Things to Do in Vancouver on Thanksgiving Long Weekend
Happy Thanksgiving long weekend! Just like you’ll be heaping more hearty food onto your already full dinner plate this weekend, more Halloween has been added to the city, such as the Stanley Park Ghost Train, a haunted trolley tour, mystery nights, harvest festivals, and a family-friendly costume expo and parade. After all, in the wise words of Mae West, “too much of a good thing can be wonderful”.
Friday October 11
Where: Stanley Park Miniature Train
What: Each year the Stanley Park Ghost Train takes our riders on a journey through a mystical and magical world, inspired by Hallowe’en and other spooky tales.
Runs Until: Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Gastown
What: Thirteen years ago Jimmy Capello was found dead in his downtown Vancouver apartment — strangled, poisoned, and stabbed. Now the Police Department has re-opened the cold case and it’s up to you to solve it. Was the killer casino boss Greg Flament? World famous psychiatrist Susan Slater? Or party girl heiress Janet Evans? Armed with your detective kit, a map and a team of your closest friends, you’ll try to prove you have what it takes to work homicide in the big city.
Runs until:Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Hastings Park
What: Willkommen Vancouver! Get ready for this Oktober as Harvest Haus returns to celebrate its fifth year of bavarian-style merrymaking – bigger than ever before. Be sure to check out our 7 unique sittings – each has a different and distinct theme and so whether you are returning for another year or about to embark on your maiden harvest adventure there is plenty to capture your imagination!
Runs Until: Saturday October 19, 2019
Where: Canada Place
What: As the night falls and shadows begin to appear, you will be whisked away by San Francisco-style Trolley where you will see streets and homes, which seem normal, but if you look and listen close enough you will hear echoes of murders and other devastating events. Your host will tell the historic crime tales that took place in familiar neighbourhoods of Stanley Park, Gastown, Shaughnessy and more.
Runs Until: Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: UBC Robson Square
What: Vancouver Halloween Parade and Expo is a festival delivered by Vancouver International Halloween Festival Society, an arts charity, and founded by the social service division of International Health Council, in collaboration with local artists, artisans and performers. Over 1000 volunteers have donated their time and skills to the festival since 2014.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Pacific National Exhibition
What: The largest harvest celebration ever conceived in Canada is sowing the seeds for your arrival. Bringing to life a vision for an enchanting and playful all-ages autumn adventure, Harvestland, is coming to the PNE from Oktober 10-20, 2019. This remarkable harvest festival brings together a diverse assemblage of rides, attractions, food, and entertainers for a celebration of community, nature, exploration and the imagination.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: Navigating the Uncertainty Principle is a major solo exhibition by Vancouver-based artist and educator Ingrid Koenig, presenting large scale drawings across the gallery façade and off-site at Yaletown-Roundhouse station.
Runs Until: Sunday March 22, 2020
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: With more than three decades of performing and recording behind them, 54•40 has an unbelievable catalogue of hit songs such as Baby Ran, She La, Casual Viewin’, One Gun, Ocean Pearl, Love You All, Music Man, I Go Blind, One Day In Your Life, Radio Luv Song, Baby Have Some Faith, Miss You, Blame Your Parents, Easy to Love, Crossing a Canyon, Since When, Nice to Luv You, and Lies to Me.
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Where: Goldcorp Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre
What: What does it mean to give care? A shave, a helping hand, and forgiveness in the face of faults. This 2018 Pulitzer Prize–winning play about relationships and living with physical disabilities is tucked with surprise humour. A wealthy student is cared for by a young woman down on her luck, and a man rebuilds an old bond by providing aid to his ex-wife. These achingly human stories delve into the social divides between people, even as they strive to help.
Runs Until: Sunday November 3, 2019
Where: Coast Coal Harbour Hotel
What: BOLDfest (Bold Older Lesbians and Dykes) is an annual conference held in Vancouver, British Columbia to create community for lesbians over 45 from Canada and the United States. The conference is held by BOLD, a non-profit society, which states that its mission is “to raise the visibility of older lesbians, and to provide a venue to meet and to share information and opportunities for learning, networking, and organizing.”
