Handcrafted in Vancouver and featured in our latest Fantasy issue of Sad Mag, Talia Tanaka puts a new twist on luxury and environmentally friendly.

We all have heroes in our lives that we admire immensely. It’s hard to give a gift that expresses how much someone means to you—be it your grandmother who mails you hand-knitted socks every winter even though she lives in Florida or your best friend who shows up to your house with Ben and Jerry’s, and the latest George Clooney movie because you had a bad day. These people are heroes in your eyes and you love them endlessly. Love Medal celebrates the people you love most in your life with a simple “thank you.”

Creator Talia Tanaka graduated from Emily Carr University of Art and Design before founding Love Medals. After a few years of researching jewelry ideas in Japan, Tanaka came back with the idea of Love Medals, pieces that “[celebrate] relationships amongst family, friends, lovers, and even ourselves.” Love Medals combines luxurious Japanese ribbons with ethical Canadian diamonds to create the most distinguished pieces of jewelry that are cast in 14k gold, sterling silver or bronze. She uses the highest quality materials for all her medals, necklaces, earrings, bracelets and pins while staying eco-friendly.

What first began as a company out of her parent’s basement has become a socially conscious jewelry line Tanaka is proud of. Love Medals is located in a 100-year-old studio space that is well equipped with a recycling program where materials such as wax, solutions, and metal scraps are reused, and packaging is either recycled or biodegraded. To top it all off, Love Medals refuses to use any animal based products, and plans to use reclaimed metals in the future.

Sad Mag: Your designs are very unique; we’ve never seen anything like them! How did you come up with the idea to incorporate medals in your line?

Talia Tanaka: Thank you. Well the medals are actually the core of my line and everything else is inspired from those designs. The idea for the medals came about quite simply, but grew into something much more meaningful and profound. I was living in Japan at the time and decided to start my own jewelry line. It was important for me to try and create something different and unique. I came across these vintage war medals and was instantly drawn to them. The inner ‘hippie’ in me thought, “These are great. But they should be Love Medals!” I made some quick sketches in my book, and when revisiting them later, began to see a much larger intention behind the idea.

I truly believe love is what makes the world go ’round. We are all here to learn how to Love, which is not necessarily an easy thing to do! Love is not just a romantic notion, but also one of acceptance, patience, peace and understanding. Love Medals are a special way to acknowledge appreciation for all those things with the people we care about.

SM: We noticed you donate some of your profits to Invisible Children  why is this foundation important to you?

TT: There are many, many issues that are important to me, but Invisible Children was a good place to start. Part of Invisible Children’s objective is to stop the abduction of young African children for use as ‘child soldiers’. These children are forced to do horrific things and many suffer completely meaningless deaths. There’s a natural alignment between what Love Medals stands for and what Invisible Children hopes to achieve.

SM: Your line celebrates heroes, who do you consider the hero(es) in your life? 

TT: That’s a great question! My personal definition of a hero is someone who actively and continuously challenges themselves to evolve past their own mental, physical and/or spiritual ‘limitations’, and is successful in doing so. I believe life presents all of us with opportunities to accept that challenge, and it’s not any easy task should we choose to accept. So I have great respect for anyone who takes on that journey. They are my heroes and inspiration. And of course my partner and my son, who motivate me to be the best I can be.

Love Medals has a blog called ‘Love Medal of Valour’ that reveals local heroes in the community who are socially conscious. In honour of all their hard work and outstanding help, they are awarded with a Love Medal Star lapel pin. If you have someone in your community that is deserving of a prestigious pin, please visit the Love Medals website or follow Love Medals on Facebook, and Twitter

Matt Munn is an unassuming renaissance man. He’s a wildly talented artist, kills it on a skateboard, plays in surfy-fuzz-garage-rock bands and runs a donair review blog called Donair or Die. He might also make tables or something. Donair or Die is the lighthouse Vancouverites didn’t know they needed to help traverse the dark, stormy waters that are Vancouver’s expansive donair scene. We sat down and had one-too-many beers and talked about the origins of the blog, pita pride, naked mountain climbing, why the oilfield inspires the best donair and where the “Gang Related” rating system came from. 

Sad Mag: Who are you and who’s Matt Munnch?

Matt Munnch: My name is Matt Munn and Matt Munch is my Donair connoisseur persona. Donairs: they’re not just a food, it’s a lifestyle.

SM: I feel like you are doing Vancouverites a great service but why did you feel the need to start a donair review blog?

MM: Ah. I guess I’ll tell you. Fuck it. It was actually an idea of mine for a while, like just smoking weed, joking around and eating donairs “Man I should review donairs, hahaha”. Then I did acid with my friend and my girlfriend and we got naked and wore Burger King crowns and climbed to the top of this mountain at Cat Lake. On this journey to find the Burger King we were talking about donair blogs and my friend wanted to start one that’s now the Hotdoglogblog and I was talking about my donair one and we told each other that if we get back to Vancouver we’re doing it. Then I started up [Donair or Die] and helped her start the Hotdoglogblog where she literally scans hot dogs in a scanner.

SM: What makes a donair fully Gang Related?

