ISSUE 02
PHOTOS SUBMITTED BETWEEN AUG 20 – SEPT 23, 2016.
FREE
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Tyler Logan
Archive is Vancouver’s people-powered magazine.
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ARCHIVE MAGAZINE
H OW A R C H I V E WO R K S Our app finds the most popular photos in Vancouver and we publish them in a monthly magazine.
H OW T H E A P P WO R K S
It’s like Tinder for photography. Swipe up if you like a photo. Swipe sideways if you don’t care. If a photo sucks, swipe it down. You can swipe a photo only once, every swipe is equal, and all swipes are kept secret. Each photo is assigned a score based on these swipes. SUBMISSION DEADLINE
There’s a timer in the app that counts backwards from thirty days. When it reaches zero we stop counting swipes, pull the winning photos off the server, and make the magazine. A week later, copies of Archive can be found in cafés, restaurants, and shops across Vancouver. W H AT TO P H O TO G R A P H
There are four categories for your photos: People, Places, Things, and Monthly. People is self explanatory. If a person is the focus of your photo it belongs in the people category. Places is for photos on a big scale like sunsets, landscapes, beaches, or architecture. Things is for the small stuff like food or animals. If the subject of the photo could fit in your living room, it belongs in the things category.
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Monthly will change every issue. It could be tattoos, the beach, cats, or black and white photos. Its purpose is to make each magazine different. If you’d like to suggest a monthly category, email it to info@elective.ca. W H AT N O T TO P H O TO G R A P H
Don’t be antisocial. Don’t post nudes. Don’t embarrass people. Don’t upload copyrighted material. Don’t post photos with watermarks. Don’t use the service to try to sell products. For fuck’s sake, do NOT post inspirational quotes. There are lots of ways to be a jerk with a camera, please avoid them all. If you encounter a photo that breaks one of these rules you can bring it to our attention by touching the three dots beside the photographer’s name. We will review it as soon as possible. T H E P H O TO S T R E A M
The default photostream consists of every photo on the network presented in reverse chronological order (newest to oldest). You can refine your stream at any time by touching the sandwich icon in the top left corner of the app. Browse a category by touching People, Places, or Things. If you want easy access to the photos your friends have submitted, touch the Following filter.
L E A D E R B OA R D
Top Photos is a list of the top 50 images based on score. It resets each month. Top Photographers is a list of people ranked by the average score of their five best photos in a given month. The winner will be interviewed and given a six-page spread to showcase their best photography in the following month’s magazine. CO M M E N T S
We didn’t include commenting in the app because user-generated comment sections often devolve into an orgy of racism and harassment. Instead, we will hand-pick someone from Vancouver each month to provide the text that accompanies the photography in the magazine. That person might be a comedian, a musician, or a bartender. Their profession is irrelevant so long as their comments are insightful, interesting, or funny. If you would like to be the commenter, read the three questions below and send your answers to info@elective.ca. 1. If you could fight one person from Vancouver (past or present, alive or dead) who would it be and why? 2. What is the worst restaurant (or bar) in Vancouver that is secretly good, and why? 3. Use a metaphor or simile to describe how people in Vancouver dress.
T H E M AT H
Photo scores are based on this formula.
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For context, 1000 is a perfect score, 500 is right in the middle, and 0 is the worst photo you’ve ever seen.
TRU E STORIES
Our readers submit stories about their lives and we publish them. A story should be between 1200 and 1500 words, set in Vancouver, and based on real events. We pay $100 for any story that ends up in print. If interested, email a draft of your story to info@elective.ca. We are hiring writers for other elements of the magazine. If you’d like to write for Archive, True Stories is a good way to introduce us to your writing.
W H AT S N E W I N T H E A P P : P H O TO S YO U L I K E D
Photos You Liked is an Instagram-style feed that allows you to scroll through all the photos you thought were cool. If you swipe something up on the home screen it’s automatically stored in the Photos You Liked feed so you can see it later. You can access Photos You Liked by touching the tick mark in the navigation bar beside the home button (You may need to update the app first.)
F E E D B AC K
Nothing is more valuable than accurate criticism. If you have any comments, complaints, or ideas about how we could make a better magazine or do a better job running Archive please email them to info@elective.ca. I read every message and will respond when I can. BUGS
If the app isn’t working the way you think it should be working, that’s something we want to fix. Archive is still in its early stages and we want to build the best possible experience. If you notice something buggy, think something could be made better, or you want to get involved in other ways please send an email to info@elective.ca. T H E M AG A Z I N E
Archive is a record of the moments that animate life in Vancouver.
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VA N C O U V E R
APRIL 2016 PUBLISHER
Elective Media Inc.
CTO
Allan Harding allanharding@elective.ca
EDITORS AT LARGE
EIC
Samuel Kerr samuelkerr@elective.ca
COPY EDITOR
Douglas Haddow Michael Mann
John Lucas
DESIGN DIRECTOR
SALES
Karim Kadi
UBC REPRESENTATIVE
Steven Hu
BUSINESS INQUIRIES
info@elective.ca
Matt Coolen
PRINTING PARTNER
Still Creek Press
COMPLAINTS
samuelkerr@elective.ca
ADDRESS
1012-207 West Hastings Street Vancouver, BC V6B 1H7
archiveapp
www.archive.live
466 Art Pohl
Developed with the participation of Creative BC and the British Columbia Arts Council
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the fine jewellery shoppe
#HowFarWouldYouGo | @CavalierGastown
www.cavaliergastown.com | 604.681.0047 217 W.Hastings St. Vancouver, BC A R C H I V E 7
ISSUE 02 | OCTOBER
Contents 08 Editor’s Letter 10
Staff Picks
19 Adult Colouring Book 581
Art by Rhek
42 From the Archive
Jeanine Solomon
20 In Your Mouth with David Stansfield 24 People
Of Rats and Men by Sam Kerr
Comments by Andrew Barber
60 Based on a True Story
47 Places
Horse and Pony Show By Jeff Anderson
Comments by Matthew Kerr
74 Top Photographer 62 Things
Willem Betts
Comments by Dusty Baker
92 A Vancouver Crossword (with dick jokes)
80 Dogs of YVR
Harrison Mooney and Merlin Von Duck
Comments by the Archive Staff
94 A Walk Amongst The Millionaires By Douglas Haddow
96 Top Rated Photo of Them All
ARCHIVE VANCOUVER IS MADE POSSIBLE WITH THE GENEROUS SUPPORT OF THESE LOCAL BUSINESSES. IF YOU LIKE ARCHIVE SUPPORT OUR FRIENDS.
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Hand Crafted Cocktails & Nigiri Specials Every Night Starting at 5:30pm 6 POWELL ST. GASTOWN www.di6mond.com diamondgastown
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421 Michael Frost
HOW WE CHOSE THE COVER — This month we wanted something visually appealing, and this photo reminded us of many things we find visually appealing: Walt Disney, Minnie Mouse, public transit, eating on public transit, and watching people eat while on public transit. 583
Katie Armstrong
Editor’s Letter Let’s get negative.
