Centaur Theatre - The Watershed

Centaur Theatre /48th Season

November 8 - December 4, 2016

Play written by Annabel Soutar

Directed by Chris Abraham

The main theme of the play is, "There’s a lot of things we can do without, BUT water’s not one of them."

If you have been following the news and are especially concerned with the environmental issues, than this play will remind you of issues surrounding the Ontario Experimental Lake Area where the government conducted an in-depth research into water tables, watersheds, pollution, aqua organisms, etc. The play chronicles the reaction by the government's representatives, researchers and activists to the announcement by the Steven Harper's government in 2012 that the project will be discontinued.

The play brings forth the complexity of the environmental and economic concerns and problems. And although at first it might appear this would be a rather dry play about the government's policies, the playwright Annabel Soutar, (a documentary playwright), manages to make it entertaining by seeing the issues from a perspective of a single family. The play is autobiographical, based on real events and exact conversation recordings made by her and also by her daughters.

There are only 8 actors in The Watershead and they play a myriad of characters in a kaleidoscopic succession. The members of the cast have a great skill not only to change their appearances extremely quickly, but also to become instantly different personages, which is a great skill in itself. Yet it was hard at first to accept that the two little girls 8 and 10 years old are played by grown up women in the range of mid 20 - 30 years old. And I did not get it until some time later into the play that a much older woman, whom I at first mistook to be the girls' eccentric grandmother, was actually also just a small kid, only 7 year old. Also, the children were a bit overplayed: too much shrieking and shouting from them to the point it was hurting my ears and detracting from issues discussed in the play. But I guess this technique was used to make it appear more credible for adults to represent small prepubescent girls. Nevertheless, it added an element of a caricature to the way the children were portrayed.

Official Synopsis:

"Join Seeds playwright, Annabel Soutar, and her family (including the dog) on a comical, cross-country trek to Fort McMurray to get the inside scoop on another probing Canadian story ripped from the headlines. See the complex environmental and economic issues surrounding Alberta’s oil sands and Ontario’s Experimental Lakes Area, first through the playwright’s investigative journalism, then through the optimistic eyes of the next generation. What kid wouldn’t jump at the chance to turn their summer holiday into an educational expedition? Last one in the RV has to name all 58 lakes!"

CAST: DANIEL BROCHU, LAURA CONDLLN, BRUCE DINSMORE, TANJA JACOBS, NGOZI PAUL, ERIC PETERSON, LIISA REPO-MARTELL, AMELIA SARGISSON

PRODUCTION TEAM:

ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR: ANDREW KUSHNIR

SET AND COSTUME DESIGNER: JULIE FOX

LIGHTING DESIGNER: KIMBERLY PURTELL

SOUND DESIGNER: THOMAS RYDER PAYNE

PROJECTIONS DESIGNER: DENYSE KARN

ASSOCIATE LIGHTING DESIGNER & TECHNICAL DIRECTOR: OZ WEAVER

TECHNICAL DIRECTOR: NORMAND VINCENT

STAGE MANAGER: MERISSA TORDJMAN

ASSISTANT STAGE MANAGER: SARAH-MARIE LANGLOIS

APPRENTICE STAGE MANAGER AND VIDEO ASSISTANT: ANGELINE ST. AMOUR

For more information, visit the Centaur Theatre website.

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For more information, visit the Centaur Theatre website.

Chat Up

Sunday, November 13, 2016,  12:30 PM 

FREE ADMISSION

Join Montreal Gazette’s Editor in Chief, Lucinda Chodan, in conversation with Playwright Annabel Soutar and Beatrix Beisner, PhD and Director Groupe de recherche interuniversitaire en limnologie et en environnement aquatique, and Professor at the Département des sciences biologiques at UQAM. Audience will be able to learn more about fresh water science and the ELA (Experimental Lake Area).

Free coffee and biscotti, generously provided by Season Sponsor Bonaparte Restaurant.

