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SPORTS AS ART 12 | Cognitive scientist explains what makes art appealing 13 | Viewing sport as a form of art 14 | The “art” in mixed martial arts

FEATURE 15 | The art of plating at Guelph’s independent restaurants

CENTRE STORY 16-17 | Nathan Campagnaro: Guelph’s poster boy

MUSIC 18 | Exclaim!’s Stephen Carlick talks life as a music critic 19 | Kazoo! works to make Guelph a better music city

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20 | To Guelph: An appreciation of my adopted city 21 | My father the artist: An interview with the novelist who raised me 22 | Short Story: Just Keep Me in the Dark 22 -25 | Poetry 22 Poem: Wherever You Are 23 Poem: If and When + photos of winter 23 Poem: Writer’s starvation 23 Poem: ADHD, anxiety, and me 24 Poem: Fractured 24 Poem: Realise When You’ve Had Enough 24 Poem: Necessary Storms 24 Poem: Untitled 25 Poem: MELODRAMA + photos of nature + photos by Michael Cimesa and photos by Cat Cooper

FEATURE 26| Comedy in Guelph: progressive or raw or both?

EDITORIAL 27 | Nude

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28 | Events Calendar 28 | Cuke Baby 29 | Crossword Puzzle 29 | Sudoku Puzzle

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Ben Montero’s comics promote cosmic kindness Gentle psychedelia marks Aussie cartoonist’s Froggy & Friends W I L L W E L L I N G TO N

that Australian musician and cartoonist Ben Montero’s comics surface every so often in my Facebook feed. Montero’s adorable little characters feel like old, dear friends. Their simple, gently psychedelic adventures have appeared on Vice and across many social media platforms. Montero is currently working on the first collection of his Froggy & Friends comics to be released by Captured Tracks. Montero is also a musician (he recently toured with Mac DeMarco), but his Froggy & Friends comics set him apart with their blend of sweetness, kindness, sadness, and joy, especially in a time of political division and anger. I asked Montero about what the Froggy & Friends characters mean to him and where they came from. IT FEELS RIGHT

Will Wellington: You did a couple different series for Vice, but you seem to have zeroed in on the Froggy & Friends characters as your main focus. How did the Froggy & Friends characters develop? Ben Montero: I’m not sure!

They just seem to pop up when it’s the right time. To be honest, it’s all playing out in real time for me, just as it is for anybody viewing them. I don’t know any more or any less. I only do what’s right. I don’t sit down and think, “It’s

time to do a froggy or a wormy” or whatever. It’s just what my subconscious calls for at that time. [The characters] developed in their own independent way. Slowly and naturally. Just as a subconscious necessity to keep me company, I think, when I was traveling around Europe alone. They just slowly forced their way out and took shape at their own pace.

Peanuts, and The Far Side? BM: I love The Far Side! I took

the visual aspect of drawing glasses without the eyeballs directly from The Far Side. I don’t know enough about Calvin and Hobbes, but I’m gonna check it out!

WW: Going back a few years on Instagram, your comics are a lot more vulgar and coarse. You used the word cunt a lot — there’s even the occasional swastika. Your new comics are a lot sweeter, happier, more innocent. How did that change come about? BM: I was a lot more ready to

WW: How did they become your focus? BM: At some point, I didn’t want

to do anything in parody or irony form. I got tired of trying to show how clever I was, because, honestly, I’m not that clever. When I stripped everything away in terms of [my] motive and target, I found that all I was left with was a feeling of complete loneliness. That’s when things got simpler and the characters became true friends that weren’t going to play tricks on me. I get lost in tricks. I’m not smart enough for satire and I just needed basic raw healing from what I was drawing. Smiles, tears, and warmth.

WW: Why do you think they’ve become so popular? BM: Maybe there are lots of

people hurting who have a lot of warmth to give and receive. The current state of the internet is great and all, but can leave you feeling empty when the lights go off. It might just be about connection. I talk to a lot of kids and we all just want to share. We’re not invincible.

W W: You also seem to be focusing recently on a square, four-panel layout, a really classic format. What draws you to this layout? BM: Ha. Originally, it was just

a good format for Instagram, but now I really like it. It’s good to be able to have limitations to work

I just needed basic raw healing from what I was drawing. Smiles, tears, and warmth. within, I found. Like a haiku. Also, I have a really short attention span. WW: Your comics often lack conventional punchlines. Do you worr y about each particular strip having a point or a conclusion? BM: I try not to think about a

punchline and just feel an overall cosmic balance without worrying about where it’s going too much: just based on feel, but still with some form. I find punchlines to be such a let down so often.

W W: Yo u r c o m i c s o f t e n focus on personal, emotional moments, but sometimes you make an explicit political statement. How do you know when the moment is right to get

political? BM: It’s hard. I’ve been more

blatantly political in the past, but I feel it ends up clunky and awkward and two-dimensional. There’s no scope for the complexity of emotions. Emotions aren’t political, but kindness can be in a subtle way. I come from a long family line of outspoken left-wing activism, so I’d like to think the basic idea of generosity seeps through to whatever I draw without the limitations of visual politics. There are lots of people who can do it a whole lot better than I could anyway. It’s not my strong point.

WW: I know you’re a big fan of R. Crumb, but are you a fan of any of the classic newspaper strips, like Calvin and Hobbes,

battle and challenge what was frustrating around me [back then]. I was living in Melbourne and I found the music and indie scene very suffocating and oppressive. I used to channel my frustrations out through comics. It finally got to a point where I offended someone and I realized my targets didn’t need to be targets and were doing good in the community. It was just me lashing out. As for the word “cunt,” it’s a very popular word in Australia that’s used casually to refer to anyone. It’s not like the way Americans say it, as a derogatory, sexist word. Having explained that, I don’t use it anymore living away from that context. I needed to do a lot of growing up and selfreflection and work out where the hurt and anger was coming from. The answer was usually loneliness. I’m trying my best.

ART PROVIDED BY BEN MONTERO

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Space animal art is out of this world S TO RY & A R T BY E M M A H AW L E Y-YA N

Top: Space Mouse — This series of space animal paintings reignited Hawley-Yan’s creative spark. Left: Betsy Right: Jilly

Right: Space Pig — A gift for her partner, Space Pig was the first painting in the space animals series. Bottom: Bunny Kiss

TWO YEARS AGO I painted this smiling pig in space as a Chrismukkah present for my partner Rob, it was our first year together, and it started me down a path of art-making I never saw coming! I have loved painting and drawing all my life, but it’s always been just a hobby I do in my spare time. After gifting Space Pig to my partner (it now hangs in the living room of our home together!), I brought Space Chicken, Space Cow, Space Sheep, and finally Space Mouse to life, and with my first full series complete, I started thinking bigger (with a lot of encouragement from Rob!). My mom, who has done art professionally for years and years, has a studio and online store, and just for fun I put my space animals series on the website, and started tagging along to markets and craft sales with a small number of prints to sell. Fast forward to now and I’ve got about 30 pieces that I sell prints of online and at markets. I’ve done a handful of commissioned pieces, and sales from my artwork are helping me pay my way through school! I’m a joint honours student at the University of Waterloo studying environment, resources and sustainability, as well as biology, and this is my final term before I graduate (hooray!). I moved to Guelph a year and a half ago after falling completely in love with the city and the community (and a Guelphite who already lived here...) and I haven’t looked back since! Most of my art is happy, silly, whimsical animals — I have a series of Flower Queen bunnies,

Working in animal rescue and animal and environmental activism can often be difficult... unconventional unicorns (including Boris, the black bear unicorn, eating his blackberries!), and lots of farm animals in space! I’ve always been an animal lover, and working in animal rescue and animal and environmental activism can often be difficult emotionally, so creating art like this has been my way of spreading positivity and providing myself with a space to be happy and remember all the reasons why we do this hard work. My art has also been a reason for my mom and I to spend more time together, at shows selling our art, and working on our online store to make sure it stays up to date. Her artistic talent, creativity, love for and dedication to animals, and support and encouragement have been hugely influential in my life and I wouldn’t be so successful in creating my art if it weren’t for her. When I graduate in April, I will be dedicating myself full-time to creating more art and taking our studio further. I cannot wait to see where this is going! @OnDragonWingsStudio

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Drawing magazine girls for a quarter ART BY B A R B A R A S A L S B E R G M AT H E WS

How I became an entrepreneur B A R B A R A S A L S B E R G M AT H E WS

ONE BRISK FALL DAY I was walking home from my grade four class at lunchtime, when suddenly a gust of wind stirred up some debris underneath a bush. A crumpled piece of disheveled paper threw itself in front of my feet. Being rather curious, I stooped down and picked it up. I carefully unfolded it and to my surprise, discovered a much handled, soiled magazine clipping of a naked woman. I found myself uttering out loud, “Wow!” This caught the attention of a big boy in grade five named Murray. Without a moment’s pause, Murray quickly offered me 25 cents for the magazine picture. I knew a good deal when I saw it, so I said, “Sure,” then took the cash and went home for lunch. Immediately af ter wolf ing down my fishsticks and Campbell’s vegetable soup, I rushed up to my father’s study and found those magazines I remember dad hiding from us kids. I proceeded to cut out some smaller images of those provocative ladies and carefully placed them inside my math textbook. Once back at school, I approached Murray and told him that there were more of those desirable pictures — that is, if he was interested. He asked to see what I had — so I showed him. He said he’d take them all and I told him the original sale was an introductory offer. These works of art were for sale at 50 cents each. He hemmed and hawed, but in the end bought them all.

Word of mouth is a thing of wonder. Within a few days, some bigger boys in grade six approached me for more of my “hard to find” product.

After a few weeks of entering into sales I was now doing a steady business. I decided it best to write a business plan in order to get a sense of the ‘big picture.’ From this analysis I realized I had an untapped target market in the girls at my school. Being artistically inclined, I started to promote myself as an illustrator of fashion drawings. I became quite good at drawing girls wearing the latest fashions — bell-bottoms, hiphuggers, all adorned with paisleys and large pink flowers against lime green backgrounds. The girls paid me a quarter per drawing. They were, after all, my friends, so I couldn’t charge them more than the boys.

In elementary school, Mathews sold fashion illustrations and erotic drawings.