It’s a bad idea to upload photos in bulk. When you upload too many photos in a row, we’re forced to see them all in a row and that creates a bad experience for everyone who’s swiping. This bad experience leads to bad scores for the person who did the bulk upload. It doesn’t matter how good the photos are, people just get sick of seeing the same photographer over and over again. When I see more than five in a row from the same person, I swipe down on every successive photo until the name at the top of the screen changes. It’s my way of punishing what I consider to be bad manners. So, if you want to get in the magazine, it’s in your interest to consider how your uploads will be received by the community of users. Pick your best photos and upload them sporadically. A good rule of thumb is no more than five at a time. The in-app experience is important to us. That’s why we’re constantly trying to improve the software. For example, our power users swipe through every single photo, multiple times a day. This enthusiasm used to lead them to a dead end in the app where there was nothing left to see. That’s no way to treat your best users. To tackle this problem we built a new feature called Photos You Liked. It’s a feed that lets you to scroll through all the photos you thought were cool. If you swipe up on a photo it’s automatically stored in the new feed so you can see it later. You can access Photos You Liked by touching the tick mark in the navigation bar beside the Home button. (You may need to update the app first.) One last note about the Archive app: the number of down swipes has increased dramatically. In the first issue, approximately 25% of all swipes went down. Now that number is closer to 50%. This is a very good thing. Your discerning eye has made the October issue of Archive Vancouver much, much better than its predecessor. So, give in to your anger. Use your aggressive feelings. Let the hate flow through you. Only then will you know the power of the dark side. SAM KERR 10 ARCHIVE
STOCKISTS C H I N AT OW N El Kartel – 104 E Pender St
G A S T OW N The Latest Scoop – 159 Water St Save On Meats – 43 W Hastings St
MAIN STREET Still Life – 2315 Main St Eugene Choo – 3683 Main St
KITS Gravity Pope – 2203 W 4th Ave
YA L E T OW N Small Victory – 1088 Homer St
WEST END Little Sisters – 1238 Davie St
CO M M E R C I A L The Drive Skate Shop – 1997 Commercial Dr
— CHECK OUR WEBSITE AND SOCIAL MEDIA FOR A LIST OF ALL LOCATIONS.
@postmarkbrewing | #EnjoyYourPostmark
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Archive Staff Picks Each month we happen upon photos that we absolutely have to feature. Whether it’s because we’re sick of the sunset photographs or the photo is simply too great to pass by, here are the photos we just couldn’t let go.
SAM KERR
This pug will literally go eyeball-deep into another dog’s puckered bunghole to get a sniff, but put him beside a tulip and he stares at you like you just fed him a spoonful of xylitol.
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Kelsey Yates
MICHAEL MANN
368 Michael Mann
This past month, Archive users were delighted by what artists iHeart, Scott Sueme, Ola Volo, and many more did for the inaugural Vancouver Mural Festival. However this fine work by an anonymous artist was our favourite. W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E     1 3
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A R C H I V E S TA F F P I C K S
SAM KERR
I’ve now been on Dragon’s Den no It’s either that I force my customers fewer than eight times pitching my to burrow through five hundred “Shawshank Reality Experience”. yards of shit-smelling foulness I can’t For the life of me I can’t understand even imagine. Or the fact that I do why it keeps getting rejected but I’ve the pitch in a Morgan Freeman voice narrowed it down to two possibilities. and blackface.
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- WHY THE TUCK NOT? www.thetuckshoppe.com | 604.620.6773 | 237 Union St. Vancouver, BC
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266 Michael Milardo
D O U G L A S H A D D OW
What is the measure of a man? Is it his shoe size or how big his biceps are? Is it how much weight he can carry on his shoulders, or can it be traced from the contours of his skull? Some might say it’s down to his, ahem… special bits. But perhaps a man’s substance and spirit
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cannot be reduced to any single organ or appendage. Perhaps it is found in his actions, choices, and intent. No, that can’t be right. It’s probably his wrists. Yes, a man can definitely be measured by how girthy his wrists are.
919 Granville Street www.studiorecords.ca @studiogranville
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A R C H I V E S TA F F P I C K S
329 Art Pohl KARIM KADI
This is pretty reminiscent to how you might have found me last night. Drunk. Thanks Junction. I have to work today.
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Once a month, A Better Life Foundation invites some of the city’s finest chefs to our commissary kitchen at Save On Meats to develop a once in a lifetime diner style menu through 4 courses thoughtfully paired with craft cocktails. The results are delicious. All proceeds go to supporting A Better Life Foundation’s efforts to increase food security in the DTES through meal programs, education and employment. B
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Photography by: Luis Alberto Valdizon @abetterlifefoundation | @saveonmeats
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373 Michael Frost
September’s Winner Colour it in. Take a picture. Upload it into Things. We’ll print the best ones next month.
319 Ashley Notnap 20 ARCHIVE
Art by Justin gradin
R ADULT COLOURING BOOK “WE ARE ALL CANUCKS”
Art by Rhek
www.rhekcreative.com
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IN YOUR MOUTH with David Stansfield David began his wine career as a teenage cellar hand 20 years ago. Today, he works as an independent sommelier for Vancouver Urban Winery, Tap & Barrel, Cuchillo, and Bestie. He is a co-host of the popular Sunday School wine school. He also drinks beer.
Vices love rituals. Often the only thing separating the connoisseur from the unconscious face-stuffer is a strict code of etiquette. You aren’t just what you eat, but how. Cramming your face with crackers and juice becomes something altogether different when done in church. Rituals elevate vices. They take them from the gutter to the ivory tower. I’m not an alcoholic. I’m an aficionado. (Likely both.) It’s silly that something that amounts to a secret handshake should have such power, but it does. There’s a bit in the 1987 Japanese movie Tampopo that illustrates just what I’m talking about. In it, an old noodle master teaches a young man the correct way to eat a bowl of noodle soup. He transforms the simple act of eating ramen into a religious experience through a ritualistic set of noodle slurping and pork caressing. It’s an absurd scene, but it changed my life, or at least the way I approach soup. Food and drink rituals force us to slow down and savour. That’s a good thing. After all, your parents were right: it’s not a race. Okanagan Spirits Taboo Absinthe $52.99 x 500mL – BCL
super corny. If you don’t own the proper rig, Prohibition at the Hotel Georgia offers a full-service absinthe experience for $35 per person. Zest Japanese Cuisine Chef’s Omakase Kaiseki Course Approximately $100 a person I eat too much grocery-store sushi. Cold, sad, shrink-wrapped rolls of shame. Rice plugs in the infinite pit of hunger. It’s food devoid of pleasure: just nutrients and waste. Jiro’s nightmare. Japanese food in Vancouver can be so much more than glum trays of dead fish. Some of the best is found in a short strip mall at 16th and MacDonald at Zest Japanese Cuisine. The dishes here are alive, artful, and expensive. Order the Omakase (roughly: “I’ll leave it up to you”) and that’s it. Sit back as food arrives in gentle waves. You won’t leave stuffed, but replenished. Opium $13/g
There is an art to a well-rolled joint. An art I don’t possess. My joints resemble Tolstoy’s description of unhappy families: Drinking absinthe requires patience. If you shoot it, you’re each unhappy in its own way. My hippie neighbour, on the an ass, and not the wild bohemian you imagine. Absinthe is an herbal spirit rather than a liqueur. It’s potent and bitter. other hand, rolls immaculate bats time after time. It’s the art of repetitive motion rather than inflamed creativity. Like Lao Hence the ritual of dripping ice water through a sugar cube on top of a slotted spoon placed above the glass to dilute Tzu, he suggests, “simplicity, patience, compassion” but also “a good grinder, papers, and time.” Good weed helps too. Try and sweeten it. the very heady, award-winning Opium strain. It’s a 50/50 Okanagan Spirits makes a proper absinthe flavoured Indica/Sativa hybrid, with dense buds that break down into with whole herbs like fennel, anise, lemon balm, and both more than seems possible. Roll judiciously. This stuff is strong. petite and grande wormwood. They named it Taboo, which nods to the myths and sex appeal of absinthe, but is also
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Get Stuffed! Join SUNDAY CIDER for our harvest social... on a Saturday! celebrate BC’s bounty with craft CIDER, fine food and merriment.
*1575 vernon dr - 1-7 pm - Little people ‘n dogS welcome - Get a Growler to-go too!
