This weekend covers a lot of bases. We’ve got rugby, dance, monster trucks, poly queer love, WW1, feminist literature and a musical about airplanes grounded in Newfoundland after September 11th attacks. Whether you’re looking for some hardcore feels, or you just want to enjoy some music, or you’re into jumping up and cheering for sports and trucks, this is your weekend, friend. Enjoy it.
Friday | Saturday | Sunday | Ongoing
Friday March 8
Vancouver International Dance Festival
Where: Various locations
What: A diverse and dynamic roster of internationally celebrated artists and local favourites, presenting three weeks of endlessly enriching performances, workshops, and a host of dance activities
Runs until: Saturday March 30, 2019
Growing Room Literary Festival
Where: Various locations
What: A feminist literary festival with over 30 panels and readings, writing workshops and two full days of manuscript consultations for literary folks both local and international. Authors in attendance include Ivan Coyote, Katherena Vermette, Eden Robinson, Heather O’Neill, Leanne Simpson, and Robyn Maynard.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
Redpatch
Where: Arts Club Theatre
What: Between 1914 and 1918, over four thousand Indigenous men volunteered to fight and die for Canada in WW1. Redpatch tells a part of this story through the eyes of a soldier from the Nuu-chah-nulth nation of Vancouver Island. From his childhood home to the battlefields of France, follow him as he endures the horrors of the Great War in a new play that uses dance, myth, and mask to tell both a universal and a personal tale.
Runs until: Sunday March 31, 2019
Come From Away
Where: Queen Elizabeth Theatre
What: The remarkable true story of 7,000 stranded passengers and the small town that welcomed them. It is set in the week following the September 11 attacks and tells the true story of what transpired when 38 planes were ordered to land unexpectedly in the small town of Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Cultures clashed and nerves ran high, but uneasiness turned into trust, music soared into the night, and gratitude grew into enduring friendships.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Reverberations
Where: Presentation House Theatre
What: Memories contain reverberations. In this site-specific performance piece, actor and sound designer, Brian Linds, explores memories through the sounds of a family’s history. Four performers and five rooms replay key moments in his life — a friend’s betrayal, a search for Jewish meaning, a simple task becoming difficult, a dying mother’s sudden lucidity in the late stages of Alzheimer’s, and a journey of love.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
Poly Queer Love Ballad
Where: SUM Gallery
What: An intimate, edgy new musical merging slam poetry with catchy pop-folk tunes. Nina, a polyamorous bisexual poet, meets Gabbie, a monogamous lesbian songwriter, at Cafe Deux Soleil. With two microphones, a loop pedal, and array of instruments, they struggle to reconcile their fierce mutual attraction with their opposing perspectives on love.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Whisky & Words
Whisky & Words
Where: Performance Works
What: Six tailored pop-ups across Granville Island where experts will guide you through your favourite whiskies (and soon-to-be favourites) along with food pairings from some of the city’s best purveyors. Masterclasses will take place from 5:30-7pm.
Monster Jam Triple Threat Series
Monster Jam Triple Threat Series
Where: Pacific Coliseum
What: Each event tests the versatility of the athletes as they go head-to-head in seven different competitions driving three different vehicles — Monster Jam trucks, Monster Jam Speedsters and Monster Jam ATVs. The point leader will receive an automatic bid to the prestigious Monster Jam World Finals to compete for the title of World Champion.
Abstracted Exhibition
Where: Federation Gallery
What: Artwork that takes inspiration from the light abstractions contained in Impressionism all the way to the large-scale abstractions of Expressionists.
Runs until: Saturday March 16, 2019
Buckcherry
Where: Hard Rock Casino
What: Sleazy 90s classic-style rock from California.
Saturday March 9
HSBC Canada Sevens Rugby
HSBC Canada Sevens Rugby
Where: BC Place Stadium
What: The 2019 Series will include ten tournaments held around the world, in which 16 national sevens teams compete for World Series points at each round. The HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series is culminated with a champion being crowned at the end of the season based on accumulated points.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Jeremy Dutcher
Jeremy Dutcher
Where: The Rio Theatre
What: A classically trained operatic tenor and composer who takes every opportunity to blend his Wolastoq First Nation roots into the music he creates, blending distinct musical aesthetics that shape-shift between classical, traditional, and pop to form something entirely new. Dutcher’s debut release, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, involves the rearrangement of early 1900s wax cylinder field recordings from his community.
Busta Rhymes
Busta Rhymes
Where: Venue
What: Chuck D of Public Enemy gave him the moniker Busta Rhymes, after NFL and CFL wide receiver George “Buster” Rhymes. He is best known for his outlandish style and fashion sense depicted in several innovative music videos as well as his intricate rhyming technique, rapping at high speed with heavy use of internal rhyme and half rhyme. He has received 11 Grammy Award nominations for his work.
