Join us on Friday, January 27 for an evening of film, photography, drama, dance, and discussion at the Social Justice Research Institute’s third annual Arts, Archives and Affinities event, held at the Marilyn I. Walker School of fine and Performing Arts. Dr. David Fancy of the Department of Dramatic Arts will be speaking about “Growing Together,” his collaborative theatre production with migrant labourers.
The Marilyn I. Walker School will be participating in the university’s wellness initiatives of offering massage therapy and therapy dogs to our students. We will be hosting a series of “Wellness Wednesdays” for our students and have booked space for this initiative on the following dates at the Marilyn I. Walker School:
We hope our students will take advantage of this free offering!! Be well!
free, free massages, lobby, MW151, puppy room, wellness, Wellness Wednesdays
Categories: Announcements, Current Students, Faculty & Instructors, News
VISA instructor Amy Friend’s piece, “Hands on Water”, is featured today on the Instagram page of the Museum of Modern Art as part of their MoMA R&D Salon 19: Modern Death. Have a look! Congratulations, Amy!
Amy Friend, instagram, MoMA, museum of modern art, VISA, visual arts
Categories: Faculty & Instructors, News
(Source: The Brock News, Wednesday, January 11, 2017. Photo: Sharilyn J. Ingram, Assistant Professor in the Brock University’s Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture and former director of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, was recently appointed Chair of the Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board.)
The Canadian Cultural Property Export Review Board is now being led by a Brock University faculty member.
Sharilyn J. Ingram, Assistant Professor in the Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture and former director of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, was recently appointed Chair of the federal board for a three-year term.
The independent administrative tribunal, which reports to Parliament through the Minister of Canadian Heritage, determines whether cultural property is of outstanding significance and national importance.
The board aims to protect and preserve significant examples of Canada’s artistic, historic and scientific heritage.
Ingram’s appointment was announced Jan. 7 by Canadian Heritage Minister Mélanie Joly.
Congratulations, Sharilyn!
The brand new Mahtay café is now open on the third floor student lounge area! Hours of operation are:
Mon – Fri from 8:30 am to 2pm.
Please note that the permanency of this café will be based on its success here at the Marilyn I. Walker School. So take some time on your breaks to get up there and enjoy reasonable prices and excellent food and drinks!
The location is 3rd floor at the south end of the building (lobby), take that elevator to the 3rd floor (not connected to the 3rd floor at the other end) or take stairwell “D”.
mahtay cafe, student lounge
Categories: Announcements, Current Students, Faculty & Instructors, News
Brock University Visual Arts assistant professor Amy Friend’s work is featured in the Main Exhibition at the Donggang International Photo Festival in South Korea.
Exhibition Overview:
A total of 14 photographers around the world are participating in this exhibition, which will revolve around the theme of ‘Heaven on Earth’.
(Source: alliance-francaise.ca)
Alliance française de Toronto invites you to the lecture of Professor Derek Knight, dedicated to Le Corbusier’s work. On Wednesday, March 16, at 7 pm in the Spadina Theatre. Free entrance.
Le Corbusier worked particularly in the town planning and the design. He is known to be the inventor of the “Unité d’habitation” (house unit), concept on which he began to work in the 1920s, expression of a theoretical reflection on the collective accommodation. His conception envisages in the same building every community facilities necessities in life: day nursery, laundry, swimming pool, school, businesses, library, places of meeting.
Derek Knight is an Associate Professor in the Department of Visual Arts at Brock University. He teaches 20th century European and North American art history, Contemporary Art and theory, and contributes to the MA program in Studies in Comparative Literatures and Arts. He is Director of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, in St Catherine.
The lecture will be held in English.
Derek Knight, Le Corbusier, visual arts
Categories: Faculty & Instructors, News
(Source: The Brock News, Monday, March 7, 2016 | by Cathy Majtenyi)
While researching the history of animal rights, Brock visual arts professor Keri Cronin realized that women did much of the advocacy work in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
She also noticed that, quite often, there was little information about these women. For example, it was common for a woman’s first name to be omitted from the record, with only her married name – Mrs. Smith, for example – being listed.
That got Cronin and her friend, award-winning photographer Jo-Anne McArthur, thinking.
“What we’ve noticed again and again is that it’s always women on the ground, raising the money, holding the bake sales, protesting, and it’s usually men at the head of the organizations,” says Cronin. “This is true today and obviously in the 19th century, too.”
“We thought, ‘all these women are doing amazing work and they’re not getting credit, they’re not being celebrated.’ We want to change that.”
So Cronin and McArthur created The Unbound Project: Women on the Front Lines of Animal Advocacy, to “recognize and celebrate women at the forefront of animal advocacy, in both a contemporary and historical context.”
