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Winner of Raspberry’s 2017 colouring contest Sarah Chen, 13
Fall 2017
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Katie Stobbart Editor-in-Chief
Jess Wind Communications Manager
Valerie Franklin Managing Editor
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Dessa Bayrock Literary Arts Curator The Red Press Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering the growth of the literary arts in the Fraser Valley; publishing works which stimulate local arts and culture, including Raspberry magazine; and promoting awareness and readership of contemporary Canadian literature.
Writers Heather Ramsay Mel Spady Christopher Towler
Red Press Society Board of Directors Jess Wind
Interested in supporting local arts and culture? Help us continue publishing, host events, and provide a space for the Fraser Valley culture to grow and thrive. Email red.press@raspberrymag.ca for details.
President
Dessa Bayrock Secretary
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Katie Stobbart Executive Director
contents Local heritage goes digital Visitors can now explore the Trethewey House heritage site and Mill Lake Park through the augmented reality app, Agents of Discovery.
Quidditch comes to Abbotsford Abbotsford was successful in its bid to bring the Western Regional Finals of this growing sport to the MCA Fields from November 17 to 19.
Art, identity, and the selfie Ephemeral work by emerging artist Sage Sidley
Duty, identity, and belonging in End of East Mel Spady visits Jen Sookfong Lee’s debut work
Overcoming obstacles in Persona 5 & Fluxx A conversation about changing the rules in games, in life
Experimental photography by Bob Friesen New indigenous art at Mill Lake, and beyond History and appropriation at Chilliwack Lake Poetry by Ekaterina Marenkov
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Making a space, changing the game How do we reclaim a world that doesn’t belong to us? by Katie Stobbart When we talk about community, we often use the language of ownership. But what if the community we belong to doesn’t feel like it belongs to us? What if the places we own by virtue of possession are places that stifle self-expression, refuse to bend and grow, or fail to include and nurture new voices? What if, in our space, there is no space for us? For many of us, this question extends beyond the borders of our community into the world at large. At times, it seems
“What if, in our space, there is no space for us?” impossible to find or make a space to safely share our authentic selves with the world. We can’t always claim or connect with the places we hold dear. The works in this issue of Raspberry explore our relationships with space and community. They show us both trying to reach and straining to break free of the past. They present a world of changing rules. How do we navigate such a world? How do we own it, and belong to it? In our corner of this corner of the world, we’re trying to do this by chang-
ing the game. Instead of focusing on reviews and event coverage, we are prioritizing in-depth features, and explorations of what our community is and can be. We’re also moving to a quarterly schedule, so the nature of the space we create is anchored less in timelines and boundaries on a map, and more in conversation and collaboration. The sort of space that keeps shifting to encompass more. One that grows and changes. And one that belongs to more of us. As always, we hope you enjoy the journey.
Trethewey House goes digital
New app to help visitors engage with local history Katie Stobbart Museums are often associated with the outdated; as homes for artifacts of days gone by, it’s easy to think of them as places where time stops. However, technological advances present opportunities for us to access the past in a more comprehensive and engaging way. In October 2017, Abbotsford’s Trethewey House heritage site introduced a new app they hope will help visitors better connect with local heritage. Run by the MSA Museum Society (MSAMS), Trethewey House is a 1920s residence in the southeast corner of Mill Lake Park, dating back to when the park was not a lake at all, but a functional mill. Using augmented reality (which grafts a virtual world onto a real-world landscape), the Agents of Discovery app allows visitors to complete missions as special agents, finding clues and taking photos
around the site to unlock extra knowledge about its history. Similar to how games like Pokémon Go work, the user might catch bugs to complete parts of their mission. There is also a photo hunt, which asks agents to take photos of certain artifacts or locations, and multiple-choice questions that interact with the current exhibit. Upon completion of the missions at Trethewey House, agents unlock a bonus mission to explore all of Mill Lake Park. Trethewey House is the first museum in British Columbia to use Agents of Discovery; its other Canadian locations include Parks Canada sites and the Parliament Buildings in Victoria. The house and other buildings on-
site are available to be toured during business hours, but Christina Reid, the Collections and Operations Manager at MSAMS, says having the app makes the site more accessible — whether by removing a financial barrier for visitors or extending explorations of the site beyond business hours when staff are available. “Sometimes we get people who want an educational tour for their students or home-schooled kids, but they feel [it] is more than they can afford,” Reid says. “Also, let’s say you’re an ESL class … [and] only open in the evenings and on weekends [when] we’re not here. You can do this for free, so we are not turning anybody away that
Photo: Trethewey Heritage Site
Just collecting stuff doesn’t cut mustard. You also have to display it and make it accessible.
wants to access the information.” Using the app to supplement self-guided tours also opens up a fuller experience of the historical site: rather than just including the buildings and the exhibits within, visitors have an opportunity to explore Joey’s Playhouse, a one-room schoolhouse replica; the Upper Sumas Train Station; and the Sylvia Pincott Heritage Gardens. “A lot of people don’t realize that we have a heritage habitat garden in the back,” Reid says. “It has all these little memorial plaques but also separate gardens within one garden, and all of that is interpreted on the app.” Having a technological component to the museum also changes the way exhibits are curated and designed. In-
stead of just what’s on the wall or in the case, texts can include multiple components: the physical exhibit, some initial information about the exhibit on the app, and more information revealed when a question is solved. Reid wrote the texts so the most important information is readily available: if a visitor knows nothing about the site going in, they should know the most important things about the exhibit by the time they leave. Program Officer Anna Irwin suggests the introduction of an app will make interacting with the museum a more familiar experience for visitors in a time of smart phones. “If you don’t have technology that people are familiar with, then you just
Photo: MSA Museum Society become antiquated. [People] don’t know what is going on and they just go, ‘I don’t know [what this is],’ and walk away.” The Agents of Discovery app is funded by a private donor so that visitors can use it for free. Its primary audience is kids, but Irwin and Reid hope it will attract anyone interested in local heritage, and bring different age groups together. “What I’m hoping to see,” says Reid, “is grandparents and grandkids that come out, and families that play it with their kids, because it becomes a social thing, and it’s a learning experience that’s different from what we traditionally offer.” She adds that the app might also
help introduce history’s heavier themes in a more engaging format; rather than sitting and listening to a long talk, kids can move around the site and discover history in digestible pieces. “The definition of a museum is to maintain a collection and make it accessible to the public,” Reid says. “Just collecting stuff doesn’t cut mustard. You also have to display it and make it accessible … and we can expand on that by way of this app.” The Agents of Discovery app can be downloaded prior to visiting the site; otherwise there is WiFi available during business hours, and Shaw Go after hours onsite. Trethewey House is located at 2313 Ware Street.
