Things to Do in Vancouver this Weekend: Feb. 15, 2018

This weekend we are ringing in the Lunar New Year! To celebrate I suggest you pet a lot of dogs (because it’s the Year of the Dog, and also because dogs are fun to pet), watch some colourful lion dances, and wander through some lanterns to light your way toward spring. During all the New Year festivities, you have the opportunity to widen your cultural exploration even further with Aboriginal and Jewish performing arts  – the Talking Stick Festival and Chutzpah! will set you up and inspire you.

Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Ongoing



Friday February 16

Chutzpah! Festival

Chutzpah! Festival
Where: Various Locations
What: Awe-inspiring dance, extraordinary theatre, hilarious comedy and globally-celebrated music highlights this year’s festival with world-class performances and workshops by international, Canadian and local artists.
Runs until: Thursday March 15, 2018

Talking Stick Festival

Talking Stick Festival
Where: Various locations
What: Celebrating Aboriginal culture, this festival showcases the new evolving contemporary work of today’s artists. All areas of the performing arts are represented from theatre, dance, drumming, and music to spoken word, visual arts and multimedia performance.
Runs until: Sunday February 25, 2018

Chinese New Year of the Dog Celebration

Chinese New Year of the Dog Celebration
Where: International Village
What: Muticultural performances, prize draws, eye-dotting ceremony, lion dance and dignitaries celebrate the lunar new year all weekend.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

Lanterns in the Garden

Lanterns in the Garden
Where: Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden
What: Experience an authentic Chinese lantern festival (yuánxiāo jié) with a display of handmade lanterns showcases various Chinese legends, adding spark to the Year of the Dog celebration. Live performances and activities include classic lantern riddles and Chinese sugar painting.
Runs until: Saturday February 17, 2018

Beethoven: Pastoral and Piano (show 1 of 2)
Where: Chan Centre
What: British pianist Stephen Hough performs Beethoven’s stormy and romantic Piano Concerto No. 4. Pastoral beauty and “sturm und drang” are also on full display in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6.

The Butterfly Lovers
Where: Vancouver Playhouse
What: A ballet inspired by the world renowned concerto and one of China’s Four Great Folktales; a love story that is older than Romeo and Juliet.

Vancouver International Puppet Festival Homegrown Series

Vancouver International Puppet Festival Homegrown Series
Where: Performance Works
What: Vancouver International Puppet Festival proudly showcases local talent with their HomeGrown Series, in collaboration with The Granville Island Cultural Society.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

The Sheepdogs

The Sheepdogs
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: Proud purveyors of guitar-driven modern-day retro rock.

Dua Lipa

Dua Lipa
Where: The Vogue
What: Pop from London.

Black Wizard

Black Wizard
Where: The Rickshaw
What: Local metal with guests Mean Jeans, Dead Quiet, Waingro, and Killer Deal.

Noble Oak

Noble Oak
Where: The Fox Cabaret
What: Local electronic music performer and multi-instrumentalist.

Traditional Year of the Dog Lion Dance

Traditional Year of the Dog Lion Dance
Where: Parq Vancouver
What: A traditional lion dance complete with 8 lions and the Fortune God bearing free Year of the Dog keychains for everyone! Plus, the Vancouver Canucks Mascot ‘Fin’ will be making a special guest appearance.

Enter Shikari

Enter Shikari
Where: The Imperial
What: Electro-hardcore from London.

Sherman Tai Charity Fortune Reading

Sherman Tai Charity Fortune Reading
Where: River Rock Casino (Richmond, BC)
What: Get your Year of the Dog fortune read by a master fortune teller. All proceeds benefit the BC Children’s Hospital.
Runs until: Sunday February 25, 2018

 


 

Saturday February 17

top of page

Lunar New Year Celebrations and Sugar Painting | Image via chinesetimeschool.com

Lunar New Year Celebrations and Sugar Painting
Where: Granville Island
What: A traditional Lion Dance parade starting at 10:30am in the Public Market, and a Sugar Painting showcase from 11am to 2pm, where the artist uses a traditional Chinese form of folk art using hot, liquid sugar to create two or three dimensional figures.