MM: A gang related donair is a classic, you know what I mean? I don’t want to get into it that much but the Canadian donairs came from Halifax. There’s this place called Canadian Donair, I don’t know if you researched it, they created sweet-sauce which pretty much makes the Canadian donair. This is on the east coast, and you know how Fort McMurray is the capitol of Newfoundland [due to the influx of Newfoundlanders working in the oil patch], so from the east coast–Newfoundland, they moved to Fort McMurray and I think with them came the Lebanese who made all the donairs. I feel like that started the trickle down [of donairs] throughout Canada. They make the classic donair, which is the most gang related donair. Classic flatbread with lamb, lettuce, diced tomatoes, onions and a bunch of fucking sweet sauce. They wrap it up in paper and foil so it catches all the pure donair extract. And yeah, that’s what that is. That’s a gang related donair. 

SM: Do you care to make the distinction between donairs, shawarma and gyros or are they all in the same family?

MM: They’re all in the same family. When I started I thought that they were all different but they’re all the same shit man. It’s just what different countries call them. I called out this one place called “Pizza + Donner” and I was like “what the fuck’s a donner?” and then some one schooled me on it [dons a scholarly accent] actually the Turkish call them “donners”, it’s just Canadians that call them donairs. Shawarma, gyro, it’s whatever the fuck you want to call it. 

SM: There’s a wealth of donair/shawarma/gyro joints in Vancouver. How important do you think they are to the local munch scene?

MM: For the wasted homies on the streets late at night it’s exactly what they need. And I wish there was more to be honest.

SM: If you’re hanging out having a few adult pops, a hunger pang strikes and the pizza place is a few blocks closer than the donair, which do you choose?

MM: Depends what I’m feeling that night, man. For the most part my appetite is pizza, burger donair, donair, burger, pizza. So if I just had pizza for lunch I’ll probably take that few extra steps and make it to that donair joint.

SM: You always give whoever’s behind the counter a solid, not handshake, but handclasp for each review. What does it signify and has anyone ever denied you on it?

MM: No one has ever denied me on it. I can’t wait ‘till someone does so I can flip them the bird behind their back. It’s more of a respect thing. What I don’t like about food blogs I’ve found is that there are no pictures. If they do it’s just of the food. I want it to be more of an experience, what it was like there. “And this is the dude who makes your donair,” and slap him a gang-related five. I can tell you the story of where that handshake originated another time. It has to due with a white Rick James on Bowen Island.

SM: In one of your recent posts you went to Edmonton for the holidays and reviewed a local donair spot. You made a claim that Alberta, overall has a better donair than we have in BC, or Vancouver at least. I have to agree with you; I’m Albertan myself (Lac La Biche represent) and the donairs on the prairies are always top-notch, surpassing anything I’ve had in Vancouver so far. Why do you think that is?

MM: It’s two things, and I cannot stress this enough: the sweet sauce. In Vancouver they do not have the sweet sauce correct and it breaks my heart. I was about to get an extract of the sweet sauce from Edmonton and bring it back to Vancouver tell ‘em to figure out what’s in here because this is fucking sweet sauce. The second reason why Albertan donairs are better than Vancouver or BC’s is because of the mentality: It’s the rig pigs, the big trucks, the bros. They just want a big ass, meaty, goddamn, greasy-ass munch and that’s what sells. In Vancouver it seems like they’re battling to see who can put the most vegetables on it. In Alberta it’s a contest to see how fat and juicy you can get your donair.

SM: Most every donair joint in Vancouver claims to have the best donair in the city, it’s usually emblazoned on their storefront in large letters and varying fonts. Is your endgame to find out which one is telling the truth?

MM: In a way yeah, I’m seeing who’s talking smack and who’s talking some gang related shit. I never really liked Donair. Dude to be honest, I remember going there once wasted and not liking it but then people kept getting at me telling me to review it. Then I eventually went [to Donair Dude] and they were claiming “best donair in BC” blah blah blah. Turns out it was the best. It was so fucking good. It was awesome. Some places claim to have the best donair in the world and you get there and it’s cat shit. What the blog is about is to look out for the homies. I trial and error at these places so you won’t have to waste your time at them.

Check of Matt Muunch’s reviews on his blog and get your donair on ASAP.

You don’t want to get up, it’s warm and soft in your bed and there might even be a cat present. I say lean into it, go comfort! Listen to this mix as your rouse yourself ever so gently to greet the day.

Listen to Pam’s ‘Go With You’ mix.

A maven of music, a food snob and a stick­ler when it comes to good design, those of us who know Pam regard her as a pas­sion­ate per­son for all things cre­ative. Pam received her Bach­e­lor of Fine Arts from Emily Carr Uni­ver­sity of Art& Design in 2006 and her diploma with hon­ours in Illus­tra­tion and Design from Capi­lano University’s IDEA Program.

Sad Mag and Rain City Chronicles are teaming up to bring you an evening of storytelling and music on Saturday, February 15^th. Join us for Love Hangover, an evening that remembers everything that can go wrong in matters of the heart, at the historic Rickshaw Theatre.

Tickets will be released next week on Eventbrite (and we’ll be offering a special one-year subscription deal with purchase!), but in the meantime please get in touch if you are interested in taking the stage to tell your true tale. We’re looking for storytellers with tales about:

• Workplace romance disasters
• Bad breakups
• Long-distance relationship travails
• Being the unwilling subject (or author!) of a Missed Connection
• Disappointments after a much-anticipated first date or first make-out
• Unrequited crushes

Rain City Chronicles is an event for Vancouverites of all ages, backgrounds, professions and interests. If you have a parent, grandparent, new neighbour or old friend with a great tale, or maybe you have one yourself, send it to us!

