ARTS Coming to Death's Door (a daughter and father collaboration) photographs by Sandra Semchuk Presentation House- until November 24 Sandra Semchuk’s recent photograph and text installations are multiple-voice collaborations with her father, Martin Semchuk. Issues of self-representation and telling one’s own stories have preoccupied Sandra’s enquiries in photography since the early 70’s when she documented her relationships with the people of her hometown of Meadow Lake. In the two new works in this exhibition, Coming to Death’s Door and The Descent, both daughter and father speak in more than one voice, images shift between experience and memory, and we, as participants, are permitted to engage personal stories of aging, possible death, and loss of freedom. Semchuk says: “My father suffered from a serious heart attack in July, 1988. In Coming to Death’ s Door, my father and I look together at the event which led to my helping him escape from the hospital. In the photographic images I trace my own responses to my father and his inevitable death. This investigation occurs within the simple experience of moving out from the blue tent where I sleep separate from my father’s home into his bedroom where photographs and textures from the past when thenuclear family was intact. I use the camera gesturally as a way of sustaining the experience while leaving a trace which can be sen. The color photographs were edited by my father and I to form broken sequences, analogues for how we come to know. The broken image, like the broken construction of self, hastens the processes of reconstruction and synthesis.” Sandra Semchuk’s texts have been silkscreened on translu- cent parachute cloth, sewn together to create one side of a tent, and backlit. The voices have been excerpted from a dialogue with her father and rewritten in the present tense. She is interested in what she calls the continuous present where the past is continually being actualized and modified within engaged experience. In The Descent, father and daughter play out the archetypal descent by going down asteep hill at her father’s home in order to start two pumps to bring water up to acistern. This done, the father can continue the daily ritual of watering the trees that he planted. Aware of the danger to her father, Sandra says in Daughter’s Voice 2: “I am mute, I cannot forbid my father to go down this hill. Iam mute. I am outside his dialogue withdeath. He says when you die, you die, that’s all. Nothing happens. He’s not about to give up his soul to any construct of a god. There is another story being played out here. I catch glimpses of it. My father is setting himself up to learn something. I’m scared but I trust him. He asks me to come down the hill with him to start the pumps. I start down the hill with him. I wonder ifIcandoCPR if I need to...” For Sandra Semchuck, the personal is the political and the breaking of the archetypal stories we play out in the unconscious as important as the deconstruction of external conventions. “The trick is”, she says, “is to be able to play them out and catch glimpses of the stories so that shifts in perspective can occur during the engagement of the story.” This exhibition is a document about a daughter’s relationship to a father facing the possibility of death. Sandra says: “I am grateful to my father for permitting me to participate in his stories about dying which could cost him his life. He teaches me what life is.”* Planet of the Arts Volume 7 Issue 3 FOOD VCC, a better place to eat Vancouver Community College By Richard Wong My friends and I cannot afford to go out for food, but whenever possible we like to go the downtown Community College (located at Dunsmuir and Pender near the Stadium Skytrain station). The food there is cooked by students training to become gourmet chefs. Sometimes it is unbelievable that they have so many items to choose from. A wide variety of main courses such as beef, chicken, fish, and sometimes wild game are served. For vegetarians the variety is just as good as the meat selection. Zucchini, rice, carrots, potatoes, and tasty beans are served with the meat items or can be ordered as a separated main meal. I simply adore the way they serve the dessert section. Swan shaped puff pastry, decadent slices of coffee cakes, and yummy Bavarian creams. Each item looks like a fine crafted piece of art. One day I had the pork loin with two mixed veggies, and it cost about five dollars. Much to my amazement, it was incredibly cheap, and tasty as well. Without hesitation, I would recommend this place to any of my friends. They have somewhat limited hours everyday, from 5:30 to 7:00 pm, and they are closed on weekends. It’s too bad - I would visit the place everyday if I had the chance.* TAKING STOCK, a soup review Stock Market - Granville Island Market By Richard Wong Frequently, I don’t have the time to go home for lunch, therefore I usually go to the Stock Market for soup. This place is conveniently located inside the Granville Island Market adjacent to the False Creek section. They sell a wide variety of items from jams to sauces. I enjoy the freshly baked buns they serve with the soup and there are three different types of soups that they sell. One is vegetable based; the others are meat and fruitbased soups, respectively. This idea of having a variety for vegetarians and carnivores is good. Prices are quite reasonable and definitely worth checking out. If anyone has a craving for something good and tasty, I would suggest this place.