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: The Contemporary Art Gallery will present the first solo exhibition in a major public institution of Chemong Lake based Anishinaabe artist Olivia Whetung. Whetung’s artistic practice examines, in her words, “acts of/active native presence.” A significant strand of recent research has manifested in beadwork, and explores Whetung’s deep concerns for knowledge as held and carried by land, bodies of water and language.
Runs Until: Sunday January 5, 2020
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: For his first solo exhibition in Canada, Sreshta Rit Premnath will develop new work in an ongoing series of material and conceptual investigations on the “knot” between ownership and occupation of space, and the conditions of invisibility and misrecognition that define migrant subjectivity. Premnath works across multiple media including sculpture, video, photography and drawing.
Runs Until: Sunday January 5, 2020
Where: Vancouver Convention Centre West
What: Vancouver is proud to host an international audience of urban stakeholders who are eagerly looking to develop cities in balance with the natural world. EcoCity World Summit is actively working with key individuals to create a program that speaks to the many challenges cities face around the globe.
Where: Bell Performing Arts Centre & Orpheum Theatre
What: A concert mixing irresistible Hungarian folk music with grand storytelling. Guy Braunstein brings his intimate sound to Hungarian composer Béla Bartók’s rich second Violin Concerto. Globe-trotting Viennese conductor Sascha Goetzel leads the VSO in charming musical tales from the Vienna Woods, featuring Richard Strauss and Franz Schubert.
Where: Hollywood Theatre
What: J.S. Ondara offers a unique take on the American dream on Tales of America, his debut album. Ondara grew up in Nairobi, Kenya, listening to American alt-rock and making up his own songs for as long as he can remember. After discovering the music of Bob Dylan, he moved to Minneapolis in 2013 to pursue a career in music.
Where: Rogers Arena
What: The reunited Jonas Brothers have announced a massive 40-date North American tour in support of their upcoming album Happiness Begins. Bebe Rexha and Jordan McGraw will provide support on the Happiness Begins Tour.
Where: Studio 16
What: With director Aaron Craven at the helm, Mitch and Murray Productions returns with another dynamite play, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Annie Baker’s Body Awareness. “Body Awareness is a smart, modest work about ordinary, flawed people, grasping for connection, but none of it feels small, thanks to Baker’s sharp ear for the deeply painful – and funny – longings squirming under her characters’ dialogue” – Time Out New York.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Various Venues
What: VIFF presents the world’s best cinema fused with related talks and events in a unique Films+ model. Annually, VIFF presents over 320 films and events, plays host to approximately 400 industry professionals from around the globe and boasts the largest Canadian film program in the world.
Runs Until: Friday October 11, 2019
Where: Various locations
What: Vancouver’s North Shore Craft Beer Week returns for its third year! We’re inviting all hop heads to come toast the North Shore’s legendary past in brewing and our bright future with a week of celebrations at our local breweries. Try special casks, attend fun events, and learn more about North Shore beers!
Runs Until: Friday October 11, 2019
Saturday October 12
Where: Orpheum Theatre
What: A concert mixing irresistible Hungarian folk music with grand storytelling. Guy Braunstein brings his intimate sound to Hungarian composer Béla Bartók’s rich second Violin Concerto. Globe-trotting Viennese conductor Sascha Goetzel leads the VSO in charming musical tales from the Vienna Woods, featuring Richard Strauss and Franz Schubert.
Where: Heritage Hall
What: The Vancouver Rare Book, Photograph & Paper Show is Western Canada’s premier antiquarian event. The 20 plus exhibitors include top dealers from British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario, offering a selection of collectible and rare books, fine photography, esoteric ephemera, maps, prints, deltiological items, manuscripts and other works.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Massey Theatre
What: The Natural Westcoast Iron Vancity Showdown is a fitness, figure, bikini, bodybuilding, physique, classic physique, a figure event governed by the Canadian Physique Alliance (CPA). Featuring the best natural athletes in western Canada, this level 1 show qualifies athletes for the Natural Canadian Championships held in Toronto. Come out and support these incredible athletes as they present all their hard work for you.
