News

  • Always loved the musical RENT!? Opening February 2nd for four performances only.

    Thursday, January 26, 2012 | By

    rent-thAlways loved the musical RENT!?  Brock Musical Theatre’s finest performers presented a fun-filled show that opened February 2nd for four performances only.

    RENT showcased the performing and producing talents of students in the Department of Dramatic Arts and the entire University community. The show was directed by Jessi Robinson with musical direction by Krystyna MacKay and choreography by Sarah Waller.  Music was performed by local band Xprime.

    Brock Musical Theatre is a university club with 19 cast members, as well as numerous production and volunteer crew members from several academic programs. BMT has been presenting music theatre to the Brock University community since 2005, showcasing such popular shows as Jesus Christ Superstar, Footloose, and Urinetown. Brock Musical Theatre president Karyn Lorence thanks the Brock University Student Union for their support of this production and BMT.

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    Categories: Current Students, Events, News

  • A New Business Incubator for students by students

    Thursday, November 24, 2011 | By

    Blueprint website

    Brock students’ union creates “Blueprint” for student success

    The Brock University Students’ Union (BUSU) today unveiled a new initiative to help student entrepreneurs turn their ideas into successful businesses.

    The BUSU Blueprint Business Incubator is a pilot project by BUSU designed to provide qualifying students with financial help and expertise in developing new enterprises.

    Applications are now being accepted for the program. All Brock students with exciting and unique business ideas are encouraged to apply.

    “As an incubator pilot program designed to further the growth of student entrepreneurs, I encourage all undergraduate students with a business idea to submit an application and witness their ideas develop and become successful,” says Daud Grewal, President of BUSU.

    “We are pleased to see our students’ union encourage and develop the entrepreneurial talents of our students,” says Jack Lightstone, President, Brock University. “We applaud efforts to incubate student-driven enterprises and turn innovative ideas into sustainable business opportunities within our region.”

    Students who submit their business proposals to the Blueprint initiative will have the opportunity to present their business ideas to, and have them critiqued and evaluated by, professional partners from Brock University, BUSU and the Niagara community.

    A team of experienced business experts will assess the applications. They will also work with students to help them present their ideas to the Blueprint Advisory Council. Successful applicants will receive business mentoring and up to $2,000 in funding.

    Blueprint is a pilot program tailored to undergraduate students at Brock. If a team of individuals wishes to submit an application, at least 50 per cent of a team must be undergraduate students studying at the University.

    To submit your ideas to BUSU’s Blueprint pilot program: www.busu.net/blueprint

    The deadline for submissions is end of day on Jan. 12, 2012.

    For more information on the BUSU Blueprint Business Incubator Pilot Program, please contact Arielle Stockdale, Research and Policy Manager (astockdale@busu.net)

    For information on becoming a partner of the BUSU Blueprint Business Incubator Pilot Program, contact Daud Grewal, President (president@busu.net)

    For media related inquiries, contact Chris Green, Manager, Marketing and Communications (cgreen@busu.net)

    The Brock University Students’ Union was established in 1970, and is a not-for-profit student organization, representing approximately 18,000 undergraduate students.

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    Categories: Current Students, News

  • Another reason to learn with us: Brock receives above-average marks in NSSE

    Wednesday, November 23, 2011 | By

    Brock University reports that the latest National Survey of Student Engagement results show senior-year undergraduates at the institution scored the university higher than both the Ontario and Canadian averages on benchmarks of active and collaborative learning, level of academic challenge, supportive campus environment, and student-faculty interaction. Brock students also exceeded provincial and national averages when asked “How would you evaluate your entire education experience at this institution?” and “If you could start over again, would you go to the same institution?” See more in the Brock News article.

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    Categories: Current Students, Future Students, News

  • General Brock’s October Soiree for 2011 a brilliant success!

    Monday, October 17, 2011 | By

    Students from the Department of Dramatic Arts along with their colleagues in the Departments of Music and Visual Arts entertained almost 350 guests and dignitaries in period costume at the General Brock’s October Soiree, held Saturday October 15, 2011.  More than $110,000 was raised, fifty percent of which after costs will accrue to scholarships in support of students in the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts.

    Douglas Kneale, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities, remarked “To judge from the comments of guests during the evening, it was universally acknowledged as the best Soiree yet, with a high degree of talent and professionalism in our re-enactors, emcee Derek Ewert, and all the singers and dancers.”

