Richmond BC, Canada #richmondartgallerybc
Artist Sonja Ahlers leads an intergenerational conversation about zines and do-it-yourself (DIY) culture with guests Whess Harman, Lisa Prentice, and Casey Wei. Classification Crisis curator Godfre Leung will introduce the discussion and connections to Ahlers’ current exhibition.
This was a fully interactive online session recorded on October 11, 2023 with the Richmond Art Gallery.
Hosted by RAG Education & Public Programs Coordinator, Kathy Tycholis and exhibition curator, Godfre Leung.
Featuring artists Sonja Ahlers, Whess Harman, Lisa Prentice, and Casey Wei.
Produced by the Richmond Art Gallery Association
About the Presenters:
Sonja Ahlers is a visual artist and poet based in Victoria, on the unceded territories of the lək̓ ʷəŋən (Lekwungen) speaking peoples, now known as the Songhees and Esquimalt Nations. Since the early 90s, Ahlers has worked primarily in book and book-adjacent formats, in a medium that she calls visual poetry. She is the author of Temper, Temper and Fatal Distraction (Insomniac Press, 1998 and 2004), and The Selves (Drawn & Quarterly, 2010), and was a key contributor to Rookie Mag from 2011 to 2015. Swan Song (Conundrum Press, 2021) is Ahlers’ most recent artist book. A major exhibition survey of her art practice titled Classification Crisis will be presented in Fall 2023 at Richmond Art Gallery.
Whess Harman is a member of the Carrier Wit’at Nation, a nation amalgamated by the federal government under the Lake Babine Nation. He doesn’t like cops and believes in land sovereignty for Indigenous peoples all across the globe. In his arts practice he works primarily in drawing, text and textiles. As the curator at grunt gallery and occasional editor for a mish-mash of publications, he prioritizes emerging queer and BIPOC cultural workers and artists. Whess looks to the arts as one of many tools in fighting oppressive forces and can be a little fucking rude about it, when the occasion calls. Currently residing on the traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples.
Lisa Prentice is a former artist and practicing bodyworker who is passionate about the creative power of touch and movement, health justice, and community approaches to access, healing, and repair. A graduate of the Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design, Prentice lives and works on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ Nations in Vancouver.
Casey Wei is an interdisciplinary artist based in Vancouver, BC, on unceded MST territories. Her work in filmmaking, writing, and performance is informed by participatory activities such as editing, publishing, and programming. Recent works include the book Tuning to Oblivion: an artist residency (M:ST Performative Art, 2023), and the album Stimuloso (Mint Records, 2022) with her band, Kamikaze Nurse.