Where: Fort Langley National Historic Site of Canada
What: Celebrate cranberries while learning the history of local uses of native cranberries by Indigenous people. Did you know that the Hudson’s Bay Company exported cranberries to California during the gold rush? Put on rubber boots and jump into the ever-popular cranberry stomp, as well as other farm-related games.
Where: Rogers Arena
What: The Vancouver Canucks are a professional ice hockey team based in Vancouver, British Columbia. They are members of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference of the National Hockey League.
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: With more than three decades of performing and recording behind them, 54•40 has an unbelievable catalogue of hit songs such as Baby Ran, She La, Casual Viewin’, One Gun, Ocean Pearl, Love You All, Music Man, I Go Blind, One Day In Your Life, Radio Luv Song, Baby Have Some Faith, Miss You, Blame Your Parents, Easy to Love, Crossing a Canyon, Since When, Nice to Luv You, and Lies to Me.
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Raven Transforming Cabaret Festival
Where: Historic Theatre, York Theatre & Vancity Culture Lab
What: A variety of ground-breaking artists—from here and around the world—will take over all three of our Cultch stages for eight explosive nights of bold, fresh, and extraordinary performance. It will be Indigenous and non-Indigenous, rough and ready, brash and beautiful, polished and political. Your heart will be wrenched, your mind inspired, and you’ll laugh until your belly hurts. All with the purpose of furthering our collective efforts towards reconciliation and the important conversations we must continue to have.
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Where: The Improv Centre
What: Get the fall off to a laughing start with some school-themed comedy as Vancouver TheatreSports (VTS) honours the beginning of fall with a special improv show dedicated to school days. Back to School TheatreSports takes classic TheatreSports short form improv ‘games’ and adapts them to parody classroom clichés and cliques (some things never change).
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Sunday October 13
Where: Vancouver Playhouse
What: The Bennewitz Quartet is a leading string quartet of the new generation that enjoys opportunities to contribute to musical life in the Czech Republic, playing from both the Czech and international repertoires. Their debut concert for us will feature quartets by Janáček and Dvořák as well as Robert Schumann.
Where: Rogers Arena
What: Inspired by the 50th anniversary of Woodstock and his iconic hit parade with Creedence Clearwater Revival, “My 50 Year Trip” recreates the sounds and spirit of 1969. “My 50 Year Trip” encompasses a celebration of the 50th Anniversary of Fogerty’s iconic songbook, which was written, recorded and released in 1969, and also showcases the original Acme guitar and amp used at the Woodstock performance.
Where: Coast Coal Harbour Hotel
What: BOLDfest (Bold Older Lesbians and Dykes) is an annual conference held in Vancouver, British Columbia to create community for lesbians over 45 from Canada and the United States. The conference is held by BOLD, a non-profit society, which states that its mission is “to raise the visibility of older lesbians, and to provide a venue to meet and to share information and opportunities for learning, networking, and organizing.”
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: UBC Robson Square
What: Vancouver Halloween Parade and Expo is a festival delivered by Vancouver International Halloween Festival Society, an arts charity, and founded by the social service division of International Health Council, in collaboration with local artists, artisans and performers. Over 1000 volunteers have donated their time and skills to the festival since 2014.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Heritage Hall
What: The Vancouver Rare Book, Photograph & Paper Show is Western Canada’s premier antiquarian event. The 20 plus exhibitors include top dealers from British Columbia, Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario, offering a selection of collectible and rare books, fine photography, esoteric ephemera, maps, prints, deltiological items, manuscripts and other works.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Studio 58/Langara College
What: As the Queen of East Van, Isolde N. Barron, Cleopatra was one of my biggest influences in the creation of my alter ego. She is one of Shakespeare’s most complex characters and one of history’s most fascinating figures. An incredibly accomplished states-person and intellectual, she co-ruled with her father from 14, was crowned at 18, commanded armies at 21, spoke nine languages including the common Egyptian Arabic and was the only ruler in her family’s 300 years that did so. Using this historical perspective, Cameron Mackenzie delves into this love story.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Stanley Alliance Industrial Stage
What: In this sweeping tale set in war-torn Afghanistan, two women’s lives intersect through fate. The unlikely but extraordinary friendship of Laila and Mariam helps them cope with the tyranny and tumult of life in 1990s Kabul—and leads them to an unforgettable act. A Thousand Splendid Suns, based on the best-selling novel by the author of The Kite Runner, is a haunting yet hopeful story that illuminates the strength of the human spirit.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Monday October 14
Where: Orpheum Theatre
What: Don’t miss Morrissey’s first tour of Canada in almost two decades. Morrissey’s last studio album, the critically acclaimed “Low in High School,” was released in November of 2017. Of Morrissey and LIHS, Rolling Stone Magazine said….”as philosophical alt-rock goes, the man is still peerless”. Pitchfork described the release as “returning Morrissey to his most utilitarian purpose as the spokesperson for youthful melancholy.”