McCord Museum - William Notman

NOTMAN, A VISIONARY PHOTOGRAPHER

THE FIRST RETROSPECTIVE DEDICATED TO THE MOST IMPORTANT INTERNATIONALLY RECOGNIZED 19TH CENTURY CANADIAN PHOTOGRAPHER

November 4, 2016 - March 26, 2017

This is a major exhibition on the life and work of William Notman (1826-1891), a Montrealer, who was crucial in pioneering photography in Canada, and who was the first Canadian photographer to obtain an international recognition. His body of work, that ranged  from portraits to the landscapes that spanned Canada from east to west, helped in esyablishing the Canadian identity.

The exhibition features some 300 photographs and objects drawn primarily from the McCord Museum collection. It offers a new perspective on Notman's career and examines how the artist’s character contributed to his tremendous success. It also reveals his contemporary approach to photography, founded on the principles of communication, management and innovation.

The exhibition focuses on vintage prints, supplementing with multimedia installations and interactive devices that provide dynamic information and help clarify nineteenth-century idea of modernity.

“In 1956, the McCord Museum received the Notman Photographic Archives, now emblematic of our institution,” stated Suzanne Sauvage, President and Chief Executive Officer of the Museum. “Sixty years later, his work is more relevant than ever. From 1860 to 1900, this talented artist stood apart through his documentation of both the birth of Canada as a nation and the history of Montreal, which at the time was playing a pivotal role in the development of the country. Our goal is to pay fair tribute to him during this period of celebration by dedicating an exhibition to him and publishing a catalogue of his works.”

The exhibition is divided into four themes inspired by Notman’s career as a businessmen as a builder, his networking proficiency, and his artistic contribution.

A Scot by birth, William Notman left his home country for Canada in 1856 at the age of 30, when the family’s haberdashery business fell on hard times. Accompanied by his wife and children and confident of a brighter future, he arrived in Montreal, a dynamic and flourishing city at that time. Notman quickly learned the importance of establishing a network of influential men and had soon connected with an elite group who helped to propel his success. He went on to secure a commission to photograph the construction of the Victoria Bridge, a remarkable engineering project for its time that played a strategic role in the economic growth of Montreal. A selection of his photographs, in a maple box, was given to Albert Edward, Prince of Wales who inaugurated the bridge, in 1860.

Notman saw photography as an art form, not a widely held view at the ttime as the artistic value of photography was only acknowledged in the 20th century. He broke down the barriers between photography and painting with his painted photographs, composites, and studied stagings. His approach opened the door to the creative manipulation of photographic images. For Notman, photography was a new way to express one’s individual and collective identity, and he actively contributed to democratizing the portrait, photographing everyday people along with celebrities, First Nations peoples, trappers and voyageurs.

Notman never hesitated to apply state-of-the-art photographic processes, a reflection of his ability to anticipate future developments in the field. Examples include stereography, which allowed photographs to be viewed in three dimensions, and composite, the precursor of Photoshop. He was constantly innovating, and in doing so he helped advance the birth of technologies that enabled images to be widely replicated and circulated. Through the publication of his works – he was a leader in publishing photography books – he shared his vision and promoted photography as an art form. His efforts in this area marked the beginning of the widespread dissemination of images and helped forge the modern-day bond between the print world and visual culture. He was a regular participant in international competitions and world’s fairs, winning a number of awards over the course of his career.

Notman’s advanced management methods and astute communication skills made his name known far and wide. A true entrepreneur, he managed his firm so well that in 1872 he was operating 26 franchised studios in Canada and the United States. Upon his death, the Notman Studio, named Studio Wm. Notman & Son in 1882, continued to do business until 1935, managed by his sons William McFarlane Notman and Charles Frederick Notman.

THE NOTMAN COLLECTION
McCord Museum's Notman Collection is one of the largest collections of its kind in Canada. It contains the archives of the Montreal studio, representing some 450,0000 photographs, including 200,000 glass plate negatives, portraits, landscapes and stereoscopic shots, all of which carry enormous historical value. The Notman collection also comprises 188 photo registers and 43 client directories from the Montreal studio as well as 15 books published by William Notman, some 300 painted photos, composite photos, photographic material and a number of documents, including correspondence between Notman and family members in Scotland. The collection is also constantly enriched through donations from individuals, families and collectors. For researchers and historians, it is an inexhaustible source on the history of Montreal from 1859 to 1935.