One fellow wanted me to draw the face of a girl from the class onto the nude body. Since this was a customized order I justifiably increased the fee again. This time to one dollar. The new product was a big hit... Things were going exceedingly well. I always had enough money for chocolate bars and the latest romance comic; I even bought my baby sister her favourite candy cigarettes. But everything has its season. One day, my dad found major sections of his magazines missing. After cross-examining the other five kids in our household, he narrowed down the culprit to none other than myself. I was in a real predicament — the demand for my erotic nudes was way up, but my supply had suddenly dried up.

What was I to do? Thankfully, I was blessed with the ability to draw. I had been practicing drawing realistic flesh tones from a cartoon at the back of Playboy magazine called Little Annie Fanny for quite some time. I tried out my drawings on the big boys. These were original works of art, so I was able to successfully market them for the higher price of 75 cents — it was, after all, an investment. One fellow wanted me to draw the face of a girl from the class onto the nude body. Since this was a customized

Putting classmates’ faces on nude bodies eventually got Mathewsbusted.

order I justifiably increased the fee again. This time to one dollar. The new product was a big hit and I was now making larger purchases with my earnings. I bought good quality papers and paints — all business write-offs — along with a much desired pogo stick and a purple banana seat for my bicycle. Alas, my return was short-lived. One of the teachers found out about my business and called my parents and me in for a meeting. The worst thing about this gathering was that this teacher, whom I really admired, had torn one of my nudes in half. She had obviously thought twice about damaging the evidence, as she had then taped it back together. Nonetheless, my teacher’s actions made me feel ashamed to return back to school. Most of all, I was sure she no longer liked me. I felt like a useless, hateful t h i n g wa n t i n g to f a d e i n to the background of one of my pictures.

At the meeting, the teacher showed my parents my nude artwork. It was a very good drawing. I had been rather proud of it. I had even earned $1.50 for it, as I had added shading, a background of

wild flowers — and all the important details. During the “discovery trial,” my mother, having been an artist herself in her youth, carefully examined the drawing. After what seemed like a very long pause, mom announced that the drawing was in perfect proportion, and was in fact a very fine work of art. My relationship with my mom had not been the best prior to that, but her brave and heartfelt comments cemented our union as mother and child once again. I felt pride rise within me. My dad then added how he would like to encourage my talent, but in a more acceptable fashion. The teacher too had a change of heart. I suggested that I draw portraits of classmates and of their families — for a fee of course. I offered to do a complimentary portrait of my instructor as a way of making amends. She graciously accepted — and my new line of work took off. Being a more respectable trade, I successfully charged and rang in five dollars per portrait. Those early years proved most valuable in my journey to becoming an artist and an entrepreneur.

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I love you, animatronic singing lobster

This Owl King print resulted from a three-minute doodle.

Chasing laughs and smiles K AT E E T H I E R

I STUDIED ENGLISH and theatre studies at the University of Guelph and graduated with a double major in 2016. I’m of the opinion that “it’s fun” is all the meaning a piece of art needs — I have a good time

making felt badges and people enjoy them. It’s great when I have a big deep impetus to create, but most of my best work has been a result of chasing a laugh or a smile. Art ought to make you feel something — and if that something is joy then all the better. I’m one of those people who, if I see something that makes me feel joy I am going to try and get it into my house (see the animatronic singing lobster my partner hates or my plus-size topless mermaid

Felt badges play with the idea of adult merit badges. | PHOTOS BY KATE ETHIER

statue), and I think lots of my art is an extension of that impulse. I got into felt and embroidery work just for fun — I saw some cool fabric art pieces and I wanted to get into the game — and then my friend told me her mother used to make little badges for her during the summer to commemorate memories and stuff. And we all got really excited about the idea of adult merit badges. It brought me back to my sweet Girl Guides sash and I got really stuck on the idea. This trash can

one turned out great — and I think I ended up selling it at my first market! Owl King is a print — I took a printmaking class with a friend and got really obsessed with car ving my ow n stamps this summer. What kills me with this piece is it comes from a day where I was working on another project and having NO LUCK with it — just kept cranking out ugly all day. I took a break and doodled the thumbnail for this owl and loved it.

Four hours of work = nothing, t h re e - m i n u t e d o o d l e = m y favourite stamp.

I am constantly hopping from one medium to another and I usually have like five things on the go at any one time. Right now it’s embroidery, printmaking, and acrylics. Eventually, I’d love to try screen printing and brush up on my oil skills.

@SWAMP.QUE E N . E MPORI UM

How to put a price on a work of art Two artists break down what to think about when valuing artwork C AT C O O P E R

MANY ARTISTS STRUGGLE with pricing their art because of how subjective an artwork’s value can be. I asked two artists to outline how they price their work, and how young artists might start pricing their own.

GART H L AI DL AW: P R I CE YOU R T IM E

Garth Laidlaw works as a freelance artist, creating animations for organizations like the Bank of Montreal, Niagara College, and the University of Guelph, as well as writing and illustrating children’s books. Laidlaw sees animating or illustrating as any other kind of contract work. Time should certainly be

a factor in how artists price, but they should also keep in mind their experience and skill level. “Early on in your artistic career, it will take you longer to complete tasks, generally, and so your hourly rate should reflect this to help compensate for the time it would take a faster or more experienced worker. Once you get faster at completing the tasks, it’s fair to increase your wage. I also think it’s obvious that your wage should be increased as your general ability and skill increases,” Laidlaw said. Laidlaw also commented on another important aspect of pricing: the complexity of the project. “Does the animation need a voice-over? Will there be sound effects? Music?” said Laidlaw. “It’s absolutely the duty of the artist to know what questions to ask, as clients are far less aware of all of the ‘bells and whistles’ than artists are.” C HRIST INA LUCK: LO O K TO OTH E RS

Christina Luck is a traditional fine artist based out of Cookstown, Ont., who has shown her work in

Garth Laidlaw

Christina Luck

I learned through going to galleries and looking at the prices... CHRISTINA LUCK TRADITIONAL FINE ARTIST

many galleries, and whose artwork can be found in the collections of CIBC, the Four Seasons Hotels, and many others.

Luck advises artists to take example from how art is priced in galleries. “I learned through going to galleries and looking at the

prices [of other works],” said Luck. “I also showed my work in galleries, so they helped me to price my work, and still do.” Luck also describes time as a factor, although she thinks less on an hourly basis and more on the larger scale of weeks or months. But time is only one factor in naming a price. “[Keep in mind] size, and the difficulty of the technique, and cost of materials, and all of that. But it isn’t like looking at your list and figuring it all out, because what also factors in is your exhibition experience, your awards, the collections that your work is in. All of those things factor into how you can price your work.” Luck suggests being consistent in price, and remembering that when working with a gallery or art dealer, they will charge a commission.

PHOTOS PROVIDED BY CAT COOPER

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The Ontarion takes on the world-famous Met Museum

Located alongside Central Park, the Met is the biggest art gallery in the United States. | PHOTOS BY LESLIE THOMPSON

Does it live up to the hype? LESLIE THOMPSON

THE METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART (the Met for short) was

built in New York City in 1870 with the goal of bringing different cultures and art to the city. The museum website claims that the Met represents “over 5,000 years of art from around the world for everyone to experience and enjoy.” According to Fodor’s Travel, the museum is the city’s top attraction, and one of the world’s best art museums. Frommer’s, a travel guide book company, claims that the museum is comparable to the world-famous Louvre in Paris, France and the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, Italy. Over the break, one of our Ontarion staff members — who has been to both the Louvre and the Uffizi — visited the Met with a friend to see what all the hype was about.

How did you feel going into the museum? Leslie Thompson: I wasn’t

overly expectant. After being to the Louvre, it felt like nothing could really compare. Plus, it felt a bit over-hyped — when I think of the Met, I think of Jessica Chastain in a fancy dress on a red carpet at the Met Ball, and maybe some paintings. Anastasia Fridman: I’d heard about the museum and about the Met Ball, but I didn’t really know what was inside. Also, I felt

overwhelmed because there are so many things to do in NYC, and this was just one stop of many for that day. Because of this, I felt like I wouldn’t be able to enjoy it fully — which I didn’t. The Met needs more than just an hour and a half. What were you expecting? LT: Lots of paintings and pic-

tures — which are always some of my least favourite museum pieces, especially when there are thousands of them in one place. It’s overwhelming! AF: I ex p ec t ed pa int ing s , artifacts, and statues. It didn’t disappoint.

What were your first thoughts upon entering the museum? LT: The building itself was beau-

tiful. What a great location near Central Park! When I walked in, the museum was really modern, sleek, and downright fancy. AF: The building really was beautiful. I felt like I was going into a palace. What surprised you? LT: There were actual things!

Ancient tools, water basins, sarcophagi, sculptures, costumes, huge displays — not just paintings. AF: So much history in one place. I wish I could have read every description.

The Met’s collection includes treasures from ancient cultures alongside contemporary pieces.

What was your favourite part? LT: The Ancient Greek and

Roman sculptures, for sure. Oh, and the section they had on 18th19th century European interiors. There were literal recreated rooms! AF: The replicas of hotel rooms and such.

Was there anything you didn’t like? LT: Honestly, no. Just the fact

that we didn’t have more time. AF: Just the fact that we had to rush through it, and maybe the fact that I was told not to take videos.

What are your final thoughts on the museum? Did your opinions change? LT: I loved it, and will begrudg-

ingly admit that yes, my opinion did change. Don’t tell anyone — I think I liked it more than the Louvre. AF: I really liked it. Going into it I didn’t really have an opinion about it, but it was pretty awesome, as far as museums go!

Over 5,000 years of art from around the world for everyone to experience...

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Joseph Connollyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s greatest architectural design took a decade to build.

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The Basilica of Our Lady Immaculate is a Gothic Revival style Roman Catholic church.

The big church downtown: the Basilica of Our Lady Immaculate | TA S H A FA LC O N E R

Tasha Falconer graduated from the University of Guelph with her BAH in Psychology in 2016. She has always had an interest in photography, but found sports photography during high school. For the past five years Falconer has taken photos at hundreds of Gryphon and Guelph games, and events. Falconer is now pursuing her masters degree in health psychology at Trent University. Above the pulpit (where the pastor stands) are paintings of various martyrs, and a few of the multitude of stained glass windows in the Basilica.

