News from the Department

An artist's rendering of the Marilyn I. Walker School for the Fine and Performing Arts showing the new theatre for the Department of Dramatic Arts.

Brock signs contract with construction firm for downtown fine and performing arts facility project

Published on January 18 2013

Earlier today, Brock University finalized a construction contract with Bird Construction Group to build its new fine and performing arts facility in downtown St. Catharines.
 
Activity at the site of the old Canada Hair Cloth textile mill at 198 St. Paul Street is expected to start the week of Jan. 21, 2013, with site preparations beginning in early February.
 
Construction bids for the project were received in October 2012 and all bids were over the University’s budget. Brock then entered into successful negotiations with Bird Construction, the low bidder for the new home of the University’s Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts facility, to reduce construction costs and move the project forward.
 
A groundbreaking ceremony to mark the official start of the project is expected to take place mid-February.
 
The new facility will put about 500 students, faculty and staff into the city’s downtown when it relocates from Brock’s main campus. The new school will be adjacent to a new Performing Arts Centre and Spectator Facility, which are being built by the City of St. Catharines.

Khalida: a play for the Arab Spring, opens in St. Catharines at the Sullivan-Mahoney.

Published on February 28 2013

By Dr. Karen Fricker and staff

The story told in Khalida, a new theatre production playing this week in St Catharines, might at first glance seem somewhat removed from the experience of many Canadians. Subtitled ‘a play for the Arab Spring’, it takes the form of the confession and testimony of Said, a man on the run from his native Middle Eastern country, which has become a battle zone.

But the play’s origins couldn’t be more local: it springs from the friendship between author/director David Fancy, Associate Professor of Dramatic Arts at Brock, and the Iraqi actor Addil Hussain, who received a BA in Dramatic Arts degree from Brock in 2006.

‘Addil was Saddam Hussein’s favourite actor,’ Fancy explains. ‘He fled Iraq during the first Gulf War and, after living as a refugee in Jordan for six or seven years, finally ended up in Canada. He did a degree in the Drama in Education and Society stream at Brock and became a Canadian citizen’. Audiences might remember Hussain's performances in two of the three plays performed in An Arabian Trilogy, a departmental mainstage production in 2006. In the third play he performed the role of the father in Leila Tatadaffah Bil Rasass. Mun Youaniquha? (By the Warmth of the Bullet that Kills) set in modern-day Baghdad and written by another Brock graduate Abbas Aldilami.

Fancy says he wrote the play ‘for the express purpose of continuing a conversation with Addil, having witnessed the challenges that he experienced as an individual and as an artist finding a voice as a new Canadian.’ The play is being produced by neXt Company Theatre, of which Fancy is co-artistic director.

While his friendship with Hussain offers fascinating insight into Khalida’s origins, Fancy believes an appreciation of the production does not rely on this backstory. ‘This is about a person somewhere in the world who has experienced difficulty and is using creativity to frame that and move beyond it,’ he explains.

The role of Said is being played by Toronto-based actor Jason Jazrawy, whose father is from Iraq. Jazrawy calls Said ‘an Arabic Everyman who whom all ethnicities can relate’ and says he welcomes the opportunity to ‘portray an Arab as a positive role model for a change,’ having found himself often cast as a terrorist jihadi because of his heritage.

Alongside Khalida, neXt Company Theatre has facilitated a community engagement project, The Arab Spring Monologues, which features 9-10 Niagarans, including four Brock students and recent graduates, writing about how the Arab Spring connects with their own experience or with the region.

Students from across the DART concentrations – Applied Theatre and Drama in Education, Theatre Praxis, Performance, and Production and Design – will be attending the production.    The production presents an excellent model for the Brock students’ creative investigations in writing and dramaturgy, performance, and production,  as well as personal and social identities and citizenship, remarks the Chair or the Department, David Vivian.

As for Addil Hussain, he returned to the Middle East in 2010, and is now working as an actor in Baghdad. Despite being half a world away, this production of Khalida is very much on his radar. Via Facebook, he sent this message to Fancy and his collaborators: 'Khalida was just a wish, and an idea, then became reality... I'm fully confident that Khalida is in great hands, hands with a great level of professionalism. Break a leg!'
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Khalida plays at the Sullivan Mahoney Courthouse Theatre from 26 February-2 March. Tickets are available here. The Arab Spring Monologues play 5-7 pm on Saturday, March 2 at Robertson Hall, 85 Church Street, St. Catharines. Admission free; groups are requested to contact the company in advance here. 

