January 6 – February 4, 2023

Friends of the Gallery

Small Gallery: The Weather

The Friends of the Gallery (FOG) is our annual celebration of the creativity of our membership. This exhibition launches our new year, and features the work of members of the Sunshine Coast Arts Council. The exhibition is a long-standing community event that has spanned more than 25 years. Its aim is to involve the broadest range of local artists, to acknowledge the role of the arts in our community, and to celebrate the extraordinary diversity in materials, forms and approach. Artists are invited to submit one piece of art they have completed in the previous year to be shown in this group exhibition. Maximum size is 36″X48″ for 2D work submitted.

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Opening night of Artesia Coffee House featuring new and long-time performers the first Friday of every month at Sunshine Coast Arts Centre

BUY TICKETS ONLINE

Join us Friday, February 3rd at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre in Sechelt for our opening night. We will be presenting singer-songwriter Catherine MacNeil accompanied by Rae Armour for the opening set. Next up is a newly formed band ‘Them Ordinary Things’ with some of the coast’s favourites; Mark Lebelle, guitar/vocals; Kaia Nielsen; bass/vocals; Simon Paradis, guitar/vocals and Paul Dwyer, drums/vocals serving up some tasty tunes. After the break, the ‘KJB Jazz Trio’ with Ken Grunenberg, sax; John Parker-Toulson, bass and Budge Schachte on guitar will entertain to close the evening. Refreshments will again be available.

The Coffee House presented by the Coast Cultural Alliance started on October 2003 and has run consistently to February 2020 followed by a small ‘pandemic’ interruption. We are excited to be back and now be partnering with the Sunshine Coast Arts Council to continue this well received and ongoing event the first Friday of each month in the Spring of each year.

Please pick up your tickets by 7:10 PM or they will be resold.

Friends of the Gallery Artwork Pick Up: Sunday February 5th, Noon-4PM

Thank you so much to all of our members who participated in FOG this year. We had the largest turn out we ever had and had a great number of submissions to our weather theme! We are sad to see it come down as well, but please do make sure to come with all your packing materials Sunday Feb 5th, thank you!

Ports of Entry

Janet Wang

Reception + Talk: Friday February 10th, 5PM

Ports of Entry explores what it means to be Chinese in Canada. It encompasses a range of media, from traditional drawings and paintings, to animated and interactive artwork. This body of work was researched and conceptualized from 2018 – 2021, culminating in an extended trip through British Columbia in 2021, to research the history of Chinese settler migration from the late 1800s. Janet’s trip wound along the Gold Rush Trail and alongside the railway routes carved into the mountainsides by Chinese labourers. She recorded the juxtapositions of the celebrated histories and landmarks with the indelible marks left on the landscape by the labour of Chinese settlers. Movement and migration write on to the landscape who has privilege, who must pay, who is held apart and separate. She pays homage to the canons and traditions of history – both artistic and quotidian – in order to use the familiar as a meeting point with the viewer.

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The Sunshine Coast Arts Council, under the guidance of a Literary Reading Committee, sponsors a series of readings each year. Authors make a selection to read from their texts, followed by a discussion with the audience. This will be held ONLINE, please register.

To Register

Please join us Saturday, February 25th @ 7PM via ZOOM

Nicole Markotić is a poet, novelist, short fiction writer and professor of Canadian and Children’s Literature at the University of Windsor. Her poetry titles include Minotaurs & Other Alphabets, Bent at the Spine, Whelmed and a recent translation of the Old English epic, Beowulf; her novels, Yellow Pages (on the inventions of Alexander Graham Bell), Scrapbook of My Years as a Zealot (about a young woman who becomes a Mormon), and a recent Young Adults work, Rough Patch (a coming of age tale about a bisexual teen). She was poetry editor at Red Deer Press for six years and is currently a fiction editor at NeWest Press. Her academic interests include representations of disability in children’s literature, feminist critical and body theory and twentieth-century Canadian and North American literature and poetics. 

Nicole’s Sunshine Coast reading will include selections from her Beowulf, a rollicking tale of toxic masculinity against the Beast from Outside. Markotić’s translation is both irreverently hilarious and meticulously researched. In the words of one reviewer, “Upending the tale with her fresh and enchanting style, Markotić gives a nod to previous translations, winks at canonical critics, bares historical biases, all while gifting transmogrifying pages that will whet your whimsy!”

Art Lab 

Sunday: February 26th, 2023

Workshop Registration – Morning Session

Workshop Registration – Afternoon Session

Join Natalie Grambow and Saskia Jetten in their ‘Art Lab’ workshops where they investigate creative processes. The morning workshop will guide you in mark-making, creating simple tools to paint and draw, and using found objects to make patterns of lines and textures on paper and cloth. The afternoon class will expand on this in an introduction to carving stamps, exploring repeat patterns as well as some simple bookbinding. You are encouraged to sign up for both classes or you are welcome to register for one of them. Just come and play with an open mind for unpredictability, experimentation and collaborative studies.

Morning Session 10:00 – 1:00 led by Natalie Grambow  – Mark Making on paper and cloth with Found objects and Handmade Tools 

Afternoon Session 1:30 – 4:30 led by Saskia Jetten – Carving Stamps, Exploring Repeat and Simple Bookbinding

Max 12 students, Sign up for one or both.

The cost to attend the workshop is free for members ($25/non), and students are responsible for materials up to $20/workshop. Once you register, you will receive a detailed supplies and materials list. This is a free workshop with pre-registration, no-show or late cancellations will be charged a $50 fee.