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Film festival hosts 2013 women's film EDA awards

Arts News: Art heads to Seattle, book launch in Squamish and historical society gets cultural grant
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The Alliance of Women Film Journalists (AWFJ) will announce the winners of two of its juried EDA awards at the 2013 Whistler Film Festival (WFF).

The organization, a non-profit made up of female film journalists in the U.S., Canada and the U.K., "recognizes outstanding achievements by women filmmakers" by presenting the EDA awards at select film festivals.

The EDA awards to be presented at the WFF are for Best Female-Directed Narrative Feature and for Best Female-Directed Documentary.

"We feel that the Whistler Film Festival's excellent programming, loyal following and filmmaker-friendly atmosphere make it the ideal selection for AWFJ's first Canadian partner in the presentation of EDA awards," said AWFJ president Jennifer Merlin in a press release.

Eligible female-directed movies are being screened as part of the festival's program.

Previous winners of EDA awards have included director Kathryn Bigelow and actors Jennifer Lawrence and Judy Dench.

Whistler Mountain Galleries at Seattle Affordable Art Fair

Whistler Mountain Galleries at the Fairmont Chateau Whistler is taking works by a group of nine of its artists to the Seattle Affordable Art Fair.

The fair, which sells thousands of original paintings, prints, sculptures and photographs for prices ranging from $100 to $10,000, takes place from Nov. 6 to 10 at the Seattle Center Exhibition Hall.

Manager Elizabeth Peacock said it was the first time the gallery has attended the fair and added that they see it as a chance to promote Canadian artists in the U.S. market.

The artists whose work will be shown are Jim Vest, Tim Schumm, Corrinne Wolcoski, Robert Genn, Brian Atyeo, Nicholas Bolt, Linda Wilder, Gail Johnson and Karel Doruyter.

Oil Man and The Sea book launch

Journalist Arno Kopecky's book on his travels through the Great Bear Rainforest, The Oil Man and the Sea: Circumnavigating the Northern Gateway, will be launched at the Brackendale Art Gallery in Squamish on Saturday, Nov. 9 at 7 p.m.

The book follows a trip Kopecky took with his friend Ilja Herb on a 41-foot sailboat to search out the land and people that will be deeply impacted by Enbridge's proposed Northern Gateway pipeline project.

The complex and unique Great Bear Rainforest — with grizzlies, humpback whales, fish habitat and the unique white "spirit bear" is too fragile for such a pipeline to be laid through it, Kopecky argues in the book. The politics, he adds, are as treacherous to navigate as the fjords of the region.

Included is a look at how First Nations and environmentalists have responded to the proposed project.

Squamish Historical Society gets federal grant

The Squamish Historical Society (SHS) has been given a grant for $12,500 from the federal government's Canadian Heritage: Building Community Through Arts & Heritage fund.

The cheque will be presented by West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country MP John Weston on Nov. 8.

The money will be used for the second 2014 Squamish Culture & Heritage Festival that will take place in May 2014. The first two-day event took place at Quest University in Nov. 2012.

SHS president Bianca Peters said it was the first time the society had applied for the grant. The festival will celebrate the 50th anniversary of the District of Squamish.

For more information visit www.squamishhistory.ca and click "Culture & Heritage Festival."