YVR: Got Craft - Sunday, May 8 !

If you're in Vancouver, check out the city's biggest indie craft fair, featuring local artists and designers, as well as some delicious treats from our friends at Bake Sale!



Got Craft takes place this Sunday, May 8 at the Royal Canadian Legion on Commercial Drive. The first 45 people in the door get a free swag bag filled to the brim with goodies from all of the vendors!! Doors open at 10am, so get there bright and early!! Plus, it's Mother's Day, so it's a great place to grab some gifts!

Strombo's Ode to Vancouver

This was the opening that George Stroumboulopoulos used for his Vancouver stint last week:

No Trespassing

I went to see the latest Morris Panych play The Trespassers at the Vancouver Playhouse last week.



It's the story about a teenage boy and his relationship with his grandfather and eventually his mysterious death. It was on the slow side, in my opinion, and I didn't find the story gripping. The play jumped back and forth in time, which sometimes works for me, but in this instance it just seemed messy and all over the place. There were no surprises, so nothing was keeping me on the edge of my seat. All in all, meah, a bit of a disappointment.

Bob Rennie Art Collection

This past weekend, I finally got to visit the Rennie Collection at the Wing Sang building in Chinatown! To get in, you have to book a time through the website but they only have certain timeslots available, most of which are during the workday. Finally they had a weekend opening, and I made the reservation.

The building is the oldest one in Chinatown, dating back to 1889 built for Chinese Canadian entrepreneur Yip Sang and his four wives. You can read more about it here. Once inside the building, we were greeted by a student from the Emily Carr art school, who proceeded to give us an hour long guided tour of the building and each piece of art on display.

The current exhibition features Amy Bessone and Thomas Houseago, individual artists in their own right, but also a married couple. Below are some pieces from Houseago, whose sculptures I found more interesting than Bessone's paintings. And of course there's the Martin Creed piece featured on the exterior of the building. Of note is an upcoming Martin Creed exhibit that will take place after this one closes down.

If you get a chance to visit the gallery, do so!

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

On Saturday night I was sitting at home, thinking, What am I going to do this evening? I didn't want to waste a Saturday just sitting at home doing nothing (which is fine if that's what you want to do, but I wasn't in the mood for that).

It was 6:45pm and I thought, I really want to go see this play, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, but it starts at 7:30, and I have no one to go with, and would I even make it in time? I'd heard about this play for many years, and just never knew anything about it. So, without even thinking twice, I dashed out the door and headed to Granville Island and made it in the nick of time to purchase a TICKET FOR ONE.

Yep, I went by myself! For some, it's no big deal. For others, it's the end of the universe. I have friends who can't fathom doing something like this. I've gone to movies and shows alone in the past. Heck, in New York, I went to a number of musicals on my own and thoroughly enjoyed myself. In fact, when my shrink tells me to "think of a happy place" (seriously, he does), the place that I pick in my mind is during my first trip to NYC when I was sitting in a theatre on Broadway, waiting for the show to begin, just by myself, surrounded by strangers, chatting with my neighbour every so often, and being absolutely HAPPY.

So, on Saturday night, I recreated that feeling just a tiny bit. It was no New York, but surprisingly, the acting was REALLY GOOD. As well, the play was interesting and well written and has absolutely NOTHING to do with Virginia Woolf!

I ran into my Grade 7 teacher yesterday at my favourite tea place during my lunch break. I always run into him actually, and we often converse. He too is gay and I remember when I was in Grade 7, Madonna's "Vogue" was a big hit on the radio. He knew I was a huge fan and came up to me and asked if I knew who all the hollywood stars were that she mentions in the song. The next day, he brought in a hardcover book full of old hollywood stars and he had bookmarked each one that's mentioned in the song for me to read up on. Anyhow, this play is his favourite of all time, he told me. Then he suggested I watch the Elizabeth Taylor movie version. Judging from these screenshots, I'm going to have to! How fabulous does this look?



Local theatre here can be hit or miss. I'd say this is a definite hit! If you've got time, I'd recommend checking out Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf! On now till March 12 at the Granville Island Stage.

What I Learned at The Vancouver Art Gallery

Yesterday I headed down to the Vancouver Art Gallery on the first day of its new exhibit. It was also open free to the public to celebrate the one year anniversary of the 2010 Olympics, held here last year. There were other festivities going on around town too, like free ice skating at the Olympic Oval out in Richmond, a lantern festival downtown, and the pedestrian-only Granville Street where vendors set up and makeshift street hockey tournaments took place. Too bad it was pouring rain yesterday which probably kept people from coming out.

