Amanda Parafina has been leading the Vines Festival for three straight years. (Photo: Vines Art Festival)
Updated:October 14, 2022, 3:32 P.M.
Vancouver, B.C.
Filipino brilliance at the 8th Annual VINES Art Festival
Stage manager and producer Amanda Parafina, a second generation Filipino in Canada brings her talents to the multi-awarded VINES Art Festival which gathers thousands of spectators.
Mildred German
Vancouver, BC – The VINES Art Festival marks its 8th year in 2022 with “The Healing Power Of The Arts At Its Very Heart”. VINES is “a community / professional arts organization and festival that is responsive to and nurturing of artists who are working toward land, water, and relational justice.” https://vinesartfestival.com
From August 3-13, 2022, ten various art events were held in many parks and green spaces in the city. The Opening Ceremonies were held on August 3rd at Stanley Park / Second Beach, and events were also held at Oppenheimer Park (August 4), Sunset Beach (August 5), Creekside Park (August 6), Hadden Park (August 9), Grandview Park (August 11), New Brighton Park (August 12), to the Prison Justice Day (August 10) and grand finale at Trout Lake (August 13). Weeks before this year’s Festival, a screening of Lake of Dreams was held on July 17, 2022 at the Djavad Mowafaghian Cinema at the Simon Fraser University Goldcorp Centre for the Arts. Lake of Dreams is a series of eight elders stories curated by Nlaka’pamux Elder Mechelle Pierre. https://vinesartfestival.com/lake-of-dreams/
Amanda Parafina is a second-generation Filipino in Canada who has grown up, lived and worked throughout the unceded and ancestral territories of the Kwantlen, Tsawwassen, Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. She is a performing arts stage manager and producer with a BFA in Theater Design & Production from the University of British Columbia (UBC). 2022 is her third consecutive year as the Producer of the annual VINES Art Festival.
As one of the most diverse festivals in Vancouver, a number of artists of Filipino descent participated this year at the VINES Art Festival. A diverse pool of Filipino talents which range from performance arts, visual arts, installations,directing, managing, and more.
Featuring Juan Imperial – “Mother”:
Juan Imperial (He/She/They) is an emerging Filipinx Queer, Non Binary Femme artist with roots in Vogue and Waacking. Juan has been spreading the joy of vogue to QTBIPOC for six years through Van Vogue Jam Arts Society. They see its powerful potential to be a vessel for liberation, protest, joy and family , and dedicates most of their time and energy to building up these communities.
Featuring Sophia Sosa – Barangay Project:
“Catch-22” is a work-in-progress performance piece directed by Filipina interdisciplinary artist Sophia Sosa. This work-in-progress is a comedic satire that confronts the lessons that we were exposed to growing up. How does one become prepared to enter society as a young adult? Relationships, confidence, aspirations…taxes, capitalism, sexism, patriarchy; Have we been taught everything we need to succeed in this world? How has the evolution of society created a predestined future for the generations to come? This specific number is performed to the songs “I Wanna Be Evil” by Eartha Kitt and Disney’s “Tangled” soundtrack “Mother Knows Best” performed by Donna Murphy. This performance is a super fun take on real life lessons utilizing improvisational dance and choreographed movements inspired from real life experiences. (vinesartfestival.com)
With Reiko Inouye (they/she) and Josh Ongcol (he/him) are both queer dancers and artists of the asian diaspora both exploring themes of ancestry, queerness and liberation through their own artistic practices. Reiko and Josh are also a part of Vancouver’s vogue scene, rediscovering what power and community mean through ballroom.
“Mother” is an exploration of what ancestry and lineage means to queer poc who have strained relationships to blood lineage. Mother is a spiritual celebration and honouring of land as ancestor, of queer ancestors, and of the sacred role of matriarchy in queer lineage through past and future.
This piece uses dance, meditation, prayer, offering and energy work to create medicine for the artists, the witnesses of this celebration, the land and our ancestors who hold and protect us. (vinesartfestival.com)
Featuring Mildred Grace German, “In Search of Hope: Kariton, Karton, Cartoon!”:
“In Search of Hope: Kariton, Karton, Cartoon!” is a project of Vancouver-based Filipino-Canadian multidisciplinary artist Mildred Grace German. In collaboration with Carlos, an avid carpenter and craftsman, and Richmond-based artist-group MIRAGER, a kariton (Philippine-style of wooden cart) was conceptualized, designed and built.
“With complicated, entwined, and rich memories of ‘home’, ‘migration’, and ‘survival’ with uncertainty and limited means. Adding the notions of karton (in English, carton; also famous for Balikbayan Boxes) symbolizes the world economy, the supply chain, and the systemic racism in the global labour practices. Plus cartoons (because of the comedy and irony of it all)”. (vinesartfestival.com)
Featuring Dongganisa, “Caddisfly”
A drag performance inspired by caddisfly larvae and how they use materials from their environment to create protective shells. Using curated music, costume, and choreography, the performance will illustrate the connected relationship between ourselves and our environment.
Dongganisa (they/them) is a drag ghost back from the dead to bring creativity, dramatics, and unhinged emotions to every stage. Dong is inspired by theatre, fashion, anime, and their Filipinx culture. In their spare time, you can find them turning tablecloths into dresses and making wigs out of garbage bags. (vinesartfestival.com)
Featuring Davey Samuel Calderon – “The Big Bad Wolf” by Valerie Christiansen
Based on Eumenides By Aeschylus & Moby Dick by Herman Melville. Adapted by Nazli Akhtari and Valerie Christiansen. Starring Davey Samuel Calderon, and Janelle Reid, The Big Bad Wolf is an immersive promenade that is based on fables and folklore with a twist. Rewritten entirely from a different perspective, the audience will find themselves on an action filled voyage around Trout Lake. Uncovering who the monster’s are in our own lives. Are we a monster in somebody else’s life? The Big Bad Wolf’s style is bold, absurdist, fun, and interactive that plays with the genre of speculative future. (vinesartfestival.com)
And Serisa Fitz-James, crafts table
Explores themes of identity, pre-/post-colonial histories of the Philippines, and Filipinx/Canadian relationships through food, comedy, illustration, performance, animation, and ceramic sculpture.
Anjela Magpantay & Teddy Ngkaion also graced this year’s VINES Art Festival as the Masters of Ceremonies at the August 13th VINES Art Festival’s grand finale, “Our Tended Harvest” at Trout Lake Park in East Vancouver.
Anjela Magpantay is an actress and producer, known for The Healing Powers of Dude (2020) and K BODY AND MIND (2021). She is a first generation Canadian originating from the Philippines and is a graduate from Simon Fraser University with a BFA in Theatre Performance.
Now living on unceded Coast Salish lands (Vancouver), Filipino-Chinese Teddy Ngkaion is an artist who grew up in multiple countries including Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia. His work centers around bridging cultures and intercultural identities.
Along with its funders and all the volunteers, the VINES Art Festival is also made possible with the support of its Board of Directors. Amongst the six Board of Directors of the VINES Art Festival is first generation Canadian of Filipina descent Joyce Rosario is not only a member of the Board but also is the Treasurer. (vinesartfestival.com) An artist, a curator, and a cultural planner, Joyce’s training is in Theatre Production/Design from the University of British Columbia. (linkedin.com)
The Vines Art Festival was created by director Heather Lamoureux in 2015. It is an all-ages festival, is diverse, and inclusive with American Sign Language (ASL) interpretation in most of their events.