Sunday, March 11, 2012



Jellybean Beaudine, Pino Rogeletti, Art Bergmann, Ray Condo & Bud Luxford

As a photographer I have always considered that there are two main classifications for it. Of that I have written here. The idea, that photography can either be active or reactive, has made me think of late that I can transfer that theory of mine to that of how we in Vancouver react to bad news.

We took for granted the Georgia Medical Dental Building, the first and second renditions of the Hotel Vancouver, Eaton’s and a few more that we blasted into smithereens. They went down without much of a fuss and they are all forgotten. We have by now forgotten the existence of  the excellent CBC Vancouver Orchestra. The same will happen when the wrecking ball takes down the newer version of Eaton’s/Sears. It will be forgotten, too, if not for its beauty but for its perceived ugliness and without any consideration of its possible value as a really good shell and a truly excellent space for the Vancouver Art Gallery.

We treasure the Park Theatre on Cambie and some of my friends have told me how in their infancy they saw this or that film in it. When the Park goes, and it is inevitable that it will, there will be no peep except for the numerous reactive posts on facebook and a couple of articles in the Vancouver Sun and the Courier on, “Alas! Another Vancouver treasured landmark is no more.”

That is precisely what has happened in the last week. Predictably those on facebook, a Mecca of predictable uniformity, have noted a pattern of three in the demise within a week of the Vancouver Playhouse Theatre Company (not to be confused to the still standing but mostly ignored poor sister, or is it brother, of the Queen Elizabeth Theatre), the chain of Book Warehouses (technically not a demise of the usual sort but more a purposely self-inflicted one) and the eventual destruction of that most ugly structure of concrete and R-bar which is The Ridge Cinema.

Protesters have reactively complained about our boring Vancouver and how this is a cultural shock on our culture. They complain that a few tourists might opt for other better cultural beacons as our city fades into the small town small mindedness of whence it came. Then after a few days of this they might return to the latest postings of the latest hyper-viral (first coined it would seem by the folks at CNN) video-a-la-Kony.

Soon the Playhouse will be forgotten as will the Ridge and The Book Warehouse. Kindles will be snapped up and orders to Amazon.ca will resume.

The problem, as I perceive it from this West-Side-Mecca-of-Culture that is Kerrisdale, is that we in Vancouver complain after the fact, but do nothing even when the soon-to-die body begins to show no brain action on the oscilloscope.

I smile at the perceived passion of a picture of a local playwright (hint, she is a woman) writing her latest play on the sidewalk of the Vancouver Playhouse (the building) who has the intention on stopping somewhere either at City Hall or the CBC. If our city is the city that I think it is she will be soon arrested for loitering or for defacing city property – culture be damned.

In 1980 when our city was supposed to be even more boring, alternative rock promoter impresario Bud Luxford (black sheep brother of one the VAG’s most prestigious curators) released a record partially funded by a Grant McDonagh (who had made a fortune smuggling Zulu spears into Canada). The record Bud Laxford Presents included a song by one Pino Rogeletti and the IUDs called Where Have all the Flowers Gone. The song more or less accurate in music had lyrics that Pete Seeger would have disavowed but perhaps have agreed on. Seeger’s lyrics were like this:


Where have all the young men gone?
Long time passing
Where have all the young men gone?
Long time ago
Where have all the young men gone?
Gone for soldiers every one
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Rogeletti’s had some differences like this one:

Where has Zippy Pinhead gone?
Long time passing
Where has Zippy Pinhead gone?
Long time ago
Where has Zippy Pinhead gone?
Gone to Yellowknife to be a cunt.
When will he ever learn?
When will he ever learn?

At the end of this fine punked up song Pino says his goodbyes and adds a startling if obvious recommendation:

“To all those starving children in underprivileged nations of the third world I say to them, ‘Eat, eat,’ and all will be well with you.”

Not too long ago, perhaps even as recently as two or three years ago, our ex Premier, Mike Harcourt pointed out publically at a lecture that I was privy to listen to at Simon Fraser University’s downtown campus, that “The problem of homelessness can be solved by building homes.”

Both suggestions, the one by Pino Rogeletti and that of Mike Harcourt have that element of forceful activity not to be seen by any of most of our fair city’s inhabitants. They know how to complain. They know how to link to media publications that state the problem or mention the demise of the various cultural institutions to be grieved. But I am sorry to say, they are unable to actively pursue any activity that might address the problem and solve it.

You might ask what it is that I do. When possible I go to the theatre and to the movies (avoiding when possible the multiplexes) and to dance performances and to concerts and to opera. I pay senior citizen rates (I am one as is my wife) and I take my daughter and granddaughters.

This pays for and occupies seats. Seats, the occupied kind, are the ones that keep arts organizations solvent. Harcourt, Rogeletti would both agree on the plan.

Sharman King ,unidentified admirer & a most appropriate book title

I must point out here, with an element of reservaion, that I no longer buy books or read them on any Kindle. I happily spend my time at our city's excellent public library. But I do support one third of the Book Warehouse's owners. I go to as many performances of the Vancouver Opera Orchestra and The Turning Point Ensemble. By occupying seats I support the salary of the very excellent bass horn and trombone player Sharman King.  He, his wife Diana King, and Tommy Banks are the ones who are closing one of our city's cultural institutions that we will soon learn to forget. We have a lot of practice in this.