DART Professor at 2013 Congress in Victoria, British Columbia

Published on February 15 2013

Associate Professor Natalie Alvarez will be serving on the Program Committee for the Canadian Association for Theatre Research's (CATR) 2013 meeting at Congress 2013 of the Humanities and Social Sciences.   In 2014 DART will be hosting the annual meeting of the CATR as part of the complete Congress event to be held at the St. Catharines campus.

In addition to participating in a seminar on performance studies and sport, her two edited books on Latina/o Canadian theatre and performance will be launched during a conference lunch in Victoria.
 

An artist's rendering of the Marilyn I. Walker School for the Fine and Performing Arts showing the new theatre for the Department of Dramatic Arts.

Brock welcomes more community partners to downtown project

Published on June 20 2012

As Brock University prepares to select a contractor for its new arts school in central St. Catharines, community members are coming forward to financially back a project many people see as being a crucial bridge to future economic and cultural health.

This summer, contractors will be invited to bid on the major job of renovating and expanding the old Canada Hair Cloth textile mill into the new home for Brock’s Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts. Work is to begin this fall.

Besides relocating 500 students, faculty and staff into the downtown, the new school will also complement and share some facilities with a public Performing Arts Centre being built by the City of St. Catharines on an adjacent lot. Both projects are scheduled for completion in 2014.

Brock’s school has a construction budget of $39.6 million. The Ontario government has given $26.1 million to the project, and the University is continuing efforts to raise more than $10-million to pay its share.

Important supporters of the Brock project were revealed today when it was announced that three donors with strong ties to the community and Brock University are making gifts totaling more than a quarter-million dollars.

Peter and Janet Partridge are giving $100,000 to the project. Art and Val Fleming have also committed $100,000. And the St. Catharines law firm of Lancaster Brooks & Welch is donating $75,000 to the new school.

Peter Partridge, Vice President and Portfolio Manager with RBC Dominion Securities and a past member of Brock’s Board of Trustees, said their gift is a way of giving back to the community.

“To have a cultural campus strategically positioned in the heart of the downtown is very important,” he said. “This is going to bring a whole new level of artistic experience not only to young performers but to an audience here in Niagara.”

The Flemings are also eager to see the Walker School flourish.

“We really believe in Brock,” said Val, a Brock graduate and past member of the Board of Trustees. “We especially want the Walker project to succeed. It’s a wonderful opportunity, and we believe the downtown will definitely be rejuvenated because of it.”

At the offices of Lancaster Brooks Welch, senior partner Dave Edwards said the law firm believes the benefits of the new school will be more than economic.

“This will change the culture of the city centre for the better by bringing students into the downtown during normal working hours,” said Edwards, a former member and chair of the Brock Board of Trustees. “It will provide an integration that’s entirely different compared to when they’re only downtown at nighttime.

“It makes you think of Kingston, and how students there are often in the downtown during the day. This will help our restaurants, stores, coffee shops, and bring a new vibrancy to the downtown throughout the day.”

Douglas Kneale, Dean of the Faculty of Humanities at Brock and a member of the committee overseeing the University’s downtown project, said the support is very heartening and much-needed.

“The truth is, we really are all in this together, this strengthening of the community,” said Kneale. “And when you have partners like these marvelous people, it is this kind of support that helps make these dreams come true for everybody.”

from:

http://www.brocku.ca/brock-news/?p=17085

Incoming DART professor reports about the Eurovision Contest from Baku, Azerbaijan

Published on May 25 2012

A spotlight is shining on Azerbaijan this May as it hosts Eurovision, the annual European song contest known for its outlandish performances, and viewed on TV by more than 100 million people. But it's not all glitz this year. While Azerbaijan attempts to show off its strength to the world, it's also come under scrutiny by activist groups for its unsavoury human rights record, and its crackdown on anti-government protestors and journalists leading up to the contest.

Karen Fricker is co-founder of the Eurovision and 'New' Europe academic research network who is covering the contest for the Irish Times. She recently reported on what these negative reports mean for the Eurovision Contest and Azerbaijan for the program Q hosted by Jian Ghomeshi on CBC Radio. She is a lecturer in contemporary theatre at Royal Holloway, University of London and deputy London theatre critic for Variety.  You can read more about her research activities in her profile at Royal Holloway. We are delighted that she will be joining her new colleagues at the Department of Dramatic Arts at Brock University in January 2013.  