BROOMS UP Quidditch, culture, and the rise of a new sport Quidditch without magic Jess Wind Photos by Dave Chapman What makes a sport? Many of the sports we’re familiar with have been around long enough that we don’t often think about them in their infancy. We don’t think about crude equipment and workshopping new rules until they make sense. Many remember hockey before helmets, but the majority of us don’t give the origin story of our favourite sport a second thought. All sports come from somewhere. They’re born out of modification, out of boredom, out of a love for active play, and, sometimes, out of fiction.
When J.K. Rowling developed a fantasy world that operates secretly in parallel to our own, she borrowed influence from the reality in which she was writing. Inspired by popular invasion sports like basketball or soccer, Rowling created a fantastical sport on which players mount broomsticks and fly around a pitch, trying to put a ball through hoops while not getting destroyed by enchanted and unforgiving iron balls. Played and enjoyed by wizards the world over, quidditch captures the hearts of the wizarding world much like our sports do in the real world. It hasn’t quite been long enough to pass into legend, but the origins of reality (or muggle)-based quidditch start on the grass at Middlebury College,
Vermont in 2005. According to US Quidditch the game was invented by “then freshman Xander Manshel,” who was looking to vary his regular Sunday activity. They conceived of a real-world version of the game that captured the hearts and minds of multiple generations for the last 20 years. Without the ability to enchant brooms and playing equipment, Manshel and his friends modified the game using things found in your closet. They switched the quaffle for a volleyball, bludgers for dodgeballs, and mounted everyday brooms.
The coveted golden snitch, according to Rowling’s universe, is “tiny, about the size of a large walnut.” It marks the end of the game, and seems to fly around with a mind of its own. The non-magic solution: a human runner dressed in yellow with a “snitch tail” hanging out of their shorts evades capture by both teams. Muggle quidditch in its earliest conception was a spectacle. The fantasy was not far from the reality in its earliest days. Players played with bristled broom sticks, capes, and goggles, not dissimilar from Rowling’s magical
It doesn’t look as Harry Potter-esque: it looks like a sport, which is what we want it to be as an organization. world. In Mudbloods, a 2014 documentary (now on Netflix) about UCLA’s underdog journey to the Quidditch World Cup in New York City, the emotion behind the sport is clear. These young athletes have transcended the Harry Potter fandom and are competing for something bigger.
Finding space on the pitch for a new sport As quidditch has developed around the world under the guidance of the International Quidditch Association, teams have gone from localized intramural clubs to collegiate champions, professional athletes through Major League Quidditch in the U.S., and international titleholders at the World Cup level. However, as the sport gains international attention, the costumed aspects have been replaced by a more stringent focus on safe, athletic, competitive play. “We’ve come a very long way from the time where people used to play with capes,” notes Yara Kodershah, communications director for Quidditch Canada. “The aesthetic of the game has shift-
ed slightly,” she explains. “By not playing with capes and not playing with bristles, the aesthetic has been more athletic. So you’re seeing people able to jump higher, hit harder, run faster because these things are out of the way. It doesn’t look as Harry Potter-esque: it looks like a sport, which is what we want it to be as an organization.” Austin Wallace, captain of the UBC Thunderbirds SC and member of team Canada’s 2016 roster, explains that quidditch is in a pivotal time of development. He says the quidditch community is looking to raise the competitive bar as it begins to shed its fantastical origins. “I guess the big hope is that by legitimizing the sport further you get a new class of recruits that come in every year that is athletic, that has heard about it as a sport, has seen it as a sport, not a Harry Potter thing,” he says. But more focus on the development of the sport itself means a
Why do you need to dribble in basketball? Why can’t you just pick up the soccer ball with your hands? It’s the constraints that define the game. more stringent focus on the game as playable and safe, as viewable, and as marketable. Wallace reminisces about the push to close loopholes in the rule book as players continue to adjust their play style. “It’s a little ridiculous. Twenty-somethings are actually really good at finding loopholes in the rules,” he laughs. For instance, after outlawing tackles from behind in a previous version of the rules, players took to running down the field backwards, making them untouchable for tackle. Thus, another rule needed to be added to balance the game. Quidditch commits to adjusting rules to address safety concerns that come with a full contact, low equipment sport. A common assumption is that injuries are sustained from playing with brooms (now PVC pipes), but Wallace explains that most injuries come from a lack of experience. “People don’t come from a full contact sport background. People don’t know how to ... make a hit, they don’t know how to fall. People don’t know how to take a hit,” he explains. “There’s
safe and unsafe ways to fall when you’re being tackled. Beyond the rules there’s a lot of education that needs to happen and does happen.” The earnest, heartfelt commitment to the game has persisted, even if the capes have not.
What do you mean you play quidditch? One thing that comes with playing a sport that most people understand as being linked to a magical fantasy world is explaining away the magic. “How does the snitch work?” “Do you fly?” “Why do you need the broom?” Wallace is no stranger to these questions after discovering quidditch as an athlete rather than a Harry Potter fan. In response, he makes links to rules we accept as normal in traditional sports. “Why do you need to dribble in basketball? Why can’t you just pick up the soccer ball with your hands?” he says. “It’s the constraints that define the game.” He goes on to explain how these constraints increase the level of strat-
egy and are part of why he was so drawn to quidditch in the first place. “The part about quidditch that makes it the most strategic and interesting and different from other sports is the beating,” he explains. “The dodgeballs, where if you get hit you have to return to your hoops, is [the] aspect of quidditch that sort of changes the entire flow of the game.” Wallace only needed to step on the pitch once before he was hooked. “I tried it once and was like, oh my god, this is amazing,” he says. “This is the best thing I’ve ever done in my entire life. It was athletic, it was physical. It was full contact.” He was drawn to the physical aspects of the game as much as the qualities that separate it from other
sports. “Most people join quidditch because of Harry Potter, or at least try it, and most people stay because of the sport or the connections,” he explains. “[It’s] a pretty awesome group of people. It’s not the same sort of ‘bro’ frat culture that you’ll find in other sports. And a a lot of people are sort of turned off by that, and that’s why they haven’t found their sport yet.”