* ivi OPERA Carmen revisited By Catherine Silva Opening night. That phrase has always had a glamorous mystique for me. Even the most banal production can be made ( at least temporarily) exciting on opening night. I only talk about opening night because that’s when I went, and not because I have nothing to say. Because Ido. However, since banal is not a word that applies to Carmen, why I brought it up. Carmen is the opera that opened Nov.2 at” the Queen Elizabeth Theatre, and continued to play until Nov II. I went on a rainy Saturday evening: I saw, I laughed and although I didn’t cry, I’m sure I could have if I'd really wanted to. It was neat - o. And the fact that yours truly is a complete operatic illiterate (is that a legit phrase?) should not sway your faith in me when I say with hand over heart that it was really really neat. Neat - 0 - rama. Anyone who heard them when they came to ECCAD and performed a teensy bit of it in the Concourse will agree with me. At least, it would be really nice if you agreed. And if you thought they were good, well, do I havea surprise for you : they weren't even the principal cast members! Not one Don Jose or Carmen in the lot. Pretty good for a bunch o’ wandering gypsies and smugglers, eh? This opera is about a gypsy girl, a Spanish femme fatale of sorts, who always has a couple of men hanging around. One of these is Don Jose, a corporal whose downward spiral in life begins when he goes to jail due to his love for her. After his release, they run away together and he follows her into a life of crime. Eventually his homesickness and jealous reproaches drive her away, and she finds anew lover in the Toreador, who suits Carmen more in spirit than the glum Don Jose. Angrily, the former lovers ‘go their seperate ways’. In the end, Don Jose’s obsessive actions and Carmen’s free - spirited ways come together in one final conflict during the Toreador’s bullfight where he has dedicated his kill to her. If you think this sounds heavy, you are absolutely kind of right. It’s also a bit of a comedy. There are many fascinating aspects to this work that make it.. fascinating. They know how to hold their cigarettes and how to stab each other. All the important stuff. The singing is pretty good too. They also know how to act jealous and have an argument while singing on key, all the while looking oh-so-cute in their costumes.Perfection at last attained. If you didn’t see Carmen, too bad. You should have. You would have really really liked it. Toreadors and cigarette girls as never seen before. Carmen - a visual and audio feast to tickle your tum-tum. At least try to make it to the next opera. This is one of those things that will sit in the back of your mind and fester like a leprous boil as you go through life. Then one day as you hurriedly shove Fruitloops in your face as fast as you can (being late for that special viewing of the Lawrence Welk Show), you'll suddenly gag and realize that that Great Big Abysmal Emptiness in your life is due to never having seen Carmen. So it’s for your health to come on down and support your friendly neighbourhood Vancouver Opera house. Oooh aaah. ARTS Coming to Death’s Door (a daughter and father collaboration) ‘photographs by Sandra Semchuk Presentation House- until November 24 ‘Sandra Semchuk’s recent photograph and textinstallations are ‘multple-voice collaborations withher father, Martin Semchuk Issues of self-epresentation andtelling one's own storieshave reoceupied Sandra's enquiries in photography since the early 70's when she documented her relationships with the people of hherhometown of Meadow Lake. Inthe two new works inthis exhibition, Coming to Death's Door and The Descent, both “daughter and father speak in more than one voice, images shift between experience and memory, and we, as participants, are permitted to engage personal stories of aging, posible death, and loss of freedom. Semchuk says “My father suffered from a serious heart atackin July, 1988. In Coming to Death's Door, my father and Iook together at the event which led to my helping him escape from the hospital. Inthe photographicimages Ivace my own responses tomy father andhisinevitable death. This investigation oceurs within the simple experience of moving out from the bve tnt where sleep separate from my fther'shome ito his bedroom where photographs and textures fom thepast when thenvclear family was intact. Tuse the camera gestually as a way of sustaining the experience while leaving a race which can be sen. The color photographs were edited by my father and Ito form broken sequences, analogues forhow we come to know. ‘The broken image lke the broken construction of elf, hastens the processes of reconstruction and synthesis.” Sandra Semehuk's texts have been sikscreened on transl ‘cent parachute cloth, sewn together o create one side of atent, and backlit, The voices have been excerpted from a dialogue with her father and rewritten in the present tense. She is interested in what she calls the continuous present where the past is continually being actualized and modified within engaged experience. In The Descent, father and daughter play out the archetypal