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Ad critters: An interview with a creative guy Discussing the behind the scenes world of creating commercials A R I A N A LO N G L E Y

BEFORE THE DAWN of the inter-

net, we were forced to watch shows on TV, and the commercials that ran with them. I grew up not just watching commercials, but in the ‘behind the scenes world’ of advertising. George Longley, my dad, was an art director and copywriter at Leo Burnett, one of the largest advertising agencies in the world. He created commercials that brought to life characters like Tony the Tiger, Snap! Crackle! Pop!, and the Pillsbury Doughboy. I sat down with my dad to talk about his approach to creating quality commercial content.

George Longley (to the right of Tony the Tiger) and his account team. PHOTOS PROVIDED BY ARIANA LONGLEY

George with mascots of the characters he created, Hubba and Bubba, for Wrigley’s Hubba Bubba gum.

George at a Rice Krispies commercial shoot with cut outs of Snap!, Crackle!, Pop!, and his character Ms Pink.

George and his team at a Frosted Flakes commercial shoot. The man in green will be Tony the Tiger in post. George Longley (left), Sam Cho the animator (right), David Cowdery the director (below).

A r i a n a L o n g l ey : W h a t i s your approach to making commercials? George Longley: I wanted

to tell stories with the characters. Commercials are like short films. That was my big epiphany. I looked at it like a 30-second piece of film and figured out how to tell an entertaining narrative. When you’re working with characters, every action and line should reinforce who they are. I find a lot of people who work on animated commercial characters don’t get that. They think, “it’s just a 30-second commercial for kids; just move the camera, add some goofy sound effects, and yell at them. They’re kids, they won’t know any better, they’ll just buy the product.” I wanted to create something that people wanted to watch again and again. When people have an affinity for the characters, they hold the brand close to their heart and eventually buy the product. AL: How do you make a good commercial? GL: You’re look ing for an

insight. You’re looking for something that resonates with the viewer or whoever the target is. Because depending on if you’re targeting young children or tweens or whoever, you’re looking for something they’ll grab onto. Sometimes it’s understanding behavioural insights, sometimes it’s as simple as kids have to deal with sibling rivalries and group dynamics. You have to make sure it’s as entertaining and relevant as possible.

AL: H ow h ave yo u r co m mercial s changed from the beginning of your career to now? GL: Earlier in my career, I wrote

based on what I learned from school, which wasn’t a lot. The teachers give you assignments, you work them up the best you can, and they give you input. But in the real world, it was different. The ideas had to sell. I learned the limitations of 30 seconds, what you can show and what you can’t show, how much story you can tell, how much product you

need to show and when to show it: all the nuances that allow you to write and create material that A) tests well and B) sells. And as you figure stuff out, you learn, and ultimately your work gets better. AL: What are some of the lessons you’ve learned being a creative in advertising? GL: At first, I wasn’t sure if my

ideas were good. But the more you get them out there and the more they work, the more you realize that you can come up with ideas that resonate. Just doing stuff

makes you better. It’s the whole 10,000 hours thing. The more you work at doing one particular thing, the better you are at it. AL: Would you consider making commercials an art? GL: I would. You can add your

voice to your commercials and tell a story. Like a filmmaker adds their voice to their work. You can flex your creative muscles and make an idea work as hard as possible. www.George6longley. wixsite.com/George

I learned the limitations of 30 seconds...

February 2, 2018:

SPORTS & ART THE ONTARION

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ave you ever found yourself looking at a piece of art for a long time, trying to understand it? Some art isn’t easy to digest. There are various aspects of art that make pieces more recognizable, enjoyable, or appealing. Cognitive science can help explain why some art is appealing while other art is not. Various researchers in Canada have investigated the neural correlates of how we consume art, and many conclude that evolution explains a large part of how we understand art. Jim Davies is a cognitive scientist at Carleton University who studies what makes art appealing to individuals. He looks at why some art is easy to digest while other pieces are more confusing. There are many aspects to why some art is more appealing to us, and a lot of it has to do with cognitive evolution. Our desire to create social relationships is a part of why we see so many faces and humans in art. “People are very interested in other people,” said Davies. “We look across all the arts, we see this big fascination with human beings and the social relationships between them.” Incongruity in art is another reason why some pieces are more compelling to us than others. Davies explains: “We don’t like our art too simple. We like some kind of incongruity that activates a different part of our brain that drives curiosity. It’s not necessarily pleasurable, but it makes us compelled to learn more and want to see more.” That explains why people find abstract art intriguing. Some defining features of abstract art are the fact that it’s incongruent and lacks patterns. This stimulates the art consumer’s curiosity, and they spend more time looking at abstract art. Personality can also be part of why you like Picasso’s work more than Monet’s. “If you have more openness to experience, you like art that is more challenging and

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Cognitive scientist explains what makes art appealing You might like that painting because of evolution C L AU D I A I D Z I K

Philosophers have long thought that humans had a separate area in the brain dedicated to the aesthetic appeal of art. However, researcher Steven Brown from McMaster University has shown otherwise. Brown proposed that there is no single area of the brain that is dedicated to our enjoyment of art. To investigate this, he set out to collect images of subject’s brains, looking at the brain systems related to the general appraisal of aesthetics. Brown and his colleagues surprisingly found that the same area that processes negative emotions is also stimulated when we look at art. The anterior insula processes emotions such as disgust, pain, and sadness, which makes it an unusual area for processing aesthetically pleasing art. Brown’s findings show that from an evolutionary perspective, our appreciation for art co-opt the same systems that are used to appreciate everyday objects that humans need to survive, instead of forming new, separate areas. Our appreciation for art lies in the same area of the brain that is used to judge whether a fruit is appealing to us when we are hungry. Next time you’re in a museum or looking at a piece of art, try and notice why a particular piece is aesthetically pleasing or displeasing for you. Does it have patterns or incongruity? Or is it your personality that can explain why a weird painting seems so compelling? Our brains have many telling signs when it comes to why we enjoy a certain piece of art.

ART BY ALORA GRIFFITHS

requires a little more work to appreciate,” says Davies. Davies is also working on a theory that can explain why some are more attracted to confusing art than others. He proposes that dopamine levels can determine whether we are more attracted to weirder art. Those with high levels of dopamine see patterns better than those with lower levels, and

these people even create patterns that aren’t there. “People who are better at seeing patterns might be more favourable toward art where the patterns are hidden or more difficult to find,” he proposes. Davies has shown that evolution can determine why we often see human faces and forms in so much of the art that we view.

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Similarly, our brain’s way of processing aesthetic appeal can also be explained from an evolutionary perspective. It has been thought that the brain systems we use to appreciate art are separate from the systems used to appreciate everyday objects, such as a couch or a piece of fruit.

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| S P O RT S & A RT

A field, court, ice rink, and ball diamond are where athletes hone their craft — similar to a painter and their canvas or writer to their page. | PHOTOS BY TASHA FALCONER

Viewing sport as a form of art The performance of athletes give audiences drama, narrative, and beauty TA S H A FA LC O N E R

AT FIRST GLANCE, it may not

seem that art and sport have anything in common, but upon further analysis it is clear that these two areas are deeply intertwined. Much like the multitude of mediums in art, there are multiple types of sports. Some of these sports, such as figure skating and gymnastics, have more obvious artistic features than others. R egardless of the ac tiv it y being viewed or the object being admired, watching a play during a game can invoke feelings of amazement in the same way that looking at a beautiful sculpture can. This is because both art and sport exhibit impressive skill or talent. Whether the performer is a ballerina or a soccer player, both of these skills take a lot of practice to perfect. Whether you are in an arena, a g y m, or a stadium, spor ts immerse you in an entirely new world, the same way that an art gallery does. The energy of the crowd roaring with excitement as their team scores the point after a long volley. The sound of helmets crashing together as two football teams come together in a fight for the ball. The feeling of the stick hitting the ice for a slapshot. The sound of the buzzer or whistle that

The act of watching sport speaks to a yearning for community.

explore indicates a goal has been scored. Like art, the visual image of a sport is often very colourful, with the players donning logos and colours that are associated with their teams. While the players’ main goal is to win, the audience is there with them to watch the performance. Much like performance art, sports have a certain aesthetic that often enchants the audience. The way a hockey player glides down the ice or the grace of a football player leaping over the opposition to run the ball into the end zone for a

touchdown are sights worth seeing. Sports, like other forms of art, make you feel something and can bring a group of people together. There is an automatic connection made when someone you meet has the same favourite singer as you. That same connection is made when you share the same favourite sports team. It doesn’t matter where you are from, what language you speak, or what your beliefs are — we can all understand and enjoy the artistic beauty of sport.

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TH E O NTA R I O N

The “art” in mixed martial arts Changing the way you think about a violent sport JA N A N S H OJA D O O S T

FOR THE LONGEST TIME, every-

day people would think about Shaolin monks or Bruce Lee practicing Kung Fu when they heard the term “martial arts.” When the same topic is mentioned now, most people are reminded of the violent nature of the recently evolved form of martial arts, the sport of mixed martial arts (MMA). There is no doubt that MMA is an aggressive sport. Once an athlete enters the cage, anything can happen that could potentially put both fighters’ lives in danger. But what most people don’t realize is how sophisticated MMA can be. With freedom and creativity in expressing skills from all martial arts backgrounds, the canvas of the MMA cage is no different than that used for making art. MMA is more than just about getting in the cage and beating someone until that person gives up — either consciously by tapping out or unconsciously through a knockout. It’s actually about pattern recognition and swift execution of a smart game plan that will end fights in your favour. Martial artists have to employ unorthodox strategies to take advantage of uncommon techniques, showing that you are bound to no one specific style, and that there are ultimately no limits to how you can dominate your opponents. Many techniques are allowed in MMA, so a fighter can decide to never perform the same

The canvas of the MMA cage is no different than that used for making art. in any given fight. Patience adds value to the authenticity of the performance by the martial artist. There are times when martial artists have the capacity to charge forward with full-on power, but they hold back, deciding instead to take their time and attack when the time is right to ensure that the net output of the attack is efficient. The outcome comes down to the small but smart adjustments that the martial artist makes to perform effectively. When genuine fans understand all the thinking and analysis that go into a fighter’s performance, that is when they can truly admire and appreciate the beauty and art of the sport.