Runs Until: Tuesday October 15, 2019
Where: Various venues
What: This Fall, the improv comedy world is bringing the laughs to Vancouver from October 14 to 20 as Vancouver TheatreSports™ (VTS) hosts the 2019 International Theatresports Institute Conference and Festival. The International Theatresports Institute (ITI) is the largest improv network in the world, representing 90 improv companies, schools and universities from 22 countries on six continents.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Commodore Ballroom
What: Stereolab are an English-French avant-pop band formed in London in 1990. The band will undertake an extensive reissue campaign covering albums from 1993’s Transient Random Noise-Bursts With Announcements through to 2004’s Margerine Eclipse. All 7 albums will be reissued throughout 2019 along with the band’s first live performances & touring since 2009.
Where: The Improv Centre
What: You’ve fallen in love with her on YouTube and now the indomitable Michelle Gidard (played by VTS ensemble member Angela Galanopoulos) is coming to the live stage at The Improv Centre. Starting in May, join us on Mondays for Improv Mondays with Michelle – Fake Stories, Real Improvisers hosted by the character Michelle from the popular web comedic soap opera Michelle’s.
Ongoing
Raven Transforming Cabaret Festival
Where: Historic Theatre, York Theatre & Vancity Culture Lab
What: A variety of ground-breaking artists—from here and around the world—will take over all three of our Cultch stages for eight explosive nights of bold, fresh, and extraordinary performance. It will be Indigenous and non-Indigenous, rough and ready, brash and beautiful, polished and political. Your heart will be wrenched, your mind inspired, and you’ll laugh until your belly hurts. All with the purpose of furthering our collective efforts towards reconciliation and the important conversations we must continue to have.
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Where: The Improv Centre
What: Get the fall off to a laughing start with some school-themed comedy as Vancouver TheatreSports (VTS) honours the beginning of fall with a special improv show dedicated to school days. Back to School TheatreSports takes classic TheatreSports short form improv ‘games’ and adapts them to parody classroom clichés and cliques (some things never change).
Runs Until: Saturday October 12, 2019
Where: Studio 58/Langara College
What: As the Queen of East Van, Isolde N. Barron, Cleopatra was one of my biggest influences in the creation of my alter ego. She is one of Shakespeare’s most complex characters and one of history’s most fascinating figures. An incredibly accomplished states-person and intellectual, she co-ruled with her father from 14, was crowned at 18, commanded armies at 21, spoke nine languages including the common Egyptian Arabic and was the only ruler in her family’s 300 years that did so. Using this historical perspective, Cameron Mackenzie delves into this love story.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Stanley Alliance Industrial Stage
What: In this sweeping tale set in war-torn Afghanistan, two women’s lives intersect through fate. The unlikely but extraordinary friendship of Laila and Mariam helps them cope with the tyranny and tumult of life in 1990s Kabul—and leads them to an unforgettable act. A Thousand Splendid Suns, based on the best-selling novel by the author of The Kite Runner, is a haunting yet hopeful story that illuminates the strength of the human spirit.
