The KIAC artist-in-residence program was initiated in 2001 and has welcomed over 300 artists, musicians and filmmakers from around the world. Usually the guest artists present a talk or a workshop during their stay. Not this time.
Jamie Ross is a professional tarot reader and video artist, and has worked for years as a Pagan prison chaplain and preschool teacher visiting from Tiohtiàke / Montreal. While he has been in Dawson, he has been working on a new documentary piece on prolific anarchist writer, rural witch and Queer ancestor Carl Wittman and teaching a master class at SOVA, among other projects in progress.
In his practice Jamie’s creation animated by an interest in the politics of Reinchantment of the world, engaged in mystery, song, and the irrational as organizing principles of the world. “It’s a cliché among political philosophers that if you want to create the conditions for tyranny, you sever the bonds of intimate relationships and local community. Totalitarian movements are mass organizations of atomized, isolated individuals,” Hannah Arendt famously wrote in The Origins of Totalitarianism. Playing games together is political. Community is world-making.
He will be hosting a game of Werewolf in order to invite Dawsonites into his practice.
Werewolf (also known as Mafia) is a seated campfire game like Muder Wink or Murder Handshake in which a storyteller weaves a story in an imagined world that all participants enter. Characters will be guided through the process. The setting will be a mysterious, shadowy early winter Dawson City. Shadowy, sinister or noir costumes are encouraged.
No prior experience necessary. All are welcome. Ages 14 and up.
Tuesday, October 29, 7:30-8:30pm
Access
The Dënäkär Zho | KIAC Ballroom is accessible in wheelchair via an elevator. Washrooms are gender-neutral. We ask for guests to refrain from using perfume.
Banner photo: still from Cate Hill (2019), courtesy of Jamie Ross