Kara Hansen is artist and filmmaker based in Vancouver, BC. Through improvisation, costume, makeup, scripts, and movement scores, her work engages collaboration to build absurd narratives around the body. Her practice spans film, video installation, sculpture, social practice, and performance. She holds a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design and is a founding member of the collective non-profit organization DUPLEX.

Website

Kathleen Taylor is an artist who engages with drawing as a means to explore sculpture, installation and architecture. Kathleen’s performance-based practice combines clowning, physical comedy, improvisation and dance which distort the lines between themes of humour, fear, desire and the grotesque. Taylor holds a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design.

Participation

2015

Makiko Hara is an independent curator, lecturer, writer, art consultant, and artist based in Vancouver, BC, on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ilw̓ətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. Since the late 1990s Hara has curated numerous notable contemporary art exhibitions and projects throughout Asia and locally, both during her time as the Chief Curator/Deputy Director of Centre A: Vancouver International Centre for Contemporary Asian Art (2007 to 2013) and independently. As a curator, Makiko has worked on large-scale projects, including Scotiabank Nuit Blanche, Toronto (2009); AIR YONAGO, Tottori Geijyu Art Festival, Yonago, Japan (2014–15); Fictive Communities Asia–Koganecho Bazaar, Yokohama, Japan (2014); Rock Paper Scissors: Cindy Mochizuki, Yonago City Museum of Art, Tottori, Japan (2018); Whose Stories?, Kamloops Art Gallery (2021); and No Pain Like This Body, Offsite: Lani Maestro (2022–23) and PACE IN SPACE, Offsite: Pedro Reyes (2023), Vancouver Art Gallery. Hara also assisted in the organization of the LIVE Biennale between 2007-2019, curating numerous programs and events. In 2020, Hara received the Alvin Balkind Curator’s Prize, and in 2024 she was the curator in residence at the Vancouver Art Gallery.

Participation

2009

Born in Tehran, Iran, and raised between Athens, Greece, and Vancouver, BC, Sarah Viscardi Harruthoonyan is an artisan and designer. After receiving her Bachelor in Fashion Design and Technology from Kwantlen, Harruthoonyan has been utilizing her skills on freelance projects and with various companies such as the Vancouver Opera, Arts Club Theatre, local film productions, Cirque du Soleil, and stage performances in Mexico. Inspired by her adventures in traveling, nature, and human behaviour, Sarah is continuously expanding on her wearable art collection of garments and accessories.

Participation

2009

Jeanne van Heeswijk is an artist who facilitates the creation of dynamic and diversified public spaces in order to “radicalize the local”. Her long-scale community-embedded projects question art’s autonomy by combining performative actions, discussions, and other forms of organizing and pedagogy in order to assist communities to take control of their own futures. Her work has been featured in numerous books and publications worldwide, as well as internationally renowned biennials such as those of Liverpool, Shanghai, and Venice. Jeanne was the Basis voor Actuele Kunst Fellow (2018-19), the Keith Haring Fellow in Art and Activism at Bard College (2014-2015), she received the Curry Stone Prize for Social Design Pioneers (2012), and the Leonore Annenberg Prize for Art and Social Change (2011). She lives and works in Rotterdam, Netherlands.

Participation

2021

Stein Henningsen is a performance artist living on the arctic archipelago of Svalbard. Since 2005, he has presented his work at many biennials, festivals, and events in Scandinavia, Europe, North America, and Asia. Henningsen is influenced by photography, thinking of his performances as vivid images. His work addresses political, social, financial and climate issues in a contemporary context.

Website

Participation

2017

Maria Hlavajova is an organizer, researcher, educator, curator, and founding general and artistic director of BAK, basis voor actuele kunst (Utrecht, 2000 – ). Between 2008 and 2016, she was research and artistic director of the collaborative research, exhibition, and education project FORMER WEST, which culminated in the publication Former West: Art and the Contemporary After 1989 (which she co-edited with Simon Sheikh, 2016). Hlavajova has instigated and co-organized numerous projects at BAK and beyond, including the series Propositions for Non-Fascist Living (2017–ongoing), Future Vocabularies (2014–2017), New World Academy (with Jonas Staal, 2013–2016), among many other international research, education, exhibition, and publication projects. She lives and works in Amsterdam and Utrecht, Netherlands.

