Vancouver Outsider Arts Festival
This 3-day free festival offers visual and performing artists facing social exclusion and other barriers opportunities for exhibition and sales, performance and participation, and connection and learning
Date/Time: Aug 11 2019, 10:00 am to 5:00 pm
Vancouver, Roundhouse Community Arts and Recreation Centre | Event calendar181 Roundhouse Mews
Tickets
Cost: Free
All events are FREE
100% of sales go the artists
Community Arts Council of Vancouver presents the third annual Vancouver Outsider Arts Festival (VOAF) offering visual and performing artists facing social exclusion and other barriers opportunities for exhibition and sales, performance and participation, connection and learning. VOAF is Canada’s first and only festival for Outsider Art, which is represented by significant fairs and museums globally. The artists may be self-taught or trained: they are all devoted to their creative practices, and come from a point of view that is outside the mainstream art world trends.
Festival Hours:
Friday August 9 11 AM – 9:30 PM
Saturday August 10 10 AM – 4:30 PM
Sunday August 11 10 AM – 4:30 PM
The 3-day free festival takes place at the Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre from August 9-11, 2019, and includes 150+ exhibiting and performing artists as well as organizational partners, free public workshops, and hundreds of artworks on display and for sale, alongside aerial silk acrobatics, Cantonese opera, intergenerational dance, wild live performances, and a range of musical stylings throughout the weekend.
Jeff Wilson and Francis Arevalo both offer sessions for working artists on the weekend, with Barrie Mowatt from Vancouver Biennale as special guest. On Saturday Sean Nosek will give a talk on Vancouver’s renowned street artist Ken Foster. We partner with Vancouver Poetry House to highlight outsider spoken word on Sunday afternoon, featuring Anjalica Solomon.
DISRUPTING EXCLUSION, INVITING CONNECTION
Our primary values are inclusion and active participation towards strengthening a sense of creative citizenship among participants and the public. Eligible artists self-identified as outsiders and have strong creative practices, with wildly diverse aesthetics. 100% of sales go to artists, and performers are paid fees: this is a significant professional opportunity for outsider artists.
The festival aims to increase awareness about Outsider Artists and to challenge stereotypes about who and what counts in the art world. Outsider Art is different, this art shakes up what you think you know about art and sometimes delves headfirst into challenging social and political issues. The festival provides a much-needed platform for visual and performing artists to gather, learn, and share their creative scope with the wider community.
Alternative Creations Studio, Coast Mental Health, John Howard Society, MPA Society, PLAN, and The Art Studios are all organizing group shows, alongside 35 exhibiting individual artists.
ARTIST WORKSHOPS
Free workshops for artists include Jeff Wilson, geologist turned award-winning visual artist’s “Artbiz” workshop and Q&A on. Francis Arevalo, rapper, producer and mental health advocate drops “Home, Ground: becoming an artist from the ground up” talk & workshop on Saturday beginning at 11 AM.
FREE ACTIVITIES
The public is invited to try out family-friendly activities like The Art Game and Banner Painting, or create “Found Messages for Public Spaces” with Angelo Moroni on Saturday at 1 PM.
More info