Deadline to apply: Thursday, June 6th,

PROJECT DESCRIPTION: School Schmool: An Activist’s Guide to McGill, Concordia, and Montreal
School Schmool is an activist day planner for students at McGill, Concordia, and for the Montreal community. It includes relevant and engaging articles, resources, and practical tools for students and non-students alike to participate in social and environmental justice activism, as well as a useful day planner to organize busy academic and activist schedules.School Schmool is a long-time publication of QPIRG McGill; and for the third year in a row, QPIRG Concordia has joined the project to expand the publication to both McGill and Concordia campuses.

**PLEASE NOTE** Two coordinators will be hired – one QPIRG McGill-focused coordinator and one QPIRG Concordia-focused coordinator. Please state which position you are applying for based on your knowledge of and experience with either of the organization’s campus-community links.

TASKS INCLUDE:
* liaising with campus groups, QPIRG working groups, and community groups to promote participation in the publication and expand resource database
* developing student volunteer base of writers, editors and artists
* collecting, selecting, and assembling content into publication format, using desktop-publishing and website-publishing software
* raising funds from campus organizations for publication and distribution costs
* meeting QPIRG Concordia and QPIRG McGill’s mandates to create campus-community links at Concordia and McGill universities
* liaising with the QPIRG staff and board members * developing a web component of School Schmool to digitally archive the project
* meeting with a staff liaison and/or QPIRG board member to give updates on the progress of the project/get support at least once per month through the duration of the summer
* giving at least two oral reports to the QPIRG board through the summer
* producing a final written report of the project giving a summary and evaluation of the organizing that was done and provides QPIRG with any materials that were produced
* developing and implementing an outreach and distribution strategy on and around campus
*helping to organize final launch parties

REQUIRED SKILLS:
* a demonstrated commitment to social and environmental change
* project and volunteer coordination experience
* writing and editing skills
* ability to work collaboratively and by consensus
* familiarity with desktop publishing applications (ex. InDesign, Photoshop)
* familiarity with website publishing applications (ex. WordPress)
* artistic design and layout skills
* experience in fundraising
* knowledge of social and environmental justice organizations in Montreal
* fluency in English (oral and written)
* ability to work in French (oral)
* familiarity with QPIRG Concordia and the Concordia campus and/or QPIRG McGill and the McGill campus

ASSETS:
* fluency in French (written)

Please submit a CV and cover letter by 5pm on Thursday, June 6, 2013 – via email to “hiring@qpirgconcordia.org” (please indicate clearly in the subject line which position you are applying to) – dropped off in person at the QPIRG Concordia office during office hours (Monday toThursday, 12-6pm): 1500 de Maisonneuve Ouest, suite 204 (corner of Mackay – please note the QPIRG is a scent-free and wheelchair accessible space). – sent by mail to: QPIRG Concordia, c/o Concordia University, 1455 de Maisonneuve Ouest, Montreal, QC, H3G 1M8 (it must arrive before the deadline).

QPIRG Concordia and QPIRG McGill have an employment equity policy in effect. People from marginalized communities, including women, Aboriginal people, visible minorities, people with disabilities, Deaf people, gay men, lesbians, bisexuals, two-spirited people, transgendered and transsexual people, and working class people are especially encouraged to apply. Please indicate in your cover letter if you would like to be considered for employment equity (full policy available upon request).

Please note that only candidates selected for an interview will be contacted by the hiring committee.

Join Vikki Law (Resistance Behind Bars) & China Martens (The Future Generation) for a discussion on ways that non-parents can support caregivers and children in their communities, movements, and collective processes.

How do we create new, non-hierarchical structures of support and mutual aid and include all ages in the struggle for social justice? Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind will be a discussion of concrete tips, suggestions, and narratives on ways that non-parents can support parents, children, and caregivers in their communities, social movements, and collective processes. Good for those who are curious and would like to learn more, those new to parenting and children’s issues, as well as the more experienced. Let’s build an all-ages, inclusive revolution that leaves no one behind!

Vikki Law and China Martens are editors of the book Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind, a collection of concrete tips, suggestions and narratives on ways that non-parents can support parents, children and caregivers in their communities, social movements, and collective processes. Don’t Leave Your Friends Behind focuses on issues affecting children and caregivers within the larger framework of social justice, mutual aid, and collective liberation.

*free. welcome to all.
*wheelchair accessible.
*childcare available on-site.
*presentation in English with whisper translation into French.

Co-organized by the Montreal Anarchist Bookfair and QPIRG Concordia.

GENTRIFY THIS!

This event will serve as the launch of Gentrify This! A Student’s Guide to Understanding and Resisting Neighbourhood Gentrification

“Gentrification can seem inevitable. As condos spring up like mushrooms, rent creeps ever higher, and available apartments become harder and harder to find, how can we resist the mass displacement of socio-economically marginal groups from popular neighborhoods? This guide addresses the structural and cultural aspects of gentrification, and suggests both individual and collective strategies for resisting the process.” Gentrify This! was supported by a research stipend by QPIRG Concordia.

With the participation of members of local housing and activist organizations active in resisting gentrification in Montreal.

- free. welcome to all.
- snacks & drinks
- wheelchair accessible
- free childcare available by request
(please phone 514-848-7585 24 hours in advance)

INFO: www.qpirgconcordia.org / 514-848-7585

DECOLONIZE! An anti-colonial teach-in

presented by the Anti-Colonial Solidarity Collective & No One Is Illegal-Montreal

free. welcome to all.
wheelchair accessible.
childcare available on-site.

