Friday, October 17th, 2008

Posted by Jenn Lowther

Last night started with me heading over to the Shebeen for the W2 Fundraising Campaign Kickoff. I love the Irish Heather, but had not yet had the opportunity to go to the Shebeen. The Shebeen is located behind the Irish Heather – you actually have to walk through it to get to the Shebeen. The venue was beautiful and I thought the perfect location given the eclectic mix of the Vancouver Art, Technology, and Non-Profit communities. Given that it was a fundraising kickoff, you were asked for a small donation at the door – every little bit helps with these fundraising initiatives!

The crowd that assembled was a great mix, I saw some familiar faces, but more than anything, I had the opportunity to meet lots of new and interesting people. Amongst the crowd, was mayoral candidate Gregor Robertson, along with a couple of other people who are currently vying for seats on several Vancouver councils. I am always impressed when I see politicians being active in the various community events around Vancouver. I know Gregor is particularly active in the Vancouver scene as this is the third event that I’ve attended in the past month where he has been present.

The W2 Community Media Arts Centre is a highly anticipated project opening in the fall of 2009 at the landmark Woodward’s redevelopment in downtown Vancouver, British Columbia. Invoke was invited to attend the event by our good friend Kris Krug who is on the organization committee.

The evening started off with several people talking about the various aspects of the fundraising initiative. Speakers included a representative from Building Opportunity with Business (BOB) and Kris Krug of Raincity Studios (unfortunately, I wasn’t taking notes so I cannot seem to recall the name of the woman that represented BOB). It was fascinating listening to the speakers talk about what they’ve been doing thus far and their plans for the future. If you have the opportunity in the future to go to one of these events, I would highly recommend it. The talks were followed up with a video that was created solely using cell phones.

Unfortunately, I was unable to stay for the entire evening as I had to join the rest of the Invoke crew over at the Yaletown Brew Pub for the first Ideas on Tap hosted by 6S Marketing – I’ll be recapping that event on the Invoke blog shortly.

They are currently trying to build up their online presence while they are waiting for the actual center to be built. The follow are a couple of places that you can join them online facebook and Ning. This is an excellent cause and I highly encourage you to find out more information on W2 and different ways in which you can become active and support them.

Below is an overview of W2 that Kris was kind enough to provide for me.

W2 is currently planned as a 14,395 square foot facility, and will be a community-based media and arts centre offering quality arts programming and presentation opportunities to Downtown Eastside and Vancouver residents through a range of programs, resources and activities. It is intended to provide a vibrant and complementary focal point in the redevelopment of Woodward’s and act as a catalyst in the revitalization of the Vancouver Downtown Eastside by emphasizing the development capacity by and for the DTES residents.

The Centre’s objectives are to produce and present new works of artistic significance and social benefit; to empower individuals and communities (young and old alike); and to engage with technology and interdisciplinary artists as producers rather than consumers. Emphasis will be placed on cross-cultural sharing, artistic and social outcomes, as well as the quality of process.

W2 will bring together hybrid art forms, community art practices, individual human development and community cultural development in a single environment. It will be home to a diverse grouping of Vancouver arts and community service organizations offering developmental programs in writing, radio and television production, painting, sculpture, photography, mixed media, video and cross-media.

Cultural services delivery will include a broad range of daily public offerings, including walk-in activities, courses, workshops, symposia, and individual and group practice. In addition, the combination of administrative and production spaces will provide professional and supportive structures, in which people can make new work, extend and develop their practice, and establish new contexts for public presentation. A portal to the global community will also be realized through 24/7 webcasting and satellite distribution systems from the performance centre, digital media labs, and TV studio.

Tags: fundraising, shebeen, vancouver, w2

This entry was posted on Friday, October 17th, 2008 at 12:13 pm and is filed under events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.