Nov 16, 2014 Free Lecture & Workshop with Julie Salverson

Julie Salverson is a writer, scholar and community animator. Over the past thirty years she has founded and run two theatre companies (Second Look Community Arts and Flying Blind Theatre Events) and has worked extensively in developing curriculum and performance work in professional/community partnerships. She has given workshops and keynotes for diverse groups using creative arts to share stories, analyze community issues and address difficult dynamics within groups and organizations.  She has published extensively about creative arts and trauma, the artist as witness, historical memory, ethics and the imagination.  Shelter, her cartoon chamber opera about the atomic bomb premiered with Tapestry New Opera/Edmonton Opera in 2012 and played in Toronto in 2014. She is Associate Professor of Drama at Queen’s University and Adjunct Professor at The Royal Military College of Canada. Her book Lines of Flight: An Atomic Memoir will be published in 2016.

In the morning Julie will talk about her work with nuclear contamination in Canada’s Northwest Territories and how she has passed this story on through an opera and a memoir. She will show some of the documentary The Village of Widows by Peter Blow, the story of the uranium mine on Great Bear Lake and the trip the Dene people from that land made to Hiroshima. Julie will discuss how she does resilience training and explores narrative possibilities through theatre with first responders and other communities. 

In the afternoon she will give an experiential workshop designed to encourage risk taking, vulnerability and connection in the telling of stories. Julie offers practical exercises to ground people in the present moment, share stories, explore connections and strategize possibilities for small changes. There is never any need for anyone to name a private experience; the spirit of the workshop is pleasure and exploration. No experience is necessary, but please come willing to work on your feet. This event is cosponsored by CIIS Student Alliance, NichiBei Care and NichiBei Care CIIS.