Photo by Fubarfoto.

With the first chord of “Burn Your Village to the Ground,” the song accompanying a burlesque act titled “Not Your Stereotype,” a transformation begins. The figures on stage, dressed in racist caricatures of Indigeneity—feathered headdresses, wearing “Indian” Halloween costumes, carrying “Made in China” dreamcatchers—begin to shed their layers. The commodified image of the “Indian” is peeled away, and then the group performs a reverse strip, putting on new burlesque regalia to reveal their true identities. This is Virago Nation, Turtle Island’s first Indigenous burlesque collective.

Vancouver-based Virago Nation engages burlesque performance as a tool of reclamation. It’s through rematriating Indigenous sexuality and identity that community building, workshops, and performance are able to interrogate the racist, oppressive structures of colonization.

By using a colonial register of communication and culture—burlesque—to represent themselves publicly as Indigenous, Virago Nation enacts femininity and sexuality on their own terms. By archaic definitions, virago refers to a woman of “masculine strength or spirit,” or, a female warrior. Today, the term refers plainly to an ill-tempered, domineering woman. This shift in meaning—from one of female empowerment to one intended to strip agency—makes convening member of Virago Nation Shane Sable chuckle, because, of course, it’s all part of the fun.

Virago Nation formed in May 2016 when Sable, feeling uninspired and burnt-out in her work, wanted to build a community of support. She asked five friends to meet at the Heartwood Cafe, a now-defunct community hub for marginalized folks in Vancouver, for brunch. Sable invited everyone to introduce themselves while fully embodying their respective Indigeneity, approaching each other free and in spite of colonial expectations. But what first started as an informal group to share ideas and inspire one another became the formalized burlesque group they are today.

The collective uses each performance to leverage a calculated interrogation of the broader sociopolitical landscape in Canada. For example, they use what Sable calls “burlesque regalia”—ceremonial regalia adapted specifically for burlesque—as a tool in their performances to demonstrate postcolonial hybridity and identify each Virago’s heritage. By stripping off layers of costumes in their performances, they seek to strip the weight of the colonial gaze with conviction and freedom. In this way, the performances allow the group to participate in new cultural production while paying respect to traditional Indigenous art.

Virago Nation also offers workshops on pastie-making, burlesque movement, and other artistic skills pertaining to the rematriation of Indigeneity. By doing this, the group hopes to promote the art of burlesque as a tool of empowerment. “Because of the cultural genocide that’s taken place across Turtle Island, people have varying degrees of contact with their traditional cultures.” Sable says. “Burlesque can help bridge some of that lack of connection.”

Most importantly, Virago Nation strives to facilitate positive experiences for members of Indigenous communities, knowing the impact it may have on others’ lives.

“When we were in Las Vegas performing for the Burlesque Hall of Fame, we received a message from an Indigenous woman that said, ‘I didn’t know that I wasn’t alone,’” says Sable.

According to the group, this reaction—a feeling of sudden belonging, like finding one’s long lost family—comes up regularly, confirming the need for Virago Nation’s mission.

Ultimately for Virago Nation, it’s all about rallying for a return to pre-colonial matrilineal power structures and building a community that embraces the identities and supports the flourishing of Indigenous people, especially women, everywhere.

As for their next steps, Virago hopes to tour rural Indigenous communities to help share their positive representations of Indigenous women and to one day create an community where all Indigenous women can be Viragos. Sable says: “We want there to be others after—and alongside—us.”

Photo by Yonah Obadia.

The seating area of the Burdock music hall is cast in a faint glow by the string lights above. A spotlight creates a faint hue behind a microphone. Tonight’s artist line up is taped on the microphone stand. The Slackline Creative Arts Series is ready for another show.

The volunteer-run arts series started in July 2016, when Evan J. Hoskins and Jess Crawford saw the need for a literary arts hub in Toronto for emerging artists. Hoskins, a poet that recently moved from Ottawa to Toronto, recounts Googling Toronto’s poetry scene and finding little. “You get virtually nothing. You get Art Bar [Canada’s longest weekly poetry reading series and hub], some slam communities, and that’s it. And you’re like, ‘Why is that the case?’ If you wanted to start out, is that not your first Google? Why is there no better way to find this stuff?” The summer of 2016 saw the end of The Emerging Writers Reading Series, a monthly literary event that is dedicated to passionate emerging writers, and there was a gap in the Toronto literary arts scene that needed to be filled. That’s when Slackline came in, acting as a space for artists of all art forms to mingle. “We…disliked how the literary scene was so separate from other art scenes and tried to create a forum that was more open and integrative between these communities,” says Hoskins.

Slackline encourages emerging artists from the Toronto arts community to share their work and recognizes that sometimes the community can feel daunting. The Slackline team addresses this through creating a welcoming atmosphere. Even before the show, members of the Slackline team are mingling with audience members and artists within the modest space of the Burdock music hall, attempting to make their guests feel more at home. “We have said from the beginning [that we] want to make a point to talk to everybody possible,” Hoskins says. According to Victoria Cho, a Slackline curator who is also involved with community outreach, the monthly arts series has a certain mood: Slackline isn’t intimidating like other arts events hosted by the community—it’s inviting.

By introducing themselves to as many people as possible prior to the show, the Slackline team helps to transform the venue into a place of communal gathering for audience members and artists who may have felt intimidated. When the show begins with brief introductions of the performers and Slackline team, most audience members are familiar with the hosts on stage. After introductions, the crowd channels that sense of community by extending their hospitality to emerging artists on the open mic. An intermission between two sets of performances by curated artists creates more opportunity for the Slackline team to get to know the people attending their shows. The evening wraps up with community updates, closing remarks, and hearty banter. 