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September By The Numbers Photos by
P E O P LE
P L AC E S
TH I N G S
M O NTH LY
TOTA L
TOTA L S
278
484
211
178
1151
P E O P LE
P L AC E S
TH I N G S
M O NTH LY
TOTA L S
4,271
9,810
3,218
3,355
20,654
3,756
6,690
2,677
2,256
15,379
8,366
13,260
6,404
5,399
33,429
16,393
29,760
12,299
11,010
69,462
Votes
TOTA L S
H I G H E S T SCO R E
Operating System
TOTA L S
75 8
LOW E S T SCO R E
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A N D RO I D
64.6%
35.4%
Providers
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Top Photographers is a list of people ranked by the average score of their five best photos in a given month. The winner will be interviewed and given a sixpage spread to showcase their best photography in the following month’s magazine. Rank
Name
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Paul Plancich
699
2
Tyler Logan
3
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AV E R AG E SCO R E
408
S H AW
TE LU S
RO G E R S
B E LL
46%
28%
15%
11%
Congratulations to Paul Plancich on winning a spread in next month’s magazine. If we don’t get ahold of you, please email info@elective.ca
Name
Avg. Score
6
Michael Frost
595
629
7
Kimberley Station
595
Olivia Prior
623
8
Justin Veenema
592
4
Amy Barber
611
9
Jeanine Solomon
585
5
Alison Boulier
601
10
Erin Kerr
580
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Rank
Proud Printer of
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PEOPLE 26 ARCHIVE
Each month, we choose people from Vancouver to supply the comments that accompany the photos in the magazine. If you would like to be the commenter, check the questionnaire on page 3 and send your answers to info@elective.ca.
*Comments are marked with the commenter’s initials. archive’s are in pink.
Commenter of the Month
ANDREW BARBER Andrew Barber is a comedian, actor, and improvisor. He’s made video sketches for over 8 years that can all be seen on YouTube! Some videos went viral. Some videos made his parents disappointed in him.
485
Katie Armstrong
500 Alison Boulier
AB: Pocket the tuition money from Grandma and just buy the t-shirt. Karen did, and you know what, things are going really great for her right now. Grandma will never know and she’s probably gonna die soon anyway. You heard that cough she had last time we were over there.
: You know the Mentos commercial with the really catchy song? Nothing gets to you, staying fresh staying cool, with Mentos fresh and full of life! Yeah, that one. When I was a teenager I recorded it off my TV then used AV cables to isolate the audio so I could put that song on a cassette tape. Whenever I went to a job interview I’d put the tape into my Walkman and listen to the Mentos theme at full volume. Now I’m the Prime Minister of Canada.
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520 Alison Boulier
500
Kayla MacKenzie
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555
Katie Kerluke
515
AB: Tiffany takes 10 minute breaks on the hour to get away from her ugly friends and remind herself how much beauty there is in the world.
Katie Armstrong
513 Megan Kwan
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555 Art Pohl
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Katie Armstrong
AB: (Left) Aiden left his life as an East Van barista behind. He would revive the train-hopping-hobo trend, and ditch it before it became popular.
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506 Michael Frost
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: Whenever I get a hot bag from McDonald’s I always buy two large fries—one for myself to eat, and the other for more abstract reasons. The first reason is the fries radiate a lot of heat, which helps keep the hot bag real hot. Second, you can tell a lot about a person’s character based on how they treat other people’s fries, and my girlfriend has the moral compass of a hyena. Those backup fries have saved my relationship many times over the years. What I’m trying to say is enduring love costs $1.79. Even less if you buy a combo.
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493 Brent Fulton
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475 Michael Frost
AB: A month after Kelly and Veronica started listening to Aerosmith, their transformation into Steven Tyler had begun. In a year’s time they would be unrecognizable.
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462 Michael Frost
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460 Alison Boulier
AB: Fact: Tall grass to children = Catnip to felines.
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Tyler Logan
470 Angela Reading
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517 Maeghan Stocker
: What’s up with everyone on Tinder having a boat? And why do I never match with them? This looks fun.
457 Amy Barber
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616 Amy Barber
AB: Some walk the trail to see nature. Some do it to exercise. Karen does it to try and catch a glimpse of Zalrock, the world’s sexiest bridge troll.
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Kayla MacKenzie
Jeanine Solomon
Paul Plancich
AB: Nothing beats sitting in a natural hot spring with a gorgeous view of your freshas-fuck $90 pedicure.
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534 Amy Barber
: Sometimes it’s good to operate outside your comfort zone. Taking chances is the best way to feel alive. So, go ahead, ghostride the whip. Eat an entire large pizza. Twerk like nobody’s watching. Stop paying your credit card bill. Get in a fight online. Take up smoking. Buy a condo. Keep a half bottle of vodka under the passenger seat. Live the no condom lifestyle. Carpe diem.
493 Matthew Miller
468
Paul Plancich
AB: What if every molecule in the universe has another universe inside of it. You ever thought about that? It’s okay if you haven’t, but give it a shot. What have you got to lose?
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468
Jeanine Solomon
524 Angela Reading
479 Alison Boulier
641 Erin Kerr
AB: Sure, no one else could see Murphy, but that didn’t stop him from being Carrie’s best friend in the whole world.
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481 Alison Boulier
445
Katie Armstrong
439
Katie Kerluke
: Famous rapper Chippy Nonstop loves the D. 40 ARCHIVE
AB: Describe yourself using three fictional characters: two Golden Girls and 2Pac. 461
Katie Armstrong
AB: Just then, for reasons we’ll never know, the weight of the world crushed lil’ baby Angela. She wouldn’t vote for another 17 years, but in that moment, she became an adult. 452 Alison Boulier
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467 Robert Huynh
AB: Trying is lying! If you want to get something done in this world, you’ve got to set a date and make a plan. Book off an evening. Start by ordering some food, maybe a pizza. You’ll need it for the long night ahead. Find a pen and
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paper. Write down some good ideas but first you might as well grab a beer. I mean, we’ve got all night to work hard. Go ahead and turn that PS4 on and let’s hit the bong a lil’ bit, dawg.
@andrewjbarber W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 4 3
Of Rats And Men — 44 ARCHIVE
BY S A M K E R R
In December of 1989 Rick Gibson issued a press release detailing his plan to drop a 25 kilogram concrete block onto a live rat in public. The block’s gravitational force would crush the rodent between two canvases and its remains would create a diptych. This free art lesson would take place at noon on Saturday January 6, 1990, at the corner of Burrard and Robson. The rat’s name was Sniffy.
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n December 28, 1989 the Province ran a short column titled “Sniffy Faces an Awful End”. It featured a photo of Gibson, dressed in a black suit, standing beside his custom-made rat-crushing mechanism. Sunglasses covered his eyes. Sniffy appeared content inside a transparent container which was resting atop a sign that read “This rat is going to die.” The public outrage was immediate and intense. Local and international media savaged Gibson relentlessly. The word artist began appearing between scare quotes. He was accused of nihilism and zoosadism. Personal-grievance essays disguised as think-pieces framed Sniffy as a metaphor for the ceaseless degradation of Canadian society. In a particularly hysterical letter to the editor, Mrs. E.O. Mason of Vancouver compared Gibson to Clifford Olson, a serial killer convicted of murdering 11 children. Ingrid Pollak of the Vancouver Humane Society attempted to use a legal injunction to save Sniffy’s life. Gibson pointed out that under Canadian law there are certain animals that can legally be killed so long as the animal does not suffer, and rats are one of them. Sniffy had been purchased at a pet store that sold live rats as food for snakes. Gibson’s crushing mechanism would ensure that Sniffy would feel no pain because his death would be instantaneous, plus he’d be spared the psychological trauma of being fed to a fucking python. The injunction failed. Gibson may have won the legal battle but the court of public opinion was unmoved by his line of reasoning. In the days leading up to the event, negative public sentiment intensified. Gibson became the victim of violent threats. “Judging by the calls I’ve been getting, if I were him, I’d be
frightened,” said John Vander Hoven of the Vancouver SPCA. The artist remained undeterred. “For the life of me I can’t tell the difference between what I’m doing and what they do when they have rats in the house,” Gibson said. “I’m giving a public demonstration, a free art lesson, to show people how they could do this themselves. People will be able to crush all sorts of creatures in the comfort of their own homes… to see what kind of patterns they get.” Sniffy’s execution would go on as planned. Shortly after one o’clock on January 6, Gibson arrived at the corner of Robson and Burrard. He found a scrum of television reporters and an enraged mob of over 300 protesters, all demanding Sniffy’s reprieve. What came next was the most audacious act of performance art that Vancouver had ever seen.