Join us for a full day of introductory and in-depth workshops about anti-colonialism and resistance.
—–

SCHEDULE OF WORKSHOPS:

10am: Re-appropriating Indigenous Identity (avec Clifton Nicholas) (Salle H-763 — EN)
10am: The P.Q., colonialism, and current social movements in Quebec (room H-762 — FR/EN)

1pm: Unsettling and Decolonizing: An Introductory Workshop (room H-763 – EN)
1pm: Our solidarity: A Territory to Decolonize (room H-762 – FR)

3pm: Industrial Development in Nitassinan: A History of Dispossession of the Innu (room H-763 – FR)
3pm: “Our Terrain of Struggle”: Migration, Borders and Global Apartheid (room H-762 – EN/ES)
—–

In the last several months we’ve seen a resurgence of grassroots struggle for Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination. Indigenous peoples across Turtle Island have always resisted colonization, from the beginnings of European settler invasion, through over 200 years of land theft and genocide that the nation of Canada was built upon. This resistance has been echoed by Indigenous peoples throughout the world, who face displacement at the hands of Canadian corporations and the neo-colonial governments that serve them.

This series of workshops has been organized so that our movements can actively support and participate in decolonization struggles. At present, these workshops are organized by predominantly non-native anti-colonial groups and individuals.

This teach-in is organized by the Anti-Colonial Solidarity Collective & No One Is Illegal-Montreal and co-sponsored by the Status For All Coalition (comprised of Mexicans United for Regularization, Dignidad Migrante, Solidarity Across Borders, No One Is Illegal and the Immigrant Workers Center) , QPIRG Concordia, QPIRG McGill, and the Popular Education Committee of the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC).

INFO:
indigenoussolidarity@gmail.com
514-848-7585
www.nooneisillegal.org
—–

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTIONS

* Re-appropriating Indigenous Identity (with Clifton Nicholas)
(10am – Room H-763 – EN)

This presentation looks critically at the uses and misuses of Indigenous imagery, from contact to today. Using a slideshow combined with an oral presentation, topics include negative stereotyping of native people, government and media propaganda against natives, the anti-Indigenous lobby, land rights, and the commodification of Indigenous identity. This workshop debunks past and present cultural appropriation of Indigenous culture and people. Presented by Clifton Nicholas, a member of the Kanehsatake Mohawk Community.

* The P.Q., colonialism, and current social movements in Quebec
(10am – Room H-762 – FR/EN)

Within its means, the student movement called into question almost all aspects of Quebec society. It was a central actor in the process of critiquing the colonial issues of the Plan Nord – political pillar of the Charest government. Within the neo-liberal agenda of austerity that imposes commercialization of education, we find the unconstrained exploitation of natural resources and the assimilation of indigenous communities. Under the governance of the P.Q., these same themes are still ongoing. This will be an occasion to talk about how, starting from a social movement rooted in a colonial society, we can integrate the concerns of indigenous solidarity and anti-colonial struggle.

* “Unsettling and Decolonizing: An Introductory Workshop”
(1pm – Room H-763 – EN)

“Decolonization” describes a process by which the ongoing structures, practices, and mindsets of colonialism are dismantled, and Indigenous peoples restore what colonialism has wrongfully denied them. This workshop will discuss different meanings of decolonization, and explore ways that theories of decolonization are, and can be, put into action. This workshop has been developed by non-indigenous settlers, and will have a particular focus on the ways settler allies can participate in decolonization. The discussion will be facilitated by non-indigenous members of the Anti-Colonial Solidarity Collective.

* Our Solidarity: A Territory to Decolonize
(1pm – Room H-762 – FR)

Revolution at Point Zero
A Book Launch and Discussion with Silvia Federici

Thursday April 4 at 6:30pm
1610 Ste-Catherine West (Faubourg Building), Room B-060
(métro Guy-Concordia)

- This event is free.
- For free on-site childcare, please call 24 hours in advance: 514-848-7585.
- Wheelchair accessible.
- Il y aura une service de traduction chuchotée vers le français.

Join us for a discussion with feminist and anti-capitalist activist Silvia Federici, a veteran of the Wages for Housework campaign and author of Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation.

Federici will discuss her most recent book Revolution at Point Zero: Housework, Reproduction, and Feminist Struggle (PM Press 2012), a collection of texts written between 1975 and 2010. In this talk she will specifically address social reproduction in an era of  globalized capitalism providing a feminist and autonomous Marxist analysis of the ongoing recolonization and decimation of much of the planet. As outlined in Revolution at Point Zero, this process fosters a permanent crisis of reproduction and survival. As women continue to bear the brunt of this onslaught, Federici puts forth a vision of the commons as a site of resistance.

Copies of Caliban and the Witch and Revolution at Point Zero will be on sale along with other feminist and anti-capitalist literature.

This event is co-sponsored by QPIRG Concordia, QPIRG McGill and Kersplebedeb Publishing.

(Note that Silvia will also be giving a workshop on “Reproductive Work and the Construction of the Commons in an Era of Primitive Accumulation” at the Anti-Capitalist Teach In on April 7th. For more information, visit: http://www.qpirgconcordia.org/?p=4319)

info: 514-848-7585 – info@qpirgconcordia.org
www.qpirgconcordia.org – www.qpirgmcgill.org – www.kersplebedeb.com

Work?!$@#

Sunday April 7, 2013, 10am to 6pm

—
SCHEDULE IN BRIEF:

10am: Self-management in the Workplace  (Guillaume! & Marie-Eve Lamy)
10am: Reproductive Work and the Construction of the Commons in an Era of Primitive Accumulation (Silvia Federici)

1pm: Immigrant Workers in Montreal: Precarity and Struggle? (Erik Argüello, Evelyn Calugay, Viviana Medina & Aadi Ndir)
1pm: Workplace Popular Assemblies: Possibilities for reclaiming grassroots power (Dave Bleakney)
1pm: Art & Politics: Creative work as a tool for political emancipation – critique of activist productivism (Marhi Aive)

3pm: The Authoritarian Division of Labour (Kevin Sutton)
3pm: Survival and Resistance: An Immigrant History of May Day (Mostafa Henaway & Jaggi Singh)
3pm: Educational Institutions: Squeezing maximum productivity from students (Jeanne Bilodeau, Amber Gross, Camille Robert & Camille Tremblay-Fournier)