Max Raabe & Palast Orchester
Max Raabe & Palast Orchester
Where: The Centre
What: Dream a little dream with Max Raabe & Palast Orchester from Berlin. There is something wonderfully transcending to the performances of this group that embodies the high style and musical glory of the 20s and 30s.
Darlingside
Darlingside
Where: The Biltmore
What: A four-person indie folk band from Boston, MA.
Barney Bentall and the Legendary Hearts
Barney Bentall and the Legendary Hearts
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: Despite solo projects, Barney Bentall and the Legendary Hearts continue to play the occasional gig together. Muir is a successful stockbroker; Fraser is now a litigator with Burrard Law LLP in Vancouver and Bowman is a well known plastic surgeon.
Vancouver Canucks vs. Las Vegas Golden Knights
Vancouver Canucks vs. Las Vegas Golden Knights
Where: Rogers Arena
What: It’s a hockey game.
Sunday March 10
Funny Feminists
Where: Red Gate
What: Punch up at the patriarchy with an afternoon of witty poetry and prose featuring some of the most incisive and hilarious writers in the country—Ivan Coyote, Lucas Crawford, Molly Cross-Blanchard, Jo Dworkshack, Eden Robinson, Hana Shafi, and Lindsay Wong.
Biggest Dog Meetup
Biggest Dog Meetup
Where: Trout Lake
What:Bring your dog, bring your dog-loving friends to this big dog meetup.
Ongoing
The Good Bride
Where: Firehall Arts Centre
What: A one-woman comedy about a Quiverfull Christian girl. As 15-year old Maranatha waits excitedly for her 28-year old fiancé to carry her off to their wedding, we catch a glimpse into a teenage girl’s thoughts on love, sex, and milkshakes — and watch her pray to a God she loves without question. But as she’s made to wait, night after night, will her faith uphold? Based on a true story.
Runs until: Saturday March 9, 2019
The Shoplifters
Where: Arts Club Theatre
What: Meet Alma, a career shoplifter who prefers the “five-finger discount” over any senior citizen’s deal. When a grocery store theft goes awry, her elaborate life of petty crime is halted by an overzealous security guard and his affable mentor.
Runs until: Saturday March 9, 2019
Le Soulier
Where: Studio 16
What: Melanie’s son Benoit, age 8, has a pain that won’t go away, so she takes him to the dentist. Naturally, this results in an epic meltdown. You see, with Benoit, nothing is ever simple. The proof: once in the dentist’s chair, Benoit turns out to have a lot more than cavities inside his mouth… In the end, Melanie – with the help of a kindly alcoholic receptionist, and a dentist who prefers plants to people – must face the fact that her son’s problems are much larger than a simple toothache.
Runs until: Saturday March 9, 2019
Children of God
Where: The York Theatre
What: In this powerful musical, the children of an Oji-Cree family are sent to a residential school in Northern Ontario. This is a story of redemption: for a mother who was never let past the school’s gate, and her kids, who never knew she came. Children of God offers a thrilling blend of ancient traditions and contemporary realities, celebrating resilience and the power of the Indigenous cultural spirit.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
HSBC Canada Sevens Rugby
HSBC Canada Sevens Rugby
Where: BC Place Stadium
What: The 2019 Series will include ten tournaments held around the world, in which 16 national sevens teams compete for World Series points at each round. The HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series is culminated with a champion being crowned at the end of the season based on accumulated points.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Bacio Rosso
Where: Queen Elizabeth Park
What: An intimate, fully immersive evening of cirque, comedy and cuisine. Guests are seated in the heat of the action with jugglers, contortionists, trapeze artists, magicians, singers and clowns weaving together an evening of magic and laughter. The entertainment is all combined with a delicious 4-course gourmet menu designed by local award winning chef Adam Pegg of La Quercia.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Poly Queer Love Ballad
Where: SUM Gallery
What: An intimate, edgy new musical merging slam poetry with catchy pop-folk tunes. Nina, a polyamorous bisexual poet, meets Gabbie, a monogamous lesbian songwriter, at Cafe Deux Soleil. With two microphones, a loop pedal, and array of instruments, they struggle to reconcile their fierce mutual attraction with their opposing perspectives on love.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
Come From Away
Where: Queen Elizabeth Theatre
What: The remarkable true story of 7,000 stranded passengers and the small town that welcomed them. It is set in the week following the September 11 attacks and tells the true story of what transpired when 38 planes were ordered to land unexpectedly in the small town of Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Cultures clashed and nerves ran high, but uneasiness turned into trust, music soared into the night, and gratitude grew into enduring friendships.