    See the Cogeco TV news item which includes on-camera interviews with several Brock spokespeople.

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    Categories: Events

  • Read all about it! the cSTAC Newsletter for 2011-12

    Sunday, October 02, 2011 | By

    cstac_newsletter_2011_th2The Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture (cSTAC) Newsletter for 2011-12 is now available for download.
    Contents include information about the interdisciplinary program and Concentrations – including the new Concentration in Cultural Management, a snapshot of some of our special courses, the lead faculty, alumni accomplishments, student awards, our community connections, and events and opportunities in the Niagara Region.

    Paper copies are available upon request from stac@brocku.ca

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    Categories: Future Students

  • Rotary Club makes donation to Brock’s downtown arts project

    Thursday, September 29, 2011 | By

    The effort to move Brock University’s Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts into downtown St. Catharines received a major boost today when the Rotary Club of St Catharines donated $100,000 to the project, the largest single gift in the club’s 91-year history.

    The announcement came at a ceremony at the vacant textile mill that will be extensively renovated and expanded to house the new school. The project is a key piece of one of the most important redevelopment initiatives ever to take place in downtown St. Catharines.

    Rotary Club President John Crossingham said his colleagues realize the Brock downtown project is a critical opportunity to invest in the city’s future.

    “Our members come from all across the community,” said Crossingham. “We’re here today to show that Brock’s project is something the community can get behind, and we hope Rotary’s decision prompts others to step up and help make this opportunity a reality.”

    Crossingham said gifts like this are possible because of the support Rotary receives for fundraising efforts such as Ribfest or the annual Rotary TV Auction, which takes place this year Nov. 24-26.

    The contribution was warmly welcomed by University officials, who see Rotary’s decision as an important public endorsement of the plan to relocate more than 500 students and faculty into the city centre, revitalizing a downtown that has been in decline for many years.

    “I can tell you that Brock is ecstatic today,” said Douglas Kneale, Dean of Humanities and a member of the team overseeing the project. “This shows the power of partnership. We recognize that this is a huge commitment for Rotary to make, and we are thrilled they are helping to make this project come true for the benefit of the entire community.”

    Due to be open in 2014, the Brock project is half of a major collaboration that will see the Walker School situated adjacent to a public Performing Arts Centre being built by the City of St. Catharines.

    For the University, moving Walker School downtown will enrich the student experience, free up much-needed space on Brock’s main campus and help spark economic and cultural renaissance across the Niagara community.

    Alongside other support, the Brock project is made possible because of $26.2 million provided by the Ontario government’s Open Ontario program to create new jobs and growth.

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    Categories: Announcements, News

  • Special performance: Which Way to the Bastille? at Rodman Hall

    Thursday, September 29, 2011 | By

    Image: Milutin Gubash, The Hotel Tito, 2010. Lambda color print (24" x 50"). Image courtesy of the artist.

    Image: Milutin Gubash, The Hotel Tito, 2010. Lambda color print (24″ x 50″). Image courtesy of the artist.

     

    MILUTIN GUBASH
    The Hotel Tito
    September 16 – December 30, 2011
    Opening Reception: September 15, 2011, 7 -9 pm
    Curated by Shirley Madill

    In collaboration with Musee d’art de Joliette

    Special performance:  Which Way to the Bastille?
    Following the premier on September 15 the second of eight short performances by students of the Department of Dramatic Arts (DART) occurs September 23, 2011 after 12 noon. Tanisha Minson and Dylan Mawson, senior students in the DART program have collaborated with the artist and faculty of DART to create a brief interpretation of the text during the course of the exhibition.  The performance will function as a dramatic evocation of the principal tenets of the artist’s and the curatorial program.

     

    Performance are scheduled for:
    Thursday, September 15, evening, at the opening reception.
    Friday, September 23, 12 noon, last day of the artist’s residency
    Thursday, September 29, 6:30 pm
    Saturday, October 15, 2:30 pm
    Thursday, October 27, 8 pm
    Sunday, November 6, 2:30 pm
    Friday, November 18, 11:30 am
    Saturday, December 3, 2:30 pm

    The exhibit in brief:
    Milutin Gubash has pursued a multidisciplinary practice revolving around video, photography and performance since 2002. This ten-year survey of work by Milutin Gubash includes a residency project with the Department of Dramatic Arts and the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts at Brock University. Beginning with the work titled, Re-Enacting Tragedies While My Parents Look On, the exhibition includes various works that focus on daily-life occurrences with historical and philosophical narratives. Gubash is interested in exploring how individuals and ideas can overwrite commonly held perceptions of landscape, politics and expectations of representation.
    www.milutingubash.com
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    The exhibit in detail:
    Milutin Gubash has pursued a multidisciplinary art practice revolving around video, photography and performance since 2002. He first made a name for himself in 2003 with the webcast project Re-Enacting Tragedies While My Parents Look On, in which he “re-created,” with his parents, various tragic news stories reported in the Calgary Herald. Gubash plays the part of the victim, dressed in a dark suit that now has become a signature for the artist.

