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Backyard Booty – Words versus Pictures

Digging up the treasures of our own backyard
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It begins at high noon. The Deep Winter Photo Challenge is coming…

Over the past 72 hours, photographers Paul Morrison, Dano Pendygrasse, Ian Coble, Jordan Manley, Bryan Ralph and Phil Tifo have been out trying to capture the essence of winter in Whistler.

Not winter out in the back 40, or the backcountry, or the back of beyond, but deep winter as it looks in our immediate backyard, in bounds on the mountain, at a time of year that most photographers are simply waiting for the light to return.

This portrait of the twin peaks from multiple perspectives will be revealed in a slideshow event that takes snow-porn to orgiastic proportions — the Deep Winter Photo Challenge. In its inaugural year, Deep Winter packed Millennium Place to the rafters. This weekend, it moves into the Chateau’s ballroom.

It was an idea that Mike Douglas, the Godfather of Freeride, had been pitching for four years. “After competing in a similar competition in 2002, I thought it would be a great thing to do in Whistler during the darkest days of winter,” he said. “Not too many photographers are out working on the stormiest winter days, but there is an opportunity to create beautiful images. Whistler has a reputation for bad weather and we haven't done enough to show how beautiful skiing on a stormy day can be.”

Douglas partnered up with the Light-master, photographer Paul Morrison, to deliver last year’s winning show, a Hallelujah chorus to winter in Whistler. Overlaid with sound clips from the snowphone’s weather report, images of skiers huddling into their jackets on the chairlift or being buffeted against a wind-scoured slope were interspliced with icicle art and epic shots of Mike Douglas dropping in on snow-covered ziggurats. Not a heli-drop or bluebird day in sight.

And the crowd left, stoke-fuelled for inbound storm-chasing adventures and the prospect of a 7 a.m. start.

(You can check out their four minute show at www.deepwinterphoto.com .)

For Morrison, the Deep Winter Photo Challenge personifies Whistler more than any other single event. “To be returning with Mike Douglas as my teammate, and to be a part of the second edition of this event, is the highlight of the winter for me.”

Kootenay adventurers hit the road

If Deep Winter is iconic of Whistler, then next Friday’s Backyard Booty brings the best homegrown from the Kootenays, for a sampling session.

Billed as a night of “home-brewed multimedia to stoke the furnace” and presented by the Nelson-based Kootenay Mountain Culture magazine, the Booty rocks into MY Place on Jan. 11.

Dedicated to celebrating, promoting and documenting mountain culture, the KMC crew will be showcasing the stories that are too multi-dimensional to lay flat. “It’s representative of the magazine in ways we can’t show on the pages,” says publisher Peter Moynes.

The show is a collection of mostly Kootenay talent — photographers, filmmakers, spoken word artists, and storytelling, including Doug LePage and Peter Moynes, Swedish adventure sport shooter Mattias Fredrickson, internationally-travelled East Kootenay lensman Patrice Halley and Freeride Entertainment. The Nelson-based movie and commercial-making company is producing a short film of clips from the wide variety of projects the production house has reeled off in the past few years.

The Booty will also include a reel of rarities from well-known West Kootenay filmmaker Bill Heath, giving his "Day Job" effort, a selection of work “that pays the bills.” Given that Heath’s newest film, Nine Winters Old, was just awarded Best Film on Mountain Culture at Banff, the “Day Job” should give hope to any aspiring filmmaker.

Hollywood star shooter, photographer Bryce Duffy and Rossland-based bike photographer Derek Frankowski will join the traveling crew, with KMC editor, story-telling savant, winner of the 2007 B.C. Tourism Media Award, and one-time Whistler liftie, Mitchell Scott as the preacher-man.

It's a Kootenay-style variety show cum traveling revival, oozing tales of mountain life, something the mag has been trying to do since its inception seven years ago, as a way of articulating the voice of mountain culture.

For Scott, capturing the smoke-rings of “mountain culture” is a way of celebrating local talent, creating community out of a disparate group of tribes and giving a sub-culture the tools to stand up for itself.

Like other action sports, think surfing or rock-climbing, where the participant enjoys a profound interaction with the environment, “mountain culture” has a deeper side.

To pursue the superficial goal of the perfect turn, the perfect wave, the perfect line, we devote ourselves to something greater. A quest. Pointless, sure. But in its pursuit, we practice material ascetism (we forego things like furniture, matching crockery and party shoes), we have rituals (the board-waxing, the bong-hit in the gondola, the peeling apart of skins pulled out from under your armpits), we make sacrifices and experience blood-letting, and in indescribable ways, we approach somekindofgod.