Vancouver Canucks Celebrate Chinese New Year

Vancouver Canucks Celebrate Chinese New Year
Where:
Rogers Arena
What:
Year of the Dog warm-up jerseys, pre-game festivities and a kid zone all celebrate the new year at this game against the Boston Bruins.

Out There: The Visionary Cinema of Nicolas Roeg

Out There: The Visionary Cinema of Nicolas Roeg
Where: The Cinematheque
What: In 2011, Time Out published the results of a poll, voted on by 150 film professionals, to determine the 100 greatest British films of all time. When Nicolas Roeg’s haunting masterpiece Don’t Look Now (1973) took the surprise top spot — with three other Roeg films ranking in the top 70 — it gave pause to reflect on an erratic, provocative, and fiercely original body of work that continually, defiantly tested the limits of commercial cinema at every gutsy turn.
Runs until: Sunday March 4, 2018

Beethoven: Pastoral and Piano (show 2 of 2)
Where: Chan Centre
What: British pianist Stephen Hough performs Beethoven’s stormy and romantic Piano Concerto No. 4. Pastoral beauty and “sturm und drang” are also on full display in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6.

The Coronas

The Coronas
Where: The Biltmore
What: With four double platinum albums, a slew of top ten singles, sold out arenas and a legion of devoted fans behind them The Coronas have earned their title as one of Ireland’s best loved and hardest working bands.

Judah & the Lion

Judah & the Lion
Where: The Commodore
What: Fuzz bass, hip-hop percussion, distorted banjo riffs, and super-sized melodies all stirred into the same mixing pot.

Plum(b)
Where: The Annex
What: Music that explores depths of pitch and hue, and takes a probing look back at one of the earliest extant recordings of the human voice. Featuring Plumb, a brand-new contrabassoon concerto by Jeffrey Ryan.

Autograf

Autograf
Where: The Imperial
What: Electro slow pop music from Chicago that sounds like a winding down after-party.

Bruno Major

Bruno Major
Where: The Fox Cabaret
What: Singer-songwriter from London, on tour to support his latest release “A Song For Every Moon”.

 


 

Sunday February 18

top of page

The 45th Vancouver Chinatown Spring Festival Parade

The 45th Vancouver Chinatown Spring Festival Parade
Where: Chinatown
What: This signature event of Vancouver’s Chinatown will feature lion dances, cultural dance troupes, marching bands and martial arts performances.

The Jazz Epistles

The Jazz Epistles: Abdullah Ibrahim with guest Terence Blanchard
Where: Chan Centre
What: Four-time GRAMMY-winning New Orleans trumpeter Terence Blanchard joins Ibrahim and band Ekaya as guest performer of these jazz masterworks produced during the apartheid struggle.

Lunarfest: A Celebration for Dogs and Dog Lovers

Lunarfest: A Celebration for Dogs and Dog Lovers
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery Plaza
What: Take a photo with Canadog – the Space Husky; pick up some new toys and trinkets for your walking buddy; make an impromptu play-date with new canine friends, and fill your bellies with delicious Lunar New Year foods!

Get Lucky Art Show
Where: Fortune Sound Club
What: In celebration of Chinese New Year 2018 (Year of the Dog!), District Local has invited Vancouver artists to create artwork on red pocket/lucky envelopes for a one-day art show. Artists have the freedom to use their media of choice, using red envelopes as the canvas.

Gogol Bordello

Gogol Bordello
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: This iconic 9-piece gypsy-punk form Manhattan will put on one of the liveliest stage shows you may ever see.

Tales of Love: A Journey Through Time

Tales of Love: A Journey Through Time
Where: Ladner United Church (Ladner, BC)
What: With harp, guitar, flute, voices, and drums, Caelestra will take you on a musical journey through the ages of love.


