Editorial

At the conclusion of his book Random Acts of Culture: Reclaiming Art and Community in the 21st Century, author Clarke Mackey proposes a manifesto of the vernacular. He calls on us to reimagine the balance between commercial culture and vernacular culture (244), finding space for the homemade, the local, and the collective in artmaking. Central to the ethos of community-focused practice is conspiratio, literally “breathing together.” Mackey traces the roots of this idea to Ivan Illich and the early Christian church, situated in the salutation pax vobiscum (Peace be with you). Followers of Christ would gather clandestinely to avoid persecution and in these meetings would greet each other with a kiss of peace. Mackey translates this to our modern artistic context, advocating for a “‘conspiracy of the vernacular,’ a breathing together such that the crushing addictions and profitable bowdlerizing of commercial culture and its objects are pushed aside in favour of conviviality, hospitality, and imagination: not because it serves some purpose, but simply because our hearts tell us that it is beautiful and good” (246). In this edition of the Views and Reviews section, each article, although not exclusively devoted to vernacular art, considers the vital collective interrelations of theatremaking communities and what happens when we breathe together.

Like almost everything else it touches, the Internet has changed the face of fundraising. Websites such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo facilitate the matching of worthy projects with willing benefactors through social networking, dangling the promise that the campaign will go “viral” and generate a windfall of unimagined riches. Unable to fully escape the demands of commerce and the need for money to make art, artists frequently turn to their community as a source of economic support. Patronage in the twenty-first century has spawned the neologism crowdfunding. Taking up this term, Alex Dault of Single Thread Theatre considers the experience of indie theatre producers, assessing the benefits and the risks of this community-based fundraising platform.

Raising money with the help of a network of friends and colleagues is also the project of Theatre Smash’s SMASH CAMP. The brainchild of the company’s two principals, Stacey Norton and Ashlie Corcoran, SMASH CAMP invited teams of ten people each from a local theatre community to register at a nominal cost for a day of friendly competition, reminiscent of childhood summer camp colour wars. Events included an obstacle course, blindfolded face painting, water balloon tossing, cracker whistling, and a relay race along the waterfront. The company advertised the event as a day of “artistic, (un)ironic hipster sportsdudeship” complete with “bug juice” (“Smash Camp”). Here, we offer a scrapbook of photos from the sun- and fun-filled event.

You Should Have Stayed Home: A #G20 Romp, produced by Praxis Theatre, brings together the dual elements of power and community connections in a curious way. On the one hand, the play is founded on the power of social networking. The performance takes as its text an essay-length Facebook post by Tommy Taylor, a bystander who was kettled during the the 2010 G20 Summit, documenting his experiences in police custody. Multiplied exponentially through repeated “shares,” the post went viral and became a touchstone of civic protest. On the other hand, it is also a document of the shocking experience of powerlessness by these ordinary citizens who suddenly lost their freedom in this arbitrary action. In their incarceration, they form new patterns of community. In addition, the play in performance is itself yet another reflection on community connections as the stage fills each night with new volunteer actor-detainees recruited to play the roles of Tommy’s fellow inmates. Reviewer Christine Quintana saw the production in Vancouver and reports her impressions of it here.

When the Pulitzer Prize-winning Angels in America by Tony Kushner debuted on Broadway in 1993, at the height of the AIDS crisis, it was a cri de coeur of its age. But in the twenty years since, the social landscape of HIV/AIDS has changed. The recent revival of Angels by Soulpepper Theatre of Toronto invites the question: How does the play transcend its searing historical moment? What weight does it carry for a post-millennial...