Sporting inclusivity If the uniqueness of a sport born from a magical fictional world isn’t enough, quidditch is a full contact and entirely gender-inclusive sport. Instead of taking cues from other
The whole foundation of quidditch was built on gender-inclusive rules. Any way that you choose to identify, that’s how you’re welcomed onto the pitch. well-established full contact sports and dividing teams based on assigned sex, quidditch embraces a person’s right to identify as their chosen gender. “The whole foundation of quidditch was built on gender-inclusive rules, so it’s not just a co-ed sport … it’s a fully gender-integrated sport,” explains Kodershah. “So it’s inclusive of trans identities, it’s inclusive of gender-fluid identities. Any way that you choose to identify, that’s how you’re welcomed onto the pitch.” They play with a “four on” rule where no more than four players (out of seven) on a team who identify as the same gender can be on the field at the same time. Kodershah explains that struggles come from social structure, not from within the sport. “It’s a full contact sport ... and just the way society is structured, the way people are socialized into sports, you don’t get a lot of women or non-male bodies playing full contact sports,” she explains. “Especially by the time you reach the collegiate level. So for many women, this is the first time they’re playing a full contact sport.”
She notes that plenty of effort goes into training coaches on how to deliver and receive a tackle safely. “Because the sport is so new, we’re very open to exploring ways of making that safe and secure.” Inclusivity and accessibility is woven into the fabric of the sport’s development. While growing as an athletic organization and raising the competitive bar for international competition, Quidditch Canada is constantly looking for ways to make the sport more accessible. How do we accommodate for different bodies, how do we accommodate for different ages?” she asks. “We’re recognizing now that there are other communities that the sport isn’t accessible to. How do we reach more racialized communities, how do we reach low socioeconomic communities … that’s always at the forefront of our mind as an organization. How do we reach as many people as possible? It’s such a fun game and you want everyone to get a chance at it.”
From far and wide: Quidditch in Canada Like many that have come before it, Quidditch Canada experiences the same geographical hurdles that come with national sports in this country. It’s made up of 400 players and 20 teams split into two regions across the country. Because of Canada’s population density relative to its size, this puts teams like the Winnipeg Whomping Willows in the Western Region. “Canada was the second country ever to adopt quidditch as an amateur
sport, after the United States,” Kodershah explains. “We experience some challenges that the States, being the States, does not experience.” While teams in the U.S. may need to travel a couple of hours to play a match, Canadian players are forced to travel days, or by plane to compete. “It makes it a bit more challenging in terms of how we structure a tournament,” Kodershah explains. “Our regions have to account for this wide dispersion of teams.” As a result, Quidditch Canada must consider how much emphasis to put toward developing smaller teams across the country, versus building up their international play. “The debate in the quidditch community is how much of an emphasis do you put on competition?” Wallace asks. “How much do you support a little team? Like beginning teams, for-fun teams.” Quidditch aims to bolster long-term development through community teams and a youth version called “kidditch.” Established teams run workshops with schools from elementary through high school, adjusting the
level of competition depending on the age. They teach the basics of the sport and safety, and get kids excited about a sport they may not otherwise be exposed to. “Community teams are good for collegiate players to continue playing after they’ve graduated, but they’re also good to sustain the long-term development of quidditch as well and get more involved at a younger age,” Kodershah explains. Anyone can develop their own quidditch team in their community with a little bit of effort and determination. Wallace has experience lobbying for the UBC Thunderbirds SC, who recently secured funding and recognition as an official university sports club. Without this support, and even with it, he explains that starting a team is hard work. After the initial start up costs for buying hoops, snitch shorts, brooms, and balls, there is still plenty of advertising that goes into starting a team. “Once you’ve started a team you have to advertise heavily and you have to talk to everybody about quidditch,”
he says. “It’s ridiculous how often ... You have to be constantly recruiting all the time and people will get sick of you.”
Quidditch comes to Abbotsford Abbotsford doesn’t currently have a local team at the community or collegiate level, but Tourism Abbotsford was still passionate about bringing the sport back to town after successfully hosting the Western Regionals in 2016. Kodershah notes that Abbotsford’s commitment to make it a spectator sport and support the travelling teams helped them win the bid. Chris Blanchette of Tourism Abbotsford explains the drive to bring quidditch to local residents. “Given the nature of quidditch … the sport doesn’t pigeonhole one athletic ability. Bringing that into the community and showcasing such a progressive sport like that. It’s kind of cool for people to even just come out to see. I think it can inspire people who think ‘I can’t
play a certain sport because of certain abilities.’ It’s inspiring in a way.” As far as activities for the event, beyond food trucks and some hinted-at community involvement, Blanchette encourages people to come out and experience it for themselves. He goes on to explain two main goals with the event: establish Abbotsford’s reputation in the quidditch community, and establish quidditch’s reputation in the sport tourism community. When it comes to securing a tournament like the Western Regional Finals, the first step is competing for, and winning, hosting bids. Booking the MRC Sports Complex went a long way to securing the tournament, something Blanchette explains doesn’t happen in all communities. “One thing that’s really important is a community that is open-minded and recognized enough to accept quidditch as a sport,” he explains, noting that field space is often allocated to more traditional sports. “By having a parks and rec team and a city that accepts quidditch and will give it the time, that’s pretty important. Luckily we have that here in Abbotsford, and
they’re open to giving us the ability to get field space to bid on these events.” Quidditch comes as part of Tourism Abbotsford’s five-year strategic plan to focus on sports tourism in the area. Large spectator sports build community involvement while also bringing in travellers to play and watch. “When you look at the diversity in Abbotsford there’s so much more we could be doing … there’s a lot of sports out there that appeal to the different cultures in Abbotsford that we could really start targeting.” By the sounds of it, quidditch is one in a long line of diverse athletic spectatorship we can hope to be part of in the Valley. Quidditch Western Regional Finals hit Abbotsford on November 18 & 19 at the MRC Sports Complex. It is a family-friendly, free event.
Cranberry Festival Wearing communal boots, participants take turns stomping on cranberries in a bucket at the 22nd annual Fort Langley Cranberry Festival.
Demolition of Cannor Nursery This summer, Abbotsford said goodbye to one of its long-time landmarks — Cannor Nursery and Tamaringo’s Cafe on Marshall Road.
Autumn at Mill Lake A thick blanket of autumn leaves covers the ground at Mill Lake’s John Mahoney Park.
Title: 420 HERE LOL Artist: Anonymous This anonymous public work explores the relationship between class identities and sense of place, distilling new synergies from the juxtaposition of classical narratives and modern politics. Pulling from a diverse range of influences, the artist satirizes the struggle for substance legalization while shedding light on the hegemonic forces that perpetrate class discrimination. New insights are generated from both explicit and implicit structures, posing an inescapable question: what does “here� mean? As shifting derivatives are transformed through the lens of social injustice, the viewer is left questioning both their own values and the implications of modern society.