THE CATALOGUE NOTMAN, A VISIONARY PHOTOGRAPHER
A book on William Notman and his work, entitled Notman, A Visionary Photographer, was produced for the exhibition through the support of Power Corporation du Canada. A definitive study of the artist, this 240 page hard cover publication contains 150 illustrations and essays by photographic historians and archivists, experts on Notman. It can be purchased at the McCord Museum Boutique.

ACTIVITIES
Films, lectures and conversations are offered, in relation with the exhibition. For the schedule.  wisit the McCord Museum website's activities page.

A NOTMAN CONTEST
In conjunction with the exhibition, the McCord Museum will invite the public to enter the Notman contest at the Museum. The prize, valued at approximately $6,000 and offered courtesy of Via Rail, will include a package to Vancouver for two people (The Canadian), departing from Montreal or Toronto, as well as the exhibition’s book.

Notman, A Visionary Photographer is produced, planned and presented by the McCord Museum. Hélène Samson, Curator, Notman Photographic Archives at the McCord Museum, is curating the exhibition. Following its stay in Montreal, it will travel to the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau and the Glenbow Museum in Calgary.

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For more information, visit the McCord Museum website.

Centaur 2016 - Chlorine

Centaur's Brave New Looks Series
October 19 - 29, 2015

Written and choreographed by FLORENCE LONGPRÉ & NICOLAS MICHON 

The play is based on the true case of a woman in Mascouche, Quebec. When she was 8 years old, two boys forced her to swallow chlorine, which resulted in her being paralysed from neck down. She could only communicate by opening and closing her eyes.

The stage action takes place 10 years later, when the main character Sarah is 18 years old. Her father catches Nathan, a teenage boy, a neighbour, peeing on their lawn and forces him to make bi-weekly visits to his daughter. After some period of awkwardness, a friendship begins to form. It quickly becomes apparent that Nathan needs Sarah's company as much as she needs his visits. Suddenly, he discovers he has somebody he can talk to. He becomes a chatter box, telling Sarah about everything that happens to him, giving an impression of using her as a sounding board. Since the actor often recites his monologues facing the audience rather than Sarah, this additionally reinforces a therapeutic kind of set up, not unlike those in a psychiatrist's office where a patient is lying on a couch facing away from the silent doctor while externalizing his life, his inner perceptions, imagery, problems, and the dysfunctional family incidents, thus working towards the reintegration of his inner being. Since they are both just teenagers, the sexuality issues inevitably also come to the forefront.

The play has an unusual element that punctuates various scenes, delineating the passage of the time. Three ballerinas are "floating" through the story line to the score of the The Sound of Music and other tunes from that era. They are dressed in pink, Sarah's favourite colour. A spectator could question whether they are Sarah's invisible friends, her guardian angels, just a scenic device to elevate or dessipate the play's psychological tensions, or all of those elements simultaneously. 

The play masterfully portrays an unusual relationship that develops in the aftermath of a horrific bullying incident. It throws light on the issues that ensue, bringing forth the emotions, needs, and desires of a young quadriplegic girl, as well as those of a boy who becomes her friend. It is a sensitive story that goes to the core of this particular human situation. The playwrights, the play directors, and the actors all succeeded in creating an engaging onstage presentation that is comprehensive, striking, and emotional. It has the power to engage the audience, not leaving it indifferent.  

The play also has many off-stage elements. Though not physically enacted on the stage, the graphic narration of Sarah's bullying incident that left her severely disabled creates vivid pictures in the audience's minds, as do the colourful incidents from Nathan's life he eagerly describes to Sarah. Also, there are many stage elements that are simply hinted at and left to the audience's imagination. The stage backdrop shows a rural nature scenery, but except for the very first interaction on Sarah's parents' lawn, all subsequent action happens inside their house, on the ground floor or in the basement where Sarah has her room.

