Misrepresented and Distorted: An ‘Identity Crisis’ Clarification

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By Sheri Granite

Sheri Granite, Tied, 2010. Courtesy of the artist.

If you went looking for an art exhibition at Accolade East by an oppressed Palestinian artist who grew up in a world where death rituals were common, you were misinformed, and may have been surprised to find an art exhibition at Accolade West by an artist who happens to be Israeli, an international student who was never oppressed, and knows nothing of common death rituals.

My art, identity, and artistic focus have been significantly misrepresented, distorted, and altered in the Nov. 2, 2011 issue of Excalibur describing my art exhibition Echo.
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Art Review: ORIFICE

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By Amy Saunders

ORIFICE, as described by the artist, “is a video installation that uses back-projections on screens made of fabric to create a box in the middle of the gallery that viewers may enter to be enveloped within the video. The videos are comprised of different tight shots of artist Brendan Tang throwing clay on a potter’s wheel. The clay has been dyed to mimic flesh and blood and will play between recognition and abstraction; as something both viscerally familiar but traumatically foreign from the internal body.”
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My Night in Wonderland: How Art Saved Nuit Blanche

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By Gina Webb

Simon Granovsky-Larsen

I couldn’t stay away from Nuit Blanche. I love art but I wasn’t expecting much; there is something disturbingly disingenuous when a big bank tells us that we are going to see our city transformed by contemporary art like we’ve never seen it before. I wasn’t overly excited to go, yet I knew I wouldn’t stay in. I also always jump at the chance for a good old-fashioned all-nighter with friends.

I knew that the streets would be crowded. I knew that some art projects would be impossible to see, and others possible after an hour’s wait. I knew that it would be cold and I knew that its sprawl was vast.
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An Open Letter from Black Women to the SlutWalk

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By Black Women’s Blueprint

We the undersigned women of African descent and anti-violence advocates, activists, scholars, organizational, and spiritual leaders wish to address the SlutWalk. First, we commend the organizers on their bold and vast mobilization to end the shaming and blaming of sexual assault victims for violence committed against them by other members of society. We are proud to be living in this moment in time where girls and boys have the opportunity to witness the acts of extraordinary women resisting oppression while challenging the myths that feed rape culture everywhere.
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United in Occupation

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by Amy Saunders

Concepts of democracy have, over time, become skewed into a close representation of dictatorships. As a people, we have adopted an ‘imaginary democratic belief’, suspending our understandings of political truths in the voting booth, signing on to whatever political power reigns majority, while the minority idles by, waiting and hoping to be heard. Within this falsehood of democratic governing systems, we have been promised equality, access and freedoms. We have seen those realities dissipate, as the truths of our lives become increasingly unfair, impoverished and marginalized. The truth of access in this imagined democratic system has shrunk significantly, with truth now lying in limited access to healthcare, rights, education and livable wage standards. We have sat and watched the decline of our country, our world, our people.

No more.
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Follow the Money: Behind the European Debt Crisis Lie More Bank Bailouts

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By David McNally

While cursing the inane mainstream commentary on the global economy, I remembered a pivotal scene in the 1976 movie, All the President’s Men. As two young reporters investigate the burglary of Democratic Party offices in the Watergate Hotel, a disgruntled high-ranking FBI agent, code-named Deep Throat advises, “Follow the money. Always follow the money.”
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Reflections on Prison and the State, Post-G20

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By Mandy Hiscocks

“Get down on the ground! Hands behind your head!”

And so it began.

The Guns and Gangs Unit of the Toronto Police Service showed up at the house in the early morning of Jun. 26, 2010, the first day of the G20 Leaders Summit. There was a bang on the door, then a crash as they broke through. A man with a gun pointed at the two of us ran into the living room and yelled at us to hit the floor. Others went through the house looking for other people, finding one. Still others were looking around the place, and more were waiting outside with a wagon. It was quite an impressive crew to take down three sleepy organizers – I think the guns and the bullet-proof vests might’ve been a bit of overkill, but hey, there was all that money they had to justify spending so I guess it had to look at least a bit dangerous for them.
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Conspiracy in the Age of Austerity

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By Alex Hundert

Sept. 12, 2011 was the first day of what is scheduled to be an 11-week preliminary inquiry for what the Ontario Crown Attorney’s office call the “G20 Main Conspiracy Group Prosecution.” This prosecution will require that, myself, along with 16 other community organizers, spend almost three months in court every single weekday. Here, we will watch and listen as the Crown Attorneys from the Provincial “Gangs and Guns Initiative” present evidence, collected by a series of undercover cops who infiltrated community organizations across the country. This permeation took place over a period of nearly two years prior to last year’s G20 (an event which saw the city converted into ‘Fortress Toronto,’ as the heads of state from the world’s 20 richest countries, along with more than 10,000 cops, occupied the city’s downtown).
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Certain Days: Freedom for Political Prisoners Calendar

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By Certain Days Calendar Collective

The Certain Days: Freedom for Political Prisoners Calendar is a joint fundraising and educational project between outside organizers in Montreal and Toronto, and three political prisoners being held in maximum-security prisons in New York State: David Gilbert, Robert Seth Hayes and Herman Bell. The initial project was suggested by Herman over ten years ago, and has been shaped throughout the process by all of our ideas, discussions, and analysis. All of the members of the outside collective are involved in day-to-day organizing work other than the calendar, on issues ranging from refugee and immigrant solidarity to community media to prisoner justice. We work from an anti-imperialist, anti-racist, anti-capitalist, feminist, queer and trans positive position.
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