Save the strip bars!

Ah, Quebec.

With Premier Jean Charest leaning towards a snap election before Christmas, Quebecers are looking at the prospect of a repeat of the recently concluded federal campaign: Party leaders arguing over which of them is best-equipped to manage a battered economy.

There is, however, hope that an issue with a little spice could be injected into a campaign. In its continuing commitment to public-service journalism, Le Journal de Montréal today publishes the plea “Save the strip bars” on its front page.

Columnist Richard Martineau is alarmed by news that the mayor of Granby in Quebec’s Eastern Townships is moving to shut down the city’s last remaining strip bar. Mr. Martineau sees the move as a puritanical assault on the province’s cultural heritage.

“What do you find in every municipality in the Belle Province?” he asks. “A caisse pop [credit union], a Jean-Coutu pharmacy, a church and a strip bar. . . . From the Red Light in Val-d’Or to the Triple Sexe in Jonquière, by way of La Tigresse in Sherbrooke and Le Body Shop in Saint-Antoine, strip bars are to Quebec villages what covered bridges are to the U.S. South.”

(Image from ms_cwang’s Flickr stream.)

Alberta Arts Day

It’s really confusing to some, like me, that Alberta is becoming Canada’s cultural hotbed.

The government of Alberta has declared Sept. 6 as a special day to showcase the province’s artists, performers and writers and community events.

The first-ever Alberta Arts Day is a challenge to Albertans to participate in an arts activity or celebration, said Lindsay Blackett, minister of culture and community spirit, on Thursday in Red Deer.

For example, Blackett suggested that Albertans read a book by or about Albertans and then leave it in random places for someone else in a “BookCrossing challenge.” The book can be labelled, then registered on the Arts Day website so its movements can be tracked.

Alberta’s new culture minister predicts more funding

MLA Lindsay Blackett says giving arts and culture a boost will help draw people to the province. Hell, Calgary developed a great arts scene without the money — let’s see what they can do with some grants!

Just under a week after being named the province’s new Minister of Culture, rookie MLA Lindsay Blackett said he expects funding for the arts in Alberta will increase over the next four years.

“I haven’t really had time to delve into that but definitely the indications from the Premier during the campaign is that there will be increased funding,” he said.

“And the fact (Premier Ed Stelmach) has now made culture a full ministry, taking it out of tourism, indicated the importance he places on it.”

Meanwhile, Calgary Sun columnist offers Ian Robinson offers his opinion a proposal to give Calgary a poet laureate.

So, how many poets does it take to fill up a Calgary pothole?

Two.

But you gotta wedge them in real tight and then hit them with a shovel so they’ll stay there.

Arts funding is an election topic in Alberta

Yep, Alberta. (Previously.)

After years of playing nice, the issue of arts funding has turned into a full-blown election issue during this year’s provincial campaign and, for the first time in memory, is dividing Calgary’s arts community.

After many years of Alberta artists, arts groups and administrators speaking as a polite, unified entity, quietly seeking a boost in provincial arts funding from the Tory government, this campaign has seen Alberta Ballet artistic director Jean Grand-Maitre emerge as an outspoken lone wolf.

His comments have generated attention and raised arts funding as an election issue, but his brash approach is winning little support within the arts community.

“I’ve kept my mouth shut for six years but I’ve had enough now,” said Grand-Maitre, about what he describes as chronic underfunding and disrespect for arts and culture in this province.

(Ad for the Alberta Ballet from K’vitsh’s Flickr stream.)

The arts and culture vote in Alberta

Todd Babiak looks at the three major parties in Alberta and their plans to grow the province’s cultural industries.

Liberal Leader Kevin Taft has mentioned arts and culture a number of times in recent weeks, in speeches and announcements. Their comprehensive plan is called “Fuelling an Alberta Renaissance.” If elected, they plan to immediately double lottery funding to the Alberta Foundation for the Arts (AFA) and triple it over three years. They would create a $500-million endowment for the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, using energy royalties. They would help rebuild the Alberta publishing industry and institute a 45-per-cent Alberta tax credit for the film and television industry, which would finally allow the province to compete with B.C., Saskatchewan and Manitoba. They would create a separate ministry for arts and culture, create a biannual arts festival to showcase Alberta talent, expand performance space and eliminate entrance fees to cultural facilities for youth.

