Attracted to the Hive 2

I have this little idiosyncracy. Well, okay, okay, I may have more than one actually, but for now, we'll focus on this one.

When it comes to research, I'm pretty good at finding out information when I need information, a task that has been made almost mindless, ironically, thanks to Google.

But, when it comes to "the arts" and "entertainment", I have this strange little way of being that rears its weird head in that I tend to base my decisions about what I want to attend based almost solely on intuition once I've read the smallest snippet of advertising about it. Therefore, if you're someone who needs to know all the details about what I've chosen beforehand, then you would be much safer to find out for yourself, or even safer if you stayed home.

Entertainment, like life, is risk. You might spend money and it might be crap. Or not! I'm willing to take that risk. In fact, I like that risk. Not every day mind you. But, every once in a while. Afterall, it's about the experience. It's about being invited into the ideas and perceptions of others who think more than most about playing with the mind and whatever freaky thoughts might enter it. God knows and so do you, if you're truly human, that can be scary, possibly dangerous, sometimes humorous and at its very worst, lethally boring. But, and this is absolutely key, it will be different than let's say, showing up at the office every day!

Last night was a good example. Hive 2. Part of the Magnetic North Theatre Festival runs this year in Vancouver to June 14th. Apparently this Festival travels to a different city in Canada every second year and then returns to its base at the National Arts Center. They've been doing this for six years. They choose some of the hottest productions from independent theatre companies across Canada (although, this year, the Prairies for whatever reasons didn't make the cut).

Vancouver's Indie theatre scene, like the variety of cultural experiences in Vancouver in general, has exploded.

Hive 2 took place in a warehouse at the Centre for Digital Media at the Great Northern Way Campus which isn't really a "campus" yet! I'm not sure how to explain it. Dark. Big open warehouse-type space. Bar. 10 different groupings. Active theatre. Short. We showed up. We were led away to each contained experience. Wierd. Confusing. Different. Definitely, not Friday night in front of the TV.

Oh, and speaking of Oh, here's a little celebrity gossip for you. Sandra Oh of Grey's Anatomy and of the film Sideways was there with a friend. She looked liked, well, herself in a rumpled, sand-coloured raincoat and in true Canadian fashion, she was treated like you'd treat your next door neighbour. Actually, you'd be more friendly to your neighbour.

Why not attend one of the other theatre performances. You've got 8 days. Here's the Magnetic North site.

Google Folk Art

Walking around Santa Fe last June and saw this piece of folk art in the window of some shop downtown across from the La Fonda hotel. It's not pretty. I wouldn't want to own it but somebody who works at google might. Imagine some archeologist finding this in a pile of rubble hundreds of years from now. Google? What's Google? Could it have been their God?

Kutlug Ataman's Version of Paradise

Went to the Vancouver Art Gallery today to see an exhibit that had photos from the 1800s as part of a movement called Pictorialism.

I always find it so much better if my visit just happens to coincide with one of the talks they give because the people who lead those are always incredibly articulate and knowledgeable.

Listening to them gives you the kind of insight into the art, it's historical context, and the major artists in the movement in a way that you would never get just wandering around on your own unless you had some knowledge of art history.

But, the most interesting exhibit, for me, was on the third floor by Kutlug Ataman. It's called Paradise and Kuba.

One room is full of old televisions with chairs in front and on the TVs people are speaking and it's a bit of a cacophony as if you've just entered a room where 45 people are speaking all at once. You choose which television screen you might want to sit in front of and read what's being said off the screen. All the people on the these TV screens were from a community called Kuba located on the outskirts of Istanbul.

In the next room are 24 widescreen TVs with head phones. The 24 people in this room are from Southern California. It's as if you're sitting down at a speed dating event in which the person on TV is just talking to you about what their thing is and their thing might range from plastic surgery to porn star. The idea being that these 24 people are representative of some aspect of the mythology associated with Southern California.

You can listen to the guy who started the Quicksilver clothing line and hear how wonderful it was for him to grow up on the beach at Laguna beach and how surfing was/is his life.

You can hear a plastic surgeon speaking about how important it is to think not just about your face when you're getting a facelift but about your other body parts and how it all has to work together. Because if your face is perfect and you suddenly look 10 years young but then you bring your sausage-like, liver-spotted hand up to your chin, it's not going to work. The effect is ruined.

You can hear a women speaking about palliative care and another talking about how she can see auras and her experience of recognizing that she could do this one day and that was a talent she had that others didn't.

You can watch a laughing yoga group in action. You can hear a gay artist talking about his very specific special talent that has enabled him to make a living which he has done by videotaping himself and in complete privacy he has been able to make a living but, at the same time not take part in the porn industry in a way in which he may be exploited or have to exploit others. I was fascinated by what he had to say. The juxtaposition of his outward appearance and what he was talking about was really interesting.

When you're there, as in daily life, you find yourself making choices about who you want to talk to based on what they look like before you can hear what they're saying.

So, part of the fun is in looking at someone on screen and trying to guess ahead of time who they are and what they might be speaking about and then actually hearing what their subject is once you put on the headphones.

It's as if you've just spent the afternoon meeting 24 new people, voyeur-like, and you didn't have to do anything except listen to them and you've been given the gift of a glimpse into the reality of lives that you would never normally be privy to. I loved it. I could have spent all night there but it was closing time.

Worth experiencing for sure.