2023 YOUTH RESIDENCY AND MENTORSHIP PROGRAM

OPEN CALL FOR EMERGING CREATORS

We are excited to announce the third iteration of the Emerging Creators Incubator from May 16 to September 10, 2023. The Emerging Creators Incubator is designed to support six emerging artists between the ages of 18-30 who engage in performing, literary and visual arts and live on the Coast Salish territories colonially known as the Tri-Cities and Lower Mainland.  

This program is divided into three phases: Mentorship, Residency and Showcase. The Mentorship Phase provides an opportunity to work with professional artist mentors who have significant career experience and learn from the cohort and ECC staff. Mentors Rebecca Bair, Sammy Chien 簡上翔, and Sara Khan & Sandeep Johal will provide hands-on workshops and artist talks for participating emerging creators.

The Residency Phase includes access to ECC facilities for one month to develop individual work and/or collective creation, culminating in a professional public-facing showcase from August 03 – September 03, 2023 at the Art Gallery at Evergreen. Performing artists have the opportunity to perform a live version of their piece in our Studio Theatre on August 03, as well as the opportunity to have the archival footage screened in the gallery for the duration of the showcase. 

Applications Now Open – Apply Today!

The written application deadline is March 14, 2023, at 11:59 p.m. 
The interview deadline is March 10, 2023, at 6:00 p.m. 

Incubator Artist Benefits

Artists will Receive:   

• Group exhibition fee of $460 per artist
• Performing arts workshop, artist talk + one-on-one studio visit with Sammy Chien 簡上翔
• Artist talk + one-on-one studio visit with Rebecca Bair
• Collaborative visual art workshop led by Sara Khan and Sandeep Johal
• Access to art-making/rehearsal studio space from June 12 – July 16
• Studio visits and support from ECC and AGE staff
• Video/basic sound recording with ECC staff (by booking)
• Access to basic art-making materials and equipment available at ECC and a $90 supply honorarium for each artist
• Art storage for the duration of the project
• Access to an on-site parking space

Who is an Emerging Creator?

An emerging creator is defined as an artist who works in any discipline within the visual and performing arts. They are between the ages of 18 – 30, in the early stages of their professional career, and are committed to the development of their craft and practice.   

The Emerging Creators Incubator centers a multidisciplinary approach to the arts and will prioritize local emerging artists from the Tri-Cities area who engage in the performing, written and visual arts. Applications are also open to emerging creators from across the Vancouver Lower Mainland who are interested in engaging with this organization.  

We accept applications in a variety of formats, click on the application form to apply! We welcome and will prioritize applications from Black, Indigenous and racialized artists, persons with disabilities, persons of diverse sexual orientations, gender identities or expressions (LGBTQ2S+), and any of these intersections. Please head to the application where you will find our Commitment to Justice, Equity and Inclusion to learn more about the concrete action we are taking.

Meet the Mentors

Rebecca Bair | Visual Artist

Rebecca Bair is an interdisciplinary artist working across installation, video, drawing and photography, who is based in Vancouver on the traditional and ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples. Her work contributes to a re-imagination of representation for Black women on Turtle Island. She uses signifiers like hair, skin, and the sun to examine legacies of settler colonialism and slavery, while contributing abstracted visualisations of refusal and resiliency.   

Bair has exhibited widely across the Lower Mainland, including group exhibitions at Vancouver Art Gallery and Surrey Art Gallery, and a solo exhibition at West Vancouver Art Museum. Her work continues to gain national recognition and has been featured in Canadian Art Magazine and NUVO magazine. She mentors artists with developmental disabilities and Black youth in Surrey, and teaches at Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she received her MFA in 2020. Bair is the founder The Black Arts Centre, a Black owned and operated artist run centre and community space in Surrey. 