Shifting Sands

If you haven’t seen it already, check out Shifting Sands, the Globe‘s Series on how the Albertan oilsands are changing Canada. It’s a fascinating read. Today’s installment looks at the flow of workers from the Maritimes to Alberta.

New Waterford, population 6,500 and falling, embodies one of the less remarked-upon implications of the oil sands bonanza: a profound social and demographic shift in the small communities that furnish so much of the project’s labour force during its massive construction phase.

So many of New Waterford’s men are working out of town that the fire department can’t recruit volunteers and the dart leagues are foundering. The local high school is having a difficult time finding coaches. A great number of children are being raised by their mothers. And finding a plumber or electrician is next to impossible.

Meanwhile, some of the youth heading west in search of jobs are staying there, exacerbating the town’s attrition and raising questions about the future sustainability of basic services.

(Image from mark(s)elliott’s Flickr stream.)

There will be culture

Todd Babiak reports that Alberta is set to make a large investment in arts and culture.

There are four basic goals. The first is to spend serious money to ensure all Albertans have access to culture. Next, the government wants to increase charitable giving, enhance cultural relationships with the private sector and other levels of government, and weave cultural awareness and planning into every department. The meat of the new policy is in the third and fourth goals: broadly, to support artists and organizations more effectively, to stimulate innovation and creativity in the sector, to market Alberta culture here and abroad, and to rebuild lost industries like film and television, new media and book publishing.

In short: This changes everything.

The state of Newfoundland theatre

Maisonneuve checks the pulse of the theatre in Newfoundland and finds it beating stronger than ever.

The work created in Newfoundland was, until recently, created almost exclusively for Newfoundland. Infrequent export of shows such as Rising Tide’s Joey, Theatre Newfoundland Labrador’s Tempting Providence, or Berni Stapleton and Amy House’s A Tidy Package kept the idea of Newfoundland theatre alive nationally, for those who were watching closely. But as these and others tracked the good word out and about, Newfoundland artists on home turf created and disseminated their work with an ever increasing mark of quality and intelligence, for an ever growing local audience. The vast majority of this work was created with little to no outward speculation on a larger and lengthier life elsewhere in the country or beyond. Such success if it came would no doubt be welcomed, but the artists who chose to stay and work here did just that; worked here.

While no longer living in their own nation, Newfoundland’s artists have, and continue to, create as if they are. And this, more than perhaps anything else, defines the unique nature of the work that happens here, and the artists who make it happen.

“Passion for the arts in the government, if not in the Government”

Todd Babiak sits down with some of the people who care for the arts in the Albertan government.

Culturally speaking, what do we talk about when we talk about the government of Alberta?

In the government, not the Party, there are bureaucrats who have chosen to work for the arts branch of the Ministry of Tourism, Parks, Recreation and Culture. They work long hours and care deeply for the arts in Alberta. Many are artists themselves. They’re proud of the individuals and organizations they support, and they cheer every successful play, novel and interpretive dance that brings glory and transcendence to Alberta and Albertans. All of them would like the Alberta Foundation for the Arts ($26.6 million) to receive as much lottery money as, say, the Horse Racing and Breeding Renewal Program ($56 million). Or, better yet, receive a permanent endowment.

Some, inevitably, are Party people — this is Alberta, after all, and grandness has attended the Party people for a generation — but most are not. After 40 columns, many with a tone of exasperation, a few of these hard-working bureaucrats decided to take me to lunch and explain a thing or two. Negative articles about the Alberta government’s commitment to the arts reflect poorly on them as human beings. Are they in the Treasury Board? Do they determine budgetary allocations? Are they lobbyists?

No and no and no.