Bruce Lee was one of the first martial art practitioners to blend styles in an unorthodox but efficient way causing some to dub him the ‘father’ of Mixed Martial Arts. | PHOTO BY JANAN SHOJA DOOST

PHOTO COURTESY OF PIXELBAY

I S SU E 18 4.1

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| FE AT U R E

F EAT U R E

O N YO U R PL ATE

Taste at first sight The art of plating

Salmon crisps — house-cured salmon with sea salt and juniper berries ser ved on top of rustic house -made potato crisps, garnished with a bright preser ved lemon aioli and two slivers of green onion. PHOTO BY MIRALI ALMAULA

at Guelph’s independent restaurants M I R A L I A L M AU L A

INDEPENDENT RESTAURANTS

around the city of Guelph take edible art to the next level. With a strong understanding that the pleasure of an excellent meal begins with the sense of sight and not taste, Guelph is a haven for the casual foodie. Casual foodies know that dining out isn’t about strict dress codes, crisp white linens, or high menu prices. It’s about enjoying a delicious meal that tastes as good as it looks, and walking away in love with a new restaurant you can’t wait to tell your friends about. T here are many places in Guelph that fit this description, but the holiday season proved too busy a time for many. Luckily, here are a couple of Guelph restaurants that were able to squeeze us in during the holiday rush. ATMOSPHERE CAFE + ETC.

Head Chef: Shawn Gilbert Favourite menu items to eat: French farmhouse, the peasant food — pâté, bread, cured meats, cured fish, coq au vin Favourite menu item to cook: Braised lamb shank, tender, cooked at a very low temperature for a long time so the meat just falls off the bone Culinary background: “My first co-op position was in grade nine at the Bookshelf Cafe, which is probably one of the very first scratch based restaurants in town, so I was 13 maybe, my first real kitchen… I just always had the luxury of working at very good restaurants with a chef and with a proper hierarchy. So, I don’t like to use the term ‘self-taught’ because

Shrimp spaghettoni — thick housemade pasta with juicy shrimp served in a rich, roasted tomato cream sauce and garnished with cheese. PHOTO BY MARIAH BRIDGEMAN

that implies I taught myself. I learned on the job.” Why plating is important: “Plating is very important. Food is very visual. It needs to look good, too, so the plate is a frame for your food.” Plating tip for home cooks: “I’m a big stickler to leave a twoinch border around the food, so when you’re plating your food, treat the rim of the plate as a frame. Plus, for logical reasons, someone needs to pick up the plate so you don’t want their thumbs touching your food. There should always be two inches around your food.” YORK RD KITCHEN & CHOCOLATE BAR

Owner: Sara Watson Favourite menu items to eat: Braised beef pasta with chocolate shells, steaks with chocolate rub, s’mores, chocolate mousse Culinary background: “We had a restaurant downtown for almost 19 years and it was always fine dining, so very much into the plating and the height of food and just everything being very fancy. And we’d done that for so long we just really wanted to do something comfort food and just make it good homecooked food and keep it simple, but still appealing to a bigger crowd

Prosciutto and arugula pizza — a generous personal pizza topped with salty prosciutto, peppery arugula, shaved cheese, and finished with a sweet and tangy balsamic reduction. | PHOTO BY MARIAH BRIDGEMAN

actually than we had before. We were very streamlined in terms of our demographic there. So it was nice to do stuff here, which is for everyone. We like to make our food from scratch, especially our pasta. That’s a big thing for us is making the pasta and just having home-cooked food.” Approach to plating: “We tried to make it a little more fun and whimsical here, with like the torpedo potatoes and that kind of thing. And food that is not too handled either. I find that with fine dining people are handling the food so much that by the time it gets to your plate three people have handled the food. We just wanted it to be simple, but a little bit whimsical and a little bit of an ‘ooh,’ right? Gotta have a little bit of fun with it. Like, there’s one dish, the espetada, that we do on the skewer and it’s flaming and it’s a little bit of ‘dinertainment.’ Everyone’s looking for a little bit extra in there, so just throwing in a couple things.” Plating tip for home cooks: “Colour. Try and get something of every colour. That’s always a big thing for me. You gotta have a little bit of — even people who hate greens. It’s that little pop of colour just makes it stand out just that little bit from being kind of meh.”

Braised Ontario lamb shank — tender, fall-off-the bone lamb shank, served on top of pillowy whipped Yukon Gold potatoes and brightly-coloured seasonal vegetables. | PHOTO BY MIRALI ALMAULA

Pan seared salmon — warm salmon served on top of a lentil, spinach, and quinoa salad dressed with a bright citrus lemon brown butter. PHOTO BY MARIAH BRIDGEMAN

Dark chocolate fudge cake — a decadent slice of layered cake garnished with raspberr y coulis and just a dollop of whipped cream. PHOTO BY MARIAH BRIDGEMAN

Nathan Campagnaro:

Guelph’s poster boy Local cartoonist started by printing comics in The Ontarion W I L L W E L L I N G TO N

Nathan Campagnaro is a local artist and musician known for his vibrant, gross, and funny concert posters — notably including the poster for last year’s Kazoo! Fest. He’s also well known around the music scene for his work as a drummer in rock groups Bleet and Badminton Racquet. I wondered whether Campagnaro had ever taken his artistic talents to the comic strip medium, and was excited to discover that his first work as a cartoonist was published, over a decade ago, in these very pages. In 2004, Campagnaro began publishing a gag strip called Malenky in The Ontarion. He later followed Malenky with strips like Banana Farm and Space Pirates of the Infinite — both co-written with writer and craft beer critic Robin

Leblanc — as well as other projects of varying length. Since then his focus has been on music and posters, although he recently released a zine of collaborative drawings with artist Nick Counter. I sat down with Campagnaro to ask him about his early work for The Ontarion, designing posters, and playing music. Will Wellington: When you started writing for The Ontarion, were you a university student? Nathan Campagnaro: Nope.

No, I didn’t go to school. I don’t have debt.

WW: So how did you get into writing for the paper? NC: I used to read The Ontarion

when I was in high school. There was a comic in there, a big influence actually, Mr. Gnu, by this guy

“It’s got a month’s shelf life and then it just vanishes. And then you’ve got to do it again before people forget that you ever did it..”

Travis Dandro. It was fucking hilarious. I would read it all the time in high school and then it stopped, and then The Ontarion comics just plummeted [in quality]. WW: And you decided, “I want to try my hand at this.” NC: I kind of actually did feel a little, not

responsible, but like, “This is what I have to do, this is my role right now, to bring this back.” And I think I also took it originally as a very open door. It was like, “They’re probably not going to turn my comics away, so here I go.” And then I did that.

WW: When you were writing Malenky, did you start with a visual gag or a bit of wordplay or what? NC: I think it was mostly wordplay or just

some bizarre twist on something normal.

WW: The one that’s coming to mind right now is the one with the potato. NC: Yeah! I think that’s my favourite

comic I’ve ever written. And the first comic I’ve ever written! It all went downhill from there. I was like, “Man, I don’t know what I did, but that was funny!”

WW: It’s got a line of dialogue in it, but I feel like you could take out the dialogue and you’d still understand the whole gag. I could imagine it as a concert poster. NC: What I was getting out of Malenky

was kind of what I eventually started getting out of posters. That’s why a lot of them were single panels. I was just experimenting more than anything. Like I said, I didn’t go to school, so educating myself was important to me. I got to try all these different things. That’s what I like about posters. I can still kind of make them into one-off comics and refine my style. I try and bring some sort of deeper story, like you could look at the poster and there’s more to it going on within the image. Plus it also bridged music and art, which is still really important to me. It’s still something I’m trying to find — harmony. I got into music in an attempt to do that and I got into art in an attempt to do that too. And it’s still distilling. When I’m doing a drawing, I don’t know if a lot of influence comes from other artists — a lot of it’s music. With Malenky that was a really big thing, putting on different music — and that was when I was really into Ween. That’s also what really got the diversity in the comics. Ween’s like that. Every song has a different aesthetic and they master it. That’s what I was trying to go for.

WW: Would you do a ton of different drafts for an image? NC: No, I think I do that more now than

I did then. It’s hard to remember how I did them back then. But I don’t remember doing a lot of drafts back then, whereas now I do a lot more. And I do them all tiny. Every

put those [dates] on my calendar. And I was like, “Alright, I’m going to make a story that fits in there. This is where it starts, this is where it’s going to end, this is where the climax will be roughly, and this is the story. Now I need to take sections of that story and make comics based on that to progress it, roughly.” That’s what the goal was. WW: I get the feeling that, as a local comic artist and someone whose work is tied up in ephemeral things like concert posters, a lot of your work is just lost to time. NC: Actually I stopped doing concert post-

poster draft I do is probably only about an inch big. I draw a little square or a bunch of them. Just to get the layout. I’m entirely selftaught, but my theory behind doing that is, “If it looks good, if you can read everything when it’s an inch big, when you blow it up big, even if people are scaling it down to a thumbnail, you’ll still be able to read the important parts.” It’s almost like looking at it from a block away. WW: And where did Banana Farm come from? NC: I took this little calendar in The

Ontarion of when all the issues come out. I

ers for a while because of that. It started really weighing down on me. It’s got a month’s shelf life and then it just vanishes. And then you’ve got to do it again before people forget that you ever did it.

WW: How does designing record covers compare to designing posters? NC: It’s really fulfilling. It does immortal-

ize your work in a way too, more so than concert posters. I’ve always wanted to hang records on my wall. There are a lot of record covers that I just love. They really mean something or really capture that album. That’s an art in itself.

MUSIC

THE ONTARION

1 8 | EXC L AI M! CR I TI C

1 9 | KAZOO! MUSIC

@ t h e ont ar i o n

Exclaim!’s Stephen Carlick talks life as a music critic The internet has democratized the conversation, but critics soldier on

People don’t like to be disagreed with and people don’t like to be criticized...

T I A N N N A N TA I S

IN THE ART UNIVERSE , the art-

ists are always “the interesting ones.” Everyone wants a piece of the band, the director, the writer, or the poet. However, in terms of success — in perhaps its narrowest definition — it’s still the critic who has the authority. If something is “critically acclaimed,” we immediately know it’s worth our time. But what is it about a critic that compels us to trust their judgment? Earlier this month, The Ontarion had the opportunity to speak with Canadian music critic and senior editor for Exclaim! magazine Stephen Carlick to ask him about the significance of critics in Canadian music and the challenges of taking on such a polarizing role. Editor’s note: Responses have been edited for length and clarity.

