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Suit up for the soirée of the season

Dig up and dust off your finest cocktail attire; it's almost time for the Whistler Film Festival Society's annual gala and auction.

Dig up and dust off your finest cocktail attire; it's almost time for the Whistler Film Festival Society's annual gala and auction.

The themed evening, which includes a cocktail reception, three-course gourmet meal prepared by Four Seasons' executive chef Oliver Beckert paired with fine wines, live entertainment, silent and live auctions, a grand prize raffle and gift bags.

As one of the society's most important fundraising initiatives, Soirée attracts a crowd of 200 of the province's most influential business leaders who come out in support of WFFS's professional development and training programs for B.C.-based filmmakers and youth, and their new state-of-the-art digital theatre project in Whistler.

The 2009 Soirée takes place at the Four Seasons Vancouver on Thursday, June 25.

Tickets are $200 each or $2,000 for a table of 10. Contact program@whistlerfilmfestival.com or 1-877-838-3456 to get yours.

Bike Park opens with a bang

People have stored their ski and snowboard gear after a bit of a rocky winter season, and are ready with their mountain bikes, prepared to make the most of the spring and summer months in Whistler.

This coming weekend, Whistler Blackcomb officially opens the Bike Park, and at least one bar is ready to get the party going with their first mountain bike movie premiere on Friday night.

The GLC is screening Redbull Rampage: The Evolution , which features local rider, Brandon Semenuk, on Friday, May 15 at 9 p.m. Tickets are $7 at the door.

And the following evening, the Metallica tribute band, Damage Inc., rocks the crowd out after the premiere of yet another mountain bike movie, On the Line , that features local riders Kevin Bartkowski and Ian Morrison. The party starts at 9 p.m., and tickets to this double-header evening are $10. Plus, there will be some killer prize giveaways from Garbanzo Bike and Bean and Dincus Apparel.

Get on the Happy Trail

To coincide with the opening of the Bike Park, the Whistler Arts Council has organized a special amateur photo competition with a 2009 Whistler Mountain Bike Park season pass up for grabs.

All amateur photographers from within the Sea to Sky corridor were invited to submit up to three unpublished B.C. mountain biking photographs to the Happy Trails Photo Competition by Wednesday, May 13. The results will be compiled into a juried slideshow to be projected onto a screen in Mountain Square on Friday, May 15 and Saturday, May 16, so members of the public can check them out and go online later to cast their vote. Then, on Sunday, May 17, the winning photographer will be announced.

For more information on the competition, go to www.whistlerartscouncil.com .

Memories of McConkey

In honour of ski legend, father and good friend Shane McConkey, Matchstick Productions is reissuing one of their classic films from 2001: There's Something About McConkey .

"Scott Gaffney's wacky, whirlwind tour through a man, a mind and a sport could be the most ridiculous ski film ever," said a recent press release.

Shane McConkey died in a skiing accident in Italy earlier this year.

Copies of the film are being sold for $20, with all proceeds going towards Shane's wife, Sherry, daughter, Ayla, and www.shanemcconkey.org . Visit www.skimovie.com/store to snag a copy.

MSP also plans to release another film, chronicling McConkey's full ski career, at a later date.

ArtWalk adds artists

For the fourth year, Alta Lake Station house will play host to an assortment of artists - some extremely skilled, and some just starting out - as part of the Whistler Art Council's Art Workshops on the Lake, which run from late May until the end of August.

This year, thanks in part to additional funding from the Cultural Capitals of Canada program, WAC has been able to increase the number of workshops from nine to 15. They've also been able to hire a number of new, skilled instructors from within the community and further abroad.

"The funding has allowed us to bring in sought-after instructors from across Canada," said Ali Richmond, marketing coordinator for WAC. "For example, we've been trying to get Brian Atyeo and Mike Svob as instructors for the last two years, but both have always had busy schedules with workshops taking place in other parts of the country. Now we've been able to help pay for their travel costs to the region. Both those artists have a huge following, with workshop participants traveling all over the province or country in order to take their classes."

In addition, Vincent Massey has come on board to offer a pottery workshop, Penny Martyn will teach a ceramics class, and a famous watercolour flower and landscape painter, Marianne Broome, has joined the lineup.

Increased funding has also allowed WAC to make the classes smaller and more intimate, without having to increase workshop fees.

"The last few years we had a limit of 15 participants," Richmond said. "This year the classes are limited to 10 or 12 participants, as smaller groups work better in terms of space at Alta Lake Station House. Alta Lake Station House is a traditional workshop space obviously, but the serene location and views make it ideal for creative inspiration. As well, smaller class sizes provide more opportunity for our participants to work one-on-one with the instructors and gain more from the class altogether."

Some of the workshops, like Svob's and Northcott's, are already sold out, while others only have a few spots remaining.

People can check www.whistlerartscouncil.com for instructor bios, course outlines and registration details.