Participation

2021

SF Ho is an artist, writer, and facilitator who lives as an uninvited guest on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ilwətaɁɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. Operating somewhere between words and whatever words can’t be, SF’s work is informed by feminist methodologies, land-based practices, and grassroots community networks. Ho has presented their artwork and writing regionally and internationally, and have published a book about love and aliens called George, the Parasite (SPEC/FIC, 2021).

Website

Participation

2011

Terrance Houle is an internationally recognized interdisciplinary media artist and a proud member of the Kainai Nation (Blood Tribe). Born in Calgary, AB, and raised on the Great Plains of North America, Houle has been actively involved with Indigenous communities throughout Canada and the United States all his life. Houle’s practice encompases performance, photography, video, music, and painting. Terrance has received numerous awards for his work which has been exhibited across Canada, the United States, Australia, the UK, and Europe. Houle has a BFA from Alberta College of Art and Design (2003), and he lives and maintains his art practice in Calgary.

Trevor Freeman is an artist from Calgary, AB, whose practice involves performance and environmental sculpture. Freeman has a BFA from University of Lethbridge (2001).

Participation

2007

Johanna Householder works with found performances from the intersection of popular culture and unpopular culture. She has been making performances and other artworks since the late 1970s. With Louise Garfield and Janice Hladki, Johanna was part of the satirical, feminist performance group The Clichettes, who performed under variable circumstances, throughout the 1980s. Householder practices her own brand of pop culture détournement and often collaborates with other artists. She also writes about performance and with Tanya Mars, and co-edited two books: Caught in the Act: an anthology of performance art by Canadian women (2004), and More Caught in the Act (2016). Householder is one of the founders of the 7a*11d International Festival of Performance Art, and is professor emeritus at the Ontario College of Art & Design, where she taught performance art since 1988.

Participation

2009

Steve Hubert is an artist from Kelowna, BC, who works with Powerpoint, painting, sculpture, performance and video. Hubert has exhibited nationally at CSA Space, Or Gallery, Helen Pitt Gallery, Shudder Gallery, LES, eyelevel gallery, the Ministry of Casual Living, and VIVO, among others. His work has also appeared in Pyramid Power and The Fillip Review. He holds an MFA from Simon Fraser University (2012) and a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design (2007), and currently teaches at both schools. Hubert lives and works in Vancouver, BC.

Website

Participation

2013

Jeff Huckleberry is a performance artist living and working in Boston, USA. Huckleberry has been performing for the last 30 years, both nationally and internationally, and is a member of Mobius Inc., a Boston-based artist group. Jeff has also taught Performance at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, where he received his BFA in 2004. As Jeff notes: "He enjoys the bicycle, the hammer, the saw, the wood, his wife and son, his family, his friends, his work. (…except sometimes he doesn’t enjoy these things as much; it depends.) He is the son and grandson of far more practical people, which he tries to express in his art. His mother thinks it is time to stop getting naked in front of people and privately he thinks she is probably right; and something about death."

Website

Participation

2007

William Hunt is an artist whose work considers the intersection of music and its performance. Hunt studied at Camberwell College of Art and Design, London (1996); The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1999); Slade School of Fine Art, University College London (2000); and Goldsmiths College, London (2005). His work has been shown throughout the UK, Europe, and Canada. Hunt lives and works in Dusseldorf, Germany.

Participation

2007

Roddy Hunter is a Scottish artist, educator, and writer based in York, UK. Hunter produces research based interventions that address the intersection of performance art and social practice. His research interests include action art, aesthetics, architecture, audio art, 20th c. European avant-garde, contextual art, constructions of desire, erasure, ethics, ‘the everyday’, immediacy, installa(c)tion, insurrection, nomadism, non-linear spatio-temporal relations, performance art, town planning, praxis, processes of historicization, and psychogeography. He holds an MA in Contemporary Arts (1998) from Nottingham Trent University, and is Head of Fine Arts at York St. John University, England.

