Burrard Marina Field House Studio Residency

Australian artist de Souza investigates the politics of space informed through a formal training in architecture combined with her experiences such as squatting in Redfern, Sydney. De Souza’s work emphasizes participation and reciprocity, and often involves the process of learning new skills and fostering relationships to create site and situation-specific projects. For over ten years she has self-published her hand-bound books and zines under the name All Thumbs Press.

In Vancouver, De Souza has developed a series of community based workshops throughout 2015-16 engaging participants in a critical dialogue regarding local food production. De Souza worked closely with various local urban farmers, food security activists and community members to explore the food politics within the city as both evidence of and a metaphor for urban displacement through gentrification.

In 2015, her handmade inflatable dome became a temporary space at the Field House for a public picnic engaging Canadian colonial narratives via a consideration of national food traditions. Meeting with local chefs, food activists and residents de Souza prepared a truly Canadian feast as a source for an afternoon of unfolding dialogue that the artist mapped directly onto the floor of the dome, a starting point for the discussion was the ephemerality of the event itself.

De Souza hosted a second event, an urban foraging expedition culminating in jam making, experimental mapping and a discussion exploring local foods, cultural preservation and the continuing effects of colonization in contemporary Vancouver. The event featured two local guest collaborators, Lori Snyder, an Indigenous Herbalist specializing in urban foraging for wild, edible and medicinal plants; and Lori's partner, Steve Snyder, a master jam maker for the last fifteen years. This two-day event began with a foraging tour led by Lori Snyder focusing on the native blackberry, the introduced blackberry and other native plants. Participants foraged on the banks surrounding the Field House which are covered with wild Himalayan Blackberries — an invasive, “colonizing,” non-native species in Vancouver. On the second day, Steve Synder led a jam making session with the foraged berries. While communally making jam, de Souza led a discussion focused on the act of preserving these locally dominant berries, questioning whose culture is in fact preserved and how this can be linked to colonial narratives. This discussion culminated in an experimental mapping of the dialogue.

To complete this project, the artist returned to Vancouver for subsequent residencies at the Burrard Marina Field House in April 2015, July 2015 and September/October 2016.

Biography

Recent exhibitions include; Redfern School of Displacement, 20th Biennale of Sydney (2016); Abundance: Fruit of the Sea, Bounty of the Mountains, 2016 Setouchi Triennale. Temporary Spaces, Edible Places: Vancouver and Preservation, Contemporary Art Gallery; Temporary Spaces, Edible Places: New York, AC Institute, New York (2015). Temporality in Architecture, Food and Communities, Delfina Foundation, London; Temporary Spaces, Edible Places, Atlas Arts, Isle of Skye; If There's Something Strange In Your Neighbourhood ..., Ratmakan kampung, Yogyakarta, Indonesia (2014).

Burrard Marina Field House

The Burrard Marina Field House Studio is an off-site artist residency space and community hub organized by the Contemporary Art Gallery. This program moves beyond conventional exhibition making, echoing the founding origins of the gallery where artists were offered support toward the production of new work, while reaching out to communities and offering new ways for individuals to encounter and connect with art and artists. Running parallel to the residency program were an ongoing series of public events for all ages.