The rules, for the Rain City Chronicles newbies:

• Stories must be true, and they must be yours. No stand-up or in-character performances, and no notes.
• Stories are seven minutes or less. We will play you off the stage like drunk Cate Blanchett at the Golden Globes if you go too long
• Stories can be intimate, revealing and cathartic, but not mean-spirited. This isn’t an event to talk about how much you hate your ex. It is an event to talk about how you got stuck in a tiny elevator with her for six hours immediately following your breakup, for example.

Details:

Saturday, February 15^th, 2014

The Rickshaw Theatre (254 E Hastings at Main St)

Doors @ 6PM, Show at 7:00PM

Tickets released next week- follow Sad Mag on Twitter and Facebook, or sign up for the Rain City Chronicles Newsletter for more details!

Ranging from Abstraction to Realism, Fiona Ackerman pursues a highly diversified and methodical painting practice.  An inventor of new realities, Ackerman’s work investigates her own painting history, as well as those of others. Experimental yet deeply philosophical, Ackerman’s paintings blur our understandings of reality and challenge how we perceive space.

I first became enamoured with Ackerman’s work after viewing her paintings in person at Winsor Gallery in East Vancouver. I was struck by the playfulness and tender compositional balance, yet I also felt engaged by the complex investigational process employed within the works. An investigator of the artist studio space, Ackerman recently invited me to her studio to do some research of my own. On a sunny fall afternoon at the vast 1000 Parker St. Studios, Ackerman served me mint tea and began my lesson on her world.

SAD MAG: What are you currently working on?

FIONA ACKERMAN: I’m creating work for my next show at Winsor Gallery. It’s much like the work I’ve been doing over the past couple of years, which involves investigations into other people’s studio spaces. That’s what all the paintings here are for. I’m reluctant to say whose studio spaces they are, as I haven’t completely rounded out exactly what the exhibit will be. But for example, this long one [Ackerman points out a painting of an abstracted studio space roughly 6ft x 4ft] is for a gallery I work with in Germany and is from the studio space of this printmaker who lives in Berlin named Fritz Mitsaper. As well, this portrait [Ackerman points out a smaller realistic portrait painting] is of him. Some of the other paintings here are from a visit to Laurnence Paul Yuxweleptun’s studio. So I’ll be continuing these types of investigations into studio spaces.

SM: So you’ve been visiting other artist’s studios for a while and continue to do so. What do you achieve through these visits? What’s available at another artists’ studio that may not be available at your own?

FA: Well it started in my own studio a few years ago; I started a project where I was doing all these abstract paintings and I decided to pull out different reoccurring symbols in the paintings and put them on their own sheets. I’d been sitting in my studio with all this work that I’d been staring at for months and months, and I felt tired of looking at it. I didn’t particularly want to talk about it either. I had this big blank wall and I just started to put up all these sheets that I’d collected to just see how they looked. That kind of launched me into this whole idea of painting my environment as I build it, in my studio. So, then I took those sheets and ended up going into this whole series of paintings based on painting those sheets which led me into painting my studio, because I moved away from the wall and looked at the whole environment. Then I really started to use that up a lot, where I felt I was kind of wringing it out where it was saturating itself.

At this point I went to Germany to visit my father who’s also a painter. I visited his studio and took some photos of his space, which grew into more paintings of his space. Then it became an interesting challenge. Going into others spaces, it’s not always obvious what I can bring into their world that is of my world. So I go in and see what I can find, then I bring it back to my studio and work it out and transform it into something of my own.

SM: So the starting point for you with these studio investigations was your own past abstract works. What comes first for you generally? Abstraction or Representation?

FA: It depends on what I’m working on. The next show that I’m putting together, which I’ve already started on, won’t be studio paintings. It will be more abstract. I don’t know exactly what it will look like in the end. But that’s the difference, because it will be a much more abstract approach. It’s all painting. It’s all organizing. It’s all bringing in and putting out. But it exercises two very different ways of painting for me that I think go hand in hand. So, for that process it will be very much just diving in and making critical choices everyday. Whereas with the more representational works, a lot of the decisions are made at the beginning and then they’re tweaked, which comes together as it goes along. So it’s a different process.

SM: Are the abstract works more experimental?

FA: I would say the spontaneity is there right through to the end of the painting. Whereas with the studio paintings, I’m already starting with parameters, which is the interesting point to it for me. It’s almost the limitation that makes the challenge that I’m drawn to. Going in and taking photos and bringing them back and trying to build something familiar to me out of that.

SM: Is there a challenge in balancing these two approaches?

FA: I think they go together in a sense. With the studio paintings I’m using representational environments very abstractly. So rather than laying a canvas on the floor and reaching for blue and green and yellow or whatever I decide to do at that moment I’m reaching into somebody’s room and grabbing for their elements and using them in often very abstract compositions. So for me there’s not a huge difference to these practices. I think they go together. That’s why I’m excited to do two different shows in one year, because I don’t want to do the same thing all the time. So they both offset each other.

SM: Returning to the self-referential elements of your work, how does this shape your process? For example A Vocation By the Sea is a painting that builds on 4 or 5 other paintings. When did this research into your own painting history become important for you?

FA: I think the more you work the more it’s going to happen and you can either pay attention to it or ignore it. If you decide every single day that you go into your studio that you’re going to do something different than anything you’ve tried before, which I have often tried to do because that’s how you stretch yourself out, you inevitably build up a language that is yours that looks like all these things. So the sum of all these things together is who you are as an artist. You’re constantly referencing yourself whether you want to or not.