In the fall of 1982 Rick Gibson held an exhibition at Pitt Gallery in Vancouver’s Chinatown. It was called Dead Animals and it provides insight into the style of art that would define Gibson’s career. He had become proficient at freeze-drying perishable materials and arranging them to be interpreted as sculpture. The ethical problems associated with freeze-drying and using animal parts or disembodied human organs as art supplies was woven into the meaning of each piece. For example, his piece Some Career Options for Chickens depicted an arrangement of freeze-dried chicks in a red and white Ernie’s Fried Chicken bucket. Another work titled I Own a Uterus with a Paint Job was a painted uterus. In Gibson’s words, “At the center of this wall mounted display is a freeze-dried human uterus. It is pinned to
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FROM THE ARCHIVE —
copies of the catalogue page I ordered it from, my purchase receipt and the signed customs forms I used to import it into Canada.” Although the pieces were not necessarily aesthetically attractive, they generated a visceral reaction from the audience. Dead Animals made clear that Gibson was not interested in creating decorations or building entertainment for the masses. He wasn’t a doodler. The aim was to provoke discussion around areas of life where human morality did not match our behaviour. Audience reaction, positive or negative, seemed to be his motivation. The following year Gibson moved to London, England. He opened Dead Animals again but the exhibition didn’t receive the same level of fanfare. England’s art market had grown conservative and the galleries were reluctant to show controversial work. They wanted art that would sell to customers and Gibson’s work was not a commercial draw.
seconds and lights would flash. The aim of the piece was for audience members to insert enough money that the flies would make their way from cube X into cube Z where they would be trapped and eaten by the spider. The exhibition was cut short when a group of animal-rights activists threw a brick through the gallery’s front window. During this period of Gibson’s career he befriended some performance artists from the Brixton Artists’ Collective. Performance art suited Gibson because it did not require a gallery, it was cheap to produce, and its purpose was to provoke audience responses. In 1986 Gibson was still experimenting with sculptures made from human organs but obtaining supplies had become difficult. So, he turned this challenge into his first performance piece. Gibson knew that some portion of the general public kept preserved human organs in their homes but he had no idea how to identify them. The performance piece Obtaining Art
This economic reality compelled Gibson to make a choice: change his work to suit the galleries or pick a different venue to communicate his ideas. In 1984 Gibson built two coin-operated sculptures. The first was called Pain Dispenser. It was a narrow orange box built in the shape of a stand-up arcade game. At its top was a sign that read, “HEY, Give Yourself a Painful Shock for Only 5p.” When a patron inserted a coin the machine delivered a 6000-volt shock for three seconds. There was another sign on the machine that read, “A low cost, easy to use, clean source of pain.” Gibson exhibited the Pain Dispenser at three London nightclubs and it was used by 1,257 customers, generating £62.85. The second sculpture was called Fly Meat and it contained live animals. The sculpture consisted of three adjacent transparent cubes marked X, Y, and Z, which were connected by small circular doors. A number of common house flies could be found inside cube X and a large spider with an extensive web was in cube Z. When a patron inserted a coin, the doors between the cubes would open for three
Supplies was an opportunity to broadcast his demand for preserved human organs to the general public. He wrote the message, “WANTED, legally preserved HUMAN FETUSES” onto a sandwich board, draped it over a sheepdog, then he took the pet for a walk down Broad Street in Reading. People were not happy. “Shoppers Hurl Abuse at Grisly Limbs Appeal” was the headline in the Reading Evening Post the following day. A second performance of Obtaining Art Supplies was cut short when Gibson was arrested and charged with behaviour likely to cause a breach of the peace. In spite of the legal kerfuffle, Obtaining Art Supplies had its desired effect. A British anatomy professor gave Gibson a pair of human fetuses that had been preserved in formaldehyde for 20 years. Once freeze-dried, these fetuses would become the most ambitious gallery piece of Gibson’s career: Human Earrings. At first glance, the sculpture was little more than the head and neck of a female mannequin. Her hair was dark, voluminous, teased and sprayed, and cut short at the ears. She had high cheekbones accented with blush and her lips were painted red. Her eyes were large,
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brown, and inviting. Dangling from the mannequin’s ears were two freeze-dried human fetuses at ten weeks gestation. The exhibition took place on December 3, 1987 at the Young Unknowns Gallery in South London and it lasted less than two hours. Both Gibson and the gallery owner, Peter Sylveire, were arrested on charges of exhibiting a public nuisance and outraging public decency. The sculpture was taken into custody and never returned. (It is alleged to be somewhere in Scotland Yard’s Black Museum.) Unlike Gibson’s previous controversies, this one would end up in court. The trial wasn’t set to begin until early 1989 so Gibson had the better part of a year to cause more trouble. To demonstrate his frustration with the British legal system, he staged a one-day show in early 1988 titled Ratman. It was a very simple performance. Gibson inserted a live rat into a cage, attached the cage to the front of an orange motorcycle
tonsil canape and became the first man to legally commit cannibalism in the United Kingdom’s history. On January 30, 1989 Gibson and Sylveire appeared in court at the Old Bailey to plead not guilty to the common law offence of outraging public decency. Their case was basically fucked from the outset. The United Kingdom does not have the same legal protections for free expression that exist in the United States so the judge refused to hear any defence based on the implied meaning or intrinsic artistic merit of the sculpture. The only matter to be argued before the court was whether the act of displaying fetus earrings constituted an offence against public decency, a fact to be determined by the jury. Twelve individuals would effectively set a legal standard in the United Kingdom on what was or wasn’t acceptable for public display. After five hours of deliberation on the eighth day of the trial, the jury found the defendants guilty. In handing
helmet, then donned the helmet and spent the day speaking down his decision the judge commented, “There are some with strangers in front of the Director of Public Prosecutions things which, although in your view have artistic merit, office at Queen Anne’s Gate. It should be noted, in George are nonetheless so offensive that the public simply will Orwell’s novel 1984, the Ministry of Love trapped Winston not tolerate their exhibition.” Gibson was fined £500 and Smith in room 101 and attempted to systematically destroy Sylveire £350. Shortly after the trial, Gibson moved back to Canada. He his individuality by forcing him to wear a mask with a rat announced his return to the local art scene on July 14, 1989 trapped inside. The next act of defiance involved cannibalism. Numerous with A Cannibal in Vancouver. It was the same concept he run-ins with the authorities had driven Gibson to familiarize had executed in London save for two details: it would take himself with British law and during his study he learned place at Pitt Gallery rather than on the street and he would that Britain had no specific law against cannibalism. When eat a human testicle instead of a tonsil. The police stormed a friend gave him a pair of human tonsils to use as art the gallery, seized the testicles, and charged Gibson with supplies Gibson decided to eat them. The performance the public exhibition of a disgusting object. Gibson’s lawyer piece was titled A Cannibal in England and it took place in rightly saw this case as an excellent opportunity to challenge North London on July 19, 1988. The tonsils were prepared section 163.2b of the criminal code as unconstitutional but as a canape, placed on a water biscuit with parsley and a the Crown never prosecuted the charge. Gibson’s next performance piece was titled Kill. He white spread. (Possibly cheese.) He wore a sandwich board over his shoulders which read, “Meet A Cannibal at Erskine built a large white sign that prominently displayed the word Road” and walked around Walthamstow Market. When “Kill” in a typeface that was borrowed from a box of slug the onlooking crowd grew large enough Gibson ate the bait. Gibson took the sign to south Granville and used it to W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 4 7
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start conversations about the ethics of killing garden slugs. Kill highlighted the discrepancy between popular morality and the law, with respect to animal rights, a theme Gibson would revisit three months later on the corner of Robson and Burrard with the finest performance piece of his career: Sniffy the Rat.