To help make it happen, the UK-based cosmetics company Lush recently granted the pair $20,000 from the company’s North American Charitable Giving Program. Cronin and McArthur have also received funding from the New England Anti-Vivisection Society, the Culture & Animals Foundation, and A Well-Fed World.
To put together the multi-media and book project, Cronin and McArthur are travelling around the world interviewing, photographing and filming some 200 women in a wide range of professions and walks of life.
We want to talk about how people in all kinds of careers are making a difference and that activism doesn’t just take one form.
British primatologist Dr. Jane Goodall, with a long history of conducting pioneering chimpanzee research in Tanzania, is among the higher-profile women being featured.
But Cronin and McArthur’s main focus is on “local grassroots women, unsung heroes who make the world a kinder, gentler place for animals,” says Cronin.
“When people think of activism, they imagine a certain thing: they imagine someone out there protesting or chaining themselves to a fence,” says Cronin. “We actually want to change a bit of that story. We want to talk about how people in all kinds of careers are making a difference and that activism doesn’t just take one form.”
Unbound has its roots in a long-term project, We Animals, that McArthur created to expose animal abuses around the world. As she did this, McArthur came across women working passionately and unceasingly to end such cruelty.
“Sharing stories of inspiration and change not only gets people excited about taking part but gives them hope, something to hold onto, whereas my work on the brutal treatment of animals and factory farming can leave someone with a sense of paralysis,” says McArthur.
“This project about women is going to do the opposite: it’s going to say, ‘here’s the problem, here are the wonderful people working on this problem, here’s how you can do this kind of thing as well.’”
The duo is into the second year of their project, having already traveled to several continents and connecting with networks in North America and abroad.
animal rights, keri cronin, research, women
Categories: Faculty & Instructors, In the Media, News
Associate Professor of Art History & Studio and Director of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts Derek Knight will be delivering a lecture on the work of Le Corbusier at the Alliance française de Toronto. For more information on this lecture click HERE.
Wednesday, March 16
7:00 pm
Spadina Theatre
24 spadina road
M5R 2S7 Toronto, ON
Canada
Alliance Française, Derek Knight
Categories: Faculty & Instructors, News
(Source: The Brock News, Thursday, March 3, 2016 | by Erica Bajer)
Professor Karen Fricker has spent the last three years training Brock University students to critique theatre.
She will soon be practising what she teaches after landing the role of theatre critic for the Toronto Star, Canada’s largest, most-read newspaper.
The Brock University Dramatic Arts assistant professor isn’t new to the theatre beat – her resume includes 25 years of experience for outlets including The Guardian and Variety. She was also the founding editor-in-chief of Irish Theatre Magazine, a publication that operated from 1998-2014.
At the Star, Fricker will be reviewing major show openings in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Areas as well as writing feature articles.
“It just feels like an un-dreamed-of privilege to get to have a platform like this at this point in my career,” she says. “Toronto is a really exciting and mature theatre market.”
The theatre scene in the GTHA is rich with plenty of interesting things happening – from major musicals to performance art to original Canadian plays in storefront theatres.
Fricker can’t wait to see them all and share her observations and critiques with Canadians.
And, she’s looking forward to sharing her excitement with students, whose critiques are published on Brock’s DARTcritics.com blog. She started the blog in 2013 to offer students an avenue to be published and edited.
She plans to make sure her students benefit from the work she’s doing for the Star.
“Students will gain a strong sense of connection and understanding of how professional arts criticism works,” she says.
“They will have the opportunity to see their professor go through the same exercises they do and maybe even give her some feedback.”
Fricker says she’s grateful to be working at Brock both because it’s an exciting time in the arts with the opening of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts and because it’s a university that encourages professors to pursue their creative interests.
“Being a creator, being an artist, has equal standing to being a scholar and producing peer-reviewed research,” she says.
Fricker says the Star opportunity fits her creative and research interests of questioning arts criticism in the digital age.
“I consider this a part of my research,” she says. “It’s a time of extraordinary possibility and growth for criticism.”
DARTcritics.com is a response to that research interest and the question of how to turn an earnest blog into trusted criticism. The site has grown from a space for outstanding reviews by third-year students as part of their coursework to include reviews and features by students and recent graduates who are paid for their work. Fricker hopes that the site will continue to blossom into a year-round source of quality arts criticism in Niagara.
Fricker’s role with the Star was announced Thursday. She’s looking forward to reviewing her first production for the paper this month.
Karen Fricker, The Brock News, Toronto Star
Categories: Faculty & Instructors, In the Media, News