5pm: Plenary
—

Free entrance
Free food, childcare, and whisper translation (EN/FR)
Fully accessible to wheelchairs
Full schedule of workshops and plenary listed below or: http://www.qpirgconcordia.org/?p=4319
All day: Info-fair with anti-capitalist resources

A full day of anti-capitalist workshops, this teach-in is organized in the lead up to anti-capitalist May Day on May 1st (info: http://www.clac-montreal.net/en/mayday_2013) and the family-friendly Status for All! march on May 18th (info: http://www.solidarityacrossborders.org/en/may-18-status-for-all-march)

It is the second teach-in in a series organized in the context of CLAC’s monthly anti-capitalist assemblies in Montreal. It is open to everyone and includes both introductory and more in-depth workshops. In a spirit of self-education and aimed at collective action, the teach-in series also serves to build an online database of anti-capitalist workshops, a decentralized tool for popular education: http://ateliersanticapitalistes.wordpress.com/

If you would like to help out, submit material to the info-fair, or submit a workshop to the workshop database, get in touch with us at:educationpopulaire@clac-montreal.net

Organized by the Popular Education Committee of the CLAC (Convergences des luttes anticapitalistes), co-sponsored by QPIRG Concordia, with the support of: GRIP-UQAM & QPIRG-McGill

INFO
educationpopulaire@clac-montreal.net
www.clac-montreal.net
—

::: SCHEDULE :::

— 10am to 12pm: Simultaneous Workshops (2) —

Self-management in the Workplace
Presented in French
Room #125

In our capitalist and patriarchal society, the working world is more often than not synonymous with exploitation, alienation, dispossession and, above all, boredom! Salaried work is, for the vast majority of us, a necessity rather than a matter of choice. Is it possible to organize our workplaces on the principles of self-management: equality, mutual aid, direct and participatory democracy and anti-authoritarianism? What are the barriers to self-management and how can they be overcome? What are the limits of self-managed workplaces within a system based on private ownership of the means of production? We invite you to join an open discussion to share and learn from our respective experiences. Our workshop will not attempt to present a grand systematic analysis. Rather we hope to set out some basic points for reflecting on salaried work from an anti-capitalist and anti-authoritarian perspective in order to figure out how to put our ideals into practice, here and now, in the spaces in which many of us spend more than half of our time!

Presented by: Guillaume! and Marie-Eve Lamy. Guillaume! is a worker at Koumbit and Marie-Eve Lamy is a worker at Lux Éditeur.

—

Reproductive Work and the Construction of the Commons in an Era of Primitive Accumulation
Presented in English
Room #119

Looking at reproduction as the first terrain of social change, Silvia Federici will discuss the global restructuring and crisis of reproductive work — housework, sex work, elder care — its effects on gender relations, the development of affective labor and the need for the construction of reproductive commons.

Presented by: Silvia Federici, a writer, teacher and feminist activist. In the early seventies, she was one of the founders of the International Feminist Collective, the organization behind the international Wages for Housework (WFH) campaign. More recently, Federici is a member of the Midnight Notes Collective, and one of the co-founders of the Committee for Academic Freedom in Africa. She is the author of numerous books and essays, including Revolution at Point Zero: Housework, Reproduction, and Feminist Struggle (PM Press, 2012) and Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation (Autonomedia, 2004).

– 12pm to 1pm: Lunch –

– 1pm to 3pm: Simultaneous Workshops (3) –

Immigrant Workers in Montreal: Precarity and Struggle?
Presented in English and French
Room #119

Based on the experiences of Dignidad Migrante, Pinay and the Immigrant Workers Centre, as well as our own experiences, we will discuss the nuances between precarious labour of immigrants and the international division of labour. For example, under the table migrant work in Canada generates huge profits for Canadian businesses while the state ignores it to profit the bosses. At the same time, the social benefits of Canadian workers are based on the super-exploitation of immigrants and poor countries like Mexico. One of the effects of this economic dynamic is that our countries of origin are among the greatest immigrant producing countries in the world.

Presented by: Viviana Medina and Erik Argüello (Dignidad Migrante and Mexicains united for Regularization); Aadi Ndir (Immigrant Workers Centre); Evelyn Calugay (Pinay). Viviana Medina and Erik Argüello are activists and founding members of the Dignidad Migrante collective and the Mexicans United for Regularization. Aadi Ndir lived without papers for six years in Montreal and is well-acquainted with systems of exploitation; today he works as a community organizer at the Immigrant Workers Centre. Evelyn Calugay is a member of Pinay Québec, an organization of Filipino women in Quebec which has fought for the rights of domestic workers since 1991. Dignidad Migrante, MUR and CTI are part of the Status for All! network.

—

Workplace Popular Assemblies: Possibilities for reclaiming grassroots power
Presented in English
Room #123

The present order is unsustainable socially, economically and ecologically. The constant growth model is not only bankrupt but based on a disempowering form of commodification. Workers are in a race to the bottom in an unsustainable order. There is a fundamental conflict between those who labour and produce things and those who profit from that labour. Popular educator Paulo Friere said “dig where you stand”. Unions and any group of workers can make their presence felt in the places they work by using grassroots assemblies. This workshop will discuss how can these assemblies be created and what possibilities exist for them to challenge the destructive dynamics of capitalism.

Presented by: Dave Bleakney, a postal worker and an anti-capitalist trade unionist who, for the past 16 years, has been the national education representative (anglophone) for the Canadian Union of Postal Workers.

—

Art & Politics: Creative work as a tool for political emancipation – critique of activist productivism
Presented in French
Room #125

This workshop aims to create a space to reflect on the place of artistic creation in anti-authoritarian activist spaces. Why do we conceive of artistic creation as an individualist practice? How can we leave behind the art of amusement and move into an artistic political practice? How can we escape a productivist logic imitating capitalism and conceive an artistic emancipatory logic? How, through art, can we regain contact with our bodies? These are some of the questions which will be raised. You are welcome to come and share your experiences and reflections.