With the painting “Vocation By the Sea”, that’s very much doing it on purpose. It’s looking it right in the face. It’s saying, ‘okay what can we do if I just take what I have here and turn it into something?’ Those paintings were also from when I was working in the Downtown Eastside, at Pigeon Park Savings. I did art groups for the Portland Hotel Society and after that worked at Pigeon Park for about five years. After all that, what I took from my experience, or my artistic reaction to working in the Downtown Eastside ended up being “paint what you know”, and I painted other bank tellers. That’s why it turned into “Vocation by the Sea” because it was my studio work life and my day job working at the bank all intermingling into this fantasyland that was that painting.

SM: Much of your studio investigation works start with a photograph. How does photography play into your work? What do you achieve through painting that you can’t through photography?

FA: In a painting you can break all the rules of reality. For example in that “Vocation by the Sea” painting, you wouldn’t be able to make an arrangement like that in a photograph. Unless you had some see through strings, or something gimmicky.

SM: What about Photoshop?

FA: Well if you go into Photoshop you’re essentially painting on the computer. I have no problem with that. But I appreciate painting with paint too, so I take it to another step, which I guess is more final for me. It’s the tool I’ve always used.

SM: When did you really start to identify as a painter?

FA: Probably when I was about 18. My father lives in Germany, and I didn’t know him growing up, and I was invited to go to one of his summer school courses that he teaches. And there my eyes were really opened to painting. He said right at the beginning, “we’re not here to make pictures, we’re here to learn a few fundamental things about painting” and understanding the structures and how to put together a painting really caught my attention. So I came back after that and decided to begin painting. Well it just presented itself. I started treading water and have been doing it ever since.

It takes a long time. It’s like learning an instrument. It takes a long time to get to know yourself or at least get to the point where you can at least play with enough ease that you don’t have to think about it all the time when you’re doing it. I think that’s one of the gifts that my father gave me with these classes. He said, “ten years you have to paint for”. I didn’t even think about having a painting career for years. I just worked my jobs, paid for my supplies, and didn’t worry about where I was getting. When I graduated from art school I just put my head down. I went underground. And I think mentally knowing that I had a journey to go through before I could start to have any semblance of confidence was liberating in a way.

SM: Let’s discuss your philosophical foundations and your interest in Michel Foucault’s writings on heterotopic space. You’ve explained heterotopias as “a place that reflects someplace real but at the same time inverts it or shows it in a completely other way”. How is this philosophical cornerstone impacting your work?

FA: The interest in Foucault actually came after I started doing all these paintings. And probably after I was working on the “Vocation by the Sea” painting.  I just happened to be reading on the Internet and came across someone else’s’ essay about heterotopic space. I had read Foucault in university and had been a fan, but I didn’t know anything about heterotopias or anything he’d written about “Ceci N’est Pas Une Pipe”. Then I read this essay and it just seemed so obvious. I thought, “I don’t even have to write my own artist statement, this is exactly what I’m on about”. It was great. And then that just opened a door. It seemed like everywhere I turned I could relate it to this concept. It’s not limited to that, but it’s one way of describing basically what we do when we write or when we use any part of our life or experience or environment in a new way.

SM: What I find confusing about the concept of heterotopias is how to define what qualifies as one. Foucault provides a lot of descriptions, such as Graveyards and Psych Wards, but I have trouble distinguishing what is or isn’t a heterotopia. Is it a real space that exists outside of mainstream society?

FA: I think the mirror is the closest example because it looks so much like what we do, or what we are. But it’s literally backwards and it’s a space that you know that you can’t go to. It’s reality inverted.

SM: Do you think the studio is a heterotopic space?

FA: It functions on a number of levels. One way to think about it is that the studio is a heterotopia for my work life. The studio is an environment that has all the normal functions of daily work; I show up at nine, I work until 4 or 5, I make coffee, and I break for lunch. But yet, my job is to break all the rules of the convention of the workday. To end up at the end of the day having wrecked what you started is not necessarily a bad day. So it shows all the realities of work, it’s a work environment; it’s my office or studio. But it’s also inverted. What we know is there and the opposite is also present. Then inside my heterotopia studio is the painting which reflects my studio but at the same time reflects it in an inverted or jumbled up or upside down way.

SM: How do you balance the seriousness of your theoretical foundations with your sense of humour? A lot of your paintings use cheeky titles, such as Fresh Taint. Is humour an important element in your work as well?

FA: Well I’ve never really started with a title and tried to illustrate it with a painting, it’s usually something that happens after. But humor is a way to really boil everything down to its essence. So say with the Foucault idea, it is a big idea. And it was a big idea that I wanted to do my last show on. Because it still made sense to me, it still applied to what I was doing in studios. I wanted to talk about it and open a conversation about it.  But with the next show at Winsor I feel like I’ve gotten to know it really well and I’ve decided, good idea or not, to just boil down the next show and call it “Its Not You It’s Me”. In essence it’s a bit of a punch line, but I go into other peoples studios and turn them into my world, my heterotopia. “Its Not You It’s Me” is the humorous approach to a larger conceptual idea.

SM: When do you know that an idea is complete? At what point do you drop one line of investigation and begin another?