And these things are hard to articulate. Hard to approximate. Hard to make tangible.

Says Mitchell Scott, "I think the most tangible thing we can do is to have stories.”

So maybe, without precisely knowing it, Mitchell Scott has another agenda motivating the Backyard Booty multimedia show. Maybe he’s trying to breathe spirit back into what we’re all doing here.

Who wins the Bums-in-seats game?

If success is measured by bums-in-seats, it will be interesting to see whether Deep Winter’s hometown pride-show or a Kootenay mountain culture Booty-hunt, will win the day.

Measuring success by audience numbers is something Stella Harvey has been struggling with.

Harvey produces almost all of the literary events that come to Whistler, and has developed a six-year habit for her troubles — a habit of losing sleep over the fine art of balancing budgets, writing grants, planning press blitzes, hosting guest writers in her home, and chasing Canadian literary names across the country with hand-written invitations to Whistler.

Her biggest challenge might simply be that she programs events that have no pictures.

While Deep Winter Photo Challenge or the TELUS World Ski and Snowboard Festival’s Pro Photographer Showdown can sell out any venue, and the film scene goes from strength to strength, literary and storytelling events have yet to pack the rafters.

As founder of Whistler’s writers group, The Vicious Circle, and the volunteer Festival Director for the September Whistler Writers Festival, Harvey says it’s not a problem with the quality of writers. “We’ve been fortunate enough to attract some of the hottest talent in Canada. Lisa Moore, Noah Richler, Susan Musgrave, Joseph Boyden, Timothy Taylor, Michael Winter, Patrick Lane. The audience who come to one of our reading events say they didn’t know what to expect, but they’re always glad they came, and they keep coming back.

“So I don’t think the problem of selling out our events is with the writers. I really think it has to do with the fact that our potential audience doesn’t know what to expect. Storytelling is as entertaining as it’s always been but we’ve forgotten the simple pleasure of it, because there are so many other kinds of entertainment available to us. Listening to an author read or perform their words can be quiet, loud, entertaining, wild, soul-enhancing, leave you thinking. But it is, in a way, more participatory than film or art or photography. The audience has to be ready to remember what it was like, as a kid, to listen to a story, and imagine it unfold.”

In other words, the audience supplies the pictures. Which admittedly requires a little more effort than kicking back, with the buzz of a beer settling through your bloodstream, watching someone else’s images on the big screen.

In a town like Whistler, this is probably going to mean that the audience at a literary event will be smaller than the crowd that shows up for a slide-show or a film-night.

“This is an interesting question, though,” says Harvey, who diligently collates and analyses audience feedback from every event she’s run. “How is success measured? I don’t think it should be measured in the same way for every group of artists. Film will have a broader appeal — it’s sexier, it’s shinier, and it’s at the most a three hour commitment. If you attract 50 people to a literary event, the success lies in the opportunity provided to those 50 people that wouldn’t otherwise have existed here. And there’s another measure of success. Those who come, come again and again each year. That has to say something about the quality of the literary events. All the authors who have been here from Toronto and Vancouver have been impressed with the size of our audiences. They tell me that even in their cities, it’s difficult to attract more than 20 people to a reading, and most of the readings usually have fewer than 15.”

Which means Whistler might actually be a literary hub of Canada.

There’s enough talent here, that’s for sure.

Local stories told by local tricksters

For every literary event Harvey has organized, she’s given local scribes a chance to share the stage with established Canadian authors. It’s been part of a bigger goal, to build local capacity, support local talent, and ensure that local stories are told by local writers.

Stephen Vogler is a case in point. The long-time Pique correspondent and CBC radio contributor has made regular appearances behind the microphone at Literary Leanings, at the TELUS World Ski and Snowboard Festival’s Words and Stories, and summer story-busking throughout the village with rhythm man, bassplayer Rajan Das.

Sensing a renewed interest in Whistler stories, Vogler approached Harbour Publishing about re-publishing his book Whistler Features.

“Howard White, the publisher, had read it, and he asked me if I wanted to write something new about the place instead,” said Vogler. “I’d already done the 30 years of research, so it was just a matter of hunkering down for a year to write it!”