    By layering daily-life occurrences with historical and philosophical narratives, Gubash is interested in exploring how individuals and ideas can overwrite commonly held perceptions of landscape, politics and expectations of representation. His imagery portrays the same individuals (family and friends) living absurd situations or experiencing actual moments of psychological reflection. Together, the Gubash family and friends create a dreamscape of funny and sincere gestures while experimenting with their own relational identities. Gubash often insists on creating multiple contexts within which to engage his series of mini- narratives. By locating his own performative gestures at the scenes of such events, Gubash dares to heighten his personal psychological inquiry and that of his collaborators.

    This exhibition includes a selection of works produced over the past ten years with emphasis on the recent interconnected projects: Which Way to the Bastille?, These Paintings, and Hotel Tito.

    During a residency with the Department of Dramatic Arts, Brock University, Gubash worked with Associate Professor David Vivian, Associate Professor Dr. Natalie Alvarez, and a company of selected students to develop a “live animation” of Which Way to the Bastille? Situated as an ongoing and regular interpretation of the text during the course of the exhibition, the performance will function as a dramatic evocation of the principal tenets of the artist’s and the curatorial program. Associate Professor Catherine Parayre (Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures) of Brock University will lead an upper-level course in text and image based around this exhibition under the auspices of the Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts.

    A version of this exhibition will also be seen at the Carleton University Art Gallery, Ottawa; Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge; and the Musée d’art de Joliette, Quebec.

    Milutin Gubash was born in Novi Sad (Serbia) and has been living in Montreal since 2005.

    Shirley Madill
    Exhibition Curator

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    Categories: Events

  • Brock appoints new director/curator of Rodman Hall Art Centre

    Wednesday, September 28, 2011 | By

    Stuart Reid

    An internationally recognized art curator and writer with extensive experience in arts administration in Canada is the new director/curator of Brock University’s Rodman Hall Art Centre.

    After two and a half years as executive director of the MacKenzie Art Gallery in Regina, Sask., Stuart Reid will assume his new position in January 2012.

    “We are pleased to have someone of Stuart’s calibre join our team at Rodman Hall,” says Douglas Kneale, Dean, Faculty of Humanities, Brock University. “His experience and leadership will help to foster our region’s vibrant arts scene, and his expertise will be an asset in the development of opportunities for Brock to engage our communities.”

    “The post of director/curator at Rodman Hall Art Centre holds a lot of interest for me,” says Reid in a press released issued by the MacKenzie Art Gallery. “I’m eager to continue my curatorial work and writing. I’ll also have teaching opportunities at Brock University. This move also takes me back to Ontario and my family.”

    Reid is a Past President of the Board of Directors of the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. He has served as director and curator of the Tom Thomson Memorial Art Gallery in Owen Sound, Ont., is an alumnus of the J. Paul Getty Trust’s Museum Leadership Institute at the University of California at Berkeley, and is also an elected member of the International Curators of Contemporary Art Network based in Luxembourg.

    Born in Dundee, Scotland, Reid immigrated to Canada in 1967. He studied art and art history at York University (BFA 1986) in Toronto. From 1990 to 1992, Reid was an associate curator at The Craft Gallery of the Ontario Crafts Council in Toronto. From 1992 to 2001, he was curator at the Art Gallery of Mississauga. In 1997, he was a guest of the British Council on a study tour of contemporary art in Northern Ireland.

    Brock University assumed ownership of Rodman Hall, the Walker Botanical Gardens and the Centre’s permanent art collection in 2003.

    Rodman Hall Art Centre is committed to excellence in visual arts programming and education, providing services and resources to students and faculty of Brock University and the Niagara region. Nationally, the Centre supports the development of artists and cultural workers in southern Ontario through the dissemination of contemporary art.