FA: I don’t think I have. With the next show at Winsor, I’m picking up on the last show. That had paintings of my studio and a couple of other artists. Then when I was last in Germany I got to go into some other artists studios. I didn’t have my own proper studio, so my own studio wasn’t necessarily a big part of it. It was more of a traveling expedition through the mirror. The whole idea was being a naive explorer and going into somebody else’s environment and deciding “well in this world they only eat red paint”, or that kind of thing, and recording it in my log and making my own stories about their worlds.

Coming back to Vancouver, I was still really interested in studios. I was a Canadian in Germany asking people “who are the painters here? What are people doing?” And people would ask me “what are people in Canada doing?” I would think; “oh god I have to name names and I don’t know anybody”.  So for me to look at other people’s work here, doing these paintings is the best way for me. It gives me a way to dissect things that I’m interested in, through my own practice. It’s basically just another exploration for me.

SM: So in these explorations you acquire parts of other artists’ worlds, making them yours. Is that what you feel about the final painting? Does it still possess the essence of the other artist?

FA: I’m not sure and I guess that’s why I haven’t shown the work to any of the artists whose studios I visited for this show. There is a sculptor named Alexander Syler in Berlin, and I painted his studio. I showed him some of the work and he said in broken English “oh, I never saw myself that way”. That’s when I realized “That’s because it’s not you its me”. This is my world that I’ve brought you into. So that’s the question; how much is it about you?

Fiona Ackerman’s new exhibit, “Its Not You It’s Me”, will be presented in February 2014 at Winsor Gallery, Vancouver, BC.

Lauded as the best “low profile event space” by Vancouver Magazine, Blim is a community-based arts and crafts facility where people of all levels of craft prowess can try their hand at screen printing and button-making, they might book time in the Blim Open Studio, or else be inspired by a gallery of indie artists’ works. 

Those who got a chance to check out the Blim Holiday Market Centre on the 14^th of December experienced a taste of the eclectic Blim style via 50 hand-selected indie vendors with handcrafted goods and art objects. If you missed it, be assured there will be many opportunities to take advantage of Blim’s resources in the new year … including getting your hands on a cat onesie. Sad Mag’s “craft correspondent” Kait Fowlie chatted with Blim director Yuriko Iga to find out what’s in store.

Sad Mag: Who comes to Blim?
Yuriko Iga: The nice thing about Blim is that it is open to whoever is open to Blim. I like that our clientele is equally male and female. For a craft facility, it is sometimes hard to break the gender barrier, but I feel we have succeeded in that arena. We have clients from age 5 up to 75. Older people like to shop here because it reminds them of how they used to dress and how fun it was, and younger people like to shop here because they think that indie retro is cool.

We also have a clientele with diverse economic backgrounds. I am flattered when celebrities come in and are excited to find such a unique shop.  As well, I am flattered that residents of the downtown eastside feel comfortable enough to come in and shop as well. We try our best to keep things affordable [so that] a wide range of people [can] enjoy our products. Even thought our roots are as an experimental venue for arts and music, we now have people from all walks of life taking the workshops. Creativity is for everyone!

SM: How and when was the concept for Blim thought up?
YI: When I was 4, I had a really vivid imagination. I got upset every time I dropped my stuffed animals because I thought they were real and would get hurt. So I created this imaginary animal kingdom called Blim Blim. I would go through this intense ritual of Blimatization to immunize all my animals from pain and suffering. Together, we lived in the land of Blim Blim. In order to be Blimatized, they needed to be given a Blim name, so all the animals had a first and last name. Some of the names included Sachan Bgwier, Snoopy Liachin, and Bigew Sanchez.

SM: Your ‘About’ page says you believe that “creative expression is a hallmark of health, both on an individual and societal level.” Can you elaborate on that? 
YI: I believe that if all people practise creativity, it makes us happier and healthier. I believe that art practise should be part of preventative healthcare for mental and physical health. [Art] is a natural part of human behaviour that should be encouraged and practised regularly.

SM: What kinds of holiday gifts have been hot at Blim this year?
YI: Anything with cats and people [have been] making personal prints in the workshop to give to friends.

SM: What are your plans for Blim in the new year?
YI: We will be launching the new instructional video for the level 1 workshop, a project I worked on with a video group from Barcelona called Miniature Films. On January 4, 2014 at the first level 1 workshop of the year. This special video will only be available to those who take the introductory workshop.

…Blim is also launching a new line of adult onesies. Info TBA… (!)

On a crisp and sunny Sunday afternoon, I sat down with Anthony Casey and Shayan Naziripour. We talked about their drag alter egos, Shanda Leer and Veronica Vamp. They were gearing up for the Sad Mag Madonna Tribute at The Cobalt. We talked about the challenges of being a man in a dress and how one gets there, as well as the evolution of performance personas, and the queer camaraderie of The Cobalt.

If you’re looking to see the ladies on stage, Shanda Leer will be at Oasis for Jerk It! on December 20^th. If you’re keen to see Veronica Vamp…well, patience is a virtue! I can assure you—she’s well worth the wait!

Sad Mag: Who are you?

Shanda Leer: I am Shanda Leer, your tipsy aunt at a wedding. That’s my self-appointed title.

Veronic Vamp: Very nice. Very nice indeed. I am Veronica Vamp, lady of the night, mistress, working girl. All of the above.

SM: How did you get into drag? How did it become a thing that you do?