Participation

2007

iKatun is an artist-run organization started by new media artist and educator, Catherine DíIgnazio (kanarinka), and political activist and a new media artist, Savic Rasovic (Pirun). iKatun’s mission is to present contemporary art which fosters public engagement in the politics of information generation and dissemination. iKatun supports art projects and events, organizes exhibitions and conferences, publishes critical writing, runs workshops, gives lectures, and fosters community both locally and internationally. DíIgnazio and Rasovic also jointly founded the Institute for Infinitely Small Things, a participatory research organization that aims to temporarily transform public spaces and instigate dialogue about democracy, spatial justice, and everyday life.

Website

Participation

2007

Reiko Inouye is an emerging artist, curator, organizer, and settler guest on the traditional, ancestral and unceded lands of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish) and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. They received their Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies from the University British Columbia, and were nominated for the BMO 1st Art! Competition. In 2020-21, Reiko was the Director of the student-run Hatch Art Gallery (UBC, Vancouver). Their practice often concerns itself with theories of queer world-building, space-making, performativity and movement. Reiko’s most recent research has explored correspondence, lineages, personal ephemera and temporality as it relates to identity formation.

Participation

2021

Instant Coffee is an art collective based out of Toronto, ON, and Vancouver, BC. Instant Coffee is a service oriented collective developed to address the division between studio and exhibition based practices in both cities. The collective’s work includes installation and event based activities geared towards building space for public practices which allow ideas and actions to be explored beyond the confines and isolation of the studio. Instant Coffee has been made up of a number of members since its founding in 2000, most consistently Cecilia Berkovic, Jinhan Ko, Kelly Lycan, Jenifer Papararo, Kate Monro and Khan Lee. Part of Instant Coffee’s social practice includes circulating local art event mailing lists in Toronto, Vancouver, and the Prairies.

Website

Participation

2009

Tari Ito was a performance artist and activist based in Tokyo, Japan. Drawing from her background in theatre and pantomime, Ito’s performace practice often explored personal identity, female and LGBTQ+ sexuality, neuclear disasters, and military sexual violence. She was the founder of the Women’s Art Network (Tokyo).

Participation

2019

Born in England, Diane Thorn Jacobs is a multimedia artist whose work emerges from internal, emotional, and intuitive sources. There are strong elements of humour, angst, morbidity, spirituality, childishness, sexuality, and feminist themes evident in many of the pieces she produces. Her work often depict women, bodies, toys, and/or horses.

Participation

2011

Based in Edmonton, AB, Todd Janes is a curator, critic, and community builder who brings elements of performance art into this social practice. For over 14 years, Janes was the Executive Director of Latitude 53 Contemporary Visual Culture in Edmonton, where he organized Visualeyez, Canada’s only annual Performance art festival. He is a former President of both the Professional Arts Coalition of Edmonton and the Alberta Association of Artist-Run Centres (AAARC). Janes is a co-founder of Exposure, Edmonton’s Queer Arts and Cultural Festival, and has served on numerous national boards and committees. Janes currently works as the Executive Director Stony Plain Road Business Association, a non-profit BIA.

Participation

2009 2007

See Second Front

Participation

2007

Doug Jarvis is an artist and curator based in Victoria, BC, on the unceded land of the Lekwungen-speaking peoples of the Songhees Nation and Xʷsepsəm Nation. His individual and collective work explores absurdity, care, non-material entities and technology as a human attribute. Doug is a founding member of the Noxious Sector Art Collective and the avatar performance art group Second Front, which performed at LIVE in 2007. Doug’s projects have been presented at artist-run centres, galleries, museums and festivals across Canada, the United States, Europe and Asia. He is an active member of the Victoria arts community and participates through a variety of non-profit and artist-run centre boards, including as President of the Ministry of Casual Living. He is the Acting Executive Director at Open Space Arts Society and the Administrator for the ProArt Alliance of Greater Victoria. Doug received an MFA in studio from the University of Guelph, ON, and is a sessional instructor in the Visual Arts Department at University of Victoria.