There are always many non actual, non graphic or physically enacted elements in any play, including Chlorine, that are understood, imagined, or hinted at. This is why I did not consider it necessary to have actors exhibit their private body parts to the audience. These types of contemporary theatre exhibitionistic tendencies, in my opinion, have now surpassed the initial desire to shock or to be of a special interest to the audience as something new or unusual. I would now tend to characterise them as trying to be "cutesy", believing it is still innovative and capable to make a special impact or attract more attention and audience's interest. In the case of Chlorine, I think it detracts from the sensitive presentation of the story line, and forces the audience into a voyeuristic situation whether they want it or not. If it were really necessary for the play's message to be completely graphic, why not show then Sarah's diaper in the incident where her parents are washing her? Why simply show only her bare behind? The diaper (pulled from behind her if she were lying facing the audience with the bare upper leg) would have brought home much more powerfully the true complexity of her situation. The same goes for the Nathan's character stage exhibitionist incident  which could have been omitted if his stage position was choreographed with much greater class and taste vis-a-vis the audience, additionally reinforcing a sense of intimacy between the two main characters. 

There is also another issue in the play: nobody has seen Sarah since her incident. Yet she is shown in a wheelchair and therefore could have been taken out for walks by her parents. Instead, her parents installed her in their basement. And since I presume there was no elevator in their regular family home (if there were one, she could have been taken out to their backyard or for walks), this would also imply she was not taken out of the house to see a doctor, or to a hospital, and there would have been quite a problem in case of an emergency, or fire. This either points to her parents' gross negligence, if that was the case in real life, or to the play's story line disregarding this issue.  

Play's Official Synopses

'Based on an actual event, the title refers to the bullying incident which led to Sarah’s paralysis: when she was eight, two boys forced her to swallow chlorine. The chemical crystals burned her vocal cords, making her only form of communication the opening and closing of her eyes. At the onset of the play, it’s been almost a decade since Nathan has seen her and as he makes his way drunkenly home from a school dance, he wonders what has become of the girl love, and ends finally, with redemption. Over the course of the teenagers’ friendship, Sarah’s parents come to realise the incident hasn't arrested the development of their daughter’s mind and heart and the carefree little girl who went about singing the soundtrack to “The Sound of Music” has grown into a woman with more mature needs and desires.’

The Creative Team

WRITTEN & CHOREOGRAPHED BY FLORENCE LONGPRÉ & NICOLAS MICHON

TRANSLATED & DIRECTED BY JOHANNA NUTTER
SET & COSTUME DESIGN BY CATHIA PAGOTTO

LIGHTING DESIGN AND TECHNICAL DIRECTION BY JODY BURKHOLDER SOUND DESIGN BY GABRIEL LAVOIE-VIAU

Cast:
CATHERINE LEMIEUX, LINDA SMITH, AUGUSTUS RIVERS, BRIAN WRIGHT

Ballerinas:
CATHERINE GONTHIER, MÉLANIE LEBRUN, ERIKA MORIN

For more information, visit the Centaur Theatre website.

Biennale Montreal 2016 Open

Le Grand Balcon
Montreal's Biennale 2016 Now Open

October 19, 2016 - January  15, 2017

Le Grand Balcon was conceptualized and curated by Philippe Pirotte.
This intense and multifaceted artistic event comprises of the following:

55 artists and artistic collective groups,
25 Canadian artists 8 of which are from Quebec, 
35 new original works,
23 countries (Belgium, Cameroon, Canada, China, Egypt, France, Germany, Iran, Israel, Japan, Lebanon, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Peru, South Africa, South Korea, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, United Kingdom and United States),
22 exhibition and program venues and local collaborations,
10 international coproductions,
4 publications

The main exhibition area is at the Montreal's Museum of Contemporary Art -MAC. However, during the opening days and until Sunday October 30, 2016 many more artistic happenings and performances are taking place. Please consult the Biennale Montreal 2016 website for all the events and schedules.

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For more information, visit the La Biennale de Montréal website. 

You can read more about the Biennale Montreal 2016 in my previous article here.

Constellations

Centaur Theatre /48th Season

October 6 - 30, 2016

Play written by Nick Payne

Directed by Peter Hinton 

Centaur Theatre opens its 48th season with Constellations, the winner of the London’s Evening Standard Best Play Award. It is a tale of two people finding love in a theoretical quantum-physics multi-universes. The play made waves on both sides of the Atlantic: in London’s West End (2012), and on Broadway (2015). It was written by the British playwrite Nick Paine, and it is directed by the accomplished Canadian director Peter Hinton, the former Artistic Director of the NAC English Theatre and recent META nominee.