VV: I’m the newbie here. I started doing cosplay—that’s how I got into drag. I really enjoy anime characters and the ones I really like are the strong ladies. So I started cosplaying them. I started out with Faye Valentine from Cowboy BeBop—that was my first cosplay. I also Love Sailor Mercury from Sailor Moon. She loves romance novels, she’s got blue hair…dirty romance novels and who doesn’t love blue hair?

SL: I started at the Cobalt as a dare from Peach Cobblah. It was the Pride Ball in 2012. I had hinted at it for a while. But there’s some exposition to this and I’ll keep it short: I’m from Nova Scotia. Growing up there, I think I was 19 and I went to my first gay bar, by myself, I had no idea what I was doing. I went to this place; I think it was called Vortex. I was there and I was terrified and there were these three old queens who just kind of descended on me. They were chatting with me and asking me all of these questions. I was still doing that thing where I was saying, “Oh yah, I’m kind of gay but not really, hahaha.” I was young, what’re you gonna do? At the end of the conversation, one of them said, “Are we the first drag queens you’ve ever met?” and I said yes. They asked me if I thought I’d like to do drag sometime and I said, “Oh, I don’t think so.” And one of them leaned over, right in my face and said, “Listen, honey, when you do drag—and you will do drag—use the name Shanda Leer and don’t forget it.” And so I’ve always had this amazing drag name that I’m in love with and I told Peach that story and she said, “Just get on stage at the Pride Ball.” And I did. And, actually, a couple of weeks ago we were talking about when I’d started and she said, “You know, I honestly thought it was just going to be a one time thing. I thought it was just going to be a joke. And look at you now.” I’ve blossomed!

SM: That is an awesome story! Tell me about the Madonna Tribute show.

SL: Miss Vamp here was co-hosting.

VV: I co-hosted with Isolde N. Barron. She’s lovely, she’s always hilarious.

SL: She-larious!

VV: Oh, I love puns! Well, the night was a competition with a bunch of other queens. Shanda Leer included. I co-hosted, held the trophy, and made sure those queens worked for it!

SL: I’m excited because, you know, most gay men, they love Madonna. At least one song, if not completely. In the last Sad Mag show, the Mariah tribute, I think I was the only one who genuinely liked Mariah.

VV: I won!

SL: She won.  Whatever! That’s cause you stripped off on stage!

VV:  That’s cause I was a dirty, dirty whore! (laughs)

SL: I try to keep Mimi classy, but whatever. I was excited for this one because it was  fun to do a Madonna number. Normally, Shanda’s whole thing is kind of campy and silly, lots of Broadway. You know, the classic old lady standards. So when I have the chance to do a full-on Madonna number with dancing and everything…I’m excited!

SM: What do you find to be the most challenging aspect of doing drag?

SL: What’s RuPaul’s favourite quote? It takes a lot of balls to put on a dress and walk out the door. Right? So having the drive to do drag in general, you’re tapping into something that’s already, sort of, intrinsic to your personality. I don’t know. What are the difficulties? Starting off, doing my own make-up—that was hard. Finding clothes.

VV: Especially for a man’s body.

SL: Exactly! That fit a man’s…generous body. Actually leaving the house and confidently.

VV: Oh yes, that’s the hardest part I think. Scaring people. Terrifying children.

SL: I think another, I guess, difficulty, is people…I don’t want to say taking it seriously because, in the end, it’s a fun drag show to have fun. But, I don’t want it to be some novelty, like people just truck us out every weekend so they can watch the cute ladies put on a show. I see a lot of history behind drag so I always want to represent that. I think that’s a bit of a challenge these days, even once you’ve worked up the balls to walk out the door.

SM: Kudos to that! How long have you been performing for?

VV: I first started at the Cobalt in 2012. I failed miserably. Ok, I didn’t fail miserably. I got to the second round.

SL: Second round’s great! When did I start? Oh right, Pride Ball, 2012.

SM: So you’re both fairly new to this. Tell me about a favourite performance.

SL: I’m a huge ham so I love all of them. Some go better than others. My favourite one…I don’t know. I love any time I get to do a Barbara Streisand number. The most recent one was at Jerk It last weekend at Oasis. “Don’t Rain on my Parade” is my favourite one to do. Of course—every girl loves Funny Girl.

VV: Any one where I get an injury of some sort. If I’m wondering where that bruise came from the morning after, that was a good night. My favourite performance…I would say I don’t really have one. Any time when I can shake my pussy in front of a crowded stage is great!

SM: Have you ever had a major stage disaster where something goes really wrong?

VV: Like when you fuck up a lip synch?

SL: Oh yah. It always happens. I did a show one time and my CD was misplaced. I didn’t know what to do but I had kind of a back-up track so I said I could do that one instead. But I didn’t really remember all of the words and I didn’t have the proper clothes to go with it. You just gotta roll with it. Shit can go wrong at any time. Thankfully, I haven’t fallen. And my dress hasn’t fallen off…oh wait. No. I play in Out for Kicks, which is a queer soccer league, and at the awards ceremony that we have at the end of every season, they asked me to perform, so I did. I had this really cute floral romper as my costume, except I hadn’t tried it on in a really long time and I don’t know if I just grew or if my boobs got bigger but it kept falling down.

VV: You were growing into your womanhood!

SL: I was blossoming! On stage! My nipples kept showing so I finally just yanked it down and did a topless performance. It was so tight that I couldn’t wear bra so in the end I had this really crazy, genderfuck thing going on. They loved it!

VV: Yah, you make it work!

SL: You gotta keep it real.

SM: Do you have any goals for your performance?