The art gallery interested me the most, so I lined up for about 20 minutes before getting inside. The first exhibit is titled WE: Vancouver 12 Manifestos for the City. On till May 1st, this exhibit highlights the talent and creativity that our city has to offer.

I learned about Laneway Housing, which are dwellings built in the space where a garage normally inhabits on a family lot, and faces onto the alleyway.



Then I was surprised to see on display photos of Vancouver's only cemetery, Mountain View, which I had walked through a few months ago when I went on a big walk for some exercise. I remember cutting through the cemetery because it was more peaceful and quiet than walking along the street with all the traffic and noise. Plus there were other people jogging through it and also taking in the serenity. I remember seeing the building in the middle of the cemetery that I could only assume was used for services and administration. It was a beautiful design and looked new, and I was shocked I had never seen it before.

Turns out that "Celebration Hall" as its called, is a product of a recent renovation and has won design awards from the city, hence its inclusion in the gallery's exhibit.





And I kinda liked this "Mycologic Chandelier" which is based on mushrooms and the way they grow.

I rounded a corner and read about Univercity Childcare, an initiative of Simon Fraser University that includes one of the most sustainable and environmentally conscious buildings in Canada. Here's a photo I snapped of one of their outdoor shelters that will be part of the centre's landscape:

There was also a model of what the new Visitors' Centre will look like at the Van Dusen Gardens:





And speaking of renovated buildings, our city is definitely going through lots of change as of late, and one of the biggest projects around is the redesign of BC Place, turning it into an open air stadium with a retractable roof. It will be ready for November of next year, when we host the Grey Cup. It's gone from being a puffy looking marshmallow:



to something akin to a crab/crown, spiking up the Vancouver downtown skyline:



Upstairs at the Vancouver Art Gallery is their other new exhibit that has just opened, a collection from Vancouver Asian-Canadian artist Ken Lum. I didn't know his work before, either. At least, I thought I didn't. If you're a Vancouverite and you've seen the famous East Van cross that lights up at night, then you've seen a Ken Lum piece.



I loved these couches that he created:

And I used to see this piece all over the place, but I never knew what it was. I didn't get it. But when you put it into the context of "art" and you see Lum's other accompanying pieces, it actually made me laugh and I quite enjoy it! It's Melly Shum!

And the last part of the exhibit that was really cool was Lum's "Mirorr Maze With 12 Signs of Depression." As you walk through this mirror maze, there are phrases imprinted on the mirror that are "signs of depression" and according to a psychology test, if you have 6 or more of these symptoms at a given time, then you're depressed!

After I was done at the Art Gallery, I headed off to meet up with Calvin where we both watched as the Olympic cauldron was lit to commemorate the one year anniversary of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic games.

All in all, a perfect Saturday!!

Hope everyone else had a terrific weekend as well!

Robyn Knows How Much You Hurt

I have previously complained about the lack of energy and overall lameness/rudeness of audiences in Vancouver, but not last night. Last night at an intimate nightclub, packed with fans who were more than happy to be there, I attended the Robyn concert. And it was phenomenal. She came out and was super cute and super tiny and the entire room FREAKED OUT!!! And she proceeded to whip the crowd into a hot and heated FRENZY!

Three songs in, she brought out the big guns with Dancing On My Own. Someone managed to stand still and capture the moment, skip to the 2:20 mark for the magic to begin:



I wasn't the only one crying my eyes out when she closed off the main set with her hit With Every Heartbeat. She got the entire room, and I mean everybody, chanting at the end: "And it hurts with every heartbeat!" You tell 'em, Robyn!!



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She did all her best songs, including Hang With Me, Konichiwa Bitches, Be Mine (which I nearly lost my mind to!!!), her latest anthem Indestructible, Don't Fucking Tell Me What To Do, We Dance To The Beat, Fembot, Cry When You Get Older, and even a mini ode to the supergroup of her home country - ABBA. She just did NOT STOP once! She kept things going like a machine, and there was no real downtime for anyone, least of all the enthusiastic crowd!

At one point, she took out a banana, peeled it and ate it. Then she threw the peel into the crowd, and guess who caught it?? ME!!!! I think she was having a really good time, because at the end of one song, she dove into the crowd for a bit of body surfing!!! As evidenced on her Twitter: "Vancouver!! You made me stage dive!"

She finished everything up with a stripped down version of her very first international hit when she was just a teeny bopper, Show Me Love. And that's exactly what we did.