Pics or it didn’t happen Exploring the impermanence of the gallery selfie Katie Stobbart When was the last time you took a photo with your camera phone? Did you share it on Facebook or Instagram? Was it a selfie? When you took the photo, and you shared it, did you think about where it would go? Who would look at it? Sage Sidley’s exhibit Gap at the Reach Gallery Museum explores the changing spaces between photographer, subject, and viewer in the age of the camera phone. The exhibit features six figures: three cell phone photographers on one wall and three posing subjects on the opposite wall. To view Gap, you have to step into the space between. “My main inspiration was the ‘Instagram husband,’” Sidley says. “Because of social media and the camera phone, our whole social and cultural practice of photo-taking has changed. … So how has the camera phone — and its connection to technology and to our culture — changed the relationship between the photographer and the model?”
This line of questioning grew and developed as the exhibit came to inhabit the Reach’s foyer gallery. As an installation artist, Sidley installs her artwork directly on the walls of whatever space she’s working in. Where many artists come to a gallery with a body of work to install, most of Sidley’s planning for the space exists in mental, conceptual space until just prior to the start of the exhibit. It then exists during only that period of time, until it is taken down. “It’s intended to be a kind of oneand-done,” explains curator Chantelle
Fawcett. “The people are done on Phototek paper, which has a sticky backing, so there’s a chance they could be reused. But there are no guarantees.” For Gap, Sidley extended the floor of the foyer gallery onto the walls to make it appear as though the six life-size figures are also standing in the room. The foyer gallery, as Fawcett describes it, is one of the busiest spaces in the gallery, a lot of people end up flowing through and interacting with the work. Sidley adds that it is a less institutional and more public space before entering the
main gallery, opening it up for a unique interaction. “The moment in time that the photo is being taken,” Sidley says, “is captured and paused. The viewer comes between that interaction of the photo being taken … slowed to a standstill.” Some of Sidley’s research for the exhibit draws on ideas about how we behave in front of the camera, from Roland Barthes’ Camera Lucida, and the idea that once we are aware of the camera’s presence, we must act or perform.
“There’s this idea,” Sidley says,” that the camera is taking a picture of our true identities; we see photos as the realistic truth, even though technically it’s not, [because of the] bias of the photographer. So it’s the photographer’s truth of the subject, but the subject reads it as the truth of who they are.” Sidley’s process for creating the artwork challenges the “truth” of the camera photo. They’re not true portraits: first she took photos with her camera phone, then drew them, manipulating
the images to play with how each figure’s body language reflected a narrative relationship between photographer and subject. Through its ephemerality, the exhibit also resists the idea of photography as permanence. Like street art, Gap is installed temporarily in a public place, and interacts with both the place’s visitors and architecture. It is a fleeting communiqué between the artist and the viewer, a declaration of existence in a space. “[With] this idea of ‘tagging’ and taking ownership of place, our place is much more than our private homes. Our place is our community,” Sidley says. “So when we draw directly on a wall, we’re saying, ‘I have a connection with this place and want to communicate with those sharing the space with me.” This then circles back to the original concept of the cell phone photo. “There’s this idea that everything we do now must have a photo to be reality. ‘Take a photo, or it didn’t happen.’ And then that we must instantly share it [on our feeds] and tell everyone, ‘We were here.’”
What it’s like to be an installation artist
Sage Sidley is a Kelowna-based artist. She studied at UBC Okanagan, where one of her drawings is part of the permanent public art collection. Her next exhibit, which will explore themes of art, technology, and surveillance, opens at the Vernon Public Art Gallery on January 4, 2018. When I was doing my research for my BFA final exhibition, I was inspired by a lot of street artists and this idea that art can be anywhere — that it doesn’t necessarily have to be in a gallery space in order to be viewed as art. I like everything to fit, and think of it almost as a Rubik’s cube. The first thing that comes is the space, and then the ideas for how it can all fit together; then, in the end, how the viewer will be approaching the work within the space. [As an installation artist,] sometimes I
find I do a lot more administrative work. My studio time is much more research and conceptually connected, more than drawing and then throwing out the drawing and then redoing the drawing. It’s not so much physical problem-solving as mental problem-solving. It’s definitely a good motivator to get exhibitions rather than just have it in my space, too — to get another exhibition so I can continue this idea of finding a problem in the space and then trying to solve it visually. We don’t really work with curators through school, so it’s been a nice learning experience, and kind of like having a partner in crime. And a lot of the curators have much more experience than I do with the spaces and with installing, so … they’ve taken my art to a new level. They’re also the connector between the public and my work.
Curating Art on Demand 3.3
Chantelle Fawcett started working with the Reach Gallery Museum in 2016; Art on Demand 3.3 Gap is the second show she has curated. I became a member [of Emerge] because I got the opportunity to have a position here for the summer. I was facilitating arts classes, and then transitioned into volunteering within the curatorial side. That led to me curating Art on Demand 3.1 and being asked to come back again for 3.3. This exhibition was a bit different because Sage [Sidley] is an installation artist; I wasn’t the one actually installing the work. Sage developed the exhibition from the moment she was chosen: she had an idea, and it was really awesome for me to be part of it. As emerging artists and curators, I think we have really big ideas and concepts to work from, so for us it was about narrowing it down. The changeover time was [also] a bit of a factor, because we only had about a week to
install, and only a few days to take it down. I’ve learned quickly that installing the work is a very small portion of the curatorial process. It starts with getting the artist — getting to know them, their practice, their medium, their ideas behind their work — and then in this case, since the exhibition was developed for the Reach, it was really important for us to be in contacting regarding new theories, sources, and different ways of communicating the ideas Sage was trying to get across. I’ve kind of developed a bond with Sage. She’s super friendly and she has a lot of passion behind her work. I got really lucky with Art on Demand 3.1 as well, because my artist had a body of work that was ready to be exhibitioned. So it was a different dynamic, which has been really awesome for me, as an emerging curator, getting to work with two different sides of what’s happening in contemporary art now.
Duty, identity, and finding one’s place in Jen Sookfong Lee’s The End of East Mel Spady Family can lay terrible burdens on each other, even when they have the best of intentions. Jen Sookfong Lee’s debut novel The End of East is a story about a Chinese-Canadian family who sees what they want to see and hears what they want to hear, and never truly sees or listens to one another. Everyone wants something, but they never ask for it; they just act poorly, hoping that everyone else will understand and deliver. It’s a story about men who are constantly leaving the women in their lives, and women who pass the abuses they face on to their daughters. It’s a story in which each generation desperately tries to escape the life of the previous one, only to ironically parallel it.