Tiann Nantais: What do you think qualifies somebody to be a critic? Stephen Carlick: I think a lot

of people have strong feelings about this. Should a critic be an expert in the field that they are critiquing? So, should a critic be a musician, should they have some expertise or some music training? I don’t know if that is entirely necessary or critical, so to speak. I think it is important to be immersed in the culture of music. So you need to be going to shows, you need to be an expert in the genre that you’re writing about. It’s very apparent when somebody’s writing about hiphop and they literally only listen to Drake and Kanye West. Or, you

know, sometimes a critic will write something about a band and they’ll refer to a guitar as a bass, or they get something very simple wrong like that, and it’s like, okay, you need to know at least that much. When we’re talking especially about popular music, it’s less about theory than it is about feeling and the culture, and what a band is doing and how that’s changing or reshaping the conversation with that genre. So I think what’s really important is that a critic be engaged with the culture about which they’re writing. TN: Have you ever received backlash because of a review? SC: Oh yes, all the time. People

don’t like to be disagreed with and people don’t like to be criticized, and that’s fair. I don’t love negative reviews that are gleefully negative, I’ve never liked that sort of writing. But I think that there is something productive about critiquing art, and in my case, critiquing music. And so of course, I’ve written a bunch of negative reviews in my career and I’ve certainly heard about those. So an example was in 2013, when Daft Punk put out their last album. It felt seismic, and I stand by it to a degree that I gave Random Access Memories a 10/10. And within the same month I gave the latest Boards of Canada album a 7 or a 6. And I remember someone commenting on the Daft Punk review, “This fucking guy gave a Boards of Canada album a 7/10, he doesn’t know anything about

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W W W. C F R U . C A

don’t know what about it is surprising. It all seems normal to me. I guess the thing about my listening habits is odd. I think that’s something that people might not think about in my job.

Before joining the team at Exclaim!, Carlick was a freelance book critic for the National Post. | PROVIDED BY STEPHEN CARLICK

electronic music.” But people are always going to disagree with you, especially with negativity. TN: Do you ever find it difficult to review pieces or to give negative reviews because you have relationships with people in the music industry? SC: I mean, that’s a tough thing

because the Canadian music industry is quite small. And the thing is I can promise a review; I cannot promise a positive review. And so for that reason we have definitely upset people that we have relationships with. And that’s just the way it goes. If you’re going to be a publication with any kind of esteem, you’re gonna have to hurt people’s feelings sometimes. Or for example, I have friends in bands. I would never personally write about those bands because that would be a conflict of interest. I have no problem with Exclaim! giving my friends a negative review, or Exclaim! giving them a positive review, but I will not be writing that review. And I take it very seriously when I talk to writers about that: if you feel that you couldn’t be negative about this band without hurting someone’s feelings, then you can’t be writing about it because that wouldn’t be right. And you know, you’ll loosely meet people sometimes, and at that point I feel like I can still be critical about their work. The Canadian music industry is too small to not bump into people. But you just have to use your head and just be critical about that sort of thing.

TN: Can you tell us a bit about your job, and maybe something most people wouldn’t expect that you do? SC: So I’m also an editor at

Exclaim!, that’s my primary role. So most of my day is checking my email, listening to music that people are talking about, that people are sending me. I get word that the album is coming out first and then I get sent the album. So my listening habits are very odd because I’ll get an album three months before it comes out, fall in love with it, play the hell out of it, and by the time it actually gets released I’m like, “Oh yeah, I’m so sick of that album.” But the rest of the world is hearing it for the very first time. So it’s super weird because it kind of puts me out of touch in terms of release dates and that sort of thing. My day to day is listening to music, talking to writers, setting up interviews with them, writing myself occasionally, although I usually do that after hours. I edit reviews that come in, I make sure that I have writers going to concerts and photographers going to concerts and submitting reviews the next day. I keep all sorts of charts like, what concerts do we have scheduled, what interviews do we have scheduled, has that interview happened, did that interview go well? How are we going to write about that? I’m still trying to think of something surprising. It’s hard because I’m so mired in what I do that I

TN: Can you think of an example of a review that the magazine published that launched an album or launched a band? SC: I think media has changed so

much in the last few years, or in the last ten years. The last real example I can think of in that regard was Pitchfork in 2003 or 2004, launching Arcade Fire. And we were part of that too, we put Arcade Fire on the cover before they released Funeral. We were a part of launching that band into the stratosphere. I don’t know if any one publication has the power to do that anymore. There’s so much media saturation, so many blogs, so many micro sites, and people on Twitter and Facebook all talking about music, that it’s actually less about the power of one review or the power of one interview, than it is about just everyone talking about a thing. At this point, as a music fan, not necessarily as a music critic, but as a music fan, when I’m looking for new music, there’s so much I’m getting hit with all the time that it’s sort of the rule of three. It’s less about this one Exclaim! interview launched this artist’s career and now they’ve made it. It’s more about, someone reads about it on a blog or something, and then a friend mentions a new artist to them and they’re like, “Oh yeah, I think I’ve heard that name.” And then maybe they read the Exclaim! review and that’s the tipping point; now I’m going to check out that artist. But I don’t know if just any one review by any one publication has the power to do that anymore. And that’s sort of a good thing. If anything the internet has kind of democratized the conversation about music.

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TH E O NTA R I O N .CO M

| MUSIC

Kazoo! works to make Guelph a better music city The city’s scene is COURTESY OF KAZOO!

far from perfect — this not-for-profit aims to change that C L AU D I A I D Z I K

Bry Webb, lead singer of Constantines and frequent Kazoo! collaborator. PHOTOS PROVIDED BY CLAUDIA IDZIK

Mike Deane, programming committee member.

Andrea Patehviri, programming committee member.

The city of Guelph likes to call itself a music city. It is home to festivals, weekend music series, and plenty of bands. Guelph’s Chamber of Commerce describes Guelph as a “leader in music tourism.” However, some local organizers argue that the city cannot measure its success by revenue alone. Kazoo! is a not-for-profit organization that has been a part of the Guelph music scene since 2006. The organization began as a series of DIY basement punk shows, transitioning into multigenre venue shows, and eventually, a five-day festival. The organization strives to put on shows that feature independent artists and are physically accessible and affordable. Kazoo!’s programming committee is comprised of the organization’s director Brad McInerney, as well as Mike Deane, Andrea Patehviri, and David Lander. These individuals work to bring artists to Kazoo! and showcase talent across the city. From previous years’ lineups as well as their running series, it is evident that Kazoo! promotes emerging artists that you wouldn’t see on other festival lineups. In an interview with The Ontarion, Deane said that when it comes to booking artists, “You can’t just try and follow trends. You have to book things that you think are good and bands that deserve to play in front of people. People usually recognize that.” However, the city of Guelph doesn’t provide a platform to support artists, venues, or accessible shows. “Accessible venues are so hard to come by, and the ones that are accessible tend to be more expensive,” said Patehviri. That makes it hard for independent promoters to book shows that are both accessible and affordable. When booking talent, McInerney said, “ We tr y to book accessible venues whenever possible, but it’s just not possible for us. We don’t have the spaces. I think it’s a joke when people want to talk about [Guelph being] a music city when there aren’t venues or practice spaces for young bands to play,” said McInerney. “You don’t have local bands staying here

Brad McInerney, Kazoo! director. | PHOTO COURTESY OF GUELPH MERCURY

because they don’t have places to practice, and don’t have venues to play in. If you want to invest in a music culture, you have to invest in the nuts and bolts.” Bry Webb, vocalist of Canadian band Constantines, is a Kazoo! veteran. “Kazoo! is one of the best [promoters] I’ve encountered in terms of community accountability,” said Webb. “They respond to concerns and to input from the community actively. They are the most ambitious in terms of really connecting community and all the disciplines of art in town.” Webb also sees the need for better involvement from the city: “I would love to see the city figure ways to help its local artists more. Not just funding arts organizations, but figuring out grants and proper payments for arts initiatives.” When booking talent, McInerney said that the programming committee “really make[s] an

effort to represent a lot of different genres, and also just representing a lot of different cultural backgrounds.” Patehviri recalls a moment where the committee questioned themselves after booking a show comprised entirely of white, male musicians. “We’re always challenging ourselves to make sure that there are people of colour on the bill, or women,” she said. The festival also aims to keep its event prices affordable to the fans and fair to the artist. “I don’t think any promoter should be doing a show for less than ten bucks,” said McInerney. Kazoo!’s anti-oppression initiative is not something you see in most festival or show environments. With a mandate to make all shows affordable, accessible, all-ages, and fair to artists, Kazoo! is leading the Guelph music scene in an equitable direction.

CREATIVE WRITING THE ONTARION

2 1 | MY NOV E LI ST FATHE R

22 | A SHORT STORY

@ t h e ont ar i o n

very city has its secrets. A renowned English author writes that a fallen angel once lay imprisoned by magic and craft beneath London, and that certain doors there can take you underneath the streets, to fairy marketplaces where people peddle corpses and sea glass and cheap Indian food. An equally renowned writer claims that somewhere in Venice hides a carousel that turns adults back into children, and children into adults, in a simple ride. A rainbow serpent carved out the streets of Sydney, they say, and even now, sleeps beneath the Opera House. Ghosts walk Berlin in the guises of friendly Canadian tourists. So what of Guelph? By the river, I met a green-headed duck who told me a story in exchange for the return of a gold ring he’d coughed up on the shore. There are, he claims, tunnels beneath some of the bridges that lead to white marble galleries where strange, scaly beasts sleep and type out research papers on electric typewriters, their eyes webbed with scarlet exhaustion, living off snowmelt that clings to the ceiling in long dripping icicles. There are classes there, on cuneiform and unholy architecture; lectures by professors made of stone, who awaken from monolithic daytime routine and commute through the sewers. Their TA’s are beautiful, scuttling creatures, furred in shades of red and orange, who mark papers with paws soft and careful as dreams. There are papers on the secret lives of downtown sushi houses, and dissertations on the restorative power of Beethoven, when played in concert with the works of Thelonious Monk. Pixies hold public dances in caverns like buried cathedrals.

In a place not dissimilar to Johnston Green, a stage has been set up, the wires of dysfunctional amps trailing silver sparks across the purple grass. A band made up of grubby, bespectacled children hold court over a month-long festival in the spirit of the Roman stadium, except with less wild animals and more rock music, lemon cake, and gyros sold by a man I once met in Starbucks, who seems to have either ten identical siblings or the ability to teleport.

