Speakers Series: Where to Now? (In collaboration with Art Matters)

Does a sustainable artistic practise mean throwing down roots, building community, and staying put? Or does it mean striking out and finding opportunity in other places? How can artists working in English balance the importance of community with the linguistic realities of Montreal?

Join ELAN and Art Matters for a free panel discussion:

Thursday February 16th, 6-8pm
EV 6.720, Concordia University
1515 Rue Sainte-Catherine O

To RSVP, click ‘going’ in the Facebook Event

Featuring:

MALEK YALAOUI
As a community educator, Malek has turned Facebook into her own personal free school where everyday is a teach-in as Malek shares anti-oppression and mental health resources with her network of four-thousand-plus friends. Offline, Malek works within the community as one of many in grassroots movements that advocate for everything from migrant justice through the Solidarity Across Borders network to youth empowerment through the non-profit Head & Hands. Malek also offers workshops on a wide variety of social justice issues and serves as mentor to other women-of-color writers.

EMILY GUALTIERI
Emily Gualtieri is choreographer and dance artist who works in both Montreal and Toronto. An underlying interest in creation, choreography, and diverse movement practices led her to enrol in Concordia University’s Contemporary Dance Department. In 2010, Emily began a choreographic partnership with David Albert-Toth, creating the solo La chute that toured Quebec extensively. Emily and David would go on to found Parts+Labour_Danse in 2011.

CHLOE LUM & YANNICK DESLANREAU
Chloë Lum and Yannick Desranleau are multidisciplinary visual artists based in Montreal. Interests in collaboration and materiality inform their practice in installation, sculpture, photography, dance, print and video. They where founding members of the avant-rock band AIDS Wolf, and until recently, collaborated under the name Seripop. Yannick Desranleau holds an MFA in sculpture from Concordia University, while Chloë Lum is currently an MFA candidate at York University.

AMY MACDONALD (Moderator/Moderatrice)
Amy holds an M.A. in Communications Studies from McGill University, where she researched cultural policy, urban space, and festivals. As a vocalist, guitarist, keyboardist, and flautist, she plays with several bands in Montreal and contributes to volunteer initiatives promoting independent music.

Land Acknowledgement

ELAN is an official minority language organization within a country that recognizes two languages as official. ELAN is located in Tiohtià:ke, the original name for Montreal in Kanien’kéha, the language of the Mohawk—also known as Mooniyang, which is the Anishinaabeg name given to the city by the Algonquin. While we are based in this city, our projects have also taken place in many regions across Quebec.

We acknowledge the colonial origin of English and French in Canada, and recognize that both languages benefit from official status throughout the land. The province that we know as Quebec is an amalgamation of the traditional territories of the Innu and Inuit nations, Algonquian nations, as well as the Mohawk nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy. Kanien’kéha and Anishinaabemowin are but two of the original languages of this province; Atikamekw, Cree, Inuktitut, and Innu-aimun are also among the many Indigenous languages spoken across Quebec as majority languages, all well before French and English.

ELAN acknowledges the important work being done by First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples to revive the traditional languages of these territories, and their advocacy for the official status of Indigenous languages.