Around 10:25 AM on January 6, 1990, Rick Gibson began loading a van he had rented to transport his rat-crushing mechanism to the corner of Robson and Burrard. He was unaware that several members of an animal-rights organization called Lifeforce were hiding in the bushes outside his home. They had been there all morning. When the moment was right the activists ambushed Gibson and stole his equipment. He was outnumbered five to one so he didn’t put up any resistance, instead he went back inside his house and phoned the police. But Sniffy was still in his possession. Without the rat-crushing mechanism Gibson couldn’t be sure that Sniffy would die in a painless manner. The art would be perverted if the death was not carried out in a humane way so Gibson knew the show was over. Resigned to this reality, he took the bus across town and returned Sniffy to the West End pet store where he bought the famous rat. Then he made his way to the corner of Robson and Burrard. An impatient and angry mob was waiting for him. Susan Milne, a writer for Noise Magazine, described Gibson’s arrival thusly, “The crowd is increasing, people noticing the commotion, shouts of ‘there he is’ reverberate through the Saturday shopping atmosphere. Our walk is impeded by dozens of large flash cameras, video recording devices, audio boom mikes, all walking backwards down the street in front of us.” Gibson pushed into the centre of the crowd. Once satisfied with his position he climbed atop a newspaper stand and informed the masses of the bad news. “The performance had to be cancelled. I have returned Sniffy to the pet store I rented him from. If you are still interested in the welfare of Sniffy, you can proceed to Aquariums West, that is, if it’s not too late. Because at this very moment he may be in the process of being purchased by someone who will feed him to a reptile this afternoon.” The speech did absolutely nothing to placate the anger of the mob. If rodent blood was not to be spilled then a human sacrifice would take its place. Insults became threats. The hostility grew menacing. An old man wearing a camouflage jacket grabbed Gibson by the arm and said, “You’re a fucking asshole, you should be shot. I’d like to squish your head between two rocks.” Another man poked a finger into Gibson’s chest, called him a monster and said “We should be killing you.” Another animal lover said, “Let’s beat the fuck out of him for art.” 48 ARCHIVE
Then someone punched Gibson in the back of the head. He attempted to leave but a scrum of reporters blocked his path. They jammed microphones in his face and demanded an explanation. Before he could answer any questions Gibson was punched again. The mob began chanting, “Kill Rick! Kill Rick! Kill Rick!” Susan Milne, who was still at Gibson’s side, described the tense moment, “Suddenly they are in every direction, humans piling up fast against other humans, shouting abuse, screaming, kicking, punching. I start to panic. ‘POLICE, POLICE, where are the COPS?!!!’ As I scream this I spy the Hotel Vancouver.” The mob forced Gibson and Milne into traffic on Burrard. Honking horns of angry motorists shepherded the pair across the street to the side entrance of the Hotel Vancouver. It was their best hope for refuge. The mob was close behind. They burst into the hotel lobby, told a bellhop to call the police, and began looking for shelter. Gibson found a hiding place behind the front desk and resigned to face his fate. A moment later the mob piled in behind them. Hotel security attempted to shield Gibson from further violence but they were no match for the angry horde. Their numbers were too many and the group mentality had set in. As the situation reached its tipping point, two plainclothes police officers arrived. One of them attempted to disperse the crowd while the other escorted Gibson through a side door into the manager’s office. Gibson waited there under police protection until it was safe to leave. He spent the next few days in hiding. And what of Sniffy? Peter Hamilton, the president of the animal-rights group that stole Gibson’s crushing mechanism, went to Aquariums West and purchased the famous rat for $3.99. He gifted the animal to a rodent lover in Port Coquitlam named Julie Macadam who owned a luxurious and vacant mouse habitat where Sniffy could live out his days without fear of cats, snakes, or performance artists.
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Each month, we choose people from Vancouver to supply the comments that accompany the photos in the magazine. If you would like to be the commenter, check the questionnaire on page 3 and send your answers to info@elective.ca.
*Comments are marked with the commenter’s initials. archive’s are in pink.
Commenter of the Month
M AT T H E W K E R R Matthew Kerr is the owner of Coquitlam’s first hot-yoga Vape-lounge fusion facility. His interests include wing-suit diving and meme activism. He is a lifelong supporter of Liverpool FC.
MK: The balance of nature is an odd phrase. Anyone who’s seen ten minutes of a wildlife documentary knows that nature is hell. Of all the species that have ever lived, 99.999% are now extinct. That doesn’t seem like balance to me. That seems like a complete and utter shit-kicking at the hands of planet Earth. This is a war, people. Stop recycling now. 597 Olivia Prior
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: Fine, I’ll say it. Sunsets are overrated. We see one every night and they all look the same. Think I’m being obtuse? Catherine Opie, a giant of modern American fine art photography, had this to say about drab pastel evening skies, “The biggest cliché in photography is sunrise and sunset.” That’s right, my girl Opie just put you on blast.
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650 Linda Schroth
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695 Olivia Prior 634 Michael Frost
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: You hear about that guy who set up a Pokémon lure in an abandoned building in the middle of the forest? Neither did any of the kids he killed.
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677 Alison Boulier
MK: “The quality and ubiquity of the cameraphone has turned even the mouthbreathing zombie masses into a passable photographers. I for one welcome all the new competition in the space. It’s not like those selfie-taking basics on Instagram can really even fuck with my swag anyways.” -Annie Leibovitz
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MK: “Democracy does not work—especially on the internet. Brexit, John Scott, and now Donald Trump are proof of this fact. The mix of anonymity and lack of responsibility is the blueprint for sub-optimal decision-making. If something doesn’t change, I see a future where Twitter trolls and social-justice warriors set the political agenda.” -Voltaire
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— READER SUBMITTED STORY
Horse and Pony Show By Jeff Anderson
I
used to work for a private utilities construction company that did everything from pipe laying to road works. Anyone who’s worked in that soul-staining environment will tell you it’s a disorganized clusterfuck that makes you want to hit the bottle or hit your coworker with an excavator. My superintendent was the prototypical yo-yo asshole who constantly fucked things up. On bad days he would reminisce about his old boss and how smoothly everything went with him at the helm. The old boss lacked formal education but he had a masterful understanding of construction. Not only did this man work like a horse, he had a face like one too. A coworker of mine knew Horseface as a young man. He agreed that Horseface was the best in the business, but he was also privy to a few dirty little secrets. One day after work, the coworker and I had a few beers in the lunch trailer on a site off Marine Drive and he told me a story about our superintendent’s beloved hero. Horseface, like any man, had his vices: wine and porno mags. Magazines because in 1999 porn wasn’t available on your unbreakable Nokia brick cellphone. Horseface didn’t like your run of the mill Playboy, Penthouse, or Hustler either. He liked the gigantic-breasted fetish sort and would go out of his way to adult video stores like Red Hot Video on Main Street to collect them. Horseface hid the magazines from his wife in a briefcase, then he stowed them under the seats in his work truck. Anyone who had to move his truck knew they couldn’t adjust the seat because the pornos were piled so high. One time, a mag spilled out of the door and
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flopped open onto the dirt revealing a pair of breasts so big they could’ve worn a sombrero and sunglasses. Although he hogged all the credit and collected all the bonuses, Horseface couldn’t have seen his projects though without his lead man Billy. Billy was an angry little bastard from the prairies who knew his shit and worked hard but he also flew off the handle all the time. His calling cards were creative name-calling and physical intimidation. Billy respected Horseface primarily for his lack of micromanagement. Horseface would outline the tasks for the day, check in with Billy at lunch, and joke that he should wake him up if something were to go wrong. Unfortunately, things always go wrong. On an unkind, rainy day in November, the excavator clipped a gas main and holy hell broke loose. This was before cellphones were permanently attached to everyone’s hip so Billy had to sprint to his truck and drive to the other end of the site to grab Horseface for damage control. The fire station and gas company would need to be notified immediately. Billy jumped into action. He raced across the site to Horseface’s trailer and went inside but nobody was there. Billy could hear noises coming from the tool lock up room so he pushed open the door and found two big-boobie magazines spread out on the workbench. Horseface had his pants down, pumping away, treating his body like an amusement park. Billy’s sense of urgency immediately turned to mortification, and he exited the trailer in disgust.