VV: Fame! I want my pussy to be on every cover!

S:L Money! No, seriously. For each performance? I just want people to enjoy themselves and to think that I’m the best queen they’ve ever seen.  That’s it—it’s as simple as that.

VV: Ditto! I think the goal is just to make people happy. I love to entertain people.

SM: Do you find that different audiences attend different shows?

VV: I don’t remember their faces by the end of the night….

SL: The last couple of months, I’ve been really lucky and I’ve been booked a lot. And I’ve noticed that the crowds definitely change depending on the party but, in the end, they know what they’re in for. The Oasis has been the most interesting, especially for Jerk It on Fridays. Cause Friday’s a hard night on Davie St.—there’s a lot going on. So some nights, the crowds have come in and it’s been a lot of familiar faces, which has been super nice. Other nights, it’s been different people, which is also exciting because then it’s a different crowd to perform for. But, occasionally you’ll get people coming in and they think they know what a drag show is but they’re still not really quite sure what to expect and then it’s funny to see their reactions. And it changes on a weekly basis too. But if you go to the Cobalt, girl, that’s family!

SM: Do you ever find that your performances create tension for your personal life? Or is there a disconnect?

VV: I don’t feel that, no.

SL: Well, you’re not Veronica all the time.

VV: True. I’m more mean when I’m in drag. All that make-up…it just brings the bitch in me. I’ve definitely noticed that. But I’m the sweetest bitch you’ll ever meet.

SL: I’ve heard that before! Shanda for me is very much a character and I think that, in my personal life, Anthony is….well, I think I’m more introverted than I give myself credit for. A great night in for me is being completely alone and not texting or calling anybody and watching Dr. Who. And eating pizza. But Shanda—she works the room. She’s kind of maternal, makes sure everyone has a good time. She’s got time for everybody and I enjoy that because I get to meet people. But if it’s me at a club, I am not going to go around and say hi to everybody and see how their night is going. I’m there to just enjoy myself and my friends. And even then, I’ll probably stay for 10 minutes and then leave because…girl’s tired!

SM: Have you found that your drag personas have evolved as you’ve been performing?

SL: Oh yah, definitely. She’s a little more busted and drunk than she first started off but now I think, any transformative thing that you do, has to always be in flux because you’re not going to settle on it right away. And it’s bringing out parts of me that I kind of knew where there but had never really tapped into so watching that evolve has been interesting. And now I think she’s a bit more of a lady, definitely still the tipsy aunt though. She’ll crack the weird jokes. She’ll think she’s the best dancer in the world and really, she’s just doing the cabbage patch. Poorly.  I’ve seen it evolve and I want to keep seeing it evolve.

VV: I do feel like I’ve progressed and I feel like I’ve gone from, “Oooh, that’s a man!” to “That’s a…man??” So that’s my journey so far and I’m still developing the character. I’m a graphic designer, that’s my day job, so what I really love to do is create characters, drawing them. And I feel like Veronica is my cartoon character—all myself, but just drawn with huge hair and big-ass lips, lots of eyes, lots of lashes. An extreme character. Drag queens feel a bit like cartoon characters—fun and out there. I’m slowly getting better at drawing her. At first, it was just like crayon and not really colouring between the lines. But you get better and you, maybe, use a different brush or something. Or you actually find the right colour. More is more, more is better. Slap on some glitter. I learned about glue and then glitter on top—it solves everything.

SM: What’s next for you both?

VV: Shanda’s the more professional one. I only perform every once in while—the lady doesn’t come out that often. So what’s next is…?

SL: Do you want to perform more?

VV: I do want to perform more, eventually. But it’s a lot of money!

SL: Yes, it’s expensive. On average, I’m probably on stage twice a month. This weekend, I haven’t done any shows. But on the last 5 weekends, I’ve had one or two. And it’s been really great because I love performing! I did musical theatre when I was younger. Shanda’s not going to make it to Broadway but if I can still entertain people, then that’s great. There are some shows of my own that I’d like to do. I would love to do some live singing because I’m not the best but I can carry a tune. And, to bring it down, I’d like to do some kind of history project. Peach and Isolde have this amazing show called Tucked and Plucked and I love what they do. They interview queens from Vancouver and get the history of drag in Vancouver. I like that too but I also like that drag has been a really strong piece of queer history. I feel like I kind of want to educate people on that. RuPaul’s Drag Race has been amazing and I’ve seen every season and I own every season to date but sometimes I almost feel like it’s diluting the whole legacy that drag has. It’s great that it brings it to the mainstream so more people know who drag queens are. But, you know, there have only been a few on the show who have actually talked about and appreciated the history. Jinx Monsoon being one of them, she’s everybody’s favourite right now. I love her to bits. So there are a lot of things! There are a lot of Christmas shows that are happening in the next month. There’s going to be Jerk It on Dec. 20^th at Oasis, which will be Christmas themed. I think January’s going to be a time where I figure out what I want to do for 2014. 2013 was the year where Shanda realized who she was. 2014 is what am I going to do with this?

 

These are not your childhood puppets: no Lamb Chop, not even of the same species as any of the raunchier Muppets (apologies to Miss Piggy). No, Ronnie Burkett’smarionettes are really something else. Donned in beautifully crafted costumes and painted with expressions ranging from the adorably innocent to fantastically grotesque, his collection of over thirty marionettes includes a twerking librarian, multiple talking animals, including a gay rabbit who is also an aspiring Olympian, the aged and flighty French chanteuse Jolie Jolie, and a haggard diva named Esme who refuses to relinquish her spotlight.

