Join the Vancouver Park Board and Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre for ‘Field Guides’

From Friday, September 27 to Sunday, October 6, 'Field Guides' will showcase the work of artists and cultural facilitators involved in the Vancouver Park Board’s Fieldhouse Activation Project. The activations repurpose fieldhouses in parks as creative hubs for arts, food security and environmental stewardship. 

These cultural facilitators and artists have become familiar faces in many neighborhoods. They engage the public in their studios: drawing comics, making movies, building musical instruments, singing opera, growing food and medicine, dancing with birds, stewarding urban land, telling stories of belonging, and much more. 

Many of these projects have been active for six years or more, with some of them ending their fieldhouse tenure at the close of 2024. This exhibition celebrates the artists and facilitators who will be moving on, and features work from ongoing fieldhouse residency projects that are immersed in community. 

Projects include: 

• Frog Hollow Neighbourhood House, Clinton Park
  Community stories and artwork developed with artist Aaniya Asrani that highlight Indigenous voices rooted in this land, those from distant shores, immigrants seeking new beginnings, settlers laying down roots, and refugees in search of sanctuary.
   
• Fig Tree Palace, Jonathan Rogers Park
  New Page Foundation showcases the work of formerly incarcerated people as they come back into outside society through art, culture and food justice.
   
• xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh and səlilwətaɬ Cultural Residency, Stanley Park
  Skwxwu7mesh, Sto:lo, Hawaiian, Swiss interdisciplinary artist and Indigenous ethnobotanist T’uy’t’tanat Cease Wyss makes new forays into communicating with plants and sound. 

‘Field Guides’ will also offer a series of free workshops, performances and talks in the Roundhouse Exhibition Hall and Performance Centre. Some events will require registration. For details visit: roundhouse.ca/events External website, opens in new tab

Highlights include:

• Opening Reception, Thursday, September 26, 7pm
   
• Kairos Blanket Exercise: Indigenous Teaching and Sharing Circle with Shelley Saje Ricci and Sam George Jr.
  Wednesday, September 25, 7pm to 10pm. Register here External website, opens in new tab
  
  Walk through pre-contact, treaty-making, colonization and resistance, Talking Circles, role play and the experience of Turtle Island as one of the original people. Learn more External website, opens in new tab
   
• Artists and Culture Info Session: Neighbourhood Matching Fund and Park Board Arts, Reconciliation, and Culture (ARC) Projects
  Tuesday, October 1, at 7pm. Register here External website, opens in new tab
  
  Learn how to apply for Park Board’s Neighbourhood Matching Fund and get an overview of ARC project possibilities for practicing artists and cultural facilitators.
   
• Gamelan Bike Bike Concert and Workshop
  Saturday, October 5, 7:30pm at Roundhouse Performance Centre. Tickets $25, Register here External website, opens in new tab
  
  Hadden Park Fieldhouse artists released their new album and offer a free intro to Balinese gamelan. Pre-show workshop from 6:30pm to 7pm, no registration required. Learn more External website, opens in new tab
   
• Field Guides Closer Conversations
  Sunday, October 6, 1pm to 3:30pm.
  
  Listen to stories from artists and culture facilitators of encounters and connections with people in their neighbourhoods. Introduction by Gitxsan and Nisga’a cultural facilitator Leona Brown, Indigenous Advocate for the Vancouver Urban Food Forest Foundation with a cameo appearance by Opera Lirica Community Choir.

‘Field Guides’ highlights the Vancouver Park Board’s longstanding commitment to artists and cultural facilitators working in the community to engage citizens in creative practices through the arts, local food and environmental stewardship. Learn more about fieldhouse activations in parks: https://vancouver.ca/parks-recreation-culture/fieldhouse-programs.aspx