Runs until: Sunday March 10, 2019
The Image Book
Where: VanCity Theatre
What: Trust 87-year-old Jean-Luc Godard to produce the most radical, challenging cinematic text of the year. A ruminative philosophical disquisition on image culture, a culture which the bibliophile Godard looks at askance, this will likely be seen as a key post-modern text from the most intellectually adventurous and politically aware filmmaker of his generation. Oneiric but definitively “woke”, the film demands the active participation of the viewer, but rewards with multiple insights and discoveries.
Runs until: Wednesday March 13, 2019
Abstracted Exhibition
Where: Federation Gallery
What: Artwork that takes inspiration from the light abstractions contained in Impressionism all the way to the large-scale abstractions of Expressionists.
Runs until: Saturday March 16, 2019
Body Language: Reawakening Cultural Tattooing of the Northwest
Where: Bill Reid Gallery
What: Explore the rich history and artistry of Indigenous tattooing, piercing and personal adornment on the Northwest Coast. These five contemporary Indigenous artists are at the forefront of the revival of Indigenous tattooing in BC. They are reclaiming traditional techniques and traditional rights to be tattooed, and building awareness of the significance and protocols around the tattooing traditions.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
Growing Room Literary Festival
Where: Various locations
What: A feminist literary festival with over 30 panels and readings, writing workshops and two full days of manuscript consultations for literary folks both local and international. Authors in attendance include Ivan Coyote, Katherena Vermette, Eden Robinson, Heather O’Neill, Leanne Simpson, and Robyn Maynard.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
The Metamorphosis
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: This exhibition ties together provocative themes and ideas of change undertaken in more than forty remarkable contemporary works selected from the Gallery’s collection. With its title inspired by Franz Kafka’s 1915 novella, The Metamorphosis invokes a compelling human and creative desire to explore oneself and the world. Kafka’s literary classic follows the experience of a man who, upon waking up, finds himself transformed into a giant insect. This exhibition looks at Kafka’s themes by way of visual art that addresses physical, spiritual and cultural transformation.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
Reverberations
Where: Presentation House Theatre
What: Memories contain reverberations. In this site-specific performance piece, actor and sound designer, Brian Linds, explores memories through the sounds of a family’s history. Four performers and five rooms replay key moments in his life — a friend’s betrayal, a search for Jewish meaning, a simple task becoming difficult, a dying mother’s sudden lucidity in the late stages of Alzheimer’s, and a journey of love.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
A Curator’s View: Ian Thom Selects
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: A showcase of the span of the gallery’s rich permanent collection through an exhibition of nearly ninety works including paintings, drawings, photographs, and sculptures. Since the Gallery’s establishment in 1931, its permanent collection has become the most comprehensive resource for visual culture in British Columbia. Building on the collection’s historical and contemporary strengths, the Gallery continues to steward acquisitions through donation and purchase.
Runs until: Sunday March 17, 2019
Jesus Freak
Where: Pacific Theatre
What: The Campbell family prides themselves on their West Coast open-mindedness; from pot to political resistance, nothing is off the table. But when their daughter Clara comes home and announces she’s become a Christian, their tolerance is put to the test.
Runs until: Saturday March 23, 2019
Anne Low: Chair for a Woman
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: Low’s artistic research is typically rooted in a close looking at historical objects, materials and surfaces, especially those created immediately prior to the Industrial Revolution. She is concerned with the specific conditions under which such objects are produced and consumed—particularly by women—and the domestic spaces they defined.
Runs until: Sunday March 24, 2019
Aslan Gaisumov
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: This exhibition brings together two works never previously shown together and, in so doing, offers a new means through which to consider many of the concerns that have shaped the artist’s practice over the past eight years.
Runs until: Sunday March 24, 2019
Vancouver International Dance Festival
Where: Various locations
What: A diverse and dynamic roster of internationally celebrated artists and local favourites, presenting three weeks of endlessly enriching performances, workshops, and a host of dance activities
Runs until: Saturday March 30, 2019
Hot Brown Honey
Where: The York Theatre
What: Packing a punch of hip hop politics, the Honeys will make you laugh, cry, clap and shake what your mama gave you. This posse of phenomenal women make noise as they defiantly smash stereotypes and remix the system.
Runs until: Sunday March 30, 2019
Marking the Infinite: Contemporary Women Artists from Aboriginal Australia
Where: Museum of Anthropology
What: Showcasing for the first time in MOA’s history a presentation of all-women artists, this exhibition features the artworks of nine Aboriginal women, who are all celebrated artists from tiny remote communities across Australia’s deserts and tropical north. Encompassing a wide range of subjects from the natural to sublime and from minute organisms to vast celestial bodies, the exhibition invites visitors to explore the immutable tension between the universal and the specific, and discover the power of traditional Indigenous knowledge in an increasingly digital world.