 

Ongoing

top of page

No Foreigners

No Foreigners
Where: The Cultch
What: Shopping malls become a portal into surreal worlds that carry the nuanced stories of loss and resilience from the Chinese diaspora. This multimedia performance investigates malls as racialized spaces of cultural creation and clash where fashion, food, and commodity tether communities to a vital sense of home.
Runs until: Saturday February 17, 2018

Lanterns in the Garden

Lanterns in the Garden
Where: Dr. Sun Yat-Sen Classical Chinese Garden
What: Experience an authentic Chinese lantern festival (yuánxiāo jié) with a display of handmade lanterns showcases various Chinese legends, adding spark to the Year of the Dog celebration. Live performances and activities include classic lantern riddles and Chinese sugar painting.
Runs until: Saturday February 17, 2018

Legally Blonde the Musical

Legally Blonde the Musical
Where: Michael J Fox Theatre (Burnaby, BC)
What: A cast of local theatre luminaries are in this bright and boisterous celebration of beauty that embraces brains.
Runs until: Saturday February 17, 2017

Ruined
Where: Pacific Theatre
What: Mama Nadi’s bar both protects and profits off the bodies of the women who have become casualties of a long and brutal civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. She ensures survival by catering to both sides of the conflict, but how long can she keep the war outside her walls?
Runs until: Saturday February 17, 2018

City on the Edge: A Century of Vancouver Activism
Where: Museum of Vancouver
What: A photo-based exhibition exploring how protest demonstrations have shaped Vancouver’s identity from the Vancouver Sun and The Province newspapers’ photo collection. These photographs are exceptional historical records of intense and transformative moments in the lives of Vancouverites.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2017

Flight of the Dragon

Flight of the Dragon
Where: FlyOver Canada
What: In addition to flying over Canada from East to West, you’ll follow a mythical dragon as you soar over some of China’s most spectacular landscapes and scenery.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

My Funny Valentine

My Funny Valentine
Where: The Dance Centre
What: Hailed as “exceptionally beautiful” (Vancouver Courier), this Jessie-nominated work was written in response to the tragic 2008 murder of Lawrence King, a 15-year-old shot by his male classmate after asking him to be his valentine. In a series of profoundly moving monologues, Vancouver actor Connor Wylie (previous artist-in-residence for Theatre Replacement) will take audiences through the minds of those caught in the aftermath of an unspeakable hate crime.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

Chinese New Year of the Dog Celebration

Chinese New Year of the Dog Celebration
Where: International Village
What: Muticultural performances, prize draws, eye-dotting ceremony, lion dance and dignitaries celebrate the lunar new year all weekend.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

Vancouver International Puppet Festival Homegrown Series

Vancouver International Puppet Festival Homegrown Series
Where: Performance Works
What: Vancouver International Puppet Festival proudly showcases local talent with their HomeGrown Series, in collaboration with The Granville Island Cultural Society.
Runs until: Sunday February 18, 2018

Michael Soltis

Michael Soltis (cropped image)

Michael Soltis
Where: Kimoto Gallery
What: This series represents over of a year of the artists most personally focused and explorative artwork to date. In approaching each piece, the goal was to not edit, but to create with complete inhibition, to follow his intuition and ignore the impulse to question.
Runs until: Saturday February 24, 2018

Talking Stick Festival

Talking Stick Festival
Where: Various locations
What: Celebrating Aboriginal culture, this festival showcases the new evolving contemporary work of today’s artists. All areas of the performing arts are represented from theatre, dance, drumming, and music to spoken word, visual arts and multimedia performance.
Runs until: Sunday February 25, 2018

Sherman Tai Charity Fortune Reading

Sherman Tai Charity Fortune Reading
Where: River Rock Casino (Richmond, BC)
What: Get your Year of the Dog fortune read by a master fortune teller. All proceeds benefit the BC Children’s Hospital.
Runs until: Sunday February 25, 2018

Unsung Heroes Festival

Unsung Heroes Festival
Where: Blue Water Cafe
What: Celebrate lesser known and often overlooked fin and seafood to educate diners about alternative sustainable Ocean Wise choices.
Runs until: Tuesday February 27, 2018

Robson Street Outdoor Ice Rink

Robson Street Outdoor Ice Rink
Where: Robson Square
What: Bring your skates, hold hands for balance, and circle the rink for free right in the heart of Downtown Vancouver. Skate rentals are also available, and for that you’ll need to bring cash.
Runs until: Wednesday February 28, 2018

Jitters
Where: Arts Club Theatre
What: Four actors, a director, a playwright, and one grand dream of Broadway-bound success. Anything from a forgotten line to a faulty wig may just make or break their new Canadian play. Can this motley crew set aside their egos and anxieties in order to make it to the big time?
Runs until: Wednesday February 28, 2018