SHAW Summer Internship Program

Published on March 29 2012

Every year Brock's emerging artists have an opportunity to intern with one of Canada's most renowned theatre organizations, the Shaw Festival, for a six-week intensive learning experience. Early in the new year an application is offered to students who successfully complete DART 4P92 "Voice and Text of Bernard Shaw" as part of their final year of study. One deserving student is invited to polish their studies at DART by interning with professionals at the top of their game as they create productions for the Shaw Festival season.

Graduating student Robyn Cunningham will be the Summer Intern at the Shaw Festival for 2012.  Under the guidance of Co-Artistic Director Eda Holmes, Robyn will experience an intense period of production rehearsal and development from first read through to season premieres.  Some of the shows Robyn will witness in development include The Millionairess and Present Laughter.  Robyn (seen below) will be regularly posting to her tumblr vlog across the six weeks - check in regularly and say 'hi!'.

Brock graduate Jacqueline Costa was the first DART Intern at the Shaw Festival in 2011. Jacqueline graduated with a BA (First Class Honors) in Brock University's Theatre Stream with strong interests in both production and performance. While a student her success in theatre creative research and production was seen in the Brock main-stage performances like Charles Mee's Big Love (2010) and Sharon Pollock's Blood Relations (2010) and in her work as Departmental Technical Production Assistant and Research and Production Assistant to faculty. 

While at Shaw Jacqueline worked together with Lighting Design Director Kevin Lamotte and assisted with the development of his lighting designs for the 2011 performances of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and Heartbreak House, where she also had the privilege of meeting directors Eda Holmes and Christopher Newton. Jacqueline attended various dress-tech rehearsals, show previews, read-throughs and clean-up calls. Jacqueline remarks that "it was interesting seeing lighting levels, lighting hangs, load in's and changeovers for the shows on such a grand scale at the Shaw Festival."

During the remaining weeks, Jacqueline worked with Design Director William Schmuck, where she was able to preview other shows from the 2011 season such as Drama at Inish - A Comedy and My Fair Lady. She also witnessed the build of lighting level sets for Alan Brodie's Admirable Crichton and Louise Guinard's On The Rocks. In addition, Jacqueline toured to other Shaw facilities including the properties, scenic painting and carpentry shops and met with designers Sue Lepage, Charolette Dean and Christina Poddubiuk. Jacqueline comments, "in terms of being introduced to interesting members of the professional design/theatre community, this internship succeeded."

Working closely with the Shaw Festival, Brock's Dramatic Arts Department aims to develop these programs, and many more, to it's young emerging artists - offering them post-graduate opportunities to interact and network with the greater professional performing arts community.

Also at the Shaw Festival this season are recent Department graduates working in various aspects of technical theatre production.  Anrita Petraroia (DART '07) is back at the Festival this year, having helped out on a couple projects in Technical Direction last season. Chris Penney (DART '08) has secured a regular season's call in the audio department. Sadie Isaak (DART '10) is now being trained to take over the Cobbler's position in Production Wardrobe and will be joining the Wardrobe Running staff later in the season.

Graduates of the Department of Dramatic Arts are on the boards again and this time they are playing IN THE SOIL.

Published on April 17 2012

Nathan Tanner Mac Donald - a resident of the St Catharines and recent graduate of the Department of Dramatic Arts has brought together a company of DART students to present  The Clockmaker by Stephen Massicotte.  A metaphysical rollercoaster, The Clockmaker may seem like little more than a love story set inside a murder-mystery-to-be, but it just might end up exposing the very truth of existence itself. The show will be performed April 27 @ 8:00pm and April 28 @ 2:00pm at the Sullivan Mahoney Courthouse Theatre in downtown St Catharines.

Nathan recently performed in the 2011 STRUTT wearable art show and this past summer he wrote and directed Circus, which played at Factory Theatre in the 2011 Toronto Fringe Festival. Nathan's company includes graduates and Geoffrey Heaney, Dylan Mawson, Michael Pearson, Caitlin Popek as Performers, current student Kate Hardy as Stage Manager and graduate Finn Archinuk as the Designer.

In the Soil Arts Festival brings Niagara artists from a range of disciplines together to provide unique audience experiences. The festival nurtures the creation of new work, showcases talent, encourages innovation, offers learning opportunities for youth and provides intimate and uncommon platforms for audiences to experience work by contemporary performing and literary artists, musicians and media artists. In the Soil is Niagara's homegrown arts festival and is working to make a Niagara that is self-determining and culturally distinct.

for more information see the news article and the IN THE SOIL website

Break-a-leg, Nathan, Caitlin, Dylan, Finn, Geoffrey, Kate and Michael!