Presented by: Marhi Aive, a Literary Studies student. For some time, she has thought about literature and the language of bodies as tools of political emancipation, from a feminist perspective. She is part of the Anarchist Writers Bloc and works on the creative feminist zine SpeCULum.

– 3pm to 5pm: Simultaneous Workshops (3) –

The Authoritarian Division of Labour
Presented in English
Room #123

From a lifetime of toiling in the fields of the first empires to a lifetime of precarity in the flexible labour market, the division of labour has been a central method of organizing power and privilege in patriarchal class societies. Using anti-capitalist, anti-authoritarian and feminist analyses, we will examine how the contemporary work regime perpetuates a long legacy of violent division along the lines of gender, class, race, region, legality and more. The goal is to generate a lively discussion of how movements of contestation and alternative projects for organizing (non-)production can overcome and/or reproduce these problematic divisions.

Presented by: Kevin Sutton, a precarious educator who makes a living helping economics students pass their exams and makes life liveable by undermining their beliefs in the process. Kevin seeks complicity with all who would challenge the economist’s regime of boredom.

—

Survival and Resistance: An Immigrant History of May Day
Presented in English and French
Room #119

This presentation and discussion will look at May Day from the perspective of migrant worker and anti-racist struggles. From its origins, May Day has been linked to the campaigns of immigrant workers, not just for better working conditions, but against systemic racism. From Jewish and Eastern European laborers in the 1800s, to Chinese migrants who built railways, to today’s Latin American migrants in the US who “reclaimed” May Day in 2005-06, the experiences of immigrants (with or without papers) is crucial to understanding the radical underpinnings of May Day and its meaning for us today. Aside from providing a historical perspective on the roots of May Day, this workshop will also explore some local examples of migrant justice struggles linked to popular, working class, anti-racist campaigns.

Presented by: Mostafa Henaway & Jaggi Singh. Mostafa Henaway is a community organizer active with the Immigrant Workers Center. Jaggi is a community organizer, active with Solidarity Across Borders and No One Is Illegal. Both Mostafa and Jaggi, who were born and raised in Toronto, are involved with the Status For All Coalition and the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC) in Montreal.

—

Educational Institutions: Squeezing maximum productivity from students
Presented in French
Room #125

This panel discussion by students involved in diverse aspects of the student movement will explore different elements of labour and exploitation in our education systems. Panelists will discuss the following questions: student labour organizing in universities that try to use them as discount workers; gendered divisions of labour during the 2012 student strike and in the student movement more generally; and schools as factories producing ‘good workers’ for the capitalist system.

Présentée par : Jeanne Bilodeau, étudiante en enseignement au secondaire qui milite au sein du Grévisse, un groupe autonome dans le département d’éducation, à l’UQAM; Amber Gross- étudiante militante et membre d’AMUSE/SEOUM, le Syndicat des employé(e)s occassionels de l’Université McGill; Camille Robert, étudiante en histoire à l’UQAM et impliquée dans le mouvement étudiant depuis quelques années; et Camille Tremblay-Fournier, étudiante en sociologie et études féministe; militante étudiante et ancienne membre du comité femmes de l’ASSÉ.

– 5pm to 6pm: Plenary with snacks! –

Join us at the end of the teach-in for a short plenary bringing together the themes of the Teach-In and looking ahead towards upcoming mobilizations and actions. There will be drinks and snacks, as well as presentations about the day’s workshops. We’ll also hear from members of the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC) of Montreal about the upcoming May 1st demonstration, as well as from the Status For All Coalition about the May 18th city-wide demonstration for immigrant rights.

INFO:
educationpopulaire@clac-montreal.net
www.clac-montreal.net

As part of the Study In Action Undergraduate & Community Research Conference …
On the International Day Against Police Brutality and Impunity …
QPIRG McGill and QPIRG Concordia present …

DAY OF WORKSHOPS AGAINST POLICE AND STATE REPRESSION
FRIDAY, MARCH 15, 11am-4pm
McGill University, 3480 rue McTavish (north of Sherbrooke, south of Pine)

Free. Wheelchair accessible.
Whisper translation for English and French (workshops will be in both English and French).
Free childcare by reservation (please phone 514-848-7585 24h in advance)

Workshop Schedule:

* 11am-12:30pm: A People’s History of Police Repression Against Social Movements in Montreal
This presentation and discussion will explore grassroots responses and lessons from the past 15+ years (1995-2012) of police repression of social movements in Montreal. We’ll trace back the recent history of local anti-police brutality organizing, explore instances of police infiltration of social movements, and review examples of police repression against those of us fighting for social change – from anti-capitalist organizing to migrant justice work, from women’s self-determination struggles to anti-racist organizing. This workshop will also seek to highlight tactics and strategies to resist police tactics that aim to marginalize our movements.

* 12:30-1pm: Free Lunch, courtesy of Midnight Kitchen

* 1pm-2:30pm: Organizing Collective Legal Self-defence against Criminalization
An introductory workshop to understand legal proceedings, from challenging a ticket to a trial for criminal charges. This will help prepare for defending yourself in court or for being involved in your trial with a lawyer. Presented by the Self-defense and Legal Support Committee of the Anti-Capitalist Convergence (CLAC)

* 2:30pm-4pm: Street Action 101
An all-too-brief rundown on what people need to know when they’re in the streets and the police are doing what they can to get you out there. Topics covered include: tactics the police can use, tactics people in a crowd can use, what you should and shouldn’t bring to a demo, and what solidarity means in the streets.

(The workshops will end in time for participants to attend the annual demonstration against police brutality which starts at 5pm at the corner of St-Urbain and Ontario. Info: http://cobp.resist.ca/)

INFO: 514-398-7432 – qpirg@ssmu.mcgill.ca – www.qpirgconcordia.org
STUDY IN ACTION: www.qpirgconcordia.org/studyinaction

ART IN ACTION

1455 de Maisonneuve West, 7th floor
(métro Guy-Concordia) MONTRÉAL

Viewing Hours / Heures d’ouvertures:
Monday, March 11 to Sunday, March 17, 10am to 6pm
wheelchair accessible / free / welcome to all!