The main female character Maranne, a quantum physicist, formulates clearly the main premisses on which the play is based:

Marianne: In the quantum multiverse, every choice, every decision you’ve ever and never made exists in an unimaginably vast ensemble of parallel universes.

If you accept the theory of the multiverses, then you will be greatly amused with the variations and permutations of the characters' fragmented experiences and their reactions to them. You will see the physicist Marianne and the bee keeper Roland going on a journey through parallel worlds where they fall in, and sometimes out of love over and over again in a multitude of ways. Every choice creates a different, life-altering outcome in their relationship. 

Bit even if you do not believe in the theoretical multiverses, you will be amazed to discover what a myriad of possibilities each relationship presents, and how the variations on the way people choose to react to the reality or how they select to express their free will alter the outcome of their relationship and create different life scenarios. The play is a multifaceted, kaleidoscopic succession of episodes on how the same loving relationship could play out under different circumstances, or how it could be altered because of the personal choices the characters decide to make.

Whatever are your believes, keep in mind that the theory of multiverses is only a Quantum Mechanics theory, not a law like the Newton's Laws of Thermodynamics. Those theories have not yet been proven to become the physic's laws. Almost all theories are either significantly elaborated upon, changed, or totally discarded later on in the future.

Also consider what the spiritual mystics had claimed throughout the ages that multiverses do exist but are in the spiritual realms, and that we are all spiritual beings in control of our choices that are defined or even limited by the physical reality in which we exist. 

It is also interesting to note that in all 5 or 6 multiverses portrayed in the play, Marianne, regardless of her proclamations of infinite possibilities and outcomes in the different physical universes in which she firmly believes she simultaneously exists, develops brain tumour, and only in one of them it is benign. In all the other ones, it is the same type of spread-out multiple brain tumour from which the father of the playwrite Nick Payne died, and which is also going to lead to Marianne's death. Somehow, this does not appear to support too well the Marrianne's proclamations of the multiple possibilities with the multiple outcomes in the hypothetical multiverses. Even benign brain tumours continues to grow, are very difficult to operate, and eventually lead to death, though in a slower scenario than the cancerous ones.

There are only two actors on the stage with a cellist in the background who helps with the tonal accents to separate the fragmented episodes from different universes from each other, delineating the beginning and the end of each successive experience. The play is 85 minutes long without an intermission.  

Nick Payne wrote Constellations in the aftermath of his father’s death, after watching Brian Greene’s documentary The Elegant Universe, an exploration of the quantum mechanics theory which postulates the existence of eleven space-time dimensions. He described Constellations as a dramatized attempt to reconcile “the urge to remember versus the need to forget”.

Peter Hinton, the play's director, elaborated:

"Constellations is a play in which this science is explored through the varied possible lives of a single couple. As we follow Roland and Marianne through breaking up and staying together, moving in and going their separate ways, having affairs and monogamy, we also see romance interrupted and tested by death; it is a love story both celebrated and mourned.”

The Centaur Theatre’s Artistic and Executive Director Roy Surette stated this about the play:

“Constellations is the poster play for our “Swept Away” season slogan, transporting audiences from the world we know to multiple universes where this ordinary couple’s awkward, humorous and ultimately touching relationship develops in countless directions. We are proud to introduce this simple yet beautiful story to English Canada for the first time with our partners, Canadian Stage, and are so fortunate to have Peter direct. What a perfect artistic match in any universe! His vision is always innovative and surprising; and he’s put together a celestial group of artists." 

Graham Cuthbertson returns to Centaur as Roland, a somewhat awkward bee-keeper.

Cara Ricketts, a Toronto actress, makes her Centaur debut as a studious quantum physicist, Marianne. Cara’s previous credits include work with Soulpepper Theatre and several Stratford Festival seasons. She is also known for her role as Bertilda in the popular TV series, Book of Negroes.

Michael Gianfrancesco, who has designed for theatre, opera and dance across the country, as well as for both the Shaw and Stratford Festivals, created the sets and costumes. Andrea Lundy, a 9-time Dora Award-winner and 28-year theatre veteran, brought her considerable experience to the production’s lighting design. Centaur’s Audio Engineer, Peter Cerone, who has been designing for dance, theatre, art installations and more since 1980, contributed the sound design. Michael Hart, another Stratford alumnus who has worked with Peter Hinton several times, is the stage manager, assisted by Jacynthe Lalonde. Stephanie Costa assisted Mr. Hinton and Montreal performer, recording artist and teacher, Jane Chan, plays the cello live. 

