The Rat King

I spent last week working in Toronto at Oasis Skateboard Factory through the Ontario Arts Council's Artist in Education program. OSF is an amazing alternative school where students earn high school credits by creating their own brand and running a skateboard business / professional design studio. If such a magical place had existed when I was a teenager, I may have graduated high school, too!

I've worked with teachers Lauren Hortie and Craig Morrison before, and they are incredible artists in their own right. Lauren came up with the idea of using a "Rat King" as a theme for the video. Do you know what a rat king is? I didn't either... and if you have a rat phobia, you may want to skip reading this next part. Sometimes - and this is a true thing! - a bunch of rats can get their tails inseparably tangled together, forming in essence a creepy super-rat. Do a google image search if you dare!

Lauren introduces the Rat King theme

Our project for the week was to make a shadow puppetry promo video introducing the 2014 OSF crew. So naturally, each of the students started by making a rat with their name on it. Rats often have a negative association (like teenagers, perhaps...?) but they are also intelligent and highly resilient (teens are, too!). The work these students produced was really impressive.

The second item they had to create was a paper-cut portrait of themselves, and lastly, they were to create a puppet image to represent themselves.

We layered these images together using an overhead projector, creating a moving collage for each student. In addition, we interwove a weird little narrative featuring a character we called Gargantua.

Shooting the final scene with a couple of students

I think it turned out pretty great! I've definitely never done a shadow puppetry project with quite this tone before, but if you want to engage students you've got to match the project to their skills and interests, and I think we succeeded in doing that here. Check out the video below!

The Rat King from Krista Dalby on Vimeo.

A 'SPARC' of Inspiration

I spent last weekend in Ontario's Haliburton Highlands for SPARC: Symposium for Performing Arts in Rural Communities. 

The event centered on the Haliburton School of the Arts, a gorgeous facility set amongst beautiful wilderness and peppered with outdoor sculptures.

Upon arrival, we were warmly welcomed and directed towards a rack of costumes and a photographer. Yeah, I think I'm going to like it here.

Devil meets hula cape meets Hamlet.... whaaa?

Next we were guided over to a wall where we put a pin on the map to show where we'd come from - a great representation across Ontario, Canada, and even a few international guests.

We were given index cards on which we each wrote what we were seeking and what we were offering. Mini versions of our costumed photos went on the cards, too, helping people find each other and make connections. It's easy to feel awkward about networking, but these few fun icebreakers really helped set the stage for meeting one another.

There were three stirring plenary sessions that were held in the Great Hall...

And numerous smaller sessions, including mine! I was honoured to have been chosen as a presenter, and gave a workshop called "Celebrating Local Stories With Shadow Puppetry."

How much can I possibly talk about shadow puppets...? Turns out, a whole lot!

After presenting a slide show covering my work with Shadow of a Doubt Collective, ArtsCan Circle, Puppets Without Borders and the Ontario Arts Council's Artist in Education program, it was time to offer some hands-on experience. I guided the participants into brainstorming a local story from their community, which they shared with each other. 

Participants sharing their own local stories

Then they had the opportunity to make a shadow puppet of their very own.

I love these two shadow puppets that got hung up in the Great Hall,
a nod to the history of  logging and forestry in Haliburton

There were *so many* great presentations, like this one on site-specific theatre by Kendra Fanconi of The Only Animal. Here she discusses her work "NiX," set in a geodesic dome with a set made of snow. WOW!

But it wasn't all classrooms and Powerpoint presentations. We went on field trips!

You're either on the bus, or off the bus... and we were definitely *ON*.

Who would want to come to a place like this without getting to experience some of nature's magic?

There were also tons of performances of theatre, music and dance, keeping the creativity flowing and helping us get to know each other's work.

Bi-coastal collaboration:
Newfoundland's Dan Rubin with Tina Jones from B.C.'s The Kerplunks

There were so many wonderful, like-minded people at SPARC. New friendships were forged over box lunches and bus rides, and there are great hopes of building a network of us creative rural folk to keep these conversations going.

Sadie Dixon-Spain from Scotland's The Walking Theatre with Tina Jones

To wrap up the symposium there was a presentation from the youth caucus. Some 20 or so youth were in attendance, and it was really important for all of us to hear their perspective.

All in all, it was an incredible couple of days, and I returned home to my own beautiful neck of the woods, inspired and invigorated. As a rural creator of performing arts I face particular opportunities and challenges - but now I feel like I'm not so alone. There are artists creating incredible work in the most unlikely places, and I'm going to keep on keeping on, carving out a place for myself in Prince Edward County's local culture.

Home sweet home.