Photo by Justine DiCesare.

The arts community in Toronto can be hard to discover and break into as an emerging artist, with short performance times and the scarcity of series that focus on newcomers. Drew Douglas, a host and curator for the arts series, says that there is a lot of “cliquey thinking” at art events. “You all know the same stuff. [For example] you all know this one book. So if someone starts a conversation about a book that you’ve all read…obviously you’re going to want to be a part of that. But it’s gonna form a circle, and it’s gonna form a clique. And someone’s not going to have read that book,” Douglas says. The cliquey thinking creates a feeling of isolation that can easily be overwhelming in a space full of strangers.

Cho says that isolation happens systemically, and that it can be addressed by actively engaging with people. The choice to mingle with people humanizes them and can help to eradicate cliquey thinking. “When you bring subjectivity to people I think that’s a step into addressing the isolation problem,” Cho says.

But sometimes mingling with strangers in a dim room can be a challenge. Crawford, who has social anxiety, finds attending art events by herself to be stressful. She describes the feeling as being “huge[ly] out of my shell.” When people attempt to make her feel welcome during art events, she finds that she can better cope with her anxiety. Being greeted and engaged during an event, notes Crawford, “brings you into the community and makes you want to come back.” Through greeting and engaging people who attend their shows, the Slackline team has been actively countering the effects of cliquey thinking within the community.

In addition to addressing isolation and cliquey thinking, Slackline is also being mindful about diversity—both in terms of the performers they showcase and the art forms they present. “We realize that we are suffering from just having poets all the time,” Hoskins says. “Which is okay, but we definitely want to change it.”

Photo by Yonah Obadia.

That’s not to say that Slackline hasn’t showcased its fair share of non-traditional performances. During its September show, Brolin Devine gave a stand up comedy set after reading prose. Cian Cruise handed HARIBO gummy bears to the audience and continually filled his mouth with gummy bears as he read his piece titled “Haribo” during an October show. On May 21, Rasiqra Revulva will be performing a nautical piece with voice-altering technology.

The team also attends non-poetry events once a month, actively engaging with other arts communities while looking out for emerging artists who are interested in performing under the Burdock’s spotlight. Crawford affirms, “We’ll be continually trying to figure out how to be in different communities and bring everybody together.”

Slackline’s efforts to dismantle cliquey thinking and address diversity within its community is ongoing. As the year moves forward, the team will be planning multiple projects including an outdoor show focusing on Indigenous artists and producing a podcast that incorporates workshops where artists will be able to collaborate, speak about their pieces, and have a good time.

Upcoming spring Slackline shows take place May 21 and June 18 at the Burdock Music Hall.

Poster for Pamoja's new dance work, Koncrete City.

There’s a scene in the Kenyan dance company Pamoja‘s new ballet, Konkrete City, where all I could feel was the hectic beat of downtown Nairobi, or Vancouver, or Toronto. The dancers—most of them handicapped—depicted the Central Business District, Kenya’s core of business towers and banks, during the rainy season.

Walking, running and jumping; swinging arms, dreaded hair, legs and umbrellas, they moved to the unnerving beat of techno. The audience at the dusty National Theater of Kenya was so entranced that even the children in the front row, who are usually frightened by this type of music, could not tear their eyes away from the unbelievable shapes of the dancers.

Pamoja means “togetherness” in kiSwahili. Exemplifying that concept, the dancers use each others’ bodies to grace the stage— sometimes lasciviously. During one scene, a man pedals a Kenya-style wheelchair across the stage, while two other men, sitting behind him, roll on each others’ bodies, using necks, elbows and legs as support.

Dismas Otieno, one of the members of Nairobi's Pamoja dance company. Photo by Siena Anstis.

Dismas Otieno, 24, is a long-time dancer with Pamoja. He lost his leg at the age of four when he fell off his bike and into the lethal path of a “flying coffin,” a popular nickname for the big East African buses that roar past you with little regard for human life.

His parents, aware of the new difficulties their son would face, ensured that Otieno completed both primary and secondary schools at institutions for the handicapped. Eventually, as his interest in sports grew during his school years, he moved to Nairobi to pursue this passion.

Overcoming the challenges of living as a physically impaired person in a place like Kenya, notoriously unfriendly to the disabled, Otieno is a national swimming champion and is on the national swimming and basketball teams. He also dances full-time with Pamoja. “I don’t see myself walking on crutches,” he tells me, “I consumed and accepted the situation when I was young.” When dancing, he sometimes spends over two hours on his one leg without a break.

While Dismas is well-adjusted to his situation, he admits that most Kenyans aren’t. “The government sees physically challenged people as a problem.”

In a city like Nairobi, being handicapped is not easy. There is limited wheelchair access in all buildings, elevators are often broken, buses and matatus (the popular van-type of transportation) rarely stop for people in wheelchairs. Being handicapped in Nairobi means relying on the goodness of people with their own problems who are mostly looking out for themselves.

In an attempt to change this attitude, Pamoja has made itself a popular local dance group. Performing at big cultural centers like the Alliance Francaise, as well as in remote communities, where there is even less support structures for the disabled, Pamoja, through its contemporary dance work, helps to convince individuals that there is power and possibility within even the most physically challenged body.

The Kenya Working Group, operating under the University of Toronto, supports people with disabilities in Kenya. You can consult their website here.