For two hours straight Burkett worked the crowd to perfection. The largely improvised play not only had the audience cackling but also revealed just how well Burkett knows what he is doing. The entire night was an onslaught of jokes at the expense of Canadian politicians, Rob Ford and John Baird being givens, but also local culture, taking light hearted jabs at other Vancouver institutions, even his hosts at The Cultch. Burkett has mastered the art of walking a fine line and he never falters.

Burkett’s show works because it embraces the best things about theatre. The Daisy Theatre demonstrates that a good performance is not only about keeping your audience entertained but also keeping them engaged. Burkett must have been studying up on Marshall McLuhan (or more likely has just tapped into his years of experience), as he clearly knows that a show that involves the audience is a successful one. Not only did the way the audience reacted determine much of the play, Burkett even managed to get a few unsuspecting audience members up on stage.

Audience participation can often feel awkward and while this was no exception, it was awkward in the best way possible; the balcony gleefully looked on at the front rows as Burkett plucked out his next unwitting victim who would either suffer the fate of poorly attempting to work a marionette or, better yet, be seduced by one. Not only is Burkett unafraid to take the show to weird places; he revels in it. The whole performance, audience participation especially, was testament to the fact that it is often those cringe worthy moments that make us laugh the most.

While most of the show fell somewhere between silly and fantastically bizarre, it had its more heartfelt moments too. The adorable Schnitzel, a peculiar child-mutant who wants to be a fairy, certainly elicited a few “awwws”, but it was Edna, a widowed farm wife confronting dementia, who unexpectedly stole the show.

At The Daisy Theatre an audience who shows up with an open mind ready to be entertained will certainly be rewarded. And while everyone’s favourite diva Esme taught the audience how to greet a star, they were already in the know about triumphant send offs, giving Burkett a well-deserved standing ovation.

The Daisy Theatre is on at The Cultch until December 15^th. Don’t miss the chance to be enchanted by Burkett’s quirky characters—grab tickets online.

 

Theatre Replacement’s and The Cultch’s fantastic production of Jack and the Beanstalk: An East Van Panto is the first show at the re-opened York Theatre; a building which is an East Vancouver parable of its own.

It was a live theatre venue from 1913 until the late 70s, and was more recently known as the Raja, a Bollywood movie house. I remember it best as the music venue the New York Theatre, where at the tender age of 14, I saw local punk legends d.b.s. and somehow lost one of my shoes in the mosh pit. After a frantic hunt for the sneaker, my stomach sank as I saw the shoe get chucked at the band. It was a long and barefoot five-block walk home. The new renovation looks fantastic—the wood is glossy and the sightlines clear. But the punk rock spirit of the New York theatre imbues this telling of Jack and the Beanstalk, which uses the pantomime form of slapstick humour, parody songs, and drag performance to create barbed satire of Vancouver’s dreams and anxieties. And kids will love it, too! The show places Jack, played by an effervescent Maiko Yamamoto, and his poor single mother, play by a Steven Tyler-ish Allan Zinyk, in a Vancouver special, with so little food that they eat dust-bunny sashimi. Jack sells their only possession, a morose cow, at a farmer’s market for some special Vancouver magic beans that grow into a beanstalk under a hydroponic lamp. The stalk takes Jack up to the Giant’s giant condo in the sky, from which he attempts to steal a backyard chicken that lays golden eggs. Comedian and author Charles Demers’ script pokes fun at everything from Vancouver’s insecurity about real estate—the sleazy condo tycoon that sells Jack the magic beans claims they are special Vancouver beans that, magically, will never decrease in value—to residents’ self-imposed dietary restrictions—at one tense point Jack takes advantage of the Giant’s aversion to gluten to escape.

Veda Hille composed some original songs and wrote Vancouver-themed parodies of some classics, my favourite being the dreamy condo-envy ballad “Somewhere Just West of Cambie,” to the tune of Somewhere over the Rainbow, of course. And the Giant’s harp, played by a transcendentally silly Dawn Petten, just about runs off with the show with manic Celtic warbles of cheesy songs (the only music the Giant likes). Pantos are traditionally meant to entertain children as well as adults, and the smattering of kids in the audience looked like they were having a great time. The narrator Raugi Yu, a gifted clown, begins by inviting children to interact with the show, explaining that they need to loudly contradict the performers if they lie. Every exchange between the children and the performers was a hit, and I wish the show had provided more opportunities for the children to participate. Any fears that the modern youth of East Vancouver were too sophisticated or skeptical to enjoy panto entertainment were assuaged by the sight of children trying as hard as they could to help Jack blow the beanstalk down. Less charming was the grown-up in the audience who kept somberly intoning “It’s a bad deal,” when Jack traded the cow for beans. Perhaps not everyone in the audience needs a voice? Throughout the constant hilarity, the Panto never lets the audience forget our city’s sobering inequalities. Many classic fairy tales were underpinned by the economic realities of their time period—the high infant mortality rate of 16th century Bavaria may explain the gruesome end of so many children in Grimm stories.

Surviving in Vancouver can often feel like a fairy tale, in both its occasional magic and its impossibility. Go see the East Van Panto, and you will have enough local jokes to tell your friends for the entire holiday season. And you might just leave with a new perspective of the neighbourhood surrounding the York Theatre too.