Groups & Events

The Degree Show Planning Workshops

Lunch hour workshops to you prepare for the Degree Show

Presented by the Writing Centre in collaboration with the Libby Leshgold Gallery.

Click on workshop for time and registration info (in-person and online):

Demystifying the gallery exhibition: what’s actually going on back there?
Monday, April 17, noon – 1:15 p.m.

How to Install + Title Your Work
Tuesday, April 18, noon – 1:15 p.m.

Design Writing Group Drop In Session (No registration required)
Wednesday, April 19, 2:30 – 3:30 p.m.

Labels/ didactics/ statements/ ephemera — how is text used in a gallery context?
Thursday April 20, noon – 1:15 p.m.

Spatial Considerations: How to Install Your Work + Play Well With Others
Friday, April 21, noon – 1:15 p.m.

How to Talk About Your Work: Prepping for Crit night
Friday, May 12, noon – 1:15 p.m.

 

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Demystifying the gallery exhibition: what’s actually going on back there?
Monday, April 17, noon – 1:15 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery + online

Join us for a conversation between curators that reveals behind-the-scenes perspectives on how various kinds of gallery presentations come together. We’ll cover:

• timelines,
• going from studio visit to exhibition,
• how we design exhibitions (there’s no one way!),
• budgets, how gallery teams work together, and
• how involved artists are in decision-making.

Plus further secrets designed to demystify gallery exhibitions – all to get you ready for the Show and beyond.

REGISTER to attend:

In-person attendance OR online attendance

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How to Install + Title Your Work
Tuesday, April 18, noon – 1:15 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery and online

In phase one of this workshop you’ll learn the basics of gallery practice and standards for installation including how to prepare, what questions to pose, and who to ask. We’ll go over:

• how to work with restrictions,
• ways to set up lighting, and
• discuss safety considerations.

In phase two we’ll consider generative writing practices for titling your work. Using extension, list making, and concept generation strategies we’ll come up with a plethora of ideas. Then we’ll use composition by excision to narrow them down to concise titles. In the end, we’ll discover the best title for your work and move beyond “untitled.”

REGISTER to attend:

In-person attendance OR online attendance

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Design Writing Group Drop In Session
Wednesday April 19, 2:30 – 3:30 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery

Join us for a collaborative peer workshop of your portfolio writing including: resources and handouts, brainstorming activities, writing exercises, and discussions with peers in a casual, low stakes environment!

(No Registration Needed)

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Labels/ didactics/ statements/ ephemera — how is text used in a gallery context?
Thursday April 20, noon – 1:15 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery and online

We’ll work together to create compelling artist statements and artist bios for the gallery context and consider why you need to write these, how they’ll be used, and discuss what makes a good statement or set of promotional materials. We’ll help you fit your voice into a gallery context including options, precedents, and ideas. Focusing on the materiality of language, we’ll experiment with ways to generate language that reflects your work in exciting ways.

REGISTER to attend:

In-person attendance OR online attendance

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Spatial Considerations: How to Install Your Work + Play Well With Others
Friday, April 21, noon – 1:15 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery and online

We’ll discuss the intricacies of group shows and the realities of sharing space by providing:

• practical strategies for working with the venue and
• consider how to create presence in a group show,
• how to bring multiple disciplines together in one space, and
• go over the basic principles of spatial, cultural and sensory accessibility all while keeping safety in check.

We’ll also experiment with ways to create the conditions for collaboration to flourish and take a fun approach to collaboration to create collective action. You’ll leave with an understanding of spatialization in gallery spaces and with a series of effective strategies for playing well with others.

REGISTER to attend:

In-person attendance OR online attendance

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How to Talk About Your Work: Prepping for Crit night
Friday, May 12, noon – 1:15 p.m.
in person in the Sculpture Gallery and online

Who made this? In this workshop we’ll introduce auto-conceptual approaches to talking about your work with others. We’ll link specific approaches with larger ideas to prepare for and prime exciting crit night conversations about your art and design work. This workshop will help you generate playful and super serious ways of talking about your art and design practice with whoever asks, ‘what’s this about?’

REGISTER to attend:

In-person attendance OR online attendance

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Image photo: Pexels.com

Pandemic Stories Book Launch

All are welcome – tea and snacks provided.

Join us for a book launch and reading in the Writing Centre on Friday, March 31st from 4-6. Pandemic Stories was a writing group at ECU during the 2021-22 academic year. The group met once per week online to conduct group and independent writing experiments. Each week centered around a different topic: joy, nourishment, connection, growth, humour, comfort, coping, and grief. This risograph-printed publication is a collection of works made by the group participants, as well as submissions from our larger community. Join us to celebrate the publication with tea and snacks.