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Our readers submit stories about their lives and we publish them. A story should be between 1200 and 1500 words, set in Vancouver, and based on real events. We pay for any story that ends up in print. If interested, email a draft of your story to info@elective.ca. We are hiring writers for other elements of the magazine. If you’d like to write for Archive, True Stories is a good way to introduce us to your writing.
Empty. He checked a third. Empty. Billy marched around the site checking manhole after manhole until he finally found Pony Boy, 10 feet underground, watching a porno on his phone and using his body like an amusement park. Pony Boy, like father like son, was a work-jacker. Billy had reached his boiling point. He walked directly to the trailer and told Horseface what he had witnessed, and demanded that Pony Boy be fired, or, at the very least, kicked off his crew and transferred to another division. Horseface refused. After all, how would he explain to his wife that their golden pony couldn’t ride to work with him every morning? Billy decided to disclose the masturbation secrets to upper management. Fearing a tarnished reputation, management set Pony Boy out to pasture. Horseface was allowed to complete the project before quietly being forced into retirement. Billy was promoted to the coveted position of superintendent. But the new position didn’t last long. He found a new whipping boy who turned out to be the offspring of someone even more important than Horseface and got fired for “bullying”. Billy must have really mindfucked this poor kid because bullying is almost never considered a real issue on a construction site. Of course, the next best worker got his job: our yo-yo of an asshole superintendent. To this day, my coworker and I share a smirk whenever Horseface is mentioned. Word has it that he moved his herd back to the old country where they grow wine on his family’s land. It terrifies me to think about Horseface and Pony Boy roaming the vineyard, looking for a quiet, secluded spot to enjoy by themselves. It’s only a matter of time before they traumatize another poor soul…
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(Note: It was at this moment in my coworker’s story when I realized that Horseface’s decrepit ranch of pleasures was the same trailer that I had used to eat my lunch for the past three years.) A few moments later, Horseface left the trailer with a sour look on his face and a bulge in his pants. Together, he and Billy worked hard to take care of the gas leak but the damage to their relationship had already been done. The rumour was that Horseface promised Billy a recommendation when the next foremanship came vacant in exchange for his silence on the whole “jacking it at work” issue. Years later, an opening presented itself and Billy was promoted to foreman. Horseface may have made up for his indiscretion, but he also hung around past his retirement date. Resentment grew between the superintendent and his angry little prairie foreman. The new century brought political correctness, which put an end to Billy’s draconian management style. This was a problem because the company had just hired Horseface’s high-school-dropout son: Pony Boy. In appearance, Pony Boy was just like his old man but his performance was the polar opposite. He had zero work ethic. Unlike his workhorse father, he would roam the site like a colt in a meadow and rest in the shade with a cigarette in his mouth. Pony Boy drove Billy nuts. He was incapable of the most menial tasks, held up production with ass-dragging, and would tattle on superiors constantly. One day Billy put him to work cementing the seams of the manholes and drainage basins on site. It became clear almost immediately that Billy would have to crack the whip or else Pony Boy, possibly nursing a hangover, would take a seat and have a smoke break. Every 20 minutes or so, Pony Boy would complete his task in a single manhole and descend down the next, all under the watchful eye of Billy. Eventually, something came up that required Billy’s supervision on the other side of the site, and by the time he returned Pony Boy had disappeared. Furious, Billy stormed up to the nearest manhole and looked inside. Empty. He moved down the line to the next one.
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Each month, we choose people from Vancouver to supply the comments that accompany the photos in the magazine. If you would like to be the commenter, check the questionnaire on page 3 and send your answers to info@elective.ca.
*Comments are marked with the commenter’s initials. archive’s are in pink.
Commenter of the Month
DUSTY BAKER Dusty is best known for taking part in the world’s first ever high five on October 2nd 1977. Baker is also the pseudonym of a software engineer who works in Gastown and would like to remain anonymous.
482 Andrew Rothschild
: Sometimes old pictures make me reminisce. Remember car rallies? They were fucking crazy. A bunch of teenagers steal their parents’ cars and go on a drunken scavenger hunt that ends up being a crime spree. Then they meet up at a checkpoint and compare evidence of all the laws they’ve broken. One time the rally organizers offered 25 points for every live lobster we could deliver to the checkpoint. My friend Tim drove us to a Chinese restaurant on Cambie. He told our teammate to keep the motor running and told me to follow him inside. I approached the maitre’d to create
a diversion while Tim took a position beside one of the seafood tanks near the kitchen. When the coast was clear, he plunged his arms into the tank and started pulling out lobsters, two at a time. A waiter took notice of the ongoing theft and started shouting in a language we couldn’t understand. In his rush to pull his arms out of the water, Tim caught his shirt sleeve on a jagged part of the tank. When he turned to run, the lobster tank came with him. A hundred litres of water and twenty lobsters crashed onto the restaurant foyer as we sprinted for the exit, dove in the back of the car, and hauled ass outta there. Tim had a lobster in his lap.
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559 Annika Osborne
537 Nicol Spinola
537 Victoria Hodson
DB: You know that game white people play where they spin the globe and wherever their finger lands is the destination of their next vacation? I love the look of panic in their eyes when their finger lands on the Middle East, Africa, or Winnipeg.
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484 Arjun Hair
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DB: Now this is the kind of setup I’d love to see the Kool-Aid man kick the shit out of. Fuck your Zen, here’s some diabetes in a glass. OH YEAH!
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515 Allan Harding
: The animal in the top left a sea otter, mother nature’s most depraved sexual deviant. I won’t disgust you with the details, but it is known to practice pedonecrobestiality. Google it… if you dare.
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513 Erika Boom
486 Lindsay Elliott
534 Lindsay Elliott
635 Danielle Kilgour
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DB: (Far right) I lament the collapse of honeybee colonies world wide. Not because I value the bee’s place in the ecosystem. But because I fear that I may never see a man in a bowler hat lean into a flower and get stung on his red alcoholic nose.
704 Erin Kerr 546 Art Pohl
DB: Oh look, some rich guy told his wife that her art was “brave” and now the neighbourhood is ruined. What is this, Beetlejuice?
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605 Meredith Nigh
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DB: Remember when your 19-year-old cousin decided to go to Australia for a year because he couldn’t get into university? These are the postcards that end up in your mailbox with witty comments like, “Wish you were beer ;-)”
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Monthly Top Photographer Top Photographer is a ranking based on the average score of a person’s best five photos in a given month. The winner will be awarded this section of the magazine to do with as they please. Last month’s winner was Willem Betts.
WILLEM BETTS @willembetts
DO YOU HAVE A N Y I N SP I R AT I ON S — PH OTOGRA P HERS W HO G OT YOU I N T ER EST E D IN PURSUING P HOTOG R A P HY?
I like those prodigious photographers who shoot compulsively and live like monks with cameras. I used to imitate Daido Moriyama and blast through rolls of black and white in my Ricoh GR1S, but everything came out like crap so I never finished processing my film from that period. There’s a bucket somewhere in my parents’ house with at least a hundred undeveloped rolls. W H AT K I N D O F P H O T O S D O YO U TA K E A N D W H Y D O YO U TA K E T H E M ?
