Local and not commercial: New Forms Festival

by Irene Lo

New Forms Festival, a multimedia arts and music festival, happened last weekend in Vancouver and was spread out at venues such as Hangar and eatArt on Great Northern Way, and various galleries on Main Street and East 2nd. Showcasing local talent as well as contributions from the international community, New Forms, in its twelfth year, is a vibrant underground festival of the arts and music.

The premiere of Jeff Mills’s Star People was the first highlight of the festival, a three hour piece that relied on the effect of build-up and crescendo. The much talked-about performance was ultimately far more successive on the musical front than it was on the audio side of things. Star People, a musical as well as visual act, had meat on the bones in how Mills played with ideas about cyclical nature, as well as cultural beliefs (specifically Indian), but the graphics didn’t bring home the message with as much impact as could’ve been desired.

Another multimedia performance was the Hypercube, a joint collaboration between local Vancouver artists Cedric Bomford, Innes Yates, and Reece Terris, as well as the French artist company 1024 Architecture. Set at the back of the entrance to the Centre for Digital Media, the Hypercube was basically a ten metre cube that stood on metal poles, acting as the stage for 1024 Architecture. At one moment the Persian rug that was laid underneath the centre of the cube was empty and then in the next a swarm of bodies like sardines covered the ground.

Swarm, an annual arts festival in Vancouver working with New Forms, had a two-day run during the same weekend with strong points like the open house galleries at Acme Studios on Friday. A somewhat labyrinthine building with framed photographs and paintings lining white walls along the stairs, Acme Studios spilled over with a bevy of smokers socializing outside. The upper floor hosted a steaming dance party with Greenskeepers in a room saturated in garish red and pink lights. The open house, meant to last until the wee hours of the morning, died abruptly around two when police wandered in and proceeded to shut it down.

At 1 AM on Friday night Dopplereffekt played his set at Hangar while next door at eatArt Anthony Naples played his. The strange electronic duo Dopplereffekt are what some would consider music made for headphones while Naples’ set was infectious until its close at around 4 AM. Naples’s tracks started with mellow beginnings that developed into dance melodies with undeniable bite.

Saturday was busy with artists like EPROM, Calamalka, Delroy Edwards, and Evy Jane making anticipated appearances. Kassem Mosse played deep bass with hit vibrations that livened up an excitable crowd while Calamalka held down a strong fort with dubstep to linger over.  EPROM, who went after Calamlaka, had a hard set that attracted a full house. It was a tricky thing, in fact, to divvy up times to fully and fairly experience both sets.

New Forms along with Special Summer Series scheduled performances by Neu Balance besides Daniel Wang at New Brighton Park on Sunday, but unsurprisingly Vancouver weather decided to take a turn for the worse, and despite the determination of five (give or take) eccentrically attired people shaking about, the park was a deserted affair. Daniel Wang, in fact, relocated to Open Studios on East 1^st Ave, which was a bit of a shame since the park was cozy with a view of the water.

New Forms Festival was an incredible local experience for those with toes dipped in the electronic music that celebrates Vancouver-based and Vancouver-grown artists with unique verve and grit, besides the work of talented international artists from the States or Europe. As a festival on the smaller scale of things, New Forms was a treat that fused together arts and electronics for a jam-packed weekend.