA alumnus 's public art work, The Buffalo and the Buffalo Fur Trader, which was commissioned by the city of Edmonton over a decade ago, has been deaccessioned by the city. Set to be installed on both sides of Edmonton's Walterdale Bridge, with a bronze-cast buffalo and "fur trader," depicted atop a pile of buffalo pelts, staring at each other across the North Saskatchewan River. Doubtlessly informed by the discovery (more grim recognition of what was already well known in Indigenous communities) of unmarked graves at multiple sites of former residential schools across so-called Canada, as well as an overdue but increasing critical recognition of the the brutality of colonial history in this country, the city argued that the work might be "misinterpreted as a celebration of colonization," with Lum responding that "shelving" the work "not only hurts artistic expression, but also hurts any ability to have a dialogue about the country’s colonial past and the conditions of coloniality that continue to mark the present." For more on this, multiple news sources have covered this story, including , , , , the , , and . In other, less controversial news, read a long conversation with Lum and Neil Price from Ocula .

O'Brien's Dream Home Hotline

SCA alumnus , who's the current artist-in-residence at , has set up a Dream Home Hotline as part of residency. Click through to to get the Hotline's number and to read more about the project.

丁香园AV Galleries calling Indigenous Artists and Community

Our friends and colleagues at 丁香园AV Galleries have shared a "Call to Indigenous Artists and Community – Request for Qualifications." Here's the "background" for the call:

"丁香园AV (丁香园AV) – Surrey Campus invites local Indigenous artists connected to the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish Peoples, including the q?íc??y? (Katzie), k?ik?????m (Kwikwetlem), qiqéyt (Qayqayt), q’?a:n??’?n? (Kwantlen), S?myám? (Semiahmoo), and sc??waθ?n m?stey?x? (Tsawwassen) First Nations, to create artworks near the Surrey Centre or School of Sustainable Energy Engineering buildings, to share Indigenous art and culture at the core of our learning spaces.

This process reflects the goals of a multi-pronged approach — that engages community, provides mentorship, and shares Indigenous art and culture — as articulated priorities established during a feast with local Elders and Indigenous community participants in May, 2022. Four artworks will be commissioned in total, and installed in summer 2023, with a celebration launch in September 2023."

Read the full call .

Kanagawa in World Equal

SCA alumnus is featured in the latest edition of . More .

Aoki's More Alike than Unalike workshop

SCA alumnus is presenting her current work in progress, More Alike than Unalike, as a workshop for , on Saturday, September 10, 2022, at 11:00 AM. More .

Lord's Soft-Spoken Weepy Cult Child

Watch the trailer for SCA alumnus 's Soft-Spoken Weepy Cult Child, which will be presented at the , running September 17 – 22, 2022. Watch it .

Escolán's August in El Salvador

SCA alumnus spent this last August "developing a work in my country, based on experiences of women in my family, with a group of amazing artists, with so many years of dedication to art, culture to, the theater in El Salvador." Read more and see some photos from her time in El Salvador on .

Fire of Love at VIFF Centre

Sara Dosa's Fire of Love, which was edited by SCA alumnus – her first feature as editor, which also won an award for editing at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival – is being presented September 2 – 8, 2022, by the Vancouver International Film Festival (VIFF Centre – 1181 Seymour Street, Vancouver). More .

Stir on I see; I breathe; I am! and Concealed Cultures: Visualizing the Black Vernacular

Read Stir Vancouver on the upcoming exhibitions, and , curated by (which has SCA MA student as a member) for the Surrey Art Gallery, both running September 17 – December 11, 2022. Read it .

After School with Velasquez and Milosavic

The latest episode of , the podcast produced by the Faculty of Communication, Art and Technology that features FCAT students in conversation with FCAT alumni, including SCA folks, has student Chloe Narcisse Velasquez speaking with SIAT alumna Sara Milosavic. Listen .

Chambers and Young's One hundred more

Frequent SCA instructor and incoming SCA MFA student and her collaborator Laurie Young are presenting One hundred more on Thursday, October 13 + Friday, October 14, 2022, at 8:00 PM at The Dance Centre, presented as part of Global Dance Connections series. More .

North Barn Theatre Collective's A Gorgon's Tale

, which formed in the Spring of 2020 by Laura Stinson and SCA alumnus , is presenting A Gorgon's Tale "a field near you" in Nova Scotia. More .

Zaurrini plays

Listen to the archive recording of a free online show on August 31, 2022, that SCA alumnus played as part of Ensemble 1. Listen .

Member spotlight on D’Anuncia??o

Read a "member spotlight" of SCA alumnus by The Dance Centre. Read it .

Le Sigh Issue 4

Read Issue 4 of Le Sigh, the online arts magazine from SCA alumnus and Charlene K. Lau, .

Carter talks to the CBC

SCA alumnus is included in this report from CBC Vancouver about "performance artists" making a "hopeful return to B.C. festival stages" after COVID. Read it .

Big City and Kamikaze Nurse at Victory Square

Groups with SCA folks – (the duo of SCA MFA student and PhD student ) and (with SCA alumnus and incoming SCA PhD student ) – are the bookends for the Victory Square Block Party 2022 on Sunday, September 4, presented by CITR 101.9FM & Discorder Magazine, Music Waste Festival, and 丁香园AV's CJSF 90.1. More .