Sammy Chien 簡上翔 of Chimerik 似不像 Collective | Performing Artist, Director 

Sammy Chien 簡上翔 is a Taiwanese-Canadian immigrant and queer artist-of-colour who is an award-winning interdisciplinary artist, director, performer, researcher and mentor in film, sound art, new media, movement and spiritual practice. With over 400 collaborative projects, many of which engage underrepresented communities, his work has been shown internationally at notable venues like Centre Pompidou, Paris, and the National Centre for the Performing Arts, Beijing. Chien is the Co-Artistic Director of Chimerik 似不像 collective, an award-winning interdisciplinary arts collective/design team. He has been featured in magazines, TV and commercials such as Discorder, Keedan, CBC Arts and BenQ, and is currently leading a dance research project called We Were One, as well as a media arts project called Ritual-Spective 迴融 funded by Canada Council for the Arts and BC Arts Council. Chien is an official instructor of Isadora, a projection design software.  

Sandeep Johal & Sara Khan | Visual Artists & Collaborators 

Sandeep Johal and Sara Khan are artists and collaborators who merge their distinct visual vocabulary to create characters and vignettes based on the stories of South Asian women, yet steeped in the grandeur of myth and legend.  Sandeep Johal uses bold lines and vibrant colours in her collages, paintings and large-scale murals. She illustrates pressing human rights issues specific to her experience as a first-generation South Asian woman. Sara Khan’s practice spans intimate paintings to large-scale murals. Frequently using watercolours, the softness of the transparent paint and fantastic stories juxtapose the intensity of contrasting colours and grotesque imagery.  

Johal is Vancouver-based artist who has exhibited across Canada, including Vancouver Art Gallery’s inaugural #SpotlightVanArtRental project, Burrard Art Foundation and a large-scale collaborative mural project for Vancouver Mural Festival. She has been commissioned by Apple, the Vancouver Canucks, and many more, is the 2019 recipient of the Darpan Magazine Artistic Visionary Award. Johal holds a Diploma in Fine Arts from Langara College, and a Degree in Education from the University of British Columbia. 

Sara Khan is a Vancouver-based artist who was born in Birmingham, England and raised in Lahore, Pakistan. She holds a BFA from National College of Arts, Lahore. She has exhibited widely, including solo exhibitions at Seymour Art Gallery and The Reach Gallery Museum. She was selected for the Bag Art camp, an international art residency in Bergen, Norway, and commissioned by the Vancouver Mural Festival. 

Important Program Dates

It is important that those wishing to apply are available on all the dates listed below.  The timeline of the project is May 16 to September 10, 2023.

Mentorship Phase: May 16 – June 06 

• Welcome session: Tuesday May 16, 6 – 8:30pm 
• Artist talk with Sammy Chien: Tuesday May 23, 6 – 8:30pm 
• Workshop weekend: May 27, 10:20am – 3:30pm & May 28, 2 – 5pm
  Includes a visual artist and collaboration workshop with Sara Khan & Sandeep Johal, community building activities and a performing arts workshop with Sammy Chien.    
• Artist talk with Rebecca Bair: Tuesday May 30, 6:30 – 8pm 

Studio Phase: June 12 – July 16

• Studio access at ECC: June 12 – July 16 
• Idea presentation: Tuesday June 06, 6:30 – 8:30pm 
• Individual studio visits with facilitators & Technical Operations Manager: Tuesday June 13 (time TBC) 
• Critique session w/ mentors, staff, cohort: Saturday July 08, 1 – 4:30pm  
• End of residency picnic: Wednesday, July 12 (time TBC) 

Showcase Phase: August 03 – September 03

• Performing Arts Dress Rehearsal & Archival Filming: August 03 (time TBC) 
• Opening Reception: August 03, 6 – 8:30pm 
• Artwork Pick Up: September 6 – 10, 2023

We invite applications in a variety of formats, and all the details on how to apply will be available on our Application Form, available now until March 14, 2023.

STAY CONNECTED WITH US!

FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA FOR MORE UPDATES

Situated on the shores of Lafarge Lake in Town Centre Park, Evergreen Cultural Centre (ECC) exists on the unceded, traditional and ancestral core territory of the kʷikʷəƛ̓əm (Kwikwetlem) First Nation, which lies within the shared territories of the səli̓lwətaɁɬ təməxʷ (Tsleil-Waututh), S’ólh Téméxw (Stó:lō), qiqéyt (Qayqayt) and sq̓əc̓iy̓aɁɬ təməxʷ (Katzie), xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish) nations in the region known today as the Tri-Cities.