The Victoria Foundation is honoured, thanks to a collaboration with Community Foundations of Canada and the Government of Canada, to be showcasing projects supported by Canada’s 150th grants, awarded to local organizations marking this momentous milestone.
Projects include those directly celebrating Canada’s 150th birthday, along with those that inspire a deeper understanding of our nation and its people, and those that work toward building vibrant and healthy communities, inclusive of all Canadians.
In total, more than $350,000 is going to 35 organizations for an impressively varied collection of projects. Victorians can expect to see these projects unfold over the year, many of which will be open to the public. I would like to share with you a few that I’m particularly excited about.
The Victoria Brain Injury Society will celebrate the history and future of Canada with Survivors’ Songs to Celebrate, an outdoor performance of five songs embracing Canada’s heritage, sung by brain-injury survivors. Learn more at vbis.ca.
Vancouver Island’s veterans will be honoured with the Broadmead Care Society’s Celebrating our Nation’s Heroes video project. The society will be working with a professional videographer to produce a piece focused on the courage and contributions of Canada’s Second World War and Korean War veterans. The final video will be presented at a special screening around Remembrance Day 2017.
The Inter-Cultural Association of Greater Victoria’s I’ve Not Always Been Canadian project will produce a refugee and immigrant photo essay centred on the question: “What makes you feel Canadian or, alternatively, un-Canadian?” Four community talks in the spring will encourage refugees and immigrants to share stories of their experiences arriving in Canada and ask them to articulate what it means to “belong.” For more information, visit icavictoria.org.
In November, Pacific Opera Victoria will present five shows of a new opera entitled Missing Women, by Métis playwright Marie Clements and composer Brian Current. Set in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside and along the Highway of Tears, this opera will give voice, in English and Gitxsan, to the story of Canada’s missing and murdered indigenous women. The Canada 150 grant will support a series of community conversations and exhibits around the new opera. Learn more at pov.bc.ca/missing.html.
These are just a sampling of the many projects supported by the Canada 150th grants. I hope you can find time to mark Canada’s 150th with us through some of these important and engaging initiatives. We also encourage residents to take part in the 3 Things for Canada campaign, for which more information will follow soon. Please find more details and ongoing updates at victoriafoundation.bc.ca.
Sandra Richardson is CEO of the Victoria Foundation.