And the reception for Top of the Pass: Whistler and the Sea to Sky Country has been fantastic. “The Whistler book launch was a good local party. The beer and wine on offer didn’t hurt the atmosphere,” joked Vogler, “but people were excited about the book. People love to see a reflection of themselves and their community. The people from Harbour who came up said they hadn’t seen a launch like that for 15 years. If ever.”

Vogler’s willingness to make writing a performance art, as well as his radar for quirky characters, has helped hone his storytelling technique.

“Reading or performing in public is always rewarding if a bit terrifying,” said Vogler, when asked about the place of writers in the local artsnculture scene if they’re not natural-born performers or have an anemic tickle-trunk. “You don't want to write in a vacuum, so it's good to have an audience. I don't think there's anything wrong with making it entertaining or bringing a little theatre to it.

“We certainly live in an image-hungry society. Every experience is captured on digital camera or video, and it's even more accentuated in a mountain recreation town like Whistler. But I don't think the visual arts are squeezing out storytellers or writers. The 72 Hour Film Makers' Showdown and the Photography Showdown bring out big crowds during the World Ski and Snowboard Festival but so does Words and Stories and the Chairlift Review.

“And they're all trying to tell a story; the films and slide shows are just another medium for storytelling. In some ways, writers have the most outlets; you can stand on the corner and spout your message to the passersby, you can write a letter to the editor, publish a magazine or newspaper article or a book, or speak to an assembled crowd. People can take the book or magazine story home with them and appreciate it and pass it on to a friend. So there's no lack of exposure if you want to tell a story. And who doesn't like dressing up in a costume?”

Try Group Therapy

Well, as it turns out, a fair proportion of Whistler’s literary talent, are not so big on dressing up.

In fact, reading your own work in public can be a lot more like undressing.

Where photographers and filmmakers can expose their work while sitting in the dark, fully-clothed and anonymous amongst the audience, writers actually have to stand naked under the spotlight and read.

As any good stripper will tell you, it does get easier with practice.

The opportunity to practice, as part of the annual Literary Leanings event at Celebration 2010 and last year’s successful Postcard Jam, has provided more than 50 local writers the chance to test out their storytelling chops on real audiences, since 2002.

Three of those, including Vogler and Whistler TV producer Rebecca Wood Barrett, will be embracing the therapeutic value of getting metaphorically naked in public on Feb. 19 at Group Therapy, the Vicious Circle’s 6th annual Literary Leanings storytelling event.

Says Harvey, “Think burlesque, without the striptease.”

The locals will join three of the most acclaimed spoken word performers in Canada. Storytellers Oni the Haitian Sensation "the Godmother of Canadian Slam", performer and cowboygirl Ivan E Coyote ( Bow Grip) , and Metis-Jewish poet Gregory Scofield (Singing Home the Bones, Thunder in My Veins) , will pass the talking stick, and spin, shake and rattle stories out of the raw material of their lives.

Group Therapy may be the last event of its kind, given that the producers of Celebration 2010 have advised that all future arts programming to be funded in conjunction with 2010 must take place out of doors.

“We aren’t rockstars or stiltwalkers. We’re writers. Our work is best displayed and appreciated in cozy environments where the spoken word can be heard and appreciated,” says Stella Harvey. “Stories bring the outdoors inside. They give us the chance to percolate what we’ve experienced physically, in the environment beyond us, and wrap meaning around it. So we’re not really sure what role we’ll have to play in the Cultural Olympiad, although we’re certainly keen to do so and more than equipped to share Whistler’s stories with the world.”

Whether their medium is words or pictures, burlesque or hoodie-couture, the Perfect Storm of artists is about to hit town, and they’re all unearthing the best treasures of our mountain backyards for one hell of a Show and Tell.

Enjoy the bounty, me hearties.

Ticket info:

Deep Winter Photo Challenge, Fairmont Chateau Whistler, Saturday, Jan. 5. Pre-show reception at 7 p.m. Slideshow beginning at 8 p.m. Tickets $10 can be purchased at Whistler-Blackcomb Guest Relations locations, the Arc’teryx Factory Store in Vancouver, or by calling 1-800-766-0449.

Backyard Booty, presented by Kootenay Mountain Culture, Millennium Place, Friday, Jan. 11, 8 p.m. Tickets $17, call 604-935-8410, Millennium Place.

Group Therapy, the Vicious Circle’s 6th annual Literary Leanings storytelling event, presented in conjunction with Celebration 2010. Millennium Place, Tuesday Feb. 19 at 8 p.m. Tickets $15, call 604-935-8410.



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