Harvesting the fringe
Local arts festival brings in the fringe and begs a bigger question
about art policy
By Brent MacDonald
September

Part fringe festival, part art sale and part promotional tool, the inaugural Harvesting the Arts Festival caters to all artists and art fans, and taking steps to bring new fans into the fold.
Presented by two of the committees comprising the youth networking group Fusion, the festival combines an art exhibition, a market for artists and entrepreneurs, dance and music on the boardwalk and a venue to promote local music and film.

Chris Daigle (a local folk musician) and Sean Simpson, both members of Fusion, came up with the idea for the festival and Holly McKay of the Fusion Arts and Culture committee, as well as Simone Fernandes of the Fusion International Committee, embraced it.
"There are a lot of new and emerging young artists," says McKay. "We wanted to give them a venue." McKay says she is concerned that these artists are being overlooked by the general population, and hopes two performances from Saint John Idol winner Erin MacKay will help draw a different crowd to a festival that would have otherwise catered to the converted lover of art.

"Look at the crowd that Erin can draw," Fernandes says. She hopes that an early and then late afternoon performance by MacKay will help hold a large crowd, to experience what the rest of the festival has to offer.

Initially, the group had Canadian Idol contestant Casey Leblanc booked for the show, but she pulled out at the last minute due to commitments she had with the national show.
Still, the group believes in the lineup that they have secured and their goals remain the same, Leblanc or no Leblanc.

"We wanted to highlight what is happening," she says. "It's actually shocking how much is going on." The group plans to do so by promoting first, the screening of Rubarbicon, a release by local filmmaker Greg Hemmings of Hit!Media, billed as a 'mocumentary' detailing the rise and fictional fall of the band Grand Theft Bus. They are also promoting My First Kiss, a film by Andrew Tidby of Hit!Media. On September 22, the group is pushing a Medusa Promotions effort at Tapps, with the bands, The Delegates and Down on Bedford.
On Friday, September 23, festival organizers have arranged for an art opening, Studio Watch - Emerging Artist Series, at The New Brunswick Museum. This opening is part of a larger series run through the Beaverbrook Art Gallery in Fredericton, showcasing the works of Eleni Bakapoulus, director of Gallery Connexion in Fredericton. The Saint John wing of the series will showcase the works of young artists in this city.

In addition to this, the festival is advertising the Continental Drift International Film Festival (www.cdrift.ca), taking place September 23 to 25.

On the Market Square Boardwalk, Saturday the 24, Market by the Sea joins the arts festival.
The market is a place for entrepreneurship, as much as it is a place to simply showcase the work of local artists, where locals can purchase visual art, sculpture, food and more.
McKay says a festival like this is in stark contrast to the Saint John she knew when she moved here ten years ago for work.

"The first impression I had of Saint John was, 'It's industrial,'" she says. "But it's been amazing to see how many people are involved in the arts here." Fernandes, says she's had no trouble reflecting the diversity of the arts scene in the city while booking talent for the stage on the Boardwalk.

And the list of performers in the fringe, include Chinese opera, modern and traditional Chinese dance, Indian dance, belly dancing, the Dog Gone Dancing, Dancing Dogs (trained, dancing dogs), Celtic Dancers, an acoustic performance by Pete Belleveau of the band Cold Shot, a performance by local band Drift, and Jazz and hip hop lyrical.

Suzanne Hill, a member of the New Brunswick Arts Board, thinks the festivals aim to promote the diversity of the arts scene in Saint John is admirable.

"I don't think this is a pretentious festival at all," she says. "They want to have as much fun and create as much buzz as possible. That's the name of the show game." Hill says the initial effort to book Casey Leblanc for the festival was smart of festival organizers.

"It's not unreasonable to have a singer at an arts festival," she says. "If the symphony has a fundraising gala, they try to get somebody important there so people don't mind forking over $500." Further, she says that the singers who are involved with pop idol shows have an art product to sell, like it or not, and that this fits in well with the market component of the festival.

The director of music at the University of New Brunswick and acting chair of the New Brunswick Arts Board agrees with Hill. Richard Hornsby likes that the festival is intensely local and think that in the short term, relying on a headliner to bring big crowds could be a positive thing, even though that headliner may be a "flavour of the month." "There are festivals where people rely on headliners," he says. "This festival really showcases what Saint John has to offer." But, Hornsby thinks that there is a long term challenge for festivals, both new and old.

He points to the burgeoning growth of Jazz and Blues festivals in Canada, saying that these festivals, where great short term economic drivers, haven't resulted in any more real work for jazz and blues artists.

Hornsby is a part of the Harvest Jazz and Blues Festival in Fredericton and says he's concerned that the money invested in the arts isn't producing enough work for the artists.
"We see the arts as drivers of economic development," he says. But Hornsby says they've only been drivers in the short term.

Beyond providing the economy and the artist with a short burst of money, he thinks festivals should be a small part of a larger arts community, playing a role to encourage the arts as something that develops a community and society as much as it develops the economy.
For that to happen, he says fundamental changes are needed in the way broader society treats the arts and in the way government funds the arts.

Festival organizers say their aim is simply to highlight what is happening in Saint John.
"We didn't want to reinvent the wheel," says McKay. But Hornsby says it's increasingly important that people in New Brunswick start talking about arts policy and whether or not the policies in place right now contribute to long term sustainability of the arts.
"We need to start a discourse," he says.

For a detailed schedule of events, visit www.fusionsj.com. The festival runs from September 21 to 24.