I appreciate photographic work wherever it may land on the spectrum: conceptual, documentary, street, abstract, or whatever. It’s all great stuff. My own photography, at its best, is just me etching out some kind of record of my experiences. Anything else and I’m not having fun.
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C A N YO U G I V E U S A T I P O N H OW T O TA K E A G R E AT P H O TO?
In Vancouver you should keep an eye out for shifting, unsettled weather. Observe how it plays out across the larger skyline as well how the light reflects and finds its way across the city’s surfaces from streets to windows to faces. I like to get up early and take a look outside. If there’s fog I splash water on my face, grab my camera, and run out the door without eating breakfast. Also don’t be afraid to shoot in black and white. On those bland winter days in the city, the grey clouds just suck the colour out of everything, and black and white gives you more flexibility to be expressive. Whether making a picture through analogue or digital methods, black and white can be manipulated more before your photo becomes an over manipulated app filter.
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W H E R E D O YO U WA N T TO S H O O T N E X T ?
I’ll never get enough of India. I’d love to go during monsoon season, but those are key work months for me. Might be for the best though: I’d probably get malaria and bring a tapeworm home. W H O I S YO U R FAVO U R I T E L O C A L P H O TO G R A PHER?
Shawn Mcdonald has a great portfolio up on Flickr (RIP) under the name Harry Booth. He shoots in the city, but his work that really stands out is his documentation of life in the bush as a tree planter. That’s how we met—he got on with our crew and at the time I was going through a kind of blah phase with digital photography and had gone back to shooting analogue with 35mm disposable cameras. He had a Rolleiflex, which I’d never seen in the flesh before and
I thought was awesome. So I sold my DSLR and bought a Hasselblad. Shawn has since found some obscure niche and gone pro with his photography. W H AT D O YO U L OV E A B O U T VA N CO U V E R ?
Love that early spring. Vancouver is a great place to hide out from Canadian winters. W H AT D O YO U H AT E A B O U T VA N CO U V E R ?
Wouldn’t it be cool if Vancouver wasn’t suffering a real estate boom? There’s all this crazy money running around but none of the commensurate buzz of a dynamic, functional economy. I think that’s the source of the famous Vancouver malaise. Idling on a piece of Vancouver property is more lucrative than having a career—that’s weird.
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Monthly is a category that will change every issue. It could be tattoos, the beach, cats, or black and white photos. Its purpose is to make each magazine different. For September we chose Dogs of YVR because dogs fucking rule. I hope you enjoy the spread. Starting today, the new monthly category is Autumn. In the next issue this space will be devoted to changing leaves, umbrellas, and all the other things that define the fall in Vancouver.
: In every other section you’ll find the Archive editorial voice in a pink comment box like this one. We gleefully talk shit about sea otters, sunsets, fine art, the Prime Minister, and everything else you enjoy. The one exception is the focus of last month’s contest: dogs. Making a joke about french bulldogs in Vancouver is about as socially acceptable as carrying a gun. We’re not that stupid. This city riots about hockey. Do you think we want you to delete the app en masse?
Sara Manlove
W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 8 3
517 Carolyn Edgeworth
579
Paul Plancich
478
587
Paul Plancich
Katie Nanton
84 ARCHIVE
574
Justin Veenema
550 Matt Coolen
524
Justin Veenema
500 Angela Reading W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 8 5
549 Aleesha Sangha
481 Michael Milardo
550
535
Steven Hu
86 ARCHIVE
Paul Plancich
539 Michael Milardo
512
Justin Veenema
534 Michael Frost
619
Justin Veenema
W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 8 7
592
Justin Veenema
482
535
Justin Veenema
546 Erin Norleen
88 ARCHIVE
Sara Manlove
555
Shana Wolfe
518 Erin Norleen
512
Justin Veenema
500 Michael Mann
W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 8 9
475 tyler logan
462 Michael Milardo
456 Erin Norleen
455
90 ARCHIVE
Justin Veenema
451
Paul Plancich
448
Justin Veenema
450
Jeanine Solomon
447 Erin Norleen
W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 9 1
527
Sam Kerr
698
585
Justin Veenema
568 Alison Boulier
92 ARCHIVE
Sam Kerr
593 Charlotte Anderson W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 9 3
A VANCOUVER CROSSWORD
WITH DICK JOKES
Puzzle by Harrison Mooney. Edited by Merlin Von Duck. ACROSS 1 Dîner en ___ 6 Lie next to 10 Right fucking now 14 Approach, as a departing bus 15 Bella Gelateria order 16 Like the bathrooms at The Cambie 17 “Blue Bloods” actor Will 18 Pube, e.g. 19 Going ___ (having sex) 20 Binge-drinking capital of British Columbia 23 David’s ___ 24 Desires 25 Republic Nightclub music 28 Expected outcome for the B.C. Liberals in the coming election 31 Michael Bluth calls her Egg 32 Von Trapp girl who’s 16 going on 17 34 One way to run 36 Finished on a chest, maybe 40 Road once called “Deathway 99” 43 Bart’s teacher 44 Pisses, as a bed 45 Apt description of most X-Files episodes 46 4, on a phone 48 ___suite (tech company) 50 Travis Lulay gains (abbr.) 51 Entrap 54 SonReal music style 56 Chances are it’s backed up right now 63 Street that’s home to Lotusland, formerly The Captain 64 Dispensary voted best in Vancouver in the Georgia Straight 65 Mountain range in Arkansas 66 Paper quantity one might steal from work 67 Home to a notorious NHL flu 68 Baseball Hall of Famer Smith 69 Comic book race that includes Captain Marvel and Ronan the Accuser 70 ___ good example 71 Ship poles
LAST MONTH’S ANSWERS
DOWN 1 Work at 33 Acres, Postmark or Brassneck 2 Bath bombs company 3 ___-vaxxer 4 Atomic bomb trial, briefly 5 Elvis who lives in West Van 6 Feeling in your head after a night at The Blarney Stone 7 Hog wild? 8 Part of S.F.U. 9 Noodle Box box 10 Canucks opponent in an infamous 2004 regular-season game 11 Gastown’s only Indian restaurant 12 Adjust, as wheels 13 Sampras and Tong 21 Asian language 22 “Steal My Sunshine” band (Ed. note: shame on you for knowing this) 25 Otherwise 26 What Cory Monteith did at the Fairmont 27 Like West End crows 29 Sushi bar order 30 Ryan who played his final NHL game against the Canucks
33 Bif Naked, e.g. 35 Very, very 37 Haywire 38 Schwarzenegger affair partner 39 Stevie Wonder’s work, say conspiracy theorists 41 Vince Vaughn movie where he makes Gretzky’s head bleed 42 What you shout at UBC students who 19-across on a bench 47 Not hers 49 Science World golf ball, e.g. 51 VCC-___ 52 One who’s sick 53 Japanese spinach salad 55 Uncle Fatih offering 57 “Like ___, I go to find my fawn”: Shak. 58 “U up?”, for example 59 One-named artist known for willowy, weepy mom music 60 Haagen-___ 61 Derek Dorsett brings it, according to Jim Benning 62 Gets by
558
Justin Veenema
SALLY ELVIS WONG PROFESSIONAL REAL ESTATE AGENT • 職業地產代理人 Investment Property Yoda • 投資地產界的“尤達大師”
Opportunity of a generation. I know what you’re thinking, “A backyard in Vancouver is an unobtainable luxury reserved for baby boomers, NHL players, and UBC students from overseas. A millennial like me could never afford one. I guess I’ll move to Williams Lake.” Well, think again, Matthew Millennial. Thanks to the tireless efforts of The Peebus Group, housing supply is on the rise in Vancouver. We know the key to affordability isn’t a racist tax, it’s innovation. That’s why we innovated this brand new micro-laneway-studiohouse. Not every millennial wants to live in a box in the sky, some of you want to live in a backyard. So, go ahead, have a barbecue and play some badminton because this backyard is about to be backYOURS*. *Restrictions on yard use to be determined by property owner. Barbecues and playfulness strictly prohibited.
