Essays and Editorials

Intersectionality and The Drawer Boy A quick thank you to Simone A. Medina Polo for the editorial support and collaboration throughout this series of essays. This is part of a series of blog posts about different theoretical frameworks through which to analyze theatre. Intersectionality, as a concept, deals with how

This edition of Theoretical Foundations with Eric Rice includes a guest post-script by Simone A. Medina Polo discussing the nature of decolonial emancipation beyond its used for cultural and literary criticism. Towards Understanding our Context: Colonial Theatre and Edmonton Eric Rice This is one of a series of blog posts

Performing Ourselves As the first piece in this series of short essays introduced, the methodologies and ideas that guide the theoretical foundations of how we can engage with cultural objects such as arts and culture have a self-reflective impact. I look at the roles I’ve played as administrator, playwright, and

Critical Theory and Theatre in Edmonton: A Foray By Eric Rice I’ve played roles as administrator, playwright, and producer in Edmonton theatre since 1985 — I’ve come to acknowledge these roles from the standpoint of being an aging cis-gender white male. This is all the more pertinent since I’ve recently

Postmarginal Edmonton – Reflections of a Year By Shrina Patel, Soni Dasmohapatra, and Lucy Lu A little over a year ago, 40 artists, scholars, and cultural workers gathered at the Fringe Theatre Arts Barns in Edmonton to tell stories, dialogue, move, and practice together. Led by Walterdale Theatre with funding

Curiosity Liberated The Cat Kijo Eunice Gatama Curiosity didn’t kill the cat, I think it actually liberated it and gave it the satisfaction of learning something new whether that was pleasant or not. Hello, I am Kijo, and I am a huge cat lover and so this play on the

The Artwork and Its Compassions Simone A. Medina Polo When I had an opportunity to write the first essay for this year’s run of Who Are We Now?, I was considering how my own position as an arts manager is symptomatic of a number of concrete socio-political conflicts – something

Three years ago, I started writing a show called Wastelands. In creating that piece, I studied the plastic waste and climate crises. I went in feeling that we were in trouble, that was the reason for writing the show, but as an artist I didn’t see what I could do. This was a job for policy-makers, scientists, and industry. My skills weren’t useful here.

I feel like I have experienced a sort of winter in our industry. Where some things must die so that new growth can emerge. I saw the sudden death of my frantic schedule. A full stop that was pleasant at first, but soon challenged our ‘the show must go on’ sensibility to ‘I guess the show doesn’t have to go on… can’t go on” sobriety