Editor’s choice

FUSE: Refuse at the Vancouver Art Gallery

It may be subtitled “A celebration of refusal and denial”, but the next edition of FUSE is definitely an invitation worth accepting. At the city’s biggest art party, we plan on heading to the Vancouver Art Gallery’s rooftop patio, where Vancouver artist Julian Hou is staging a live audio environment with the ambient duo You’re Me amid costumed models. You can also escape into the serenity of Elaine, a room full of sculptural, drawn, and printed works by Derya Akay and Anne Low, all based on “radical hospitality”. And don’t miss screenings of An Emo Nose, an animated film by Hong Kong’s Wong Ping that takes a surreal look at alienation. There’s dance and other performances; add cocktails and art and you have an offer you can’t refuse.

FUSE: Refuse is at the Vancouver Art Gallery on Friday night (March 10).

In the news

Artspeak

To mark Canada’s 150th anniversary, the Vancouver Art Gallery is launching two yearlong speakers’ series. The Marking Place events will look at visual art, design, and art institutions as they relate to indigeneity, colonialism, immigration, and national identity. Speakers include Wanda Nanibush, Anishinaabe-kwe [Ojibwe woman] and assistant curator of indigenous and Canadian art at the Art Gallery of Ontario; artist Jin-me Yoon (shown here); cultural historian and curator Michael Prokopow; and curator Michelle Jacques. The Work in Progress curators’ talks will look at the VAG’s history. Five of the gallery’s curators—Ian Thom, Daina Augaitis, Diana Freundl, Grant Arnold, and Bruce Grenville—will each discuss an exhibition they have organized and compare it to ones in the past. Check out www.vanartgallery.bc.ca/ for a schedule.

High five

Five events you just can’t miss this week

Florian Boesch and Miah Persson

A wow-worthy Austrian baritone and Swedish soprano.
March 16 at the Vancouver Playhouse

Antigona

Noche Flamenco fiercely fuses the Spanish form with Greek tragedy.
March 12 at the Chan Centre

Dairakudakan

Butoh surreal enough to give you nightmares for weeks.
March 10 and 11 at the Vancouver Playhouse

Bad People

The faces of the dark and the damned, in the gallery’s final show.
To March 18 at Hot Art Wet City

Amazonia

We could use a little dose of the tropics right about now.
March 9 to January 28, 2018, at the Museum of Anthropology