SKOL Festival: August 29, 2026 Program

 

 

 

Program:

 

 

The premise for a reinterpretation of the brick, a fundamental building block in architecture takes shape through the lens of invisibility. By using a form that is culturally recognized and accepted by the general public, the emerging biomaterials evoke a silent force capable of hacking the construction industry and the built environment. The mycelium bound bricks challenge modernist neoliberal chainlinks to destabilize and reconfigure our relationship with an architecture that is not manufactured, but cultivated. This paradigm shift articulates a new, or perhaps ancient manifesto that engages with the vernacular and the living to address principles of resilience and care within the urban fabric. The brick is not merely a brick, but a vector for collective agency that bridges social and ecological justice as we enter or emerge from chaos.

 

Biography

Ether Blais-Issa is a multidisciplinary and transdisciplinary artist working at the intersection of environmental research, biomaterials, architecture and scenography. Ether’s practice responds to a temporal continuum within the spheres of spatial and environmental politics. Invested in the evolutive relationship between matter and environment, they understand material agency as a powerful vector for situating and shaping holistic ecosystemic dynamics within the living. Their practice engages with the transmission and intersectionality of low tech vernacular knowledge, disrupting systemic power dynamics from the ground up.

 

Participants will join Two-Spirit visual artist and drummer Dayna Danger, Manitoba Métis Federation / Saulteaux / Polish, for a hand drum activity in the park. Together, we will learn the White Bear Song, a song connected to women’s empowerment and protection from violence. Through collective singing and drumming, the activity creates space for care, courage, and embodied connection. This activity is open to everyone.

 

Join Des Rivière and Kat Barr for a collaborative queer record-keeping workshop.  We invite people to come sit, chat, and share stories, while participating in a meditative drawing exercise that helps translate the listeners perspective into a visual language. A collective zine and audio cassette will be compiled and shared with participants post-workshop.

 

Biographies

Kat Barr is a visual artist living and working in Montreal. They graduated with a BFA from Concordia University, majoring in Painting and Drawing. Barr explores the physical and the implied body in their practice. In a collaboration with natural material, form takes shape where the surface pulls pigment and the artist’s hand falters; while border and limit is negotiated through a process of unravelling. Their practice investigates the labour of touch and value of the handmade.

Des Rivière is an artist based in Tiohtià:ke-Mooniyang-Montréal whose practice unfolds through sound, performance, installation, and collaborative processes. Nourished by sound ecology, animal tracking, and Do-It-Together approaches, they develop projects that explore the relationships between territory and perception. Through participatory workshops and ephemeral sound experiences, they seek to alter and bring forth different ways of entering into relation with the other. Their work aims to generate sensitive spaces of encounter where heightened listening becomes a tool granting access to the collective memory of our non-human kin, allowing for the transformation of our relationship to the living world.

 

I am not trans. I built an enclosure of brick. I settle into it as comfortably as I can. You glimpse me through the façade.

You look at me and you see. Everything has been built. There is no longer anywhere to go and be. Nowhere left where I could not be it. By constraint, I am trans.

 

 

Biography

Austin Henderson is an artist, writer, and cultural worker based in Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang (Montréal) with familial roots in Oshawa, Ontario. Working in drawing, painting, printmaking, and textiles, Austin’s practice engages with public and private archives to bridge the past with the present. His work has been presented across Canada and the United States, and his writing has appeared in publications such as Esse arts + opinions and Visual Arts News. Henderson has participated in residencies with The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Union House Arts, Momus, and the New York Academy of Art. Henderson holds an MA in Art History from Concordia University and a BFA from Queen’s University.

Biography

Antenne loves context. In love with situationist and relational approaches, she tries to create connection, notably through a practice in music, installation, and performance. Through a resolutely queer lens, she seeks to question politics from a structural point of view, using protocols specific to conceptual action art. Antenne is involved in the self-management of the Miroir collective and punctuates public space with playful, cynical, and minimal interventions.

 

 

Biography

Théo Bignon is a French artist and educator living and working in Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang/Montréal. His practice investigates the intersections of ornamentation and its material cultures in relation to the highs and hardships of queer life, including his own lived experience. His work has been exhibited internationally at venues including Centre CLARK and Blouin Division (Montréal), Villa Noailles (Hyères, France), Headstone Gallery (Kingston, NY), The Hive Gallery (Los Angeles, CA), Bunker Projects (Pittsburgh, PA), Salon LB (Chicago, IL), and Whatiftheworld Gallery (Cape Town, South Africa). He is a recipient of the 2023 ARTCH Emerging Artist Grant and holds an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, where he studied as a New Artist Society Scholar, and a BA from Sciences Po Paris.