DART Students attend Stratford Shakespeare Academy

Published on March 17 2012

Every summer students of the Department of Dramatic Arts (DART) attend the annual Stratford Shakespeare Academy for a three week intensive two-course experience. The courses present an opportunity to study Shakespeare through the lenses of both performance and structured analytical criticism with some of Ontario’s leading university professors and Stratford professional coaches. During the typical 7.5 hour day students observe and enquire of the talent of working actors, trainers and directors while experiencing first-hand the programming of one of Canada’s most triumphant theatre Festivals. In 2012 fourteen students will attend the Stratford Academy.  To read more click here.

Richard Maxwell Discusses his New Production with Brock Students

Published on February 18 2012

Internationally renowned New York City director and playwright Richard Maxwell of the New York City Players recently Skype chatted with students of DART 4F90 Critical Theory and Practice about his touring production of "Ads" and responded to questions of liveness, performer presence, and commodity culture.

Special Guest Fujimoto Takakyuki gives a workshop in light art at DART

Published on February 11 2012

On January 26 and 27, 2012, Fujimoto Takakyuki - pioneer of stage design with LED lighting - visited the Department of Dramatic Arts to give a demonstration and creative workshop with this innovative technology. 

Fujimoto has created a unique staging method using LED light systems and installations to manipulate all colours of the spectrum. His aim is to create new “circuits” to connect directly to the audience with no less strength than the connection created by the stage performer communicating directly to the audience in a live stage experience. He is principle designer for the Japanese performance group Dumb Type. Independently his work True, created with
Tsuyoshi Shirai (AbsT/BANETO) and Takao Kawaguchi (Dumb Type) has been touring since 2007. He has worked with Ryoji Ikeda on the videomusic concert series “formula”, with Hong Kong choreographer Daniel Yeung, Vietnam-French choreographer Ea Sola, Singapore’s video artist Choy Ka Fai, on the installation/concert path with the guitarist Kazuhisa Uchihashi and singer UA, and with dance company Monochrome Circus. He recently designed for Kyoto Noh Theatre’s 2011 production.

Fujimoto was hosted in Canada by Across Oceans and artistic director Maxine Heppner, a Toronto-based organization that  produces international arts platforms in Canada and worldwide, with acclaimed performing, visual and literary artists, and develops interactions created specially for specific environments and communities. Programming includes live performance, 2-D and 3-D art exhibits, film/video screenings, public forums, advanced training and research.  Fujimoto's recent collaboration with Across Oceans my heart is a spoon was well-received by Toronto critics and audiences.

Fujimoto shared his creative approach in technology  with approximately 15 students and professionals. A selection of videos from the workshop may be seen on a youtube channel.

Department Professors Attend the ASTR 2011 Conference in Montreal

David Fancy, the department Chair of the Dramatic Arts Program at Brock University, recently participated in the American Society of Theatre Research 2011 Conference in Montreal, Canada. David was part of the Theatre and Migrant Worker Group and presented his research paper entitled "Affective Assemblages: Migrant Worker Theatre" during the symposium. David's contribution and effort to this research was well received by the conference patrons. His recent work with neXt Company Theatre has provided a similar awareness of Migrant Worker issues for the surrounding St Catharines community. Congratulations on your success, David!

For information on upcoming neXt Company Theatre projects please visit www.nextcompanytheatre.com

Auckland Adventures: Joe Norris

In December 2011, Joe Norris spent two weeks in Auckland as a keynote for two separate conferences. During his stay, Joe presented a keynote paper on "Playbuilding as Research" at the 2nd Critical Studies in Drama in Education International Symposium at the University of Auckland. He also sat on a keynote panel during "Arts Based Research, Possibilities, Pedagogies, and Processes in Performance" during this time. He presented another keynote entitled "Reconceptualizing Self, Society and Narrative Constructions Through Critical Reflections on Personal and Cultural Narratives and Metaphors" which was presented at the "Evoking and Provoking Narrative and Metaphor in Education" symposium located also at the University of Auckland. He then provided a two-hour workshop called "Duoenthography: The Dialogic Meaning Making Through the Juxtaposition of Self with the Other" for all of his attendees.    