Image: Sunny Nestler

Creative Writing Consultations with Cecily Nicholson

March 10 – April 11, 2023

Creative writing consultations with Writing Centre Faculty Associate Cecily Nicholson is open to all Emily Carr community (students, staff, and faculty) from March 10^th to April 11^th, 2023. Discuss your work in progress and creative writing ideas. Learn more about publishing and the creative writing industry. Writing samples (maximum ten pages) must be provided at least three days in advance (upload PDF or Word file to your appointment). You may book either in-person or online chat appointments, but the samples must be attached in advance.

HOW TO BOOK:

1. Visit our schedule site.
2. Select Creative Writing Consultations (Cecily) as the schedule to view.
3. Click on any available (white) block. Each appointment is 45 minutes (final 15 minutes are transition time).
4. Attach your writing at least 3 days prior to the appointment (you can book and then return to the booking to attach the writing sample).

Please note: this schedule is reserved for creative writing consultations only. They are not for working on class assignments, etc. Please select the Spring 2023 schedule on the above site for help with all other kinds of writing.

ABOUT CECILY: Cecily Nicholson is the author of four books, and past recipient of the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize, and the Governor General’s Literary Award for poetry. She has held the Ellen and Warren Tallman Writer in Residence at Simon Fraser University, and Writer in Residence at the University of Windsor. She teaches at Emily Carr University of Art + Design and collaborates with community impacted by carcerality and food insecurity. Her most recent book, HARROWINGS, ponders rural and black experience. In April, Nicholson presents the First Annual Phyllis Webb Memorial Reading at SFU.

ECU Writing Centre Reading Series: Skim, Dive, Surface

Reading and discussion series

How does digital reading shape the way and what we learn?

Join us for this series where we will read the book Skim, Dive, Surface by Dr. Jenae Cohn and meet online to discuss these questions.

READ THE E-BOOK VERSION HERE.

“Smartphones, laptops, tablets: college students are reading on-screen all the time, and digital devices shape students’ understanding of and experiences with reading. In higher education, however, teachers rarely consider how digital reading experiences may have an impact on learning abilities, unless they’re lamenting students’ attention spans or the distractions available to students when they’re learning online.

Skim, Dive, Surface offers a corrective to these conversations—an invitation to focus not on losses to student learning but on the spectrum of affordances available within digital learning environments. It is designed to help college instructors across the curriculum teach digital reading in their classes, whether they teach face-to-face, fully online, or somewhere in between.”

[From: West Virginia University Press]

For more information on Dr. Cohn’s work, please visit jenaecohn.net

Session Meetings:
Wednesdays, Jan 18 – Mar 1, 2023 (no session reading break)
**MARCH 1 POSTPONED TO MARCH 15**
11:30am – 1pm PST
Register to attend on Zoom

Dr. Cohn will attend on sessions Feb 1 and March 15.

On Edge Reading Series SPRING 2023

Open to ECU and the public

The Writing Centre presents the On Edge Reading Series SPRING 2023, which seeks to enrich literary and writing communities both inside and outside of the Emily Carr University community.

All events are FREE and open to the public. ASL interpretation is provided.

Readings this season are ONLINE. If you wish to attend, please register below and you will receive the room link.

FEATURING:

Manahil Bandukwala
Tuesday, January 24th, 2023 at 6:30 pm PT
Online event: Zoom registration

Manahil Bandukwala is a writer and visual artist originally from Pakistan and now settled in Canada. She works as Coordinating Editor for Arc Poetry Magazine, and is Digital Content Editor for Canthius. She is a member of Ottawa-based collaborative writing group VII. Her debut poetry collection is MONUMENT (Brick Books). See her work at manahilbandukwala.com.

 

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Adam Pottle
Monday, February 6th, at 6:30 pm PT
Online event: Zoom registration

Adam Pottle is a Deaf author whose writing spans multiple genres. His works include the novella The Bus, the memoir Voice, and the groundbreaking Deaf musical The Black Drum. His work has won and been nominated for numerous awards, including Saskatchewan Book Awards, the ReLit Award, and the National Magazine Award. In the 2021-22 academic year, he served Sheridan College as writer in residence, and in 2022 he was a Warner Bros. Discovery Access screenwriting fellow. His prairie gothic horror novel Apparitions will appear in Fall 2023, and his children’s story Butterfly on the Wind will be released in Spring 2024. He lives in Saskatoon, where he teaches English and creative writing.

Photo Credit: Tenille K Campbell of Sweetmoon Photography

 

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Alessandra Naccarato
Tuesday, February 28, 2023 at 6:30 pm PT
Online event: Zoom registration

Alessandra Naccarato is the author of Imminent Domains: Reckoning with the Anthropocene (Essays) and Re-Origin of Species (Poems). Born and raised in Tkaronto (Toronto), her poetry and essays explore intersections of disability and ecological change, and have appeared widely in publications such as The New Quarterly, Room Magazine, and Event. She is the recipient of numerous recognitions, including the RBC Bronwen Wallace Award and the CBC Poetry Prize, and holds graduate degrees in both creative writing and community economic development, supporting two decades of work in grassroots social change, community arts, and the prevention of gender-based violence. Her debut poetry collection, Re-Origin of Species, was awarded the AICW Bressani Literary Prize for Poetry, shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award, and named a Best Book of 2019 by CBC Books.