Lee weaves the story threads together seamlessly, but they form two separate tapestries: the present and the past. In the present, Sammy Chan arrives back in Vancouver’s Chinatown from Montreal, and it’s unclear whether she’s running away from her unfinished life in Montreal or coming back to face the thing she first ran from: her family. Her mother is now alone after Sammy’s older sisters have all married and left their home, her father having long since passed away, and Sammy comes to realize that her place as caretaker has long been decided, as “a cast made from [her] body.” Sammy’s arrival in Chinatown also parallels the past story of her paternal grandfather’s arrival in Canada and the subsequent arrivals of her father as a teenager, then her grandmother, and
finally her mother. What could easily have turned into a “he said, she said” family tell-all is a harrowing and emotional exploration of duty, identity, and finding one’s place between two worlds that refuse to mesh — the East and the West. Each character must try to make sense of where one begins and the other ends, struggling to keep their cultural identity alive while finding a way to live harmoniously with Western society despite its racism. The End of East shuffles history into the story with ease, offering an invitation to hear the uncomfortable truth about Canada’s past from the comfort of a fictional point of view. I marvelled at Lee’s ability to do this without breaking the focus of the story, which she achieves by offering the reader firm and familiar ground to stand on. A former
West Coaster myself, I could almost feel the mist and ever-present dampness of late fall mornings in her writing. The physicality of her prose plants you next to the characters, forcing you to feel their struggles along with them: the nervousness of Seid Quan when his son, Pon Man, comes to Canada to live with him, and his desperate need
er from aggressive, painful sex — both are the result of trying to wash away something they feel is shameful. Both of them began as dreamers, and each had that quality chipped away from them by aggressive mother figures. In the end they must find closure in each other, whether it’s from Siu Sang finally seeing herself in her daughter, or from
It’s a harrowing and emotional exploration of duty, identity, and finding one's place between two worlds that refuse to mesh — the East and the West. to be close to him, although his absence for the majority of his son’s life stands between them; Siu Sang’s deep internal struggle, the depth of her cries, and the palpable hollowness of her depression. Even Sammy finds a way to connect to her departed father and grandfather through physical objects — an old sketchbook and an old cigarette tin filled with pictures and papers, respectively. Conversely, Sammy’s mother, Siu Sang, burns all objects related to either man, save for the few that Sammy finds hidden away. Sammy and Siu Sang walk around each other in a parallel that takes most of the novel to come to fruition. Both experience a gruesome vaginal or uterine injury, and while these injuries have different causes — one from childbirth and the oth-
both women realizing that the other is all they have left. This is one of those reads that stays with you long after you put it down. The End of East made me love deeply flawed characters to the point of wishing I could reach out and comfort them — while simultaneously wanting to smack the back of their heads for being so foolish. And isn’t that what being in a family is like? Comforting one another, gently guiding one another with tough love. Lee invites the reader into a new family — one that struggles, loses, comes together, and falls apart. Only by coming together again will they close the distances between their divided worlds, their past and present, their parallel lives, and their fractured relationships.
CHANGING THE RULES Adversity and empowerment in Persona 5, Fluxx, and our world
Christopher Towler
&
Jess Wind
A game world is a wonderful thing. Rarely in life are we as in charge of our circumstances as we are in a game. Though we are often presented with impossible challenges, through perseverance and sometimes with a little help from others, we can overcome whatever the game might throw at us. Games give us the power to change our circumstances: to experiment with new ways of creating, bending, or dismantling the rules that, in our lives, are harder to challenge.
Player: Chris Game: Persona 5 Mission: Overcome adversity through solidarity, and pursue justice Player: Jess Game: Fluxx Mission: Surmount the challenges of ever-shifting rules and conditions
Persona 5 challenges the oppressive message that you should know your place in society and stay there. Many of the characters are victims of abuse by an authority figure: a teacher, a politician, an artistic mentor, a boss. The victims are burdened with inescapable hopelessness — there’s a sense that “this is just the way things are.” This sense of helpless dread is all too familiar to many of us, whether it be at school, at work, or in relationships. It is becoming more familiar with each passing Twitter-rant filled day as certain authority figures use their positions of power to oppress and take advantage of those most vulnerable — stamping out any flicker of hope you have left. If any of this resonates with you, Persona 5 isn’t just a videogame, it’s a rallying cry.
So we’ve got a real stick-it-to-the man theme developing here. These characters are disenfranchised within their lives and the world around them, so they change it. When I finally sat down to play Fluxx for the first time, I wasn’t thinking about the larger social implications of a game with ever-changing rules. I was just playing a game. Fluxx sets you up with two very simple rules: draw one, play one. The outcome of the game is up to you and how you play the hand you’re dealt. As the game progresses, the rules change — either by your own action, or by the actions of those around you. Everyone is playing by the same rules, but their paths to victory differ wildly. At some point I stopped describing *Fluxx and started talking about that rickety point in life where your path isn’t set. You’re finally free to write your own rules, but paralyzed by a lack of direction.
Strategy: Make change through solidarity and flexibility
Luckily we’re still discussing game-based situations in Persona 5 and Fluxx, so there are sure to be opportunities to change the circumstances and beat the game. United by a power called Persona, characters are able to slip into realms conjured by the psyche of their wrongdoers and carry out psychological heists. The abusers become overwhelmed with guilt and are profoundly changed, eventually repenting their actions. Using this newfound power, the characters, dubbed the “Phantom Thieves,” work together to change the hearts of those that use their positions of authority to inflict harm on society and evade traditional justice. The main characters start out
holding themselves at fault for their hopelessness. And while you only take on the role of Persona 5’s main character, Joker, each Phantom Thief joins the team out of solidarity for the marginalized. They strengthen their bond with each other through their “confidant” ranking by earning the trust of other team members. This is done by interacting with them, bearing witness to their inner struggles, and counselling them in times of need and doubt. The higher your confidant ranking, the more abilities you unlock that can be used in battle. Later in the game, your most trusted confidants will take blows for you that would have otherwise ended your life, game over.
On the other hand, Fluxx doesn’t just let you affect circumstance — it puts you in charge. There’s a certain point while you play Fluxx where the path starts to materialize. At first it’s disorienting. Your hand of cards is supposed to add up to something, to lead somewhere, but as far as you can tell, they’re going nowhere. I always prefer to start a game with all the information necessary to win, or at least the promise that I will learn
what I need to along the way. ***Fluxx doesn’t make this promise. It doesn’t need to. It was only once I relaxed into the uncertainty and allowed space for flexibility that I started to understand what I was trying to accomplish. The control I had over the game’s conditions was freeing. Don’t like how many cards you can hold? Increase the hand size with a rule card. Don’t like the conditions of the goal? Change it.