For more information about STUDY IN ACTION, visit: www.qpirgconcordia.org/studyinaction

Participating Artists: Grace An * karen b * Al Blair * Amy Barrington * Jacqueline Brandon & Noemi Stern * Kathy Chagnon * Dinette * École Cardinal Girl Group * Arianna Garcia-Fialdini * Freda Guttman * Imaging Apartheid * John Lanthier * Cassandra Marsillo * Tournesol Plante * Jesse Purcell * Shannon Willmott

TWO Art In Action Events:

i) Interactive Anti-capitalist Performance/Performance interactive anti-capitaliste by/par Art Ache Collective / Le collectif Art Ache
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 13, 4:45pm
métro Place-St-Henri, west exit
info: https://www.facebook.com/events/129374033910190/

ii) Artists’ Gathering “5 à 7” with free food and drinks
SATURDAY, MARCH 16, 5pm-7pm
1455 de Maisonneuve West, 7th floor, at the Art In Action exhibition
Come meet the artists contributing to this year’s ART IN ACTION. There will be music, some performances, and some artist talks too. Welcome to all!
—

exhibits et présentations:

1992
Grace An
Film Animation, Concordia University

This piece is a part of an upcoming series of paintings and illustrations titled, ’1992′ to showcase radical femme gender performances. This painting attempts to reinvent the image of racialized, femme identity and to express the problems in representations of over sexualization of racialized women.

Grace An is a painter, illustrator and comic book artist from Toronto and Lindsay, Ontario that works under the brand ‘Sunshinable’. She is currently living in Montreal, studying Film Animation in Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema at Concordia University.

Interactive Anti-capitalist Performance/Performance interactive anti-capitaliste
Art Ache Collective / Le collectif Art Ache

The Art Ache Collective invites you to a bilingual, interactive, performative guided tour, lasting about 45 minutes. Come reconsider a space via humourous anti-capitalist sketches, then be invited to intervene in the space in order to infiltrate the mechanisms of this highly criticized system. The precise location of the performance will be revealed to you on site. Meet at métro Place Saint-Henri, west exit, at 4:45pm, Wednesday March 13th.

Le collectif Art Ache vous propose un tour guidé, bilingue, mi-performatif, mi-interactif d’une durée d’environ 45 minutes. Venez revisiter un endroit à travers de sketchs anti-capitalistes à saveur ironique, pour ensuite être invités à intervenir dans l’espace afin d’infiltrer les méchanismes de ce système hautement critiqué. Le lieu précis de la performance vous sera dévoilé sur place. Le rendez-vous se fera au métro Saint-Henri sortie ouest à 16h45 ce mercredi 13 mars.

washed in the blood of the land
karen b
Studio Arts, Concordia University

By engaging in artworks we are able to see the potential in where our imaginations can take us. By imagining the possibilities, we are inspired to construct alternative landscapes, both physical and psychological. We are limited first and foremost, by our belief that we need this culture to survive.

The work addresses ideas of an animate landscape, one in constant flux, one engaged in ever shifting cycles, both natural and altered by human acts. Interdependency is a constant. It is tremendous in its complexity, scope and the beauty of its gesture. This intricate balance has been shattered industrial-capitalist culture, and all human and non-human life is affected on a global scale. Humans ultimately have a choice to be the stewards or destroyers of life. The feminine emerges with the power she has always guarded closely in the face of the violent repression she has always encountered. Light, motion and materials are critical to the work. Time passes, light changes, the earth seems eternal, water, soil, air infinite. The reality is articulated in materials implemented: our surroundings are ephemeral, our resources finite, the unity is easily severed and in many cases will never reconnect. The collective body fills with a fury that must manifest in urgency to act, knowing that we all breathe and bleed with the earth.

karen b is a multidisciplinary artist and activist based between Montreal and rural south-eastern Ontario. The main focus of her work is rooted in how we relate to our environment; how historical, social, political, ecological, cultural concerns are all encoded on landscape. Her works in drawing, relief-printmaking and stop-motion animation, explore through narrative and material, the decline of the old and the emergence of a new paradigm, and how they are read in our surroundings. karen b is doing a major in Studio Arts at Concordia University.

when the personal is political
Al Blair
ABCPOSTERS

As an artist who mainly makes posters and art for public spaces and community events, Al Blair desired to create a poster series that was specifically crafted for spaces of home and intimacy. These posters offer a visual representation of many themes that  can be felt within organizing communities that are worked-to-the-bone and often in dire need of care. Self-care, queer displays of femininity, support, and alone-time are all subjects that are captured in these posters. These themes are prioritized in this poster series, because they are rarely prioritized in other public or community settings.

Al Blair is a Montreal-based artist who creates posters and art for community events and organizations. She works under the title of ABCPOSTERS. She has created logos and art for such projects as Solidarity Across Borders’ Solidarity City and Education Committee, and the Community-University Research Exchange (CURE) project.  Her work can be viewed at abcposters.wordpress.com

Circles of Awareness
Amy Barrington
School of Community and Public Affairs, Concordia University

“Circles of self-awareness” brings symbolic representations of earth-based spirituality to the forefront of political questioning and social organization. Influenced by the fifty chiefs circle wampum, “circles of self-awareness” is held within a braided circle representing the social, spiritual and political underpinning of society and decision making like the Haudenosaunee confederacy from which the artist has taken inspiration from in a class (First peoples studies 210 – Haudenosaunee peoples). Note the themes represented in concentric circles are the radiating wellness of self, family, chosen family, community, region, nation.  With this piece the artist hopes to encourage self-care and harmony within each of the inner circles to radiate positivity in order to effect change and harmony in the larger spheres. We know that systematic change requires conflict and the power of many to subvert few, but in order to do that best popular uprising should be organized, strategic, and relatively healthy.

