Earth: World Urban Festival

In spite of the madness, I did manage to take in a bit of the World Urban Festival last week, happening in conjunction with the UN World Urban Forum. Lots of great local and international art, all of it political. Info booths on recycling (there’s a good one for properly disposing of old electronics: www.TechnoTrashRecycling.com)as well as organics delivery companies, and a display on green roof technology. There were shipping containers converted into mini-galleries. There were concerts and dance performances. We saw the Judith Marcuse company do a very cool piece on race, culture and the environment called Earth=home. We saw the Coup do a fabulous outdoor concert. Particularly liked a video project piece by Margot Butler about bees and the murdered women at the Pickton pig farm; and a piece by Haruko Okano made entirely of found organic materials. Part of the point of this piece is that it will eventually decompose. I’m sure it gives conventional art galleries, with all their assumptions about the eternity of art, a heart attack. There was also a little food fair with much delicious earth-friendly food.