Rewards: self-actualization and renewed respect for versatility Through their solidarity, each of the Phantom Thieves of Persona 5 begins to have their own individual awakening. This is represented in-game as awakening to their alternative “Persona” selves that embody the spirit of rebellion and empower them in battle. Each character comes to this very personal awakening following a particular hardship, which makes gaining a persona resonate that much more with the game’s central themes: marginalization, hopelessness, and the will to change things for the better. At the end of the day, Fluxx and Persona 5 are just games, one with significantly more narrative than the other. I don’t pretend to assume Fluxx is rife with social commentary — that is all me and what I brought to the table. But it doesn’t change the fact that simply maneuvering a system where I make the rules was incredibly relieving. It’s like for 30 minutes of gameplay I was able to forget about that rickety unset path and take control of an otherwise directionless situation. Persona 5 isn’t just a good game. It offers an antidote for many of the ills experienced in our world. There is a very real message of hope and solidarity, of becoming aware of the forces that impact your life, and of social and political consciousness. But the most moving aspect of Persona 5 is the Phantom Thieves’ refusal to give in to despair. Giving in to despair is to accept defeat without resistance. To be a revolutionary, one must first fight the battle within before fighting the one outside you.
We are more than just consumers of nerd culture; we are critics and creators. We look at these media while they look back. In an environment that is infamously exclusionary of non-normative voices, we decided it was time to start saying something different. This conversation is far from over.
by Aymee Leake
digital photography By Bob Friesen Bob Friesen is a long time member of the Abbotsford Photo Arts Club and regular photographer for the Mission record. He has been building his skills most of his life and describes himself as mostly a landscape photographer. Though, when he sees an interesting technique he can’t wait to try it out and see what happens. Here he presents a few images inspired by a deep desire to create.
The Scream Bob Friesen
Woodwind Bob Friesen
The Ocean Bob Friesen
Poplars Bob Friesen
Raphael Silver’s ho in Fraser Valley Maggi Lang with files from Aymee Leake Visitors to Kariton House might notice a new addition to the threshold of the gallery at Mill Lake Park: a house post carved by Abbotsford Arts Council’s artist-in-residence Raphael Silver. The carving was inaugurated with a ceremony on September 29, which included traditional drumming, singing, and a blessing. Silver, an artist from the Sumas First Nation, says he’s honoured to contribute one of Mill Lake’s first pieces of public art. “I’ve lived here my whole life, born and raised in Abbotsford, and the park has never had anything really significant in any form of art,” he says. Tery Kozma, the Cultural Outreach Coordinator at the Abbotsford Arts
Photo: Abbotsford Arts Council
Council at the time, says this project was commissioned to advance a more inclusive vision for Mill Lake Park. Kozma says the lack of First Nations art in the park, a central community location, was noticeable. And the opportunity for a Canada 150 grant was a chance to change that. Coast Salish house posts are upright wooden sculptures carved with the images of animals, plants, spirits, and other symbols. They may be used indoors as part of a building’s support structure, or outdoors as a symbol of welcome. House posts carry similar cultural significance to totem poles, but are more specific to this region. The symbols carved on them represent the culture of a family or band. The house post outside the the Kariton Gallery features a hummingbird and flowers, symbols of natural beauty and the “art” present in nature.
ouse post the latest y indigenous art Silver’s approach to carving draws on traditional First Nations elements, but is infused with his own artistic style. “People like to do just traditional things — there is a lot of copying of old artifacts and doing what everyone else always did, but [I try to never] do the same thing twice,” he says. Silver has been creating public art since he was 11 years old. He has painted murals, taught art, carved welcome figures, and, most importantly to him, created the St. Mary’s Memorial House Post at Fraser Valley Heritage Park in Mission. Other notable pieces he’s created include the metal salmon sculpture at the McCallum Road roundabout, and the logo for Mountain Elementary School. Silver, who received an Arty Award in the visual arts category this fall, was surprised to see nearly 500 people turnout for the house post ceremony,
“The amount of people that showed up was insane … it was a little overwhelming because the piece is small and I’ve done such big pieces and this one is barely taller than I … but everybody seemed to like it.” The spotlight on local First Nations art in public spaces is growing. The Abbotsford Arts Council recently held its second annual Aboriginal Arts & Culture Celebration at Mill Lake, which included Métis dancer Madeline McCallum, the Matsqui Youth Drum Group, and hoop dancing by White Thunder Theatre, among other artists. The Reach Gallery Museum is currently showing Mi’kmaq artist Ursula Johnson’s Mi’kwite;tmn (Do you Remember) until December 31, 2017. And in Chilliwack, carver Terry Horne recently completed two 12-feet-tall figures to stand at the entrance of the Chilliwack Visitor Centre — one
male and one female, both welcoming guests with raised hands. “Lots of history is being brought out,” says Elaine Malloway, the hereditary chief of Yakweakwioose First Nation and Horne’s mother, who works at the UFV Indigenous Student Centre. “As a mother of three artists I am happy to see more of our art in public places.” Malloway hopes such art installations will get the recognition they deserve, but worries about the public artwork being vandalized. “I’m scared of it being disfigured, but happy to see it,” she says. “These young artists have such talent, have spent so much time learning the stories and histories. It is still tough ... to make a living [as an artist] unless you’re getting commissions. It is time for it to get the recognition it deserves.” It has been a month since Silver finished his eight-month project, and the house post now stands permanently outside the Kariton Art Gallery to remind passersby of the rich cultural heritage of the surrounding area. “We wanted it to be specific to the region … I wanted to create something that was specific to the people who would have been here 150 years ago,” Silver says.
