INTRODUCING THE LARGEST ARTS FESTIVAL IN VICTORIA … taking place city-wide throughout June.
A ground-awakening initiative by one the longest-running grassroots arts organizations in our city, this coming together across literary, performing, and visual arts celebrates the breadth of queer art and the tenacity of queer artists practicing in the face of adversity.
The Victoria Arts Council is partnering with two dozen cultural groups/organizations/businesses towards a city-wide festival of queer arts, that might just be the largest such cross-disciplinary collaboration in our region’s history.
The West Coast has long been considered a queer haven, and this exciting new festival reinforces that notion. At time when our community and our rights are facing an uncertain future, globally, we know that coming together is one way to prove that we’re still here and we’re still queer.
In organizing this inaugural Festival, we have been guided by the words of the late bell hooks (1952-2021), who offered,
“Queer’ not as being about who you’re having sex with (that can be a dimension of it); but ‘queer’ as being about the self that is at odds with everything around it and that has to invent and create and find a place to speak and to thrive and to live.”
With that, I hope to see you at many of the events planned throughout June. A complete list of events can be found online: queerisland.ca
Welcome to Queer Island!
Kegan McFadden Festival Producer 2025
QUEER ISLAND FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS is supported by: CRD Arts Services, Province of British Columbia (Community Gaming Fund), BC Arts Council (Community Arts), and the VAC members + donors.
Community Partners include:
Arc.hive artist-run centre Aunty Collective The Bay Centre (VAC Project Space) Carr House National Historic Site Camosun College the.Dock Centre for Social Impact (VAC Satellite) Fernwood Community & Arts Association The Fifty Fifty Arts Collective Gallery Merrick Greater Victoria Public Libraries (VAC Satellites) Habit Coffee Hands On Collective Intrepid Theatre Ministry of Casual Living Planet Earth Poetry Madrona Gallery Mark Loria Gallery The Regional Assembly of Text Saanich City Hall Sunday Afternoon University of Victoria’s Library / Special Collections Victoria Film Festival The Vicious Poodle XChanges Gallery and Studios
We are creating a Cultural District in Victoria and we want you at our first public informational session Sunday June 22nd.
For the past three years the Victoria Arts Sustainability Coalition has been working towards the goal of acquiring a building that will act as a permanent home for the education, production, and presentation of visual and media arts in downtown Victoria …
And now, we are thrilled to invite you all to a community open house to learn more about the future community arts district in our city!
Please join us at 722 Johnson Street Sunday, June 22nd from 1-4PM
There will be: Art Installations, Film screenings, Informational panels, Prizes, Refreshments, and more …
This is part of a larger initiative where we will be launching the first CULTURAL LAND TRUST, rejuvenating our downtown through art as a way towards cultural, financial, and social sustainability.
All are welcome to help shape this vision.
Why? Art and cultural organizations continue to buckle under the pressure of ever-rising rents and our staff & volunteers are burning out. We need a permanent solution to this untenable situation.
Some facts: our core groups are paying over $300k in rents annually, which should go to an asset rather than a landlord. The downtown is emptying… We need economic and cultural development that is sustainable now, not 10 years from now.
BC arts funding levels cannot keep up with rising rents: Between 2013 and 2023, commercial rents in the province surged by 270%, according to Statistics Canada. In stark contrast, operating allocations from the BC Arts Council only increased by 25% during the same period (BC Arts Council data from 2014 and 2024).
VICTORIA ARTS COUNCIL | Project Space 670 Fort Street | Thurs – Sun | 12-5
Rebranded as an experimental reading room/library, the Victoria Arts Council’s Fort Street storefront presents a continuation of their Shelf Life project for Winter/Spring 2025. This time, ANOTHER SHELF LIFE, refocuses on printed matter and artistbooks in an expansive way, encompassing the entire venue.
Loosely themed from month to month, with rotating titles on offer, VAC’s executive director and curator of the project, Kegan McFadden, assembles interpretations of what makes a book and where printed matter enters the realm of contemporary art, all while presenting a dynamic new way of engaging with the local art scene.
Highlighting local artists/publishers/writers, on view throughout these monthly exhibitions will be limited edition artistbooks, printed matter, ephemera, and [un]related items of interest.
The Last Chapter: here is a noun Queer Island Festival of the Arts
VICTORIA ARTS COUNCIL | Project Space 670 Fort Street
5-29 June 2025
Shawna Dempsey + Lorri Millan, Larry Glawson, Terence Koh, Doug Melnyk, Ho Tam, As We Try & Sleep, HOTAM Press, Size Queen Magazine, and more…
The VAC is partnering with local galleries and cultural organizations to organize exhibitions, projects, readings, and screenings reflecting the breadth of queer art taking shape here as part of the inaugural Queer Island Festival of the Arts.
Our Project Room will act as the Festival’s office for the month of June, as well as the home for the concluding chapter of Another Life: here is a nounto foreground queer artists working in print, and/or, inhabiting the bookform.
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CHAPTER 5: Also As Well Too
also as well too| selections from the artistbook library, with a special installation honouring Cliff Eyland
VICTORIA ARTS COUNCIL | Project Space 670 Fort Street
3-31 May 2025
Featuring publications by: Steven Leyden Cochrane, Erika DeFreitas, Hannah Godfrey, Greg A. Hill, Jeanette Johns, Kimiwan Magazine, Craig Love, Mary-Anne McTrowe, Mariana Muñoz Gomez, A.O. Roberts, Suzie Smith, Becca Taylor, Marlene Yuen, Collin Zipp, and more
Letch Kinloch + Kegan McFadden, co-curators
With the blooms of springtime, we turn over our Project Room to highlight a selection of holdings from the wild prairie artistbook library, Also As Well Too. Established in Winnipeg in 2015, this 10th anniversary presentation acts as a reawakening to invite a West Coast audience to learn about this experimental project through a selection of their collected and published books.