Story by Miryam Haworth Illustrations by Catherine Meng

Yesterday, very abruptly, I realized that one of my professors, who I had believed for the entire semester to be some peculiar breed of emu, was in fact a dodo bird. I located her office and went to confront her. “Hang on,” I said, “you’re supposed to be extinct. What are you doing teaching philosophy?” “Nothing is ever extinct,” she told me, in a voice like two pieces of sandpaper running away in opposite directions. “The past is a distant land we have sailed away from. Life goes on there, happily enough, without us.” “Okay, I guess that makes sense,” I said. “But you’ve given me 55 per cent on this paper on Hannah Arendt. Can we talk about that?” After she refused to pass me, I took a lurid green lollipop from the jar on her desk and left. I didn’t look back. On my way back from a party at East Residence in a peculiar November hailstorm, I passed a practice match for what I initially thought was Quidditch. I sat at the edge of the brightly lit stadium and watched for awhile. The team wore robes of pale emerald, and those with long hair appeared to have been possessed. Their locks wrapped around other players like boa constrictors while Bob Marley blared over the loudspeakers. The short haired people flew. If

the coach is reading this, I want to know when tryouts are. One night, unable to sleep, I left my dorm room and wandered barefoot down the steps, but found myself unable to find the lounge. Instead, I wandered deeper and deeper, into a land inhabited by pale denizens of the dormitory who spend their days masquerading as janitors, or students of the natural sciences. Their wind-like snoring blew like a desert wind about my nightgown-clad body, and I descended further, into a cavern so deep even the dinosaurs never walked its surface. There, I found him, asleep on his stone plinth, and I ran my fingers over his beak. Waking, he shuffled his wings open, and I climbed onto his back and tangled my fingers into his feathers. We flew out of the cavern and into the sky above Lennox-Addington, where I saw that all the blue emergency lights had gone a soft shade of orange. Then the gryphon, who knows the meanings of things, whispered to me in Ancient Greek, or a language even older. And I listened. As I write this, it is cold as a witch’s tit, and the ducks in the river are few and far between. I have left the window open in

my room, and when I return there I will have to add blankets to my bed to make up for this mistake. When summer comes again, I expect you will find me seated cross-legged under a tree on Johnston Green, playing Vivaldi on my dented fiddle, or beside the cannon, painted completely white and standing still as a plaster statue, with my arms open. When that day comes, if you happen to have about you a snail shell, or a blue ribbon, or a penny gone green as jade, or a lost button you found under a bench in the Arboretum, you might place it in my top hat, and I will come to life. And perhaps I will mime to you the secret that the gryphon told me; or perhaps I will only blow you a kiss, and take a bow, and turn to stone again, as if you are Medusa, and seeing you has petrified me. I will not mind it. Better to have seen too much — to know the meanings of things — than to have stayed locked away, and never to have seen you at all.

Miryam Haworth is a first year English student at U of G. When asked how she came up with this story, she said: “I was taking a walk in the evening by the river and I happened to have a piece of paper in my pocket. I started thinking about the tendency in fiction to characterize cities with their own magical styles and wondered what sort of characteristics my new city has that would lend itself to fantastical reinterpretation. I started telling myself a story. I must have looked a bit mad; I was talking to myself, occasionally laughing aloud. I thought it was a decent bit of fiction, so I sat down in a shawarma shop and wrote it down. On my way back, I saw a stack of newspapers and picked one up. The rest just clicked.”

Catherine Meng is a third year biomed student doing a minor in music. She loves all things creative, both visual arts and music, and she enjous integrating these into her science-filled academic life.

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My father the artist An interview with the novelist who raised me H A D E E L I R AQ

Nasser Iraq is the author of five books, including The Unemployed which was nominated for the Arabic Booker prize in 2012 .

HAVING BEEN R AISED by a successful novelist who has a never-ending supply of information in the realms of history and art, it is almost impossible to not be influenced by the amount of information surrounding me constantly. When I was a kid, a curious look at an old movie on T V would induce a lecture from my father about the entire history and art of the film industry in the Arab world in relation to social movements and ideologies of the time. For a seven-year-old, it was too many big words, too many names and numbers to fully understand. But his enthusiasm made me want to. Growing up, this ever-present variation of art in the form of books, movies, music, and paintings gave birth to my persistent need to create and discover art. Artwork was all over the place. All his friends were artists. I thought that everyone grew up to be artists. However, underlying factors such as family and society can also influence creativity and art. I decided to ask my dad a few questions about his progression into art. Hadeel Iraq: Were your parents artists? If so, how did you find your individual voice in relation to theirs? Nasser Iraq: My father was

an artist, he loved art and literature very much. That affected my mother and he taught her reading and writing, for she hadn’t gone to school. His passion made him a sophisticated intellect and artist.

That again affected my siblings — we are seven and I was the second youngest. So growing up, the influence of my family is by far the strongest. I always say that I have been lucky to grow up in a different family that greatly appreciates the arts in life — literature, music, movies, philosophy, politics — all of it was always discussed at home with unbelievable passion and depth. In terms of my individual voice, my father and siblings were accountants, scientists, and engineers; they practiced the arts as a hobby. I was the only one that actively pursued art as a career, and I guess that was how I found my voice.

Artwork was all over the place. All his friends were artists. I thought that everyone grew up to be artists.

HI: Do you wish that I became an artist? NI: (Laughter) Sweetheart … you

already are an artist! You don’t have to have a career in the arts to be an artist; I see you draw and I see you write and much more … that counts too!

It should not be particularly surprising that a child of an artist grows up with a desire to make art. I grew up performing, painting, and writing, but faced an identity crisis when having to decide what career to follow — for the limitless sense of discovery that accompanies the sciences also captured my heart! Needless to say, taking the science path surprised my dad a little, but he was still supportive as always.

IMAGES PROVIDED BY HADEEL IRAQ

I felt the artistic pathway was a little too much pressure; there were too many people to compare with and an internal need to live up to my dad’s success. It was even harder that he’s worked

in almost every artistic medium. It sometimes makes me question my source of influence, and that takes me down a whole road of a could-be identity crisis as an artist (and possibly as an individual). So,

I decided to pursue art as a hobby instead. It can be hard to be objective with art — mine as well as my dad’s. I have not read any of his novels yet (purposefully), but I intend to this year. With time and age, I’ve learned to acknowledge my dad’s influence and to find peace with it. I’ve learned that an artist’s goal is more personal and internal. The children of artists may understand what their parents are doing and share in aspects of it, but no one can truly participate in another’s creative act. That they must discover within themselves. And so here I am, picking up the pen again, and hoping I never run out of ink.

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Just Keep Me in the Dark |

I CO U RT ESY O F PAWE L F U R M A N

Wherever You Are ARIELL A GOLDEN

To my beloved to be, I(Hmm, no, too fancy shmancy. Crumple, toss.) Greetings, future husband, I(Nah, that’s no good. Crumple, toss — ah, whoops — re-toss.) To my prince in shining armour: (PERFECT!) I know we haven’t met yet, ’cause you’re off in some foreign land, like Italy or France or Hollywood or someplace growin’ up all cultured and reading Shakespeare for fun in a cute accent that will make my name sound majestic whenever we meet, and you’re probably really busy because grade 8 is a lot of work, I hear, and of course you’re 3 years older ’cause that’s the perfect age gap according to Seventeen Magazine the experts, but I just wanted to say hello. I think about you a lot sometimes, y’know, when I’m sitting in class or alone on the bus or trying on Mum’s pearls that’ll look divine with my wedding dress. I wonder what your favourite animal is and what you dream about and what you’ll order on our first date (to Baskin Robbins, if you don’t mind, it’s kinda my favourite place) and whether you ever wonder about me. Just some days I question if you’re really there: a living, breathing boy somewhere in the world instead of some puff of my imagination when I’m picked last in gym class and my strapless dress won’t stay up and my desk is empty each year when they come to deliver valentines. So, I guess if I’m shy at first to hold your hand or read you my poems it’s not because I don’t love you, just that it’s hard to believe in dreams coming true when most of my shooting stars turn out to be airplanes in the night.

t happened quickly, but not quickly enough. “You’re right,” he said, “I’ve slept with her.” Frieda breathed out through her mouth like she’d instructed her boys to do when ripping off a Band-Aid: “In and… out!” Tom reached a veined hand out to touch her knee, a gesture so familiar from years of marriage that Frieda hardly felt it. “I’m sorry. It was a mistake.” “A mistake?” she snapped, pulling away. “What do you mean, a mistake? You’re saying you drove to her house by mistake? Fell into her bed, oops — my mistake!” “Frieda, please.” He shook his head to himself, shrinking into his chest. When had he grown so small, she thought, so tired? “So. How many times are we talk ing? Months?” She shuddered, “Years?” “A few months. A year.” He refused to meet her gaze, and a memory of their son came to Frieda’s mind. “Open your hands, Alfred,” she’d said, a scolding edge to her tone. He’d opened his small palms slowly, uncovering three chocolate chip cookies that he’d snatched from the pan. “Alfred,” she’d repeated, and he’d cracked his mouth open, just a smidge, to reveal a fourth cookie, still warm, melting on the roof of his mouth. His eyes remained glued on the floor, and an unrelenting wave of tenderness had washed over the young mother for her boy, her honest rosy-cheeked thief. Frieda’s chest warmed for a moment now too, feeling her husband cower under her stare. Just a little mouse. But she quickly crumpled the feeling up and set it ablaze. She’d known. Of course she’d known, deep down, for quite some time. The late nights at the office, the vague conversations, the fishing trips some Saturdays, he never bought more bait, why did he never run out of bait? Ah, and the flowers, what a sweet, spontaneous thought. Did he buy bouquets in pairs? She opened her mouth, then shut it, knowing the answer would do her no good. Tom looked up at her silence. “It was nothing,” he hesitated, “it meant nothing, and it’s over. I told her that.” Frieda said nothing, picked at the fraying throw pillow in her lap. “I love you, you know I love you,” he said. Twenty-nine years of I-loveyou’s, and Frieda wondered when the words had started to mean nothing. It didn’t mean they had stopped loving each other necessarily, she would tell herself in

