No Benefits, No Work

TSSU ESCALATES JOB ACTION

While bargaining should follow logic and reason, it follows power, and our greatest power is our labour.

DALTON KAMISH TSSU BARGAINING COMMITTEE MEMBER

In order for Indigenous women and girls to have safety, we need Canadians to see Indigenous people as full dimensional beings.

ANGELA STERRITT

SILENCE EQUALS VIOLENCE

RADIOACTIVE COLONIALISM

This vile garbage isn’t welcome in our community, or anywhere else.

The destruction of the Kakhovka Dam “has been recognized as indicative of genocidal intent.”

MAYOR BRAD WEST

DR. SVITLANA MATVIYENKO

ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF CRITICAL MEDIA ANALYSIS

Professors need to set more manageable schedules and rethink some of their unrealistic expectations regarding course load.

Xiao Lu and the “fight for authorship” over her art

Content warning: mentions of gunshots used for art-making.

Note: quotations taken from Xiao Lu were translated from Mandarin to English by a translator at the event.

Nestled deep in Sun Wah Centre on Keefer Street is Centre A, a public art gallery displaying “contemporary Asian and Asian-diasporic perspectives.” On September 29, the gallery hosted a talk by ChineseAustralian artist, Xiao Lu, done in partnership with SFU’s David Lam Centre. The presentation, delivered in both Mandarin and English, captured the stories behind some of Lu’s most thought-provoking works of art, such as “Polar,” “Holy Water,” and “Skew.”

Lu is an artist who does performance works, installations, and other forms of art. She studied at the China Academy of Art (formerly the Zhejiang Academy of Fine Arts), with a specialization in oil painting. However, her graduating work, “Dialogue,” was an extra-credit installation that didn’t use a single brush of paint. The installation came about due to Lu’s “[reflection] upon some personal and emotional struggles.” She noted that the piece

features the backs of a man and a woman displayed on two separate telephone booths with a telephone standing between them, showing the “impossibility of dialogue.” This piece underwent many changes over the course of time, but also became key in her fight for authorship over her works of art.

The “unusual” aspect of “Dialogue” became a main reason for faculty members to see the installation. She recalled how one teacher called the visual composition “too clean,” which caused her to consider placing a “break” in the glass. Open discussion resulted in her decision to use a gunshot to break the glass.

Initially, Lu had been interested in firing a bullet into the work during the exhibit. To do so, she reached out to a friend in the firing squad who ended up sneaking a gun; however, they were unable to meet up for this exchange.

On February 5, 1989, during the opening day of the China Avant-Garde Exhibition at the Beijing Art Museum, Lu fired a gunshot into the installation. However, as police didn’t see the actual shot being fired, they made the

assumption that the man she was with had fired the gun, and apprehended him instead of her. This resulted in various news publications and sources inaccurately reporting that the exhibit was created by Lu and her friend, rather than Lu herself.

The struggle over authorship of “Dialogue” was only made greater by the patriarchal systems of the contemporary Chinese art world, which fought against her individuality as a woman and the authorship she was asserting with her own creation. The public exhibition-turned-movement, “Bald Girls,” which was done in conjunction with artists Li Xinmo and Jiny Lan, and curated by GermanChinese Yong Xian, stood as a “feminist exhibition” that helped Lu “awaken.”

“When I had to fight for authorship in 2005, I had to open myself up,” Lu said. “Not only [to] confront myself, but confront the world around me and connect directly with society on all sorts of different levels.”

Lu’s novel containing her experiences in regaining her authorship, titled Dialogue, can be found on her website, xiaoluart.com.

IZZY CHEUNG · STAFF WRITER

Creative work is an attempt to approach and somehow understand, if only partially, subjects that are beyond me.

JINUSHI // MULTIDISCIPLINARY ARTIST

MAIKO

October 10–15

Aries

March 21–April 9

Change your phone wallpaper to something that will yell at you to do work. How about a photo of Nicki Minaj with the caption, “Barbs stay in school!” Or a picture of your favourite video game with the caption, “You wanna play? You have to earn it.” Bonus points if you also use that audio as your ringtone and alarm. Be creative!

Taurus

April 20–May 20

You pay for your SFU gym membership in your tuition. 99% of people who promise they’ll take advantage of their membership throughout the semester only end up working out twice, both in the first week of school. I want to be your witness when you’re working on your fitness!

Gemini

May 21–June 20

Make one trip to do all your groceries. Buy those 100-pack instant noodles, 50 pounds of minute rice, and 300 granola bars. If you want to have time to study this semester, you’ve got to be able to make meals in one minute. Who knows when you’ll have a chance to attend Guy Fieri’s Grocery Games?

Cancer

June 21–July 22

Get a pair of anti-slip, waterproof, ice-proof, grippy shoes with straps instead of laces. If you’ve lived here in the fall and winter, you know what the weather is like. And once the temperature gets low, your hands will be so frozen they won’t be able to untie your laces when you get home.

Leo July 23–August 22

New school year means new sticker collection! Go to some random marketing stands or wander around the SUB until someone hands you free stickers. You could also buy those cute animal stickers at the dollar store. Make the back of your laptop unforgettable so your professors can always notice you in the lecture room and remember how awesome your computer was.

Libra

September 23–October 22

Invest in roller blades. As students, we don’t have a single minute to waste. Rolling down the hallways and across campus in Heelys instead of walking is estimated to save you 28.73 seconds per 100 metres (just an educated guess by me). And sometimes that’s the bit of extra time you need when you’re submitting an assignment on Canvas right before midnight.

Capricorn

December 22–January 19

Hey Capricorn! I know you think you should be studying for midterms, but the stars actually want you to binge-watch all the seasons of your favourite show one last time before you start drowning in schoolwork. Just soak in all the good parts so you can replay them in your head when you’re bored in class.

Scorpio

October 23–November 21

Get your Halloween and Christmas shopping over with! Prove to yourself you’re not a pro procrastinator. You know you’ll be studying for your midterm the night before Halloween and staying up all night wrapping presents on Christmas Eve. Why not avoid all this stress for once?

Virgo

August 23–September 22

Clear your entire drive, whether it’s Google Drive, OneDrive, or whatever you use today. It’s a true nightmare getting constant notifications saying, “your storage is 99% full.” Where will you keep all your videos from the Coldplay concert and hilarious videos of your dog and cat chasing each other??? Oof, just make a new email address and get the free storage plan again.

Sagittarius

November 22–December 21

Take a nice long walk down a trail to mentally recover from the realization of midterms approaching. Go bananas and swing from branch to branch. Who knows when you’ll ever have time to inhale fresh air while you lock yourself indoors for months trying to catch up on weekly readings and assignments?

Aquarius

January 20–February 18

Give your phone a leash like it’s your pet, and you can’t lose sight of it. How annoying is it to leave your phone somewhere and go through the whole process of tracking your recent footsteps, calling your phone number, and reporting your missing phone? And doing all that to eventually find out your phone was at the bottom of your backpack the entire time? The point is, just keep your phone in sight at all times to avoid unnecessary stress!

Pisces

February 19–March 20

Know where every bathroom is so you can avoid lineups during breaks. Whenever there’s a 10-minute break during lecture, everyone just goes to the same nearest bathroom and spends the whole time lining up. If you walk one minute to a more hidden bathroom, you’ll probably have the whole bathroom to yourself.