Runs until: Sunday March 31, 2019
Redpatch
Where: Arts Club Theatre
What: Between 1914 and 1918, over four thousand Indigenous men volunteered to fight and die for Canada in WW1. Redpatch tells a part of this story through the eyes of a soldier from the Nuu-chah-nulth nation of Vancouver Island. From his childhood home to the battlefields of France, follow him as he endures the horrors of the Great War in a new play that uses dance, myth, and mask to tell both a universal and a personal tale.
Runs until: Sunday March 31, 2019
Elephant and Piggie’s “We Are In A Play!”
Where: Waterfront Theatre
What: Join best friends, Gerald and Piggie, on a day where anything is possible! Filled with beloved characters and lively songs, it’s the perfect adventure for young audiences .
Runs until: Sunday March 31, 2019
Fitness For All
Where: 1100 West Georgia Street
What: Chinese contemporary art collective Polit-Sheer-Form Office (PSFO) has produced a five-piece set of exercise equipment specially designed for the Vancouver public. The artists’ decree suggests that establishing a more collective self-awareness fosters inclusivity and collaboration within a community.
Runs until: Sunday March 31, 2019
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
Hastings Park Farmers Market
Where: Hastings Park
What: Find a weekly selection of locally grown fruit and veggies, farm fresh meat, eggs and dairy products, fresh baked sourdough bread and treats, craft beer, wine and spirits, artisanal prepared food, local crafts, hot coffee and food trucks.
Runs until: Sunday April 28, 2019 (Sundays)
French Moderns: Monet to Matisse, 1850-1950
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Sixty paintings and sculptures from the Brooklyn Museum’s renowned European permanent and long-term loan collections. Identifying France as the artistic centre of international modernism from the mid-nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries, these works—which are diverse in subject matter, style and scale—were created by leading artists of the period, intended both for private collections and public display.
Runs until: Monday May 20, 2019
Affinities: Canadian Artists and France
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Looking at the significance that French art and culture has held for Canadian artists over the past 120 years, this exhibition of works from the Vancouver Art Gallery’s Collection focuses on influences of Impressionism, Post-Impressionism and Surrealism on Canadian artists during the first half of the twentieth century.
Runs until: Monday May 20, 2019
Counternarratives: Paintings by Archibald Fairbairn
Where: Bill Reid Gallery
What: The watercolour paintings of Archibald Fairbairn (1888 – 1979) document the beauty of totem poles and communities during the early 20th century. This exhibition juxtaposes an idealistic painter’s postcolonial gaze with critical discourse from contemporary Indigenous voices.
Runs until: Sunday June 2, 2019
Displacement
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: This exhibition comprises internationally acclaimed Victoria-based artist Mowry Baden’s work from the late 1960s to the present. Baden is known for producing intricate, sometimes humorous sculptural works and installations that borrow from the fields of perceptual psychology, science and architecture, and often solicit the audience’s participation.
Runs until: Sunday June 9, 2019
Wild Things: The Power of Nature in Our Lives
Where: Museum of Vancouver
What: This exhibition delves into the life stories of local animals and plants—how they relate to each other and how they connect people to nature in the city. Scenic design, videos, taxidermy, crowd-sourcing technologies, and the display of natural specimens breathe life into these tales of co-habitation. The immersive nature of the exhibition, including hands-on activities, encourages visitors to examine their relationship with nature, think about momentarily disconnecting from their devices, and find equilibrium with the natural world around them.
Runs until: July 2019
Making Waves: The Story and Legacy of Greenpeace
Where: Vancouver Maritime Museum
What: With humble beginnings in Vancouver, Greenpeace has grown into a large organization with offices in 40 countries. The NGO has protested numerous causes: whaling, deforestation, mining, genetic testing, and nuclear testing. Explore this exhibit that goes from their first voyage from Vancouver to Amchitka to protest Nuclear testing on an old fishing vessel to how cities, government, and industry today are developing new policies, technologies, and sustainable practices to ensure the preservation of our environment.
Runs until: Monday September 9, 2019
Shake Up: Preserving What We Value
Where: Museum of Anthropology
What: The exhibition will bring to light the convergence of earthquake science and technology with the rich Indigenous knowledge and oral history of the living cultures represented in MOA’s Northwest Coast collection. Beyond scientific discoveries, knowledge of earthquakes and natural disasters has been passed down through generations throughout many cultures, including those of the Northwest Coast First Nations. Also as part of the exhibition, visitors will have the opportunity to see the majestic poles of the Great Hall undergo conservation, many for the first time in 40 years.
Runs until: Fall 2019
How Far Do You Travel
Where: Select B-Line TransLink busses
What: Five Canadian artists — Diyan Achjadi, Patrick Cruz, Rolande Souliere, Erdem Tasdelen and Anna Torma — are being commissioned to graphically wrap the exterior of a series of articulated buses traveling on major routes in Metro Vancouver.
Runs until: Tuesday December 31, 2019
What are you up to this weekend? Tell me and the rest of Vancouver in the comments.