Photo: Maggi Lang
DEEP WATERS Shelley O’Callaghan’s How Deep is the Lake explores uncomfortable questions of family history, property, and land appropriation Heather Ramsay How deep are your roots? In her memoir How Deep is the Lake, Shelley O’Callaghan finds herself wondering how her family came to the privileged position of owning a private oasis on Chilliwack Lake, a blue-green jewel tucked into the mountains at the southeastern edge of the Fraser Valley. Many people have made connections with Chilliwack Lake, especially since a road was built in 1961 and then a provincial park was created in the early 1970s. But O’Callaghan’s Vancouver-based family has travelled to the teardrop lake since the 1920s: by foot, by pack horse, on old logging railway sweeper cars, by float plane, and on an increasingly improved road to their idyllic summer retreat. Five generations have taken part in the rituals of opening the summer cabins — packing in supplies; setting up the water system; clearing out the mouse droppings; dust-
ing and sweeping; the first chilling swim — all in preparation for the storied recreational privilege of spending a summer at the lake. O’Callaghan admits she didn’t think very deeply about the lake until she retired from her 25-year career as an environmental lawyer. When she became curious about the land and cabins that brought her family so much joy, she realized that she knew next to nothing about the history of the place. She had a few photos and her spotty recollection of stories told by her grandparents and mother, but with grandchildren growing up and the 100th anniversary of her family’s time at the lake inching closer, she set out to answer some basic questions. For instance, when exactly did her federal water agent grandfather, Christopher Everett Webb, first encounter the lake? Rather than return to the city each weekend, she spent June, July and August — an entire summer — at the lake, devoted to research. She travelled into Chilliwack, where the archives revealed curious details: that a young man who was part of the Boundary Commission died and was buried at the lake in 1859; that a Ts’elxweyeqw chief, William Sepass, started a silver mine on the southern shores in 1916 and transported men and freight in a giant dug-out canoe. She learned the truth about the 62 people who died in a plane that crashed into Mt. Slesse, one of the jagged peaks near the lake, and she explored the history of the American Fishing Club that ran nearby for 20 years. Then, at the Stó:lō Library and Archives, O’Cal-
“For O’Callaghan, the lake and its history are inextricable from her own” laghan began to delve more deeply into the Indigenous history of the area. She discovered that in the early 1800s there was one Ts’elxweyeqw village of 450 people on the lake and eight hamlets along the Chilliwack River. Two calamities — a smallpox epidemic and a rockslide that buried one of the small villages — led people to migrate farther downriver to the area now known as Vedder Crossing. According to the Stó:lō Coast Salish Historical Atlas, the pre-contact population was estimated to be around 25,000 to 50,000 people, and O’Callaghan began to reconcile this number of people with her more private experience of the lake. She remembers her father finding arrowheads on the beach, and realizes how little she or any of her family had thought of the lake’s Indigenous history before. O’Callaghan admits that writing about this was the most difficult part of the book. “I’m deeply uncomfortable that neither I nor anyone in my family have taken the time to learn about [the people whose traditional territory encompassed the lake],” she wrote. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission had just finished their work when she had embarked on her research, and she ordered and read Volume One of the report. “We were a wrecking ball destroying Indigenous traditions and culture,” she writes.
“We stole their land. I don’t know what to do with this realization. Is this a cop out?” She reflects on her family’s dugout canoe, which was carved by a man her Poppy had always called “Indian Billy.” During her research at the Stó:lō Library and Archives, she came to understand that this must be the same Chief William Sepass, a man who had been both hereditary and elected chief of the Ts’elxweyeqw people for more than 50 years. When her grandfather arrived at Chilliwack Lake, William Sepass would have been in his eighties, yet Poppy always referred to him by this diminutive name. She saw another canoe carved by Chief Sepass at the Stó:lō Research and Resource Management Centre and wondered more about her family’s canoe. How did her grandfather ac-
quire it? Should she give it back? But the canoe, like their place at the lake, was a treasure that reminds her of her connection to her grandfather. She and the taciturn Poppy shared a love of fishing and as a child, she was often the only one allowed to accompany him in the dugout as he gathered the night’s supper from the lake. For O’Callaghan, the lake and its history are inextricable from her own. With the help of a researcher in Ottawa who has access to federal government records, O’Callaghan finally pinned down the date when her grandfather first recorded water levels at the lake — 1923. Charles Lindeman, the trapper who first led Poppy to its shores, was a charming recluse who had been living alone on the lake since 1911. In the book, she imagines them setting off on a long day’s hike
along the “rushing [Chilliwack] river, up ever steeper inclines, switchbacking through the forest.” When they wound their way out of the towering Douglas firs and cedars onto the beach, Poppy must have been entranced. He carried out his official business, hiring Lindeman to record the lake levels for the next year. But he couldn’t stay away. Webb hiked back in over the summer and set up a tent beside the old trapper’s cabin. The next year he brought his wife, son and daughter — O’Callaghan’s mother. Finally, Webb asked Lindeman if he would build another log cabin nearby for his family. Over the years, the lake changed. Poppy sold a piece of his land to another family in 1939, and a church camp for boys was built. In 1961, the road to the lake was finished and in
1969, a logging road was built through the family’s property, which allowed more industrial and recreational activity along the shores. In the 1970s, a neighbourhood of recreational properties called Post Creek was constructed a few kilometres away. And yet, in many cases, O’Callaghan’s explorations show the reader how little her family associated with anyone but their tight-knit group at the lake or in the surrounding area, including Chilliwack, during all that time. O’Callaghan’s personal explorations are vivid and her anecdotes can be charming, but by the end of the book, this reader was left with an overall sense of privilege. O’Callaghan is deeply possessive of this piece of paradise that her family acquired, and she does not like it when visitors from the park set up a picnic on the beach in
front of her cabin, even though her family only owns to the high water mark. Her grandfather and Lindeman squatted on the land and applied to buy the parcels where their cabins sat only after they’d built cabins there. Interestingly, O’Callaghan discovered that her grandfather’s lawyer purchased the land and then transferred it to her grandmother’s name. She didn’t understand why, until she finally realized that Poppy, as a federal government employee, couldn’t apply to buy Crown land. The question of Indigenous rights to the land aside, had he even acquired it ethically all those years ago? In the last chapter, O’Callaghan writes openly about the fear of expropriation that her grandfather felt in the 1970s when whispers of the provincial park that now surrounds their property first began. To this day, O’Callaghan has the same fear. The family dodged the issue when the park was first created, maintaining their little piece of heaven, but she wonders what might happen if the government decides to expand. She ends the book on this note: “What would we do if we lost our land? Where would we go? We would not find anywhere with such beauty and isolation within a two-hour drive from Vancouver. I would be devastated … I would fight. It would be my Armageddon. This is where I got stuck: in the shallows of her privileged colonial access to Chilliwack Lake. Early in the book, O’Callaghan wrote of Chief Sepass’ fight with the government over the terms of the expropriation of the Ts’elxweyeqw territory. Their
“When they wound their way out of the towering Douglas firs and cedars onto the beach, Poppy must have been entranced” traditional territory covers 95,000 acres, extending up the Chilliwack River and around Chilliwack Lake, she writes. Yet his descendants in the Skowkale First Nation live on 58 acres of reserve land. O’Callaghan’s family land is 58 acres too. “There were no treaties. The land was simply taken by the British Crown,” she writes early on. “But this land is ours now. I would not want to give it up.” Ten years before her grandfather squatted on the land, Chief Sepass made a presentation to the McKenna-McBride Royal Commission on Indian Affairs in British Columbia (1912), protesting the size and location of his people’s reserve. She writes about it, but by the end of the book, she doesn’t seem to grasp the paradox. Instead, she chooses to throw up her hands. One wonders if she has really deepened her connection to the lake after all.
