A special event launching a suite of multi-textured podcasts based on and inspired by The Foreshore Sessions: Vanessa Campbell thinking in and about hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ and language reclamation, Stacey Ho considering embodiment and decolonization, Sarah Moore on cones and zones, Dan Pon swimming through confluence and intervention.
Sound design by Pietro Sammarco.
The “foreshore” describes the land along the edge of the water that is both submerged and revealed by the tide. Very simply, it is the wet part of the beach. The foreshore is a place
of unclear jurisdiction, and thus of contestation, friction, and constant movement. Those who dwell in this zone must continually adapt to a changing environment. The foreshore also conjures histories specific to this region: narratives of trade and exchange, habitation and nourishment, resistance and violent erasure. It might similarly evoke our contemporary lived situation in this place. Considering the potential of this zone as both concept and site, The Foreshore initiative asks the following: how do we generate conditions of emergence? How can we take up space differently? How do we support unruly practices and futures?
SESSIONS
Starting in the fall of 2016 – 2017 Other Sights hosted a bi-weekly program of discussion focused events within a dedicated space at Access Gallery, continuing (less frequently) in 2017-2018 in Vancouver Public Library spaces in collaboration with the Contemporary Art Gallery. Guided by our mandate to consider the aesthetic, economic, and regulatory conditions of public places and public life the series was essentially a public research project for Other Sights’ ongoing practice of commissioning temporary artworks for the public realm. We sought insights and dialog from folks working in diverse projects including- but not limited to; accessibility, poetry, housing rights, architecture, de-colonization, song, theatre, body work, urban indigenous history, labour organizing and art. We were interested to identify resonances between diverse practices and apparently unrelated projects and to make ourselves both vulnerable and uncomfortable in our own practice as artists.
AUDIO ZINES
Inspired by the mixed texture of self-published artist zines The Foreshore Listens responds to, expands on, and incorporates elements of The Foreshore sessions. The process of developing these audio works started with recordings commissioned from past Foreshore Session presenters. Invited to consider to a series of prompts from a foreshore in the distant future the responses range from ambient recordings to poetry to foley of a longed-for place. These are by Bracken Hanuse Corlett, Lindsay Dobbin, Journée sans Culture, Laiwan, Justin Langlois, Cecily Nicholson, Kristina Lee Podesva, Carol Sawyer, and Jay White and can be listened to on our website apart from the zines. www.theforehsore.org/audio.
The editors, Vanessa Campbell, Stacey Ho, Sarah Moore, and Dan Pon were invited to work from the session recordings and the commissioned works to make curated or commissioned additions to the existing material. The resulting audio zines draw out complex constellations of thought and insight otherwise latent in the series and crystalized the depth and urgency.
ABOUT
The Foreshore Listens is produced by Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, coordinated by Other Sights Producer Jen Weih and co-presented by the Western Front. This project is supported by the British Columbia Arts Council, The City of Vancouver Public Art Program and the Canada Council for the Arts. Thanks also to Massy Books who is generously supporting the book exchange. The Foreshore is produced by Other Sights, Contemporary Art Gallery and Access Gallery. The program was curated by Other Sights and Kimberly Phillips and coordinated by Jen Weih.