Runs Until: Sunday October 13, 2019
Where: Museum of Anthropology
What: This enchanting exhibition illustrates the role puppets have played around the world in the transmission of cultural knowledge, stories, and values from generation to generation. Shadows, Strings and Other Things features a broad array of puppets, old and new, from 15 countries in Asia, Europe, and the Americas. Visitors will have the opportunity to view more than 250 handcrafted puppets from MOA’s collection — the largest in Western Canada — plus, new acquisitions from China, Brazil, Italy, Java, the UK, and France revealed to the public for the first time. Enter into an immersive and theatrical world for visitors of all ages.
Runs until: Monday October 14, 2019
Where: Hastings Park
What: Willkommen Vancouver! Get ready for this Oktober as Harvest Haus returns to celebrate its fifth year of bavarian-style merrymaking – bigger than ever before. Be sure to check out our 7 unique sittings – each has a different and distinct theme and so whether you are returning for another year or about to embark on your maiden harvest adventure there is plenty to capture your imagination!
Runs Until: Saturday October 19, 2019
Where: Pacific National Exhibition
What: The largest harvest celebration ever conceived in Canada is sowing the seeds for your arrival. Bringing to life a vision for an enchanting and playful all-ages autumn adventure, Harvestland, is coming to the PNE from Oktober 10-20, 2019. This remarkable harvest festival brings together a diverse assemblage of rides, attractions, food, and entertainers for a celebration of community, nature, exploration and the imagination.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Studio 16
What: With director Aaron Craven at the helm, Mitch and Murray Productions returns with another dynamite play, Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Annie Baker’s Body Awareness. “Body Awareness is a smart, modest work about ordinary, flawed people, grasping for connection, but none of it feels small, thanks to Baker’s sharp ear for the deeply painful – and funny – longings squirming under her characters’ dialogue” – Time Out New York.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: The Vancouver Art Gallery presents Vikky Alexander: Extreme Beauty, the first retrospective of the renowned Canadian artist. Alexander became known for her investigations of the appropriated image, the artificiality of nature and the seduction of space in the 1980s. Extreme Beauty showcases more than eighty works from this artist’s career whose practice includes photography, sculpture, collage and installation.
Runs Until: Sunday October 20, 2019
Where: Chinatown
What: A speakeasy-style performance venue hidden behind a fake business facade in Chinatown; part of a new trend in magic entertainment that focuses less on grand-scale illusions and more on intimate experiences that leave the audience awestruck and moved. Confirmed guest will only be given the address for the venue once their tickets have been purchased.
Runs Until: Saturday October 26, 2019
Where: Lonsdale Quay
What: Stroll the boardwalk and take in ocean and city skyline views from North Vancouver’s Lonsdale Quay while you check out fresh, locally grown produce, delicious baked goods and nifty crafts created by local growers, bakers, and crafters.
Runs Until: Saturday October 26, 2019 (Saturdays)
Where: Stanley Park Miniature Train
What: Each year the Stanley Park Ghost Train takes our riders on a journey through a mystical and magical world, inspired by Hallowe’en and other spooky tales.
Runs Until: Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Canada Place
What: As the night falls and shadows begin to appear, you will be whisked away by San Francisco-style Trolley where you will see streets and homes, which seem normal, but if you look and listen close enough you will hear echoes of murders and other devastating events. Your host will tell the historic crime tales that took place in familiar neighbourhoods of Stanley Park, Gastown, Shaughnessy and more.
Runs Until: Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Pacific National Exhibition
What: Fright Nights at the PNE is Western Canada’s Scariest Haunt; having multiple Haunted Houses and other attractions on-site in Playland.
Runs Until: Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Gastown
What: Thirteen years ago Jimmy Capello was found dead in his downtown Vancouver apartment — strangled, poisoned, and stabbed. Now the Police Department has re-opened the cold case and it’s up to you to solve it. Was the killer casino boss Greg Flament? World famous psychiatrist Susan Slater? Or party girl heiress Janet Evans? Armed with your detective kit, a map and a team of your closest friends, you’ll try to prove you have what it takes to work homicide in the big city.
