surveillant pleasures
participant information
Gallery 101
Thursday, July 24th
12:00pm - 4:00pm
Registration is limited and prioritizes equity deserving artists. The deadline to register is July 17th.
For more information and accessibility needs email Stéfy at stefy.mcknight@carleton.ca
Workshop Leaders: Cam Hunters
Dr. Stéfy McKnight
STÉFY is a white settler, non-binary artist-scholar based in Katarokwi/Kingston. They are an Assistant Professor in the Bachelor of Media Production and Design at Carleton University on unceded Algonquin Territory. Their work explores surveillance as a contemporary form of colonialism in now called Canada post-9/11 through the methodology of research-creation. STÉFY is interested in the ways that citizens use surveillance cameras in rural and forested areas, surveillance as a logic for colonialism, and function-creep as a creative method of producing knowledges. STÉFY likes (loves) true-love, beaches, shinny objects, spaghetti, and nature. STÉFY dislikes mushrooms, scratchy textures, car rides (that make them nauseous), and has a fear of aliens.
Dr. Julia Chan
Julia Chan is a mixed-race settler, writer, artist, and academic living in Mohkinstsis/Calgary. She is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Communication, Media and Film at the University of Calgary. Her work explores surveillance, culture, race, horror, sexual violence, and technology, and has been published in journals such as the Quarterly Review of Film and Video, Media Practice and Education, and Porn Studies. A collection to which she contributed a chapter, Screening #MeToo: Rape Culture in Hollywood (SUNY Press, 2022), edited by Lisa Funnell and Ralph Beliveau, won the 2023 CHOICE Outstanding Academic Title Award. She always feels like someone is watching her.
Participant Resources and Information
Ethics Participant Forms
This workshop is part of a larger research-creation project that brings together an interdisciplinary constellation of 2SLGBTQIA+, BIPOC, disabled, classed, and gendered artists, curators, and scholