Summer Learning
Generator’s ongoing partnership with SummerWorks Performance Festival
SummerWorks Exchange 2019
After a successful inaugural year in 2018, #SWexchange returns to SummerWorks Performance Festival in 2019. SummerWorks Exchange is an industry series designed to facilitate artist and community growth. This is the place where we come together in a spirit of learning, dialogue, and collaboration—to share, connect, and confront the big questions we face in our communities.
The 2019 #SWexchange was all about the theme of Making Space, and considering the spaces we hold, create, and have the power to transform. Generator was proud to partner on events taking place August 12-14, 2019.
SW Exchange Day 2 – Monday, August 12
Open Hours – ArtistProducerResource.com Wiki-edit-a-Thon
2:30 pm – 5:00 pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre – Gathering Space
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks
ArtistProducerResource.com is an open-source encyclopedia of knowledge, resources, tools, and practices for producing independent performance work in Canada (starting with a focus on Toronto). Hosted by Generator, this site is made by artists and for artists, to broaden the scope of instruction and knowledge-sharing in the community, and provide a platform for new ideas and practices to be shared. Artists can add new content through this wiki-edit-a-thon. Have a useful best practice or resource you want to share? Come add it to ArtistProducerResource.com and see it live on the site!
The SummerWorks Exchange Open Hours is a generative studio space for encountering new projects and resources in performance making. Drop in on these creators and builders, with an opportunity to learn and exchange ideas as they shape their ongoing projects. Learn more about the other Open Hours activities - culture capital and Beyond Silent Mode - here.
SW Exchange Day 3 – Tuesday, August 13
Small Time Space
11:00 am – 12:30 pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre - Dames Making Games
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks
Designed by Kristina Lemieux and Elenna Mosoff
“We haven’t got much time so we have to work slowly.” – Hungarian director George Tabori
Come consider the role time plays in space making. Take 15 minutes this morning for an experiential meditation on time and change.
Open Hours – ArtistProducerResource.com Wiki-edit-a-Thon
12:00 pm – 2:30 pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre – Gathering Space
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks
ArtistProducerResource.com is an open-source encyclopedia of knowledge, resources, tools, and practices for producing independent performance work in Canada (starting with a focus on Toronto). Hosted by Generator, this site is made by artists and for artists, to broaden the scope of instruction and knowledge-sharing in the community, and provide a platform for new ideas and practices to be shared. Artists can add new content through this wiki-edit-a-thon. Have a useful best practice or resource you want to share? Come add it to ArtistProducerResource.com and see it live on the site!
The SummerWorks Exchange Open Hours is a generative studio space for encountering new projects and resources in performance making. Drop in on these creators and builders, with an opportunity to learn and exchange ideas as they shape their ongoing projects. Learn more about the other Open Hours activities - culture capital and Beyond Silent Mode - here.
Workshop – Creating Sign Language Magic
2:00 pm – 4:30 pm
Venue: Artscape Youngplace
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks and Deaf Spectrum
Led by Sage Lovell, Thurga Kanagasekarampillai, Derek Kwan, Gaitrie Persaud, and Suchiththa Wickremesooriya
Explore the possibilities of creating accessible sign language productions for d/Deaf, Hard-of-Hearing, and sign language users. This workshop looks at multiple approaches, using selected performance excerpts to demonstrate interpretation, shadowing, and acting practices.
ASL Interpretation and Captioning provided for this workshop.
This workshop has been made possible in part through an accessibility initiative led by Theatre Passe Muraille. This project was supported through Toronto Arts Council Strategic Funding.
Workshop – Making Space for Conflict & Dialogue
2:00 pm – 4:30 pm
Venue: Artscape Youngplace
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks and Generator’s Transform Dance project
Led by Meg Saxby
What do we do when people hurt each other in our community? How can we respond supportively to people who have been directly harmed, while also changing the cultures and structures that make bullying and unhealthy conflict possible? This workshop uses experiential and Theatre of the Oppressed techniques to explore ways of dealing with conflict well, making space for healthier dialogue, and treating each other better in the arts spaces we work in. Participants will imagine and dialogue about what healthy and supportive arts spaces can look and feel like.
Talking about conflict can be challenging. In an effort to make this workshop as accessible and supportive a space as possible, we will have Alexia Dyer, a Registered Psychotherapist, on site to offer debriefing and support to any participant who needs it. Alexia has twenty years of experience working in areas of violence prevention, trauma counselling and restorative justice. To learn more about her practice, visit eastendtherapy.ca.
ASL Interpretation and Captioning provided for this workshop. A group agreement to support safe participation for all will be available online leading up to the workshop. During the workshop, a therapist will be present to provide support to participants, should anyone need it.
This project is supported through Toronto Arts Council Strategic Funding as part of Generator’s Transform Dance project, which is about finding ways into healing and community accountability within the dance sector in Toronto. In particular, we are interested in transforming the conditions that enable harassment (sexual, gender-based and otherwise) and abuses of power.
SW Exchange Day 3 – Wednesday, August 14
Long Table – Making Space
3:30 pm – 5:30 pm
Venue: The Theatre Centre – BMO Incubator
Presented in partnership with SummerWorks
FREE and open to the public
The Long Table is a dinner party where conversation is the only course. The format ingeniously combines theatricality and models for public engagement. This edition will close out this year’s SummerWorks Exchange focused on the concept of ‘making space.’ Come with your questions, and bring your ideas - this is the place to talk about what needs to be done and find folks to do the work with. ASL interpretation provided for this event.
Venues
Toronto Media Arts Centre, 32 Lisgar Street, Toronto ON M6J 0C9
The Theatre Centre, 1115 Queen Street West, Toronto ON M6J 3T4
Artscape Youngplace, 180 Shaw Street, Toronto ON M6J 2W5
The three venues housing Generator’s SW Exchange events are very near to one another (within an eight block radius), located in West Queen West. All venues have accessible entrances and washrooms. To learn more about accessibility at the festival, click here.
SummerWorks Exchange 2018
In 2018, SummerWorks launched the Exchange as a new stream of the festival, encapsulating professional development and industry activities. Keep reading to learn about the programming Generator was involved with (August 13 & 15, 2018)! Photos by Henry Chan.
SW Exchange Day 1 - August 13, 2018
INDUSTRY LUNCH
Monday, August 13, 2018 12:00pm-1:30pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre
An opportunity to connect with colleagues, as well as meet new artists and presenters. ASL Interpretation will be provided for this event.
WORKSHOP SESSIONS
Monday, August 13, 2018 1:30pm-4:30pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre
Presented in partnership with Ad Hoc Assembly, Artscape Launchpad & Generator
Participants will have the opportunity to choose between concurrent workshops providing tools for generous listening, decolonizing performance practice, and equitable engagement within cross-cultural collaboration. ASL Interpretation will be provided for all workshop sessions.
Session 1: Affinity Gathering
Facilitated by Ad Hoc Assembly: Donna-Michelle St. Bernard, Grace Phan-Nguyen & Cole Alvis
Ad Hoc Assembly (AHA) in association with Generator and SummerWorks will lead a workshop to equip Indigenous and culturally diverse artists for equitable engagement. Tools include holding space and empowering yourself within cross-cultural collaboration. AHA Affinity Gatherings engage with local artists to identify barriers/resources and strengthen their practice through the exchange of knowledge and experience. We welcome settler arts practitioners who identify as members of an equity-seeking cultural community (i.e. Deaf, disabled, Trans, gender non-binary, etc). AHA is dedicated to the sustained forward movement of ethno-cultural and socially diverse performance works, processes, and traditions. adhocassembly.com
Session 2: Systems by Design
Facilitated by Artscape Launchpad: Jerrold McGrath & Peter Toh
We have all experienced getting stuck in structures that make responding, learning, and participating hard. This program is for those interested in how we can shift how we show up with each other to do new things. Participants will receive practical tools and direct interactions with a live case in the arts community. Our systems — organizational, community, or societal — are defined by a set of spoken and unspoken rules and assumptions. By pointing out these unspoken patterns, we can redesign the moments in which we come together to better reflect the world we want to see. Pulling back from habits and rituals is time-consuming and difficult. This session will provide the structures and the discipline to do this in the systems we care about.
In this session we will explore:
Intervening in systems: Practices and approaches for changing how systems work
Disorganizing by design: Breaking up routines so that new things can happen
Reorganizing from our values: Redesigning structures that embody the values we want to see
Properties of spaces: Imagining them in new ways
Session 3: Talking Treaties: Quick Creation with the Dish with One Spoon
Facilitated by Ange Loft
A continuation of last year’s workshop Re / Colonizing – Decolonizing Performance Practice, Ange Loft takes participants through the history of the Dish With One Spoon, followed by participants creating a multidisciplinary performance response shared in small groups, and concludes with group reflection and sharing. The Dish with One Spoon is a regional agreement between Indigenous Nations to uphold shared responsibility for the land. This three-part workshop begins with presentation and exploration of the conceptual origins, historical documentation and challenges to the understandings held in the wampum-based agreement. A generative mapping of images, symbols and key phrases serves as the base for improvised vocal interpretation, but also as the generated content for speedy collaborative creation in small teams. The final phase invites participants to witness and perform in the impromptu spectacle. Time is given for brief reflection and for discussion.
SW Exchange Day 3 - August 15, 2018
Info Fair 12:00pm-1:30pm
Venue: Theatre Centre – Gallery, 1115 Queen Street West
Free Event
An opportunity to meet with and ask questions of funders before the next grant deadline as well as learn more about resources and initiatives impacting the community including ArtsVote and ArtistProducerResource.com. Coffee and snacks will be provided. ASL interpretation provided at this event.
SYSTEMS CHANGE OPEN SPACE
1:30pm-4:30pm
Venue: Toronto Media Arts Centre
Presented in partnership with Generator and Why Not Theatre
Can we keep doing this? Change comes when a community rallies together with an idea, time, and resources. It is time to shift the ways we make and work together. Instigations from various sectors, including theatre, music and gaming, will suggest alternatives to current systems, make recommendations for what is needed to create a healthier and more sustainable ecology and spark smaller discussions among those in attendance. Be prepared to commit to a new future. This is a space to talk about what we will do and find folks to do it with. Do you have an idea that needs more momentum, bring it here to find collaborators and resources?
More information here: summerworks.ca/exchange
August 2017 SummerWorks Leadership Intensive Program (SLIP)
SummerWorks Intensive Leadership Program (S.L.I.P.), is a series of public events that explore how we can remove barriers and dismantle systems of oppression through artistic practice.
All SLIP discussions are FREE and will take place at Artscape Youngplace Studio 103 (180 Shaw Street, Toronto).
CORE DIALOGUE: ARTS, ACCESS, AND AESTHETICS
Tuesday August 8, 10am-1pm
Facilitator Barak adé Soleil
Photo by Dahlia Katz from our (RE)conciliation: a workshop on integrating Indigeneity and decolonizing performance practice.
Barak adé Soleil, Artistic Director of Tangled Art + Disability and disability arts scholar Eliza Chandler will co-facilitate a core dialogue and presentation on the ways in which cultural production and accessibility co-exist. What is disability aesthetics? And, how does our understanding of aesthetics expand when we consider how people access and relate to our work? **ASL Interpretation Provided
Presented in partnership by SummerWorks, Generator, and Tangled Art + Disability
(RE)CONCILIATION: A WORKSHOP ON INTEGRATING INDIGENEITY AND DECOLONIZING PERFORMANCE PRACTICE
Tuesday August 8, 2pm-5pm
Facilitators Cole Alvis and Jill Carter
The land acknowledgement perfunctorily performed by rote will not serve the fraught, complex project of reconciliation; indeed, it may, at the end of the day, render such an endeavor an exercise in futility. How do artists go beyond the learning of names, or geography, or historical fact to begin decolonizing their practice? How do we re-imagine our relationship with this land upon which we create? Cole Alvis (Métis) and Jill Carter (Anishinaabe-Ashkenazi) lead a workshop for artists on how we can more actively engage in (re)conciliation. **ASL Interpretation Provided
Presented in partnership by SummerWorks and Generator
THE CREATIVE CASE FOR RELAXED PERFORMANCE
Wednesday August 9, 10am-1pm
Facilitated by Access Activators
Relaxed Performance (RP) as a cultural practice helps to make theatre spaces more comfortable and welcoming to audience members with autism spectrum disorders, sensory and communication disorders or learning disabilities. This workshop will explore how cultural producers, artists and arts organizations can more widely and independently integrate RP principles within their work and creative process. This workshop will be led by Access Activators, a Relaxed Performance pilot consulting project. **ASL Interpretation Provided
Presented in partnership by SummerWorks, Generator, Tangled Art + Disability, and the British Council
ANTI-OPPRESSION AND ANTI-RACISM WORKSHOP
Wednesday August 9, 2-5pm
Facilitator Rania El Mugammar
This workshop for artists explores the language, theories and practices of anti-oppression in depth. Institutional, community based and organizational strategies for building equity and unlearning oppression are central to the content and objectives of the workshop. Creative, technical and collaborative models for building equity and liberation will be explored. Group activities, case studies and discussion are critical tools to apply the learnings of this workshop. Participants will have access to a plethora of digital and print resources to continue their learning journey beyond the scope of the session. **ASL Interpretation Provided
Presented in Partnership by SummerWorks, Generator, and b current performing arts
August 2016 SummerWorks Leadership Intensive Program (SLIP)
Photo by Dahlia Katz
IMAGINING THE FUTURE, POWERED BY PECHAKUCHA
A curated event featuring artists, thinkers, makers, doers, activators, and leaders from Toronto and beyond. Following the fast-paced Pecha Kucha format, speakers have seven minutes each to give mini-presentations focusing on the question “How do you imagine arts and culture 20 years from now?”
FEATURING: Dr. Mary Fogarty, Alex Johnson, Jane Kirby, Andy Moro, Christine Quintana, Joseph Recinos, Katie Sly, Donna Michelle St. Bernard, and Joshua Vittivelu.
Monday August 8, 7:00pm
The Koffler Centre of the Arts
Photo by Dahlia Katz
Click here for a short and sweet look at the Pecha Kucha on Generator's Vlog
Click here to watch the full Livestream on Koffler's Digital Streams
What are the future needs of artists and cultural leaders? We want to know what you think. Help us imagine where we take S.L.I.P. moving forward.
An open source community dialogue where YOU are at the heart of the conversation! Putting the communal voice at the centre, this conversation gives power to the people allowing everyone present to set the agenda. Come prepared with a brain full of ideas!
Saturday August 13, 4:00pm
Factory Theatre Studio
What can be better than great company and conversation, with food to unite us all?
Come celebrate with us at our communal meal that wraps up the Open Source S.L.I.P. event where creative minds gather over a communal feast! Best part: the food’s on us!
Saturday August 13, 6:00pm
Factory Theatre Studio