Runs until:Thursday October 31, 2019
Where: Granville Island Stage
What: When Brett inherits a family estate, he and his partner, Drew, move to a quiet little tourist town to set up a B&B. But will these big city boys face friction in their new community? With dozens of hilarious characters all portrayed by two actors, it’s a heartfelt comedy about “being out,” skeletons in the closet, and finding a place to call home
Runs Until: Sunday November 2, 2019
Where: Potter’s Farm & Nursery
What: Every fall, Potter’s Farm & Nursery staff converts the grounds from an enjoyable, plant-filled garden centre into a maze of terror, with all the latest animatronics, digital sounds, high-tech scares and trained actors to put on a fun and scary event that sends chills down the spine of all those who enter
Runs Until: Saturday November 2, 2019
Where: Maan Farms, Abbotsford
What: Maan Farms Haunted Corn Maze, features nightmarish installations, shocking and gory scenes as well as intimate scares. Creating a surreal world in which guests may find themselves unsure of where reality ends and the show begins. Pitch Black is an interactive multi-sensory separate ticketed attraction where the actors can touch you! Touching is NOT full contact, but you may be grabbed, held back, sent into hidden passageways, and even temporarily removed from your group.
Runs until: Saturday November 2, 2019
Where: Goldcorp Stage at the BMO Theatre Centre
What: What does it mean to give care? A shave, a helping hand, and forgiveness in the face of faults. This 2018 Pulitzer Prize–winning play about relationships and living with physical disabilities is tucked with surprise humour. A wealthy student is cared for by a young woman down on her luck, and a man rebuilds an old bond by providing aid to his ex-wife. These achingly human stories delve into the social divides between people, even as they strive to help.
Runs Until: Sunday November 3, 2019
Where: Various locations in Vancouver and Surrey
What: At the core of Diwali Fest’s mandate is the objective of breaking cultural barriers and encouraging participation from all communities. The celebration and spirit of Diwali is truly universal. The message it engenders of promoting inclusiveness motivates us to bring the festival to the Lower Mainland, as well as bringing the Lower Mainland to our festival. This can be demonstrated through the number of fusion acts, as well as artists we highlight through our programming.
Runs Until: Sunday November 3, 2019
Where: Cathedral Square
What: Step inside a world of murder, revenge, and true grit in a dramatic history of Victorian Gastown. Stories of deadly fire and smallpox emerge from the shadows as you venture through cobblestone streets to the shocking finale in this unique performance-theatre experience.
Runs Until: Saturday November 30, 2019
Where: Stanley Park
What: There’s more to Stanley Park than incredible scenery. It’s also recently been home to crime, riots, persecution, political intrigue, class warfare, logging, hunting, disease, military installations, remarkable public art, ecological catastrophes, secret construction mega-projects, poetry, scandal, and murder.
Runs until: Saturday November 30, 2019 (Saturdays)
Where: Concord Pacific Place
What: Cirque du Soleil’s delightfully-imaginative and visually-stunning production Luzia is coming to Vancouver. Audiences are invited to a redesigned white-and-gold Big Top at Concord Pacific Place to escape to an imaginary Mexico – a sumptuous world suspended somewhere between dreams and reality.
Runs Until: Sunday December 29, 2019
Where: First Baptist Church
What: St. Andrew’s Wesley’s Jazz Vespers, is celebrating its 26th Anniversary. Every Sunday from 4-5 PM, you’ll be tapping your toes and clapping your hands to the amazing sounds of local and international jazz giants. It’s an hour of jazz interspersed with reflections on love, faith and hope given by Rev. Dan Chambers or Very Rev. Dr. Gary Paterson.
Runs Until: Sunday December 29, 2019
Where: The Polygon Gallery
What: Reward Friends, Punish Enemies is a site-responsive installation – imagined as an intervention into the architectural space of The Polygon—that invokes histories of resource extraction and the forest industry on the North Shore. Roy-Bois’ rustic, handcrafted aesthetic rubs against the steel-and-glass design of the gallery and the surrounding waterfront developments, upending distinctions between interior and exterior, private and public.