Presented alongside this reading-room style exhibit is an installation of the work, Some Authors, by the late Canadian artist and printed matter advocate, Cliff Eyland (1954-2020).
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CHAPTER 4: Some poetry does, others don’t
3 – 27 April 2025
featuring: Henry Heavyshield, John Latour, Ronnie Montreal, Corrie Peters, Chimwemwe Undi, and Carrie Walker
Screenings of experimental films at night in the windows of our Fort Street Project Space are presented with the financial support of the City of Victoria’s OUR DWTN IDEAS fund.
April’s film selections will feature work by: Big Top Collective, jaz papadopoulos, Grace Salez + Judith Price, and Judy Woo
For International Poetry Month, the Victoria Arts Council turns the page to poets with an emphasis on the visual forms of erasure and concrete poetry. Considering various applications of erasure in poetry, as well as expansive forms of the written work becoming visual and taking up space, Some poetry does, others don’t, builds on the 2023 Victoria Festival of Authors exhibition, as small as a world and as large as alone.
Please join us Thursday 24 April, 5-7PM for John Latour and Sue Hirst, in-conversation with curator Kegan McFadden.
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CHAPTER THREE: Women in Revolt!
From 6-30 March, the third chapter of Another Life unfolds.Titled “WOMEN IN REVOLT” this special presentation recognizes International Women’s Day and showcases printed matter and moving images and original works of art by local and international artists.
Artists contributing to “WOMEN IN REVOLT” include:
Sonja Ahlers, Collage Party, Samantha Dickie, Aganetha Dyck, Lynda Gammon, and Jeanne Randolph, with a special selection of books on loan from Jane Coombe.
Screenings of experimental films at night in the windows of our Fort Street Project Space are presented with the financial support of the City of Victoria’s OUR DWTN IDEAS fund.
March’s film selections will feature work by: LES666, Laura Gildner, Nikki Wilkson, and Marina Roy.
Please join us for an intimate Artists in Conversation with Jeanne Randolph and Marina Roy, Saturday 29 March from 2PM-3PM.
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CHAPTER TWO: “A Little Sugar in My Bowl”
Made popular by two Black American female singers thirty years apart, the song that has inspired this selection was originally recorded by blues singer Bessie Smith in 1931, and later interpreted by Nina Simone as part of her Backlash Blues album released in the throes of the civil rights movement. In the context of Another Life, (a project centering publications and related artworks) might these lyrics be about sex and intimacy, or just wanting to be seen?
From Thursday 6 February – Sunday 2nd March, the second chapter of Another Life unfolds.Titled “A Little Sugar in My Bowl” this special presentation recognizes Black History Month and showcases printed matter and moving images by local and international artists.
Artists contributing to “A Little Sugar in My Bowl” include:
Aya Behr +Kemi Craig, Ingrid Mesquita, and Paul Mpagi Sepuya with publications on loan from Blackspace Library.
This chapter includes the re-staging of the mural by Ingrid Mesquita that previously graced the exterior of our Pat Martin Bates Gallery on Store Street, a curated selection of titles from Blackspace Library, and a special presentation of zines, printed matter, and monographs by LA-based artist Paul Mpagi Sepuya.
Screenings of experimental films at night in the windows of our Fort Street Project Space are presented with the financial support of the City of Victoria’s OUR DWTN IDEAS fund.
Films presented in conjunction with “A Little Sugar in My Bowl” included: Wash Over by Aya Behr,Praying for Time by Kriss Munsya, and Battle Cry by Rhonda Hackett.
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CHAPTER ONE: MILE ZERO
Beginning Thursday 9 January, the first installment of Another Life is titled “MILE ZERO” and considers place and placelessness through the contemporary lens of printed matter and moving images.
Artists contributing to “Mile Zero” include:
John G Boehme, Cathy Busby, Jean Murray, Ed Ruscha, and Wendy Thompson, with additional publications by Ian Baxter&, Douglas Coupland, Ryan Foerster, Jeff Jones, Leah McInnis + David Peters, Tracy McMenemy, and others.
Screenings of experimental films at night in the windows of our Fort Street Project Space are presented with the financial support of the City of Victoria’s OUR DWTN IDEAS fund.
Films presented in conjunction with Mile Zero included: Cake by Leah McInnis and David Peters, 200 Seconds on Scafe Hill by Nick Noble, and Anastomosis of Sunlit Generations by Jeffrey Ellom.
The Victoria Arts Council acknowledges the partnership with The Bay Centre, and funding from CRD Arts, BC Arts Council, and the Province of BC, as well as our Members for their support.
With the ever-increasing costs to operate, the VAC is in the very unfortunate circumstance where we now need financial help from our core supporters — the community of artists, educators, and arts enthusiasts we’ve served for decades.
If you’ve enjoyed our programming, or have been one of the hundreds of artists we’ve uplifted through exhibitions and other opportunities, we’re now calling in the favour.
Please donate to the VAC today … no amount is too little or too much!
{charitable tax receipts issued at time of donation}
Though we have been able to increase and diversify our revenue stream over recent years, it just isn’t enough to cover costs anymore.
We’ve been there for you since 1968, and together we’ve built something incredible and unique to Victoria … please help us raise the much needed funds to keep the VAC going!