Website

Participation

2021

Fatima Jawdat is a performance artist based in Diwaniya, Iraq. Her education and background is in theatre and fine art. Her performative pictures relay a profound sensitivity through visual metaphors to discuss feminist and political issues. While unable to travel outside Iraq, her chosen exhibition venue is commonly Facebook where she has developed an exponentially growing international audience.

Participation

2019

Geumhyung Jeong is an artist whose practice centres the relationship between the human body and the objects that surround it. With work that bridges performance, dance, choreography, puppet theatre, video, and installation, Jeong blurs the line between animate and inanimate. Jeong studied Acting at Hoseo University in Asan (South Korea), Dance and Performance at the Korean National University of Arts, and Film Animation at the Korean Academy of Film Arts (both in Seoul). She has participated in international performance art festivals, including recently at Holland Festival, Amsterdam (2025); Transart Festival, Bolzano (2025); Asia TOPA, Melbourne (2017, 2025); and Theater Spektakel, Zurich (2012, 2014, 2017, 2019). Jeong has been part of a number of group exhibitions, including The Gatherers, MoMA PS1, New York (2025); The Milk of Dreams, The 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, Venice (2022); and Copenhagen – Red Light Green Light (In the Realm of the Senses), Kunsthal Charlottenborg, Copenhagen (2022). Jeong is based between Seoul and Bucheon, South Korea.

Website

Participation

2009

Maiko Jinushi was born in Kanagawa, Japan. She investigates the concept of analogical reasoning often used in storytelling as a means to disclose differences of perception and interpretations of the world. Maiko describes her hybrid practice as “a new type of literature, a combination of video art, installation and performance, which strongly relates to traditional forms of literature such as poems and novels," expanding that this specific kind of literature "is the mixture of speech, reading scripts, dialogues and writings, which compose the structure of a story.”

Website

Participation

2017

Kurt Johannessen is a Norwegian artist who works primarily in performance and installation. Since the early 1980s he has produced upwards of 160 works across the mediums of performance, video, installation, and artists books, and has had more than 300 presentations all over the world. His work is characterized by a minimalist and poetic presence with a touch of humour. He is his own publisher and has produced more than 60 books, many of them translated into English. The books vary in form from just one sentence to short stories to only pictures.

Website

Participation

2011

Caleb Johnson is a music producer, composer, mixer, and sound designer based in Toronto, ON.

Participation

2009

Kamikaze Nurse is a rock band featuring KC Wei, Ethan Reyes, Sonya Eui, and John Brennan. Named after Simone Weil’s unfulfilled humanitarian death wish, the band formed in Spring 2018. They released their debut LP, Bucky Fleur, on AgonyKlub in 2019, and Stimuloso Album on Mint Records in 2022. Their music has been described as “ethereal skronk,” “Deleuzian rock,” and “best of the 90s” by people on the internet and irl.

Website

Participation

2019

Jessica Karuhanga is a first-generation Canadian artist of British-Ugandan heritage based in London, ON. Her work addresses issues of cultural politics of identity and Black diasporic concerns through lens-based technologies, writing, drawing and performances. Through her practice, Karuhanga explores individual and collective concerns of Black subjectivity and embodiment. Karuhanga has recently exhibited work at Mitchell Art Gallery (Edmonton, 2022), the Robert McLaughlin Gallery (Oshawa, 2021) and Varley Art Gallery (Markham, 2020), and performed at Remai Modern (Saskatoon, 2023) and Pallas Art Projects (Dublin, Ireland, 2022). She earned her BFA from Western University and MFA from the University of Victoria. She is an Assistant Professor at Western University.

Website

Participation

2023

See National Bitter Melon Council

Participation

2007

See Second Front

Participation

2007