Keep your fire burning, sometimes there is power in outrage, channel it into positive change to build the alternative. Taking time to make beautiful things and feel the circulation of plant and animal lives connected to your own helps fend against burn out. Be well.

Rooted in gardening, and blooming into agriculture. Organizing, planning, and creating make my heart sing. I’d like to feed the soul, minds and bellies of the people I surround myself with and the friends I haven’t met yet, to be mindful and build a better world together.

SCUM
Jacqueline Brandon and Noemi Stern
Valerie Solanas Makeout Club VSMC

We feel, with certain modifications, that the words of the late and great Valerie Solanas can vocalize our artistic sentiments. We have altered the opening of her manifesto so as not to reinforce the gender binary. We seek instead to target the d00d (dude) as an oppressive essence, rather than problematically blaming those traditionally seen as being of the male sex.

“Life in this society being, at best, an utter bore and no aspect of society being at all relevant to non-d00ds, there remains to civic-minded, responsible, thrill-seeking non-d00ds only to overthrow the government, eliminate the money system, institute complete automation and destroy the d00ds. To be a d00d is to be deficient, emotionally limited; d00dness is a deficiency disease. The d00d is completely egocentric, trapped inside their own d00dness, incapable of empathizing or identifying with others, or love, friendship, affection of tenderness. D00ds are a completely isolated unit, incapable of rapport with anyone. Their responses are entirely visceral, not cerebral; their intelligence is a mere tool in the services of their drives and needs; the d00d is incapable of mental passion, mental interaction; they can’t relate to anything other than their own physical sensations. The d00d a half-dead, unresponsive lump, incapable of giving or receiving pleasure or happiness; consequently, the d00d is at best an utter bore, an inoffensive blob, since only those capable of absorption in others can be charming.”

Jacqueline and Noemi are committed to bringing down the patriarchy in an inclusive, fun, passionate, rage-filled, artistic, and community-oriented way. Both are studying Herstory at the bastion of privilege known as McGill University. We hope that our artistic endeavors inspire.

Espace à louer
Kathy Chagnon
Université du Québec à Montréal, Collège Édouard-Montpetit

Le projet Espace à louer est à la base une performance dans le but de dénoncer les injustices sociales reliées à l’itinérance et au capitalisme. Concrètement, j’ai erré à Montréal, carton sous le bras et pancarte à la main dans le but de me trouver des «spots» qui pourraient être loués ultérieurement aux plus offrants. Comme on loue, ou sous-loue, un appartement. Pourquoi ne pas louer une partie de la rue? Il me semble qu’il serait possible d’arriver à soustraire davantage aux plus démunis afin d’enrichir les plus riches. Bien sûr, c’est ironique. N’empêche que ça met le doigt sur un bobo. Un gros bobo de société auquel nous devons faire face.

Pour pousser le propos, j’ai fait un catalogue dans lequel on nous met en relation avec des locateurs comme pour les petites annonces. Le carton, facilement associable à l’itinérance, amène une autre question : Où sommes-nous habitués à les voir? Ou encore, où tolérons-nous de les voir? Un itinérant (ou plutôt un espace à louer pour itinérant dans ce cas-ci), dans une galerie est-ce que cela dérange? C’est aussi dans cette perspective que mon travail peut-être abordé. Donc, ma proposition est de délimiter un territoire dans la galerie à l’aide d’un carton et de le mettre à louer. Le catalogue serait laissée sur place pour consultation seulement.

Kathy Chagnon aborde, dans le cadre de sa pratique artistique, la fragilité de la vie. Par le biais de la sculpture, elle met en lumière ses propres expériences. C’est à l’aide d’un regard critique, voir ironique, sur la société qu’elle fait de la performance.

Konnectik
Dinette

Connexion, interaction, liaison, réseau…autant de termes devenus inéluctables afin de nous faire oublier notre propre besoin vital de cohésion. Nous remplaçons aisément les affinités par des câbles numériques, les communications par des moteurs de recherche : et plus si branché(e)… Une multiplication de l’amitié aussi vaste et infinie que les lignes de codes devenues raison d’être.

Et pourtant, l’abondance de l’utilisation technologique semble précipiter un inévitable détachement face à notre propre impermanence. Las de considérer les liens vitaux, humains, (oserons-nous dire sociaux ?) nous avons décidé de n’être que des spectateurs impatients devant notre déchéance. Pressés d’examiner l’implacable vérité qui masque la richesse de nos existences nous oublions le simple, le direct. De fait, la croissance des moyens mis à notre disposition précipite la dilution progressive de nos relations les plus essentielles.

L’œuvre proposée se veut être une réflexion sur les rapports humains dans leur forme la plus éthérée qui apparaît à l’heure d’aujourd’hui comme la réalité. Sommes-nous à ce point conditionnés par l’implacable ? Pouvons-nous encore être des acteurs de nous-mêmes ? À travers des formes simples, j’ai voulu mettre en évidence la contemplation forcée de la dégradation évidente des liens sociaux. L’observation d’une vérité unique par un public devenu voyeur est accentuée par le fourmillement d’amarres physiques qui dissimulent la superficialité de nos relations devenues immatérielles et inexistantes.

Géographe de formation, je suis totalement dévouée à l’exploration de la relation à l’espace, relation qui se matérialise par les émotions qui nous submergent selon le contexte territorial : dimensions urbaines plus ou moins matérielles, et univers de plus en plus déshumanisés.

Pourquoi les Femmes
le Groupe de Filles de l’École Cardinal (Hawa, Santa-Félicia, Kelly, Sabrina, Sada, Michella)
‘Bien dans ma Ville!’ Projet Modèle de Condition Féminine Canada, Femmes et Villes International

Nous avons créé un magazine en français intitulé ‘Pourquoi les femmes?’, réunissant les dessins, poèmes, pensées et chansons par et sur la vie de six adolescentes. Ce projet a émergé de nos discussions sur les relations amoureuses saines, l’image corporelle, la discrimination, la violence contre les femmes et la liberté d’expression.