Photo credit: Simon Beckmann of JOYA

 

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Joshua Whitehead
Tuesday, March 28, 2023 at 6:30 pm PT
Online event: Zoom registration

Joshua Whitehead is an Oji-nêhiyaw, Two-Spirit member of Peguis First Nation (Treaty 1). He is the author of full-metal indigiqueer, Jonny Appleseed, and Making Love with the Land. He is also the editor of Love after the End: an Anthology of Two-Spirit and Indigiqueer Speculative Fiction and has a chapbook, Indigiqueerness: a Conversation on Storytelling to be published in 2023 with AU Press alongside Angie Abdou. Currently, he is an Assistant Professor at the University of Calgary where he is housed in the departments of English and International Indigenous Studies.

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This series is organized and hosted by Mercedes Eng and assisted by Tenaya Fogelman.

The On Edge series showcases the work of writers who are doing the freshest, most interesting, and relevant work, writers who are also artists, volunteers, literary award winners, social justice organizers, prison abolitionists, literary organizers, dancers, managing editors, filmmakers, creative writing instructors, and scholars. The On Edge programming serves to enrich literary and writing communities both inside and outside of ECUAD. The series is support by the Emily Carr Writing Centre with grateful acknowledgement to the Canada Council for the Arts and the Coast Salish First Nations whose traditional lands we are on.

This season’s poster (click thumbnail to enlarge):

On Edge on social media!

Follow On Edge on Instagram for more information on events and readers involved!

For any other inquiries:

Please e-mail onedge@ecuad.ca

 

Wordsmiths

Creative writers unite!

Creative writers! Join us every week for camaraderie, creative writing exercises, workshopping and relaxed conversation about creative writing, poetry and storytelling! Writers welcome at any stage of and with any kind of creative writing (graphic novels, poetry, scripts, etc.)

Wordsmiths in Spring 2023 will be held in person on campus and is facilitated by tutors Elijah and Aretha.

HOW TO JOIN:

• What: A club for creative writers–experienced or aspiring
• Who: All students, regardless of experience.
• When: *Now on Tuesdays for SPRING 2023*  Tuesdays, 4:30-6PM (starts January 17)
• Where: In-person in the ECU Library

 

No need to register. Just drop by!

Please e-mail writingcentre@ecuad.ca if you have any questions.

Wordsmiths art by Elijah B.

Design Writing Group

Yes, Designers Write Too.

Confused about how to start your case study? Unsure of how to approach your critical response? Wanna hang out with your fellow design enthusiasts? The Design Writing Group is the group for you!

A casual study hall where any students passionate about design can get together with their peers to discuss any and all aspects of design writing. Bring in any of your design assignments or projects to work on and get feedback from peers.

Bring a snack, writing utensils, and get excited to explore your design practice!

• Who: Any students passionate about design.
• What: Casual weekly gathering to share and discuss all forms of design writing
• When: Tuesdays from 3:30 – 4:30PM (SPRING 2023)
• Where: In person in the Writing Centre

*NEW* Join the DWG Discord server!

Please e-mail writingcentre@ecuad.ca if you have any questions.

Letter Writing Club

Bringing back snail mail

Bringing back snail mail

We may say letter writing but we’re up to so much more! Join us for chats with fellow letter writing enthusiasts, pen pal writing, mail-related art and design projects, and field trips, among other things!

HOW TO JOIN:

This group is online, and we meet every other Tuesday during the lunch hour: Register now for the Zoom link

Please e-mail writingcentre@ecuad.ca if you have any questions.

• What: A club for letter writers from all backgrounds
• Who: All students, regardless of experience.
• When: *Now on Tuesdays for SPRING 2023*: Biweekly, Tuesdays from 11:30 – 12:30PM PT. Starts January 17th, 2023.
  Where: Online Zoom room. Occasional in-person activities and field trips may be involved.

Letterwriting illustration by LWC member Ryuvine

 

Faculty + Staff Writing Group

Get some writing done!

The Faculty + Staff Writing Group has been one of the Writing Centre’s most beloved programs. Every week, faculty colleagues gather to talk (a little) about their writing projects and goals; we then set timers and write, getting done in 90 minutes what can take hours without the accountability of a writing community.

• What: Weekly writing group
• Who: ECUAD faculty and staff
• When: Fridays, 10 – 11:30AM PT
  
• Where: Register for the Zoom link here

**OCT. 7 SESSION IS IN-PERSON IN ROOM D2315**

Please e-mail writingcentre@ecuad.ca if you have any questions.
Image: KaboomPics / pexels.com