Tasting History: The Traveling Tales of Tea
Where: Roedde House Museum
What: Tea is one of the most consumed liquids in the world, second only to water. But the beverage that brings much pleasure and calm to our 21st century senses is steeped in a turbulent history of politics and society. The exhibit will also feature stories from Vancouver’s modern-day tea community.
Runs until: March 2018

Out There: The Visionary Cinema of Nicolas Roeg

Out There: The Visionary Cinema of Nicolas Roeg
Where: The Cinematheque
What: In 2011, Time Out published the results of a poll, voted on by 150 film professionals, to determine the 100 greatest British films of all time. When Nicolas Roeg’s haunting masterpiece Don’t Look Now (1973) took the surprise top spot — with three other Roeg films ranking in the top 70 — it gave pause to reflect on an erratic, provocative, and fiercely original body of work that continually, defiantly tested the limits of commercial cinema at every gutsy turn.
Runs until: Sunday March 4, 2018

Winter Yoga Series on Grouse Mountain
Where: Grouse Mountain
What: Begin your Sunday morning with a journey through the twinkling Light Walk and over to the hiwus feasthouse atop a mountain. Come prepared with snow-appropriate footwear or strap on your snowshoes for the this snowy walk.
Runs until: Sunday March 4, 2018

Emily Carr: Into the Forest

Emily Carr: Into the Forest
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Far from feeling that the forests of the West Coast were a difficult subject matter, Carr exulted in the symphonies of greens and browns found in the natural world. With oil on paper as her primary medium, Carr was free to work outdoors in close proximity to the landscape. She went into the forest to paint and saw nature in ways unlike her fellow British Columbians, who perceived it as either untamed wilderness or a plentiful source of lumber.
Runs until: March 4, 2018

Fun Home
Where: Arts Club Theatre
What: Alison’s father was many things: a historical preservationist, a funeral home director, a distant parent, and a closeted gay man. In the struggle to understand her father while also dealing with her own coming out, graphic novelist Alison documents the story of her life in coloured panels. This Tony Award–winning musical memoir is a heartbreaking and fiercely funny journey, punctuated with a refreshing score that frames the curiosity of childhood and the complexities of a family.
Runs until: Saturday March 10, 2018

Chutzpah! Festival

Chutzpah! Festival
Where: Various Locations
What: Awe-inspiring dance, extraordinary theatre, hilarious comedy and globally-celebrated music highlights this year’s festival with world-class performances and workshops by international, Canadian and local artists.
Runs until: Thursday March 15, 2018

The Lost Fleet Exhibit
Where: Vancouver Maritime Museum
What: On December 7, 1941 the world was shocked when Japan bombed Pearl Harbour, launching the United States into the war. This action also resulted in the confiscation of nearly 1,200 Japanese-Canadian owned fishing boats by Canadian officials on the British Columbia coast, which were eventually sold off to canneries and other non-Japanese fishermen. The Lost Fleet looks at the world of the Japanese-Canadian fishermen in BC and how deep-seated racism played a major role in the seizure, and sale, of Japanese-Canadian property and the internment of an entire people.
Runs until: March 25, 2018

Into the Arctic

Into the Arctic
Where: Vancouver Maritime Museum
What: This exhibit encompasses over 50 Arctic oil paintings and 3 films from Trepanier’s 4 Arctic expeditions to the furthest reaches of the Canadian North. Its wilderness is so remote and untouched that many of its landscapes have never been documented before.
Runs until: Sunday March 25, 2018

Two Scores

Two Scores
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: A solo exhibition of ambitious new work by Vancouver-based artist Brent Wadden, his first in a public institution. Dominated by singular woven statements upon the floor and walls, in their dramatic scale and graphic simplicity, they mark a point of departure for the artist, but might also be said to reveal both an unseen structure and a complex set of tensions that quietly anchor Wadden’s ongoing practice as a whole.
Runs until: Sunday March 25, 2018