我了解您可能的最先反應：「在溫村買到擁有後院的住宅，這是職業 運動員，大富翁以及外籍大學生能取得的夢想。我只有能力住在威 廉斯湖。」 但您不是毫無選擇的。由於我們地產集團的精心發展和努力，溫哥 華內的豪宅選擇已急速上升，而我們最新的現代後院單房獨立屋則 是市場上的最佳產品。我們了解解決溫哥華地產價位過高問題不在 徵收一項充滿種族歧視的購物稅，而在創新市場上的產品。因此，請 您盡心的在您的新後院遊玩吧！因為它是您的天下*。 *後院使用權將由屋主本人決定，獨立屋住客用前需獲得批准。
Information You Need to Know PRICE
$28, 888
DEVELOPER
Peebus Group
AREA
Cedar Cottage
BEDROOMS
1
BATHS
0
SQ. FT.
12
YEAR BUILT
2016
MLS
P3N15033D
MASTER BEDROOM 3’FT X 3’FT
FOOD DISH
PEEBUS GROUP Realty Associates
A Walk Amongst The Millionaires
W
By Douglas Haddow 96 ARCHIVE
263 Andrew Rothschild
hen I was 12-years-old, I walked out to the forest’s edge on a beautiful spring day, found the tallest tree I could find and climbed it. But I didn’t get far. Around the eighth branch up my twinkling LA Gear runners slipped on a knot, sending me falling back to the earth, where I laid writhing in pain from a broken leg. I spent that summer indoors, leg bound in fibreglass, with Bubble Bobble and Contra as my only forms of entertainment. But one can only burst so many bubbles and machine gun to death so many vaguely Euronesian guerrillas. So naturally I was left wanting. Scrounging around the crawlspace under my rumpus room steps, I discovered a dusty old box filled with even dustier old books—long forgotten paperbacks that no one seems to remember or care for anymore. The greatest of these was Tarzan and the Lost City of Gold, where, as the title suggests, the naked and feral Tarzan hangs dong and discovers a city made entirely of gold. A classic potboiler from the intrepid mind of Edgar Rice Burroughs, author of Tarzan of the Apes, Tarzan and the Madman, and Tarzan goes to Mars, among others, I read it and re-read it and then read it again. Even when I wasn’t reading it, I would sit daydreaming and let my mind drift towards the shimmering golden grandeur that danced within its pages. In retrospect, it was a rather hackneyed bit of prose, highly problematic in its colonialist portrayal of exotic locales and rather insipid in the way it leaned on its white saviour narrative, but that’s besides the point. It was through Tarzan that I discovered the magic of books, and how they could transport you into a different world—a world where things didn’t necessarily need to make any sense and you could let one’s imagination expand and contract like the wings of a butterfly, guiding you to a dreamworld of endless possibilities and fantastic adventures and whatnot and the like. And so it was with great delight and bit of childhood wonder that I read an article in The Globe and Mail last week that detailed how my city, our city, Vancouver, had become “Canada’s First City of Millionaires”. I won’t bore you with the details, and quite frankly I don’t understand the math behind it, but the main takeaway was that everyone in the city is now a millionaire, probably.
With an average household net worth of $1,036,202 this cluster of glistening glass we call home has risen far, far above Canada’s other urban centres, making them look like blighted and dingy backwaters in the process. Think of Toronto, a frigid and depressed discount version of Chicago, desperately clinging to the whatever shreds of cultural significance that Drake sees fit to toss its way. Or Montreal, kilometre after kilometre of never-to-be-finished construction, mired with potholes and mafioso ne’er do wells, persons who regard George St. Pierre as a greater man than René Lévesque. Calgary? A polluted slum. Edmonton? A worse one. Don’t even get me started on Ottawa, with its dirge of second-rate bureaucrats in cheap suits who spend their days playing grab ass in their dreary government cubicles. Neigh. Vancouver now stands alone, peerless—a pure vision of wealth where the sun’s rays reflects upon all the shining blue-green condo towers to impress a flaxen patina on one’s retinas. After finishing the article, it was with fresh eyes that I set out to rediscover our city as the city of gold it truly is. The city of gold that I had spent so much of my youth inexplicably lusting after. I needed to buy some cigarettes and was hungry so thought that maybe I’d get a bowl of pho—a banal outing that on an average day would barely register in my short term memory. But as soon as I stepped foot outside my apartment, everything began to glimmer like so much bullion. I set out north on Knight Street, towards the gas stations that line 12th Avenue, and I could instantly sense that things were different now. Maybe it was the unseasonably warm breeze, but the city made me feel as if the North Shore mountains were a mink coat wrapped around a collection of rare diamonds. A man that looked to be somewhere in between the ages of 30 and 45 passed me on the sidewalk. He was wearing overalls, his long, flowing chestnut-brown hair adorned with a Pantera bandana, a weathered and scratched longboard in tow. He didn’t look the part but I couldn’t help but ask myself if he too was a millionaire? He was probably some sort of tech-sector raconteur, the gifted bugger. The houses along Clark Drive, with their matted-out lawns littered with plastic bags, Big Gulp cups and spent
Durex wrappers, appeared as if they could all be normal dwellings with average lives playing out within them. But I knew better. These were houses owned by millionaires, and were not merely homes, but beacons of capital that transmitted their energy in all directions, as if to announce to the world “Yassssss Queen! I have arrived my little darlings!”. As I continued up towards the Commercial Drive SkyTrain station, the little, inconsequential things began to stand out—the discarded cigarette butts that lined the curb, dirtied with spittle and grime, those probably came from some millionaire’s mouth. It seemed a shame now for them to be tossed away so carelessly. Even the SkyTrain itself was different. Its humdrum and uninspired architecture morphing before me to strike the image of a sleek metallic post-brutalism. Inside I was faced with a scene out of some monied foreign bazaar. Gone are the days when the kiosks used to sell knock-off Canucks jerseys. Now they sold knock-off soccer kits adorned with names like Ronaldo and Messi. Vodaphone. Fly Emirates. I took a bus up Main Street, only to find that my favourite Vietnamese restaurant had been replaced by an eerily similar “Authentic” Vietnamese restaurant. Its once flourescent lights were now incandescent, bathing the interior in a comforting sepia hue that mimicked the colour of the horizon on a postcard of an English Bay sunset. Their Phở đặc biệt was now priced at a full dollar more. For a moment I began to think that perhaps living in a city of millionaires could have its drawbacks, but once the pho touched my lips I could feel that the ingredients were of a higher standard. Outside I saw a familiar face: a white ceramic poodle perched on a 25-foot pole, looking down at the city with the pious ambivalence one might find in the eyes of a cosmetic surgeon. I had seen this face before and it had only registered contempt within myself, but now it spoke to me, or rather, through me: “You can make a lot of money if you Airbnb your basement suite.”
W W W. A R C H I V E . L I V E 9 7
Top Rated Photo of Them All— Paul Plancich 758, 729, 707 Archive: The top rated photo this month is that endless arch of cherry blossoms at the top of this page. Typically we would feature that photo alone, blown up in all its glory, but the image resolution was too low to increase the picture’s size without ruining how it looked. The second highest rated photo this month is that terrifying green shack. And the third highest rated photo this month was that whimsical barn. The reason we’ve grouped them together is because all three came from the same photographer, Paul Plancich. The guy took gold, silver, and bronze. A clean sweep of the podium. Respect.
98 ARCHIVE
703 Matt Coolen
535 George Vancouver