Nous planifions le lancement du magazine le 28 février 2013, au Parc Bélanger – un parc situé dans le quartier où les filles habitent, à Ville Saint-Laurent. Le lancement aura pour but de donner une voix aux jeunes, pour qu’elles/ils se réapproprient le parc comme lieu qu’elles/ils pourront  fréquenter sans souffrir de discrimination ou de harcèlement.

Nous sommes un groupe de jeunes femmes de l’école Cardinal. Nous nous sommes rencontrées une fois par semaine pour participer au projet ‘Bien dans ma ville!’. Nous créons de l’art, nous explorons notre quartier, et nous discutons de sujets qui sont importants pour nous.

Why Women?
École Cardinal Girl Group (Hawa, Santa-Félicia, Kelly, Sabrina, Sada, Michella)
‘My City, My Safety!’ Status of Women Canada Blueprint Project, Women in Cities International

We created a francophone magazine called ‘Pourquoi les Femmes’ – Why Women?’, which collects the drawings, poems, thoughts, and songs of six adolescent girls on the theme of young women’s lives. The project emerged from our discussions on respectful relationships, body image, discrimination, violence against women and liberty of expression.

We will launch the magazine at Parc Bélanger – a park in the girls’ neighborhood of St-Laurent that we want to reclaim as a place for young women and youth to hang out without facing discrimination or harassment.

We are a group of young women at École Cardinal that have been meeting every week to participate in the ‘My City, My Safety!’ project – we make art, explore our neighborhood and talk about issues that matter to us.

Endangered Heroines, #1-6
Arianna Garcia-Fialdini

The body of work being submitted is composed of two triptychs of framed mixed-media prints, approximately 2Fx3F in size. The work is meant to serve as a social commentary on gender and feminism by addressing patriarchies and un-even gender power structures. This series is currently a study for a larger mural project that addresses ways in which art can serve as a tool in raising awareness for social change and/or current social and political issues.

Arianna Garcia-Fialdini’s work in paint and print media deals with issues raising awareness of gender violence and social change. From 2010 until recently, her work has been exploring the conditions of women from the marginal side-lines. In many ways, her work is a direct observation and comment on social realities with which the artist remains closely informed with. Her artistic goal is currently concentrating on story telling in the form of portraits and large scaled murals that humanize and represent socio-political experiences, whilst expressing her own perspective as a form of activism on diverse situations.

Photo Essay: Place d’armes
Freda Guttman

I am proposing an album of photographs, a photo essay on a monument in Place d’Armes, old Montreal, to Paul de Chomedey, sieur de Maisonneuve, known as the founder of Montreal. The monument, erected to glorify his memory, was unveiled on July 1, 1895, as part of the celebrations for the 250th ‘anniversary’ of Montreal in 1892. During the 1890s, a series of commemorative plaques was produced for the first time in Montreal, at the instigation of the Antiquarian and Numismatic Society. Although the monument declares that in 1644, de Maisonneuve  defeated the Iroquois at that very spot, according to Wikipedia, he was almost killed when a group of 30 Montrealers were surrounded by over 200 Iroquois, and de Maisonneuve barely managed to make it back to the safety of the nearby fort. Words engraved on the side of the monument declare that he it was his honour to have accomplished his mission which he would have done even if all the trees in Montreal had been been Iroquois. Aside from the monument itself, there are 2 plaques, one French, one English, on the wall of the HBO bank, flanking the north side of the square, which declare that de Maisonneuve killed the Iroquois chief with his bare hands.

This work is the first in a study that I intend to make over the next years of various monuments in Montreal that unwittingly expose the colonial, racist glorification in our midst, of the dispossession of the people of Turtle Island by European nations.

Freda Guttman is an activist artist whose work has been shown across Canada and many countries. Over the years, she has produced artworks related to many injustices and struggles, while at the same time, having participated as a solidarity activist in those struggles.

Birthright
Lily Hoffman
McGill University

This poem, “Birthright,” is about navigating being the descendant of holocaust survivors and belonging to a ‘people’ which have embraced ethno-nationalism in this century, while simultaneously being an anarchist anti-Zionist. The question of ‘What does my birth entitle me to?’ is posed both legitimately and ironically.

Lily is someone who writes poetry to find some avenue of expression amidst the limitations of corporate and individualist culture. She enjoys writing and reading to imagine she is not alone.

Imaging Apartheid
various artists

Imaging Apartheid is a Montreal-based initiative with a global reach aimed at bringing awareness and support to the Palestinian struggle for liberation through the production and dissemination of poster art.

We are a small collective of artists and activists who strongly believe in the intersection of art and politics as a means of advancing social change. Though this project’s focus is on the pressing issue of Israeli Apartheid, we also recognize the development of a global state of apartheid and aim to contribute to the dialogue of resistance against it. Info: imagingapartheid.org or justseeds.org

Crucifixion Picnic
John Lanthier

This painting subverts religious imagery and corporate branding to illustrate a grand theme of the struggle for individualism with the modern corporate machine. The constant advertisements we urbanites are bombarded with as we go about each day have an undeterminably powerful yet real influence on our eating habits as well as our purchases. But what does it mean for the consumer when he sees the familiar symbols he’s preconceived to view with positive sentiment entwined in a seditious artwork and loaded with a host of new associations?

In this satirical work I aim to provoke the viewer through the aggressive recontextualisation of recognizable images from history, pop culture and mass media. I borrow much from both the language of surrealism and advertising to craft a dynamic scene of a strange world where product placement has run amok. The style references renaissance landscapes and classic crucifixion scenes yet is worked with bright colors and a cartoonish approach lending it a darkly humorous quality.

I’m a young, French-Canadian, self-taught artist. I enjoy experimenting widely with a range of media and pushing the boundaries of painting by incorporating motile and tactile elements within my compositions. These mostly explore contemporary subjects utilizing a surrealist vocabulary, creatively channeling my shifting perception of life and the events and ideas which fill it. Some recurring themes in my work are the body, machines, music, religion and pop culture and they often take form in phantasmagorical dreamscapes combining vivid color, intense detail and grand settings.