the dark hours of the morning as Tom lay snoring beside her. Rather that enough repetition could dissolve meaning in anything. The old organist at church was living proof of that, zooming through “Amazing Grace” as cold and unfeeling as the stone Jesus by the door. This reminder would be enough to dispel the gnawing in her stomach and allow her to sleep, however briefly. But now. Now. Her sleeplessness had had just cause and no words would hold her down. With a sigh of exertion, Frieda huffed out into the quiet, August night. “Frieda,” her husband called after her, but he didn’t follow. It was past his bedtime. The bell above the door tinkled as Frieda entered the diner. It was nearly closing time, and only one couple remained. They sat picking at a plate of fries and thumbing through pamphlets. Summer folk, Frieda thought irritably, and she took a seat in the back corner. “Mrs. Hastings!” Frieda craned her neck up at the young man who had come to her table. “Oh, hello there, Robbie.” She’d always had a soft spot for the boy, though she’d deny having the ability to develop feelings for anyone to her death bed. As a rule, teenagers made Frieda nauseous. But Robbie was a good boy, she knew that. And bright as anything, too — something of a memory whiz, the way he could point to anyone who walked in and recite exactly when they had last been to the restaurant. “Will it be the usual, Mrs. H? It’s a little late for an eggs benedict, but,” he glanced around and placed a hand to his mouth as though sharing a secret just with her, “I’ve got an in with the chef, and I’m sure we could whip some up for ya.” Frieda lifted a corner of her mouth and replied, “No, no, just a coffee. Please.” “Decaf, black. Gotcha.” She watched him head behind the counter, poking the cook’s shoulder with a grin before grabbing a mug. The cook chuckled, bent over a sink piled high with pans and plates. Frieda wondered how many litres of dish soap a place like this went through each month. How many eggs they cracked, how many hollow hearts they filled with hot coffee. Robbie returned to her table and placed the mug down, pouring from the carafe with a steady hand and a look on his face, such a look, like a painter smudging the finishing touch of his piece just… so. “Robbie, how old are you?” “I’m 20 in October, ma’am.” He had a loud voice, far too eager to engage in conversation in Frieda’s

ARIELL A GOLDEN

opinion. But she was grateful for it tonight. “And what of plans to go to college? Mrs. Carter always said how smart you were, said you knew the answers before she thought up questions.” The boy grinned as he wiped a drop from the carafe, but it seemed to stretch inward, reaching for some private memory that she couldn’t see. “Yeah, she’s got a mouth on her, that Mrs. Carter. She was a great teacher. She really saw us. You know?” He looked up, and Frieda nodded. “But college ain’t for me. I’m plenty fine where I am. I help my Ma out. It’s good.” “Fine, but you’re so young. Don’t you…” Robbie looked at her expectantly. “Don’t you want to take some risks, know what’s out there? You must feel sometimes, I don’t know… restless?” Her eyes searched his open face, pricked with an agitation she couldn’t comprehend. She wanted to see some yearning in him for the world beyond the nest, some fire. She needed proof from him that such a thing was possible. “No, ma’am, I… ‘out there’ is my town and my car and my paycheck at the end of the month. This is my home, I don’t want anything else.” Something within Frieda sunk, like a cold stone, into her stomach. She no longer wanted her coffee. “Can I have the bill?” Tom hadn’t moved an inch since Frieda left. She opened the door to find him still, his head in his hands, gazing glassy-eyed at the coffee table. An image of some famous statue came to Frieda’s mind, but she couldn’t recall the name. Frieda stood in the doorway for a few moments, taking in the arch of his back, the ridges snaking up his neck, the way his shoulder shrugged inward like he was in a perpetual state of uncertainty. How strange they had grown, and yet how familiar. How comfortably familiar. She let out a sigh and headed upstairs to bed.

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If and When AMY RECHTSHAFFEN

Abandoned in a field by the side of the road, it watches others pass by. | CAT COOPER

When would admire If’s sense of self, If’s knowledge, preparedness… Most anything else. If is so simple, But If is so deep, But If never wonders Or talks in If’s sleep. When would catch eyes With If from afar, Race into If’s arms And When’d say, “When we’re stars We’ll tour ’cross the globe, All the seas, first through fifth, Just think of the times we Could spend — When and If!” “No, no,” If would say. “It’s If first, then When. For When is delusional When When spills Whens.” When’d look around, and then When would say, “When I meet Of Course, we’ll be gone in a day.” Amy Rechtshaffen is a first year theatre major at University of Guelph. She has been writing since she was very young, and has always been interested in poetry. The inspiration for this poem came from her own never-give-up attitude, and how people often correct her by telling her to say “if” instead of “when.” Amy’s other interests include acting, music, dancing, and puppies. She is from Toronto, but WHEN she gets famous, she will move to Hollywood. :)

Growing by the side of a boardwalk, between two extremes of field and forest. | CAT COOPER

“ I a m a fi rst-yea r stu d ent stu d y i ng wi l d l i fe bi o l o gy. M u ch of my wo rk i s ta ken whi l e travel l i ng a nd fo c u ses o n what inte re sti ng thi ngs a l rea d y exi st a s o ppo sed to what I co u l d c re ate.” — Cat Co o per

ADHD, anxiety, and me

Writer’s starvation

FAT I M A B U E L A

Here comes ADHD She is imaginative, inventive, her mind forever wandering She can be whoever she wants to be Is she able to bring her thoughts into creations? She forgets, she procrastinates, sensory overload Here comes anxiety She is responsible, careful, wise She can do whatever she wants to do Is she able to go through with it? She is exposed, fearful, cries Here I come I am hoping, wishing, dreaming Who really am I? I am a quitter, pessimistic, distressed — Now read this backwards

They say writers starve Starve for greatness When pen touches paper Writers feel euphoric Ink spills poetry out from the love Pen and paper were never meant to separate A longing mind to bring them together The hunger to want to write a new life To write is to play God Cause a beginning And an end When a writer halts their free spirit When they cannot bring themselves To recollect feelings Whether they are harsh or kind It breaks pen and paper apart Pen and paper cry out for each other “When will we be together to create life again?!”

“I was born in Toronto, raised in Guelph. I’m a second year sociology student at the University of Guelph. I love the places where I’ve lived, I’ve travelled, and people I’ve met. I write to express my gratitude as well as my grief towards what has transpired to make me who I am today.” — Fatima Buela

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Necessary Storms Fractured A N I K A M AT T H E WS

A window will never un-break A broken shell will never become whole And yet we use plaster to glue pieces of ourselves back together Creating splintered joints that restrict movement A broken shell will never become whole We continue to breathe through fractured lungs Creating splintered joints that restrict movement Living in the spaces between beings to survive We continue to breathe through fractured lungs Becoming coffee tables with broken rings and faint promises Living in the spaces between beings to survive Leaving dying roses in molding water Becoming coffee tables with broken rings and faint promises Testing new relationships over muffin crumbs and tea bags, coffee forgotten Leaving dying roses in molding water Forgotten and replaced by tulips and sugar

K AREN K . TRAN

Tears flow from the sky Not just a cry, but a plea “Someone, please help me” For the riverbeds Are a dry constellation Of tired, sleepy veins Mother only asks For a little fall of rain To quench the parched Earth A flood to renew The pure, simple green and blue That once existed

Karen is a fourth year English major, creative writing minor at U of G and Digital Content Editor at The Ontarion. “I started writing beginnings for poems on post-it notes whenever my train of thought got away from me while I was supposed to be working on something else. Eventually, I found time to complete some of those thoughts while taking some poetry workshops here at U of G.” —Karen K. Tran

Violent, but kind A necessary fury Of a storm maligned

Testing new relationships over muffin crumbs and tea bags, coffee forgotten Sweaty hands reach towards each other in the afternoon light Forgotten and replaced by tulips and sugar Spring creating fresh lives and new sweethearts Sweaty hands reach towards each other in the afternoon light A window will never un-break Spring creating fresh lives and new sweethearts And yet we use plaster to glue pieces of ourselves back together

Realise When You’ve Had Enough A N I K A M AT T H E WS

Frozen water rushes into the crack The boat slowly sinks into my subconscious Drowning itself in the forgotten memories that bubble towards the surface Hitting the bottom, it slides down the sand The boat slowly sinks into my subconscious Revealing hidden shadows in the murk Hitting the bottom, it slides down the sand The crack expands, the cold water surrounds us Revealing hidden shadows in the murk Our past revealed to the world, one Red Bird Match at a time The crack expands, the cold water surrounds us Striking alive and burning through the oxygen left in the hull Our past revealed to the world, one Red Bird Match at a time The fire sparks underwater, terrible but that’s us Striking alive and burning through the oxygen left in the hull Do we release the boat and struggle to breathe as we reach out for the sun?

It almost seems like the world ends outside of the space we occupied. | CAT COOPER

Untitled T R U S T K AT S A N D E

As I stepped outside, my attention was seduced by the sweet notes of the songs the birds sang less like tweets more like rhythmic melodies as they flirt with the lilies on my African print shirt The sun winked a sweet ray as she bowed to kiss my chocolate tanned forehead, burning the birds with envy From the deep crevices of my soul I felt the wind blow, carrying the bitterness of yesterday together with the sweet aroma of an auspicious tomorrow with my hands resting comfortably in my pockets, I looked back at the African plain as a smile cracked open my lips for I knew I had chosen the latter Turning my back to the days gone, I gave thanks to the Lord for the blessings and yet another day.

The fire sparks underwater, terrible but that’s us Tell me when you’ve seen enough Do we release the boat and struggle to breathe as we reach out for the sun? Is that all? Tell me when you’ve seen enough Frozen water rushes into the crack Is that all? Drowning itself in the forgotten memories that bubble towards the surface PHOTO COURTESY OF PEXELBAY

Anika Matthews is a fourth year English major at the University of Guelph. When asked about her poetry, Anika said, “I always thought of poetry as an old form of expression but through poetry I was able to express my emotions and have consequently gained respect for the often forgotten form of writing.”

Trust Katsande is an MSc student in plant agriculture based mainly at University of Guelph, Ridgetown Campus. Besides his studies, he is also passionate about art (poetry, photography, painting, and more). He draws his inspiration in poetry from nature and life in general. His major influences include Michael V Darklight, George the Poet, Rupi Kaur, Seneca, and Paulo Coelho.

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COURTESY OF KELLY SIKKEMA.

