Ephemera: An Archiving Party

(2018-2022)

Ephemera. Photo by Tim Matheson.

The scholar Peggy Phelan once claimed that the ontology of live performance is its disappearance. It is here for a moment in time, and then it is gone. But, as Rebecca Schneider has argued, every performance also leaves remains: in the bodies of its creators; in the memories of its audiences; and in the paper trails and material detritus that attest to the different phases of its development. At these events we’re hoping to collect some of those remains as they pertain to the recent history of Vancouver performance. Ephemera is an ongoing archiving project that celebrates all of the performing arts community on these lands. To date, there have been 5 iterations of this project. All collections are housed as part of SFU Special Collections and Rare Books. The objective of Ephemera is to gather the Vancouver Theatre community in a non-competitive way to catalogue and celebrate our shared memories and our history. Building on the spirit and energy of Our Present Dance Histories project that culminated at the 2017 Dance in Vancouver Biennale, we invite participants to contribute to and help divine the story we might tell from examining the remains of Vancouver performance. Ephemera is a series of events brought to you in collaboration with T/R, Rumble Theatre, and SFU Special Collections. Partners for previous iterations of the event also include the GVPTA and Upintheair Theatre.