Artdolls
Cassandra Marsillo
Studio Arts at Concordia University

Artdolls (2012) is a mock product for the masses. Artists often have and often still get a bad rap in society. It is still not uncommon to hear people question “Why?” or “What are you going to do though?” when I tell them I’m studying art. Our work is valued (sometimes), and yet the role of the artist is not. Inspired by a reading entitled “The Artist as Public Intellectual” by Carol Becker, I began to question why people could turn to art for healing, contemplation, and even for answers to tough questions, but why we still cannot, as a society, take art and artists seriously.

With this piece, I have turned the stereotypical artists (The Philosopher, The Madman, The Art Star and The Bohemian) into consumer products. The accompanying brochure reassures the consumer that one does not have to “ruin their reputation” or get involved with the “negative influence” of the art milieu to understand it. The four dolls are men, as male artists have dominated art history, and they each represent the ultimate stereotype of the character they are given (with inspiration from actual artists of course: diamond-encrusted skull anyone?).

Artdolls is a tongue-in-cheek response to society’s ‘art needs’, feigning educational value, while they continue to make and permeate the same assumptions people have already made. The piece aims to create a discussion about these stereotypes, and therefore a discussion about our society’s view on art and the artist, which is the core issue Artdolls seeks to represent.

Cassandra Marsillo is a multi-disciplinary artist working in sculpture, installation, fibres and performance. She is currently an undergraduate student majoring in Studio Arts at Concordia University.

Ruptures; De la cuisine à la Rue; Le temps, le travail, la routine tuent; Sortir de la machine
Tournesol Plante

Tournesol Plante est un artiste-peintre, connu pour son implication dans la communauté anarchiste de Montréal depuis plusieurs années. Il a participé à plusieurs évènements artistiques, notamment, ceux du Salon du Livre Anarchiste de Montréal, de l’exposition Art + Anarchie en mai 2007 et de Art in Action à l’hiver 2012. Il a également plusieurs autres expositions personnelles à son actif dans des bars, des cafés ou des salons de tatouage. S’inspirant du mouvement punk, de la philosophie situationniste et des peintres expressionnistes allemands, il nous livre des oeuvres chargées politiquement sur la guerre et la consommation pour en citer quelques exemples. Ses peintures, comme ses sculptures, sont un amalgame d’objets trouvés, de collages, d’images de la vie courante et qui finissent par donner une sorte de “Patchwork-Painting”.

No Justice, No Peace
Jesse Purcell
Justseeds

No Justice No Peace is a poster made in support of recent indigenous uprisings.

Jesse Purcell is an artist, designer and professional printmaker living and working in Montréal, Québec. He is a member of Justseeds Artitists’ Cooperative a decentralized network of 24 artists committed to making print and design work that reflects an engaged social and environmental position.

Untitled Paintings
Shannon Willmott

These paintings are about history and the weight of the legacy we are struggling under. We cannot escape all of the atrocities that have happened on this earth – to the land, to the animals and to each other. It is a terrible and ongoing weight. The feelings that motivated the making of these paintings ask me, how will you continue? How will you intervene? What can be done?

Shannon Willmott is an artist, a counsellor and a harm reduction worker in Ottawa. She is a member of Rama First Nation and hangs around with Anarchists.

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Art In Action is organized and presented by QPIRG Concordia, and endorsed by the Fine Arts Students Alliance (FASA) and QPIRG McGill. // Art En Action est organisée et présentée par le GRIP à Concordia, et endossé par l’Alliance des Étudiants et Étudiantes en Beaux-Arts à Concordia et le GRIP à McGill.

INFO: www.qpirgconcordia.org/studyinaction
514-848-7585 – artinaction@qpirgconcordia.org
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Le Groupe de recherche d’intérêt public du Québec à Concordia (GRIP Concordia)
The Quebec Public Interest Research Group at Concordia University (QPIRG Concordia)

Your campus-community link for social change!
Nous sommes situés à / We are located at:

1500 de Maisonneuve Ouest, # 204
tél: 514-848-7585 – fax: 514-848-7584
Heures d’ouvertures : lundi à jeudi, 12h-18h
Office Hours: M-Th, 12-6pm
http://qpirgconcordia.org

To stay up-to-date about QPIRG Concordia activities:
-> Follow us on twitter: http://www.twitter.com/QPIRGConcordia
-> Join our facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/QPIRGConcordiaGRIPConcordia

STUDY IN ACTION 2013:

SATURDAY & SUNDAY, MARCH 16-17, 2013
at Concordia University, MONTREAL
info: www.qpirgconcordia.org/studyinaction

Workshop and panel topics include:
Radical Pedagogy – The Quebec Student Strike – Migration – Indigenous Sovereignty – Gentrification – Public Space – Food Security – Gender & Feminism – Decolonization – Police & Policing – Alternative Media – Prisons – Language & Culture (full details below)

- Free & welcome to all!
- Wheelchair accessible.
- Free childcare on-site during the conference.
- Whisper translation in English and French will be available
- Vegan lunch served on Saturday and Sunday
- Attend one panel, workshop or event, or attend them all!

* As part of Study In Action:
ART IN ACTION
MARCH 11-17 at Concordia University
7th Floor, 1455 de Maisonneuve West

ART IN ACTION highlights creative expression on social and environmental justice issues through diverse mediums.
INFO: http://www.qpirgconcordia.org/?p=4299
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STUDY IN ACTION is a grassroots undergraduate and community research conference featuring contributions to social and environmental justice research by students, community organizers, and artists. Co-presented by QPIRG McGill and QPIRG Concordia, this year’s conference will take place between March 14-17th.

STUDY IN ACTION SCHEDULE (MAY 16-17)

SATURDAY MARCH 16th

* 9:30am – People’s Potato, 7th Floor (1455 de Maisonneuve West)
Breakfast