MELODRAMA MEGAN LAPIERRE

a single bending lilac branch — she is melodrama blooming. a singsong laugh at notions of frailty; something to sharpen your teeth on, pending the great fatigue of a mouth unable to resonate. constancy in disjointed heartbeat — resonate in the chest cavity, echoing in each aortic branch the rise and fall an involuntary gesture of spotlighting presence; teeming, blooming luminosity more intrinsic than could ever be turned on with the flick of a switch, she taunts frailty. the delicate vane of the feather invokes frailty, not the stem, whose saunter resonates a steady wavelength that goes on and on, inking a tattoo of an olive branch on porcelain skin — blooming into permanence outlasting the materials we’re made of. her inhibitions are a labyrinth of negotiations within what defines frailty, a garden of wallflowers blooming in the dark. rooted with resonate meaning never fulfilled — maybe you should branch out; but a comfort zone is pavement un-walked on. can you lend a limb to go out on? a missing appendage in dislocation of. sharpen the end of a branch to get to the point; shed frailty sticks more than stones resonate — swarms of deadwood blooming. she is unbeautiful blooming; the abject art object to agitate on. feelings of unease resonateresonateresonate razorblades trapped inside her pretty mouth, a mirror of how it feels to gaze fallacious upon perceived frailty: snap the glass, shatter the branch. varium et mutabile semper femina: reservoir of paradoxes in boxes marked “fragile” — frailty unknown; infinite possibility is a single bending lilac branch.

Megan Lapierre: I am a fourth year English major (doubleminoring in psychology and music), and though I’ve been writing from a very young age, with shifts in genre preferences accompanying different phases in my life, poetry seems to be a mainstay. I wrote this sestina to get a feel for the style and ended up really liking it. It was inspired by a weird amalgamation of a Laura Marling album, an Ella Yelich-O’Connor interview, an Emily Dickinson poem, and my own experiences with notions of femininity.

“ Fo r t h e m o s t p a r t , my a p p ro a c h to t a ki ng photo s i s to try a nd get a s c l o se to the s ub je c t s a s p o s s ib l e in o rde r to c a pt ure a l l the l i ttl e d eta i l s, l i ke the fu z z o n a to m ato . W h e n de c idin g w h at to p h oto g ra ph, whatever seem s i nteresti ng to m e at t h e t im e is fa ir g a m e , w h et h e r it ’s a pretty pl a nt o r my c ats wa nd eri ng a ro u nd o u t s ide . A re p e at in g t h e m e in my p h oto s wo u l d be d i fferent a spects of natu re, a s g a rde n s a n d fo re s t s a re w h e re I f in d a l ot of my i nspi rati o n.” Mic h a e l C im e s a is a f ir s t - y ea r p o l it ical s cien ce s t u den t at t h e U ni versit y of G u elph .

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F EATUR E

Comedy in Guelph: progressive or raw or both?

In December, The Making-Box celebrated its 100th show. This January, Comedy Night at Jimmy Jazz celebrates its first year. Top right: Dave MacInnis. | PHOTO BY ODESIA HOWLETT. Left: Jay Reid. | PHOTO COURTESY OF CANADIAN IMPROV GAMES LOGOS COURTESY OF THE MAKING-BOX AND JIMMY JAZZ

Making-Box and Jimmy Jazz forge different paths for local scene O D E S I A H OW L E T T

Five years ago, Guelph’s comedy scene provided little opportunity for local comedians. “You could watch Ron James at the River Run, but there surely wasn’t any place to try comedy yourself,” said Jay Reid, who co-founded The Making-Box comedy company in 2013. Since then, the city has seen the emergence of a weekly comedy night, a four-day comedy festival, and a dedicated storefront comedy theatre. Comedians like Patrick Haye (Just for Laughs 42, Winnipeg Comedy Festival) and Mark Little (Just for Laughs, Canadian Comedy Award winner) have performed in Guelph to sold out crowds. The Making-Box on Cork Street and Jimmy Jazz on Macdonnell Street have created a home for local, national, and international comedians. The Making-Box, co-founded by Jay Reid and Ric Mattingley, began by hosting shows at the local Army, Navy & Air Force Veterans club, but soon realized there was a larger demand for comedy. They moved and made a home at 40

Baker Street as a pop-up theatre. Today, they are the first storefront comedy theatre in Guelph, located at 43 Cork St. Think all they offer is stand-up? Think again: “We have a bathroom covered from floor to ceiling in pictures of cute bulldogs,” said Reid. They also teach improv. Their regular schedule consists of a twice-monthly open mic, “Headliners” shows featuring a handful of local talents leading up to a successful national or international comedian, a monthly “Improv Jam,” and more. T he Ma k ing-B ox put s a n emphasis on “[building] community through comedy, so naturally we’re always trying to listen harder, identify and erase potential boundaries, and celebrate unique communities,” said Reid. Their open mics guarantee five spots to people of colour, LGBTQ2IA+ people, gender non-conforming people, females, or people with disabilities. They also have a gender-neutral washroom. In such a safe and accessible space, people with marginalized identities can enjoy a fun night out and also see themselves on stage. “Some shows we produce are more obviously focused — queercentric shows, feminist shows, drag shows. We’ve put on comedy shows for law firms, seniors, and have taught improv to six-year-olds, inside of women’s prisons, and at the head office of Canada’s largest

Today, you can see multiple comedy shows a week in Guelph. It’s incredible. bank. Laughter has no bounds,” said Reid. The Making-Box isn’t the only place to see comedy in Guelph. Comedy Night at Jimmy Jazz is a free weekly show created in 2017 and hosted by Cambridge comedian — “A lot of nights, people would clarify me as a ‘loser’” — Dave MacInnis. Local comedians (first-timers, amateurs, or pros) perform before a headlining comedian every Sunday night. The headliner is often a hardworking touring comedian who performs raw material for a crowd willing to respond and interact with them. MacInnis himself has been practicing for years. “Dave is a great example of someone who worked and works hard at comedy,” said Reid. “Years back, he did one of his first sets at a Making-Box open mic and it was terrible, repulsive even. Flash forward to today and, probably a hundred sets later, he’s skilled and generally hilarious on stage.” W hen creating the weekly

lineup, MacInnis is impartial to the content. “A lot of people, they want gay comedy, they want women comics,” said MacInnis. “I just want funny people. I don’t care if you’re black, you’re brown, I don’t give a shit who you are. I just want you to be funny and do the show.” The comedy matches the venue: grungy. Many comedians talk about the realness of their lives, work, and relationships without feeling the restrictions of political correctness. They use ableist and sexist slurs that would elsewhere be unacceptable. There is a silent understanding that true comedy is born in grungy communities such as this, and comedians will test out risky new material that might end up bombing or offending the audience. Each show could be a hit or a miss. There is a non-judgmental vibe around those who have been to a handful of shows and understand what they’re in for. According to MacInnis, Comedy Night at Jimmy Jazz doesn’t attract

many students, despite being free: “I’m kind of a miserable prick and a lot of comics that I book are kind of miserable. And a lot of students, they’re in the time of their life where they’re having so much fun. They don’t want to listen to some sad asshole’s problems. So most times [when] we have students, we end up walking them. Most people who come here are usually mid-20s to early 30s. And I like that crowd better because they know that life sucks a bit and they can relate.” “The Making-Box, like especially with their pro shows, they definitely do it differently,” said MacInnis. “They do what they do very, very well. But here, you’ll find people you wouldn’t see at The Making-Box, because I book everyone and anyone. You would find material here that you would never find at The Making-Box.” Comedy fans can also watch for shows at other bars and venues around Guelph, such as the River Run Centre, Silence, and the Army, Navy & Air Force Veterans club. Local comedian Zach Charbonneau has even started hosting shows in his own living room — his second house show runs later this January. Reid summed things up perfectly: “Today, you can see multiple comedy shows a week in Guelph. It’s incredible. Guelph has a flourishing and talented comedy community.”

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E DITORIAL STAFF Editor-in-Chief Mirali Almaula News Editor Tiann Nantais Arts & Culture Editor Will Wellington Sports & Health Editor Matteo Cimellaro Digital Content Editor Karen K. Tran Marketing Assistant Leslie Thompson Copy Editor Carolynn Whitehouse PRODUC TION STAFF Photo & Graphics Editor Alora Griffiths Director of Layout & Design Frances Esenwa BUS INESS STAFF Office Manager Aaron Jacklin Business Coordinator Lorrie Taylor Ad Manager Al Ladha Circulation Director Salvador Moran Readership Researcher Patrick Sutherland BOARD OF DIREC TORS President Alex Lefebvre Chair of the Board Jordan Terpstra Vice President Communications Heather Gilmore Vice President Finance Mehkansh Sharma

The human body is a piece of artwork.

I’VE NEVER BEEN ONE TO BE NAKED. I know the word “naked” might mean something different to others. Feeling naked might mean you’re vulnerable to emotions. Feeling naked might mean you have literally lost your clothes. To me, naked means striping away the fabric to show what I have put hours into. Literally hours at the gym, daily, for over 10 years. Agreeing to do a nude fitness photography shoot puts a whole new meaning to “I workout to look good naked.” I’m not going to lie, I was scared and nervous about the experience. The photographer, Mark Ruddick, did an excellent job of explaining what was involved, the things I needed to bring, and what was to be expected. I believe the photographer can either make or break a photoshoot like this. I was fortunate enough to work with Mark, a well-established photographer in London, Ont., who has photographed many athletes, and people of all shapes and sizes. Mark said he had never photographed a powerlifter before. I wanted the photos to be a bit different than the typical bodybuilder photographs. I spend most of my training in a back squat or deadlift, I wanted him to capture those movements. Whether you workout, train, compete or not, the human body is a piece of artwork. These photos are a representation of the accumulation of work that I put into my body to compete in 2017.

DIREC TORS Emma Callon Miriam Habib Jonathan Marun-Batista Josh Millen Megan Scarth

Back squat.

CONTRIBUTORS Fatima Buela Mariah Bridgeman Nathan Campagnaro Michael Cimesa Cat Cooper Kate Ethier Tasha Falconer Ariella Golden Emma Hawley-Yan Miryam Haworth Odesia Howlett Claudia Idzik Hadeel Iraq Trust Katsande Megan Lapierre Ariana Longley Anika Matthews Catherine Meng Amy Rechtshaffen Mark Ruddick Barbara Salsberg Mathews Megan Sullivan Janan Shoja Doost

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