“Prufrock Syndrome� An excerpt from Alchemic
By Ekaterina Marenkov
Ekaterina Marenkov is a poet and student of Philosophy and Mathematics at UFV. She currently lives with her partner in crime (Chelle), goat (Flynn), and two rats (JeanPierre and Basil) in a little rancher in the Fraser Valley. In her spare time, Ekaterina enjoys climbing mountains, reading the works of Anne Carson, and building blanket forts.
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor— And this, and so much more?— It is impossible to say just what I mean! T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock i. wouldyoulikeacupatea? (words spill from my mouth like water out the spout of an overflowing kettle) the teacup is chipped & its floral print doesn’t match the saucer’s with my fingertips i trace the embroidered daisies on the tablecloth i hold my breath when she takes the first sip, as if there could be something wrong with it shit, i forgot to offer the milk & honey she lets out a sigh & sinks deeper into the floral couch cushion i let go of that breath & watch as the fabric quietly absorbs her watch her eyes dance playfully around the room watch her smile grow, dimples arching themselves up towards the sky (she is of the heavens) watch her chest heave up & down steadily in h
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. . . i ask my overwhelming question.
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ii. our feet dangle over the edge of a wobbly ferris wheel bench round & round we turn overlooking the sea in the distance swollen purple clouds let go of their sorrows & the wind blows the water white and black a breeze blows by & for a moment i forget the bottoms of my trousers are rolled
iii. dawn budding luminous streams through sheer lace curtains p o l g o i n onto the surfaces of my goodwill furniture saturating everything in a warm effulgent glow she pulls the cream duvet over our heads, just five more minutes i don’t respond— i am too busy captivated by her collarbone which looks like the edge of a ravine (do i dare press my lips to it?) my vision blurs when her fingertips begin to run (cool & soft as flower petals) along my bare chest lingering in question at the switchblade scar beneath my left nipple i inhale a breath of the cherry incense that has smoked up the room (i’m drowning again) how’d you get it? i tense how do you think i got it? it is impossible to say just what i mean she props her head up on her elbow furrows a brow then shrugs & kisses it tenderly so
iv. that summer we ate overripe peaches with our bare hands/ the juices dribbling down our chin & exposed scarred arms/ and for once we forgot to hide our vulnerabilities under sleeves & excuses/ i stopped measuring out my life with coffee spoons/ i think it could have been the peaches/ (the same ones prufrock couldn’t bear to eat)/ the same ones we indulged in/ and in short, i was not afraid.
v. after she left when the evening was spread across the sky i climbed the hill that overlooked the town & sat up there past curfew from up above the glimmering lights made the city look like tears right before they fall i imagined that’s what god saw when he looked down on us: clusters of sadness stumbling, each to each around in the dark before being put out to sleep.
YOU MADE Y When we set up our Raspberry booth at various festivals this summer, we wanted the public to have some fun with us. We set out a tray of acrylic paints, a paintbrush, and a blank canvas, and invited anyone who stopped by to paint something. It always started with one or two hesitant artists dabbling paint in a corner of the canvas. And then the next person who came by would stop, look at it, and add some little detail — a school of fish, or a curling vine, or a cat’s face. And then the next person did the same thing... until a bigger picture emerged. From deep-sea creatures to dragons, airplanes to rainbow berries, here are some of the collaborative paintings that you helped create this summer. Thank you for being a part of Raspberry.
YOUR MARK
Summer colouring If you dropped by our booth at the Berry Festival, Canada Day celebrations, or Abbotsford Air Show this summer, you might have seen some of these young artists working on their submissions for our colouring
Freya Zhou Age 6
Hallie Moorthy Age 14
Jayden Age 7
Kathleen Cruson Age 11
g contest winners contest. The winner was Sarah Chen, 13, whose work is featured on the cover of this issue. The runners-up are below, listed alphabetically by first name. Thank you to everyone who participated!
Hazel Terepocki Age 10
J. Harini Age 8
Kiana Chalmers Age 11
Nevaya Janes Age 10
Our contributors Dessa Bayrock is an ex-journalist with a soft spot for the Fraser Valley. She currently lives in Ottawa and studies the apocalypse as part of her M.A. in English. You can find her reviewing books online at Bayrock, Bookrock and for Ottawa Review of Books. If you rearrange the letters of her name you can spell “abyss croaked,” “as bark decoys,” or “brocade as sky,” all of which describe her in one way or another. @YoDessa www.bayrockbayrock.wordpress.com Maggi Davis is a graduate of UFV and lives with her family in the Fraser Valley. Aymee Leake is an arts advocate and artist in the Fraser Valley. She was the Gallery Coordinator at the Abbotsford Arts Council among other roles for several years. Aymee is known for her dedication to the arts community and for guiding artists to find opportunities in their own city and beyond. Heather Ramsay recently relocated to the Fraser Valley. She is a writer and journalist and is completing a Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at UBC.
Katie Stobbart is a writer and editor from Abbotsford. She has edited The Cascade newspaper, Louden Singletree literary magazine, and the Pacific Rim Review of Books. She is also a proud co-founder of QuiQuill Communications, and is working hard to improve her patio gardening game. Christopher Towler just finished his Master of Arts in Communications & New Media. He is an avid roleplayer, board and video gamer, (surprised?). He is also a writer, musician, and really into improv theatre. He’s also the owner of a rad pug-familiar named Oscar! Jess Wind somehow managed to earn two degrees by writing about zombies. She holds a BA in Creative Writing from UFV and an MA in Communication from Carleton University in Ottawa. Jess is an ex-editor of The Cascade, is published in The Louden Singletree and has been known to blog about entertainment media and culture. She likes her coffee black, her video games retro, and her sports local.
Mel Spady is a reader, writer, blogger, and lover of music. Among other escapades, she has been on the editorial board of Louden Singletree literary magazine, and was a staff for The Cascade newspaper. Mel currently studies and lives in Saskatchewan.
Raspberry is a magazine devoted to Fraser Valley culture and community life. Established in June 2016, Raspberry publishes reviews, event coverage, and other local content online as we work toward our goal of publishing in print. You can follow us on social media for updates on our progress, information and insights on the Fraser Valley arts and culture scene, and more.
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We'll publish it. Email info@raspberrymag.ca We reserve the right to edit all submissions. Submissions must be suitable for publication as determined by our editorial team, but we are pretty open to ideas and subject matter. We are happy to coach emerging writers. We also appreciate volunteers in other areas.