Fin and Feathers

Fin and Feathers
Where: VanDusen Gardens
What: Paintings by Jo Scott-B. Jo’s book: Carved in Oak – Medieval Pew Carvings in English Churches began her study of medieval designs in UK and Europe, continued in this body of work.  Jo’s children played on the old Shaughnessy Golf Course before it became VanDusen Botanical Garden. For her, it is a perfect venue for her humorous images of fish and birds, set in foliage taken from her sketchbooks.
Runs until: Sunday March 25, 2018

Chief Dan George: Actor and Activist
Where: North Vancouver Museum
What: An exhibition exploring the life and legacy of Tsleil-Waututh Chief Dan George (1899- 1981) and his influence as an Indigenous rights advocate and his career as an actor. The exhibition was developed in close collaboration with the George family.
Runs until: April 2018

空 / Emptiness: Emily Carr and Lui Shou Kwan

空 / Emptiness: Emily Carr and Lui Shou Kwan
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: The exhibition pairs Canadian modernist Emily Carr with the founder of the New Ink Movement in Hong Kong Lui Shou Kwan. Looking across culture, geography and time to explore expressions of the sublime in landscape painting, the exhibition draws connections by exploring how each artist experimented with abstraction and spirituality in their respective depictions of nature.
Runs until: Sunday April 8, 2018

The Fabric of Our Land: Salish Weaving

The Fabric of Our Land: Salish Weaving
Where: UBC Museum of Anthropology
What: For generations Salish peoples have been harvesting the resources of their territories, transforming them into robes of rare beauty and power. Symbols of identity, they acted as legal documents and were visible signifiers of the presence of knowledge holders and respected people. Now mostly stored away in museums these masterworks are rarely seen. They have much knowledge to share and many stories to tell. Musqueam asked the Museum to bring these weavings to inspire weavers and share part of this rich legacy with all of us.
Runs until: Sunday April 15, 2018

Public Artwork by New Delhi-Based Artist Asim Waqif

Public Artwork by New Delhi-Based Artist Asim Waqif
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Inspired by environmental concerns and the pace of human consumption, Waqif will construct an immersive architectural experience from materials collected at re-purpose stores, transfer stations and landfills in the metro Vancouver area. Waqif’s architectural structure will also incorporate an interactive acoustic system using microphones, effects pedals and speakers. Visitors are encouraged to move through the installation maze allowing them to actively experience the architecture instead of passively observing it.
Runs until: Sunday April 15, 2017

Winter Farmers’ Market

Winter Farmers Market
Where: Nat Bailey Stadium
What: Each week you can look forward to finding locally grown vegetables and fruit, meat and seafood from local ranchers and fishermen, artisan cheese and bread, herbs and seasonal nursery items, baked goods, prepared foods and artisanal craft.
Runs until: April 21, 2018 (Saturdays)

N. Vancouver

N. Vancouver
Where: The Polygon Gallery
What: The show in the newly-opened gallery will pay tribute to the evolution of North Vancouver and will feature commissioned works by more than 10 artists, including Andrew Dadson, Gabrielle Hill, Althea Thauberger, Stephen Waddell and Tracy Williams, paired with existing work by Stan Douglas, Greg Girard, Fred Herzog, Curt Lang, and Jeff Wall, among others.
Runs until: Sunday April 29, 2018

In a Different Light

In a Different Light
Where: Museum of Anthropology
What: More than 110 historical Indigenous artworks and marks the return of many important works to British Columbia. These objects are amazing artistic achievements. Yet they also transcend the idea of ‘art’ or ‘artifact’. Through the voices of contemporary First Nations artists and community members, this exhibition reflects on the roles historical artworks have today. Featuring immersive storytelling and innovative design, it explores what we can learn from these works and how they relate to Indigenous peoples’ relationships to their lands.
Runs until: Spring 2019

Takashi Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg

Takashi Murakami: The Octopus Eats Its Own Leg
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Featuring fifty-five remarkable works, some newly created for the presentation in Vancouver, this retrospective offers a critical and serious meditation on the current state of Japanese society in the midst of a complex, global world, while highlighting Murakami’s important role as a committed and often conflicted commentator on cultural production.
Runs until: Sunday May 6, 2018

What are you up to this weekend? Tell me and the rest of Vancouver in the comments below.

 

 




Tagged: , , , ,

Comments are closed for this post

Comments are closed.