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Production Team:

Actors Graham Cuthbertson and Cara Ricketts
Cellist Jane Chan
Set & Costume Designer Michael Gianfrancesco 
Lighting Designer Andrea Lundy
Sound Designer Peter Cerone
Fight Director Jean-François Gagnon
Stage Manager Michael Hart
Assistant Stage Manager Jacynthe Lalonde
Assistant to the Director Stephanie Costa

CHAT UP, IN COLLABORATION WITH MONTREAL GAZETTE:
Sunday October 9th at 12:30pm.
Free coffee and biscotti offered by Season Sponsor Bonaparte Restaurant.
Admission is FREE!

TALK BACKS:
Get behind the scenes with Constellations’ two actors after the evening performance on Thursday Oct. 13th and after the matinée on Sunday Oct. 16th.

For more information, visit the Centaur Theatre website.

1700 La Poste - Claire Labonté

Claire Labonté
at 1700 La Poste

October 7 - December 18, 2016

Claire Labonté is a self-taught artist. Initially, her paintings which deployed minutely executed motifs across large surfaces were classified as naive art. However, over the years, her art evolved into an orchestrated complex imagery with a striking autopoiesis. As she explained herself, her paintings happen in the space after she dips her brush in a paint and before she makes the mark on the canvas. It is during this meditative instant where her works take shape and the imagery is conceived. Her imagery expresses her personal type of visual poetics, her unconscious sense of aesthetics, and not only her own but also the collective mythology that surrounds her. In addition, the colours she deploys are striking and vibrant, and project the sense of great energy and vitality. The colours play the major role in the propagation of her repetitive motives and painterly spots into a complex visual symphony of balance, harmony and meaning.

Her notion of a painting “making itself” reveal two involuntary constants in her art: the repetitive nature of her artistic process and the mythological dimension of the resulting works. In 2003, after twenty years of personal exploration and in-depth searching, she enrolled at a university to investigate the enigmatic mechanic-like and the unconscious nature of her work. She obtained the Bachelor of Philosophy and the Master of Fine Arts degrees, and came to view her repetitive creative process as being at the root of the mythological dimension of her artwork. In 2011, after completing a thesis on the mythical and ritualistic aspects of her paintings, she focused her pictorial research on the concepts of repetition and replication.

In 2013, in an effort to resist the mytho-narrative imagery that automatically introduced itself through the repetition or replication of her small touches of paint, Labonté created L’esthétique des contraintes à l’Orée des bois -The Aesthetic of Constraints at the Woods’ Edge (see the top-most image). With this work, she came to discover that the circumstances involved in the application of a touch of paint not only accounted for the mythical nature of her own paintings, but were fundamental to creative activity as such.

Claire Labonté's pairings could be easily discussed in conjunction with the Alfred Pellan's art who used extensively the repetitive elements and themes in his later works. This type of repetitive-imagery depiction, the complex visual rhythms that are conceived and portrayed, might even represent an artistic approach specific to some Quebec artists, and might stem from the Quebec's collective mythology.

Claire Labonté has participated in international exhibitions in Switzerland and France, including the fourth Biennale internationale d’art hors les normes in Lyon. She is the recipient of awards and grants from Switzerland, Québec, and the Canada Council for the Arts. Her murals have been integrated into the architecture of a number of public buildings.

Since 2008, Claire Labonté has exhibited primarily in Québec museums that have the necessary space to display her large and at times almost endlessly wide works that are perceived as being “murals.” 

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Watch the video about the Claire Labonté's exhibition at 1700 La Poste here.

1700 La Poste is a private space dedicated to visual arts. It presents events in the form of exhibitions and lectures. It is housed in a former Postal Station F, built in 1913, that was originally conceived by the architect David Jerome Spence. It is located in Montreal's Griffintown, 1700 Rue Notre-Dame West. The building was fully restored a century later, thanks to private financing from Isabelle de Mévius, and the vision of the architect Luc Laporte.

For more information, visit the 1700 La Poste website.
The admission to the exhibition if free of charge.