Joe Norris’ book, “Playbuilding as Qualitative Research: A Participatory Arts-based Approach” was selected as the winner of the American Educational Research Association’s Qualitative Research SIG’s 2011 Outstanding Book Award. This book not only met all the criteria for the award, it exceeded every criteria. Norris bridges arts-based research, qualitative inquiry, and playbuilding grounded in rich theories and created dialogue for various social justice issues. The committee members (Linda Evans, Allison Anders and Kakali Bhattacharya - see in the photo with Joe Norris) exclaimed not only about the accessibility, utility of this book, but the ways in which this book challenged their thinking, made them imagine how the audience participation might look like at the end of the scenes, and created the fertile ground for much needed dialoguing. The committee was honored and privileged to review the works of such great thinkers as Valerie Janesick, Kathryn Roulston and Norman Denzin, change agents, and activists in qualitative research and are delighted to present Joe Norris with this years’ Outstanding Book Award.
Congratulations, Joe.

Associate Professors Peter Vietgen (Visual Arts Education in the Department of Teacher Education, Faculty of Education) and David Vivian (Department of Dramatic Arts and the Centre for Studies in Arts and Culture, Marilyn I. Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts, Faculty of Humanities) were each presented with three Volunteer Recognition Certificates from the Government of Canada, the Province of Ontario, and the City of St. Catharines, at the 23rd Annual Volunteer Recognition Night co-sponsored by the City of St. Catharines, the St. Catharines-Thorold Chamber of Commerce, and the Henry of Pelham Family Estate Winery.

Professor Vietgen was nominated by the Niagara Artist's Centre for his contribution to the Public Art Advisory Committee of the City of St. Catharines. Professor Vivian was nominated for his service over four years as Chair of the Culture Committee of the City of St. Catharines.  Both Committees of Council are actively engaged in developing new policy, advocacy, funding, recognition and opportunities in the arts and culture sector, contributing to the creation of stimulating and sustainable culturally-rich lives in the city of St. Catharines.

Given annually, the Volunteer Recognition Awards recognize those outstanding volunteers whose unselfish and dedicated service to an organization has made a significant difference in the community. Nominations are open to youth and adult volunteers, who are presented with their awards at a banquet hosted by the Mayor and councillors in April. This year the banquet was held at the Quality Hotel Parkway Convention Centre on Tuesday, April 19, 2011.

(Pictured left to right are Professor Debra Maclauchlan and Associate Professor Peter Vietgen (Faculty of Education), Associate Professor David Vivian and Assistant Professor Virginia Reh (Department of Dramatic Arts, Faculty of Humanities)

Professor Virginia Reh speaks about life in theatre and the production of Phedre that was performed by students of DART in the Sean O'Sullivan Theatre in 2011. Video interview from the series University People by BROCK TV. (click image to play)

Nina Arsenault recently visited us for an artist's talk, part of Dramatic Arts 3P96 Studies in Praxis II: Queer Theories and Performance Practices. 

Arsenault is a "transsexual cyborg" theatre and performance artist whose one-woman show, The Silicone Diaries, has had sold-out runs in Toronto and Montreal, and will be touring the country this coming Spring.  Ms. Arsenault gave a short talk about her process followed by an interview with Praxis course director, Paul Halferty.

www.ninaarsenault.com

Earp Dance at Brock Nuit Blanche 2010

For those of you unable to attend Nuit Blanche Brock this year, check out the short video above to see dancers Shannon Perugino and Jessica Goncalves of the Department of Dramatic Arts perform on the beautifully lit top floor of Earp Student Residence at Brock University.   The original piece was performed every half hour from 6pm to midnight on the chilly night ofDecember 3, 2010,  to audiences outside on the street below as part of Nuit Blanche Brock 2010. Performed by Dramatic Arts students Jessica Goncalves and Shannon Perugino; Sound Op: Matthew Viviano; Tech and Design Support: Doug Ledingham and David Vivian; Conceived by Natalie Alvarez. Choreography by Jessica Goncalves, Shannon Perugino and Natalie Alvarez.

The new Artistic Director of Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, Brendan Healy, met with DART students in autumn 2010 to discuss Queer Theatre.  Sitting with Brendan is host Paul Halferty, DART faculty member teaching the Theatre Praxis course DART 3P95.

Theory and Practice of Drama in Education with JONOTHAN NEELANDS Six-day intensive course

Published on July 08 2011

THE DEPARTMENT OF DRAMATIC ARTS

DART 3V90: Theory and Practice of Drama in Education with JONOTHAN NEELANDS
Six-day intensive course: Monday, July 25 - Saturday, July 30, 2011

Students should visit DARTboard, the top level Wiki Page or Portal providing informtion about activities and courses in the Department of Dramatic Arts http://dartboard.pbworks.com