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    Categories: Announcements, News

  • A new program from cSTAC and the Faculty of Business in 2011: Concentration in Cultural Management

    Thursday, July 21, 2011 | By

    The Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture (cSTAC) will be offering a new program that brings together learning opportunities from two leading Faculties at Brock University – the Faculty of Business and the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts of the Faculty of Humanities.

    The Concentration in Cultural Management, a new collaboration with the highly-regarded Faculty of Business, will begin in the autumn of 2011.  This is the ideal program for students who seek to graduate with employable skills as Cultural Managers in diverse fields of arts and culture, including music, the visual arts and dramatic arts.  Together with their interdisciplinary or single-discipline studies in arts and culture students may pursue service-learning or practicum experiences with professionals and organizations in the Niagara Region.  Required upper-level courses taken at the Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture include Arts Management; Arts, Heritage and Culture: Public Policy and Governance; Producing a Performance Event, or Creating social value from material culture. Courses taken within the Faculty of Business include: Introduction to Business,  Marketing Management, Organizational Behaviour and Design, Human Resources Management , Entrepreneurship, Personal Financial Planning and others related business topics.

    Read the information sheet for this exciting new Concentration for 2011.

    contact the Director of the Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture, David Vivian, for more information: dvivian@brocku.ca
    or the Academic Advisor for the Faculty of Humanities, Alisa Cunnington: alisa.cunnington@brocku.ca

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    Categories: Announcements, News, STAC Courses

  • TAP Jamaica celebrates five successful years

    Wednesday, July 20, 2011 | By

    Turn Around Projects of the Arts – lead by graduates, students and colleagues of the Department of Dramatic Arts of the Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts – began its fifth year on July 7th, 2011 in Port Antonio, Jamaica.  TAP is a multi-national initiative using the arts and education to build sustainable communities.

    This year, four talented Brock students attended TAP Jamaica: Lescia Poppe, Jamez Townsend, Dorothy Kane and Meaghan Gowrie, as well as seven Brock graduates, Tiffany Stull, Rox Chwaluk, Mike Irwin, Whitney Lee, Alycia McQueen, Christine Cassar, and Matt McLeod. Along with 8 others, the Canadian/American team developed successful workshops in dance, visual arts, music, creative writing, dramatic arts, culinary arts, film, and photography. Many weeks since the conclusion of the program the spirit and principles of TAP persist in the hearts of the Canadian facilitators and the Jamaican youth who participated. The hard work, dedication and compassion that every single team member brought to the project has once again guaranteed its success.

    The TAP pilot project began in 2007 with a collaboration between the programming director of the project and former Drama in Education and Society program graduate, Tiffany Stull, her classmates, and their guest professor the renowned Canadian Dub Poet Michael St. George. Students of the third year dramatic arts course Alternative Forms of Theatre worked together to create a two-week long program of intensive educational workshops for the youth in an impoverished region of Jamaica.  With the leadership of former DART professor Jane Leavitt and Michael St. George a five year commitment to TAP Jamaica was established with the intention of initiating and maintaining integrated arts workshops every July.

    Participant and third-year DART student Meaghan Gowrie exclaimed, “From a personal standpoint, I can proudly say that when facilitating the music workshop, my success was in part rooted deeply in the skills, knowledge and values that I have been taught so far as a Drama in Education and Society student at Brock University.”

    Now that the five year commitment to TAP Jamaica has come to an end the Canadian team is prepared to move into Phase 2 of the program, training Jamaican youth to become facilitators of an autonomous and self-directed workshop program.  This summer the groundwork was laid for Phase 2 with the creation of the F.I.T. team (Facilitators in Training). This team included ten Jamaican youth who have successfully achieved the objectives of TAP through their actions and leadership skills in previous years.  Five of these participants graduated the F.I.T. program in 2011 and will facilitate workshops in July 2012.

    Gowrie added, “The experience that I had as a Canadian team member, educator and friend to the amazing 44 Jamaican youth that attended the program is completely impossible to describe in words or writing. It is my hope that anyone who comes in contact with the pictures, videos, and people of TAP will get a small taste of the impact that the first five years has made on everyone who has ever helped in the execution of, or attended the program. The optimism and positivity that is now ever-presently radiating in each of us will inspire the people of Brock University and eventually the world that the arts can change lives, that anything is possible and that step by step, we WILL make it to the top!”

    Further information about the 2011 program can be found at the project blog http://turnaroundproject.ca/blog/.  For information about TAP please contact info@turnaroundproject.ca.

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    Categories: Alumni, News

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