Runs Until: December 30, 2019
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
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: The Vancouver Art Gallery is home to the finest collection of art by Emily Carr (1871–1945) in the world. Our collection is particularly rich in her forest paintings from the 1930s. This installation in the Gallery’s rotunda reflects Carr’s direct engagement with and great affection for British Columbia’s landscape—for her, a site of artistic and spiritual inquiry. This installation brings together four of Carr’s iconic paintings: Big Raven (1931); Red Cedar (1931); Scorned as Timber, Beloved of the Sky (1935); and Above the Gravel Pit (1937).
Runs Until: Tuesday December 31, 2019
Where: Vancouver International Film Centre
What: Year-round VIFF presents some of the world’s best cinema fused with related talks and events in a unique Films+ model.
Runs Until: Tuesday December 31, 2019
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: The Contemporary Art Gallery will present the first solo exhibition in a major public institution of Chemong Lake based Anishinaabe artist Olivia Whetung. Whetung’s artistic practice examines, in her words, “acts of/active native presence.” A significant strand of recent research has manifested in beadwork, and explores Whetung’s deep concerns for knowledge as held and carried by land, bodies of water and language.
Runs Until: Sunday January 5, 2020
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: For his first solo exhibition in Canada, Sreshta Rit Premnath will develop new work in an ongoing series of material and conceptual investigations on the “knot” between ownership and occupation of space, and the conditions of invisibility and misrecognition that define migrant subjectivity. Premnath works across multiple media including sculpture, video, photography and drawing.
Runs Until: Sunday January 5, 2020
Where: Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coastal Art
What: A solo exhibition of carvings, jewelry, and portraits by contemporary Ts’msyen artist Morgan Asoyuf. Asoyuf challenges the classical definition of the “royal portrait” with new photographs of activists wearing crowns, frontlets and headdresses.
Runs Until: January 19, 2020
Where: Vancouver Art Gallery
What: Transits and Returns presents the work of 21 Indigenous artists whose practices are both rooted in the specificities of their cultures and routed via their travels. These forces of situatedness and mobility work in synergy and in tension with one another, shaping the multiple ways of understanding and being Indigenous today. Within the exhibition, these dual realities are explored through themes of movement, territory, kinship and representation, with many artworks inhabiting multiple categories.
Runs Until: Sunday February 23, 2020
Where: 1100 West Georgia Street
What: Vienna-based artist Erwin Wurm alters and re-envisions recognizable forms in order to challenge our psychological perceptions of what is well known, including our bodies and familiar architectural forms. This 19th installation in the Vancouver Art Gallery’s Offsite series will incorporate three sculptural works from Wurm’s oeuvre that highlight his wry sense of humour and his ongoing interest in the body. Throughout the duration of the exhibition, local artist Mike Bourscheid will develop a series of performative interventions.
Runs Until: Sunday February 23, 2020
Where: Museum of Surrey
What: The first major exhibition in Canada to shine a spotlight on Surrey’s Punjabis, showcasing their stories of struggle and success. The exhibition is intended to be a catalyst for discussion and sharing, while also documenting histories of this diverse community.
Runs until: February 23, 2020
Where: Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre
What: Ambassadors, the first exhibition of its kind at the Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre, celebrates the staff family and faces of the Cultural Centre while highlighting their strong sense of connection to their land, their cultures, and each other. Visitors to the exhibit will learn about our Ambassadors’ deeply-rooted connections to our immersive Cultural Centre, and the passion they share in belonging to Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Lil’wat7ul.
Runs Until: Sunday March 1, 2019
Where: Contemporary Art Gallery
What: Navigating the Uncertainty Principle is a major solo exhibition by Vancouver-based artist and educator Ingrid Koenig, presenting large scale drawings across the gallery façade and off-site at Yaletown-Roundhouse station.
Runs Until: Sunday March 22, 2020
Where: The Improv Centre, Granville Island
What: Karen Flamenco brings the glamour and extravagance of a large flamenco dance production onto a small theatrical stage. The one-hour production welcomes audiences of all ages with live traditional flamenco music, dance, storylines, puppetry and magic. With theatre style seating and bistro-style table seats, every audience member will get a close-up and personal experience that is very typical of a traditional Spanish Tablao.
Runs until: Saturday May 1, 2020
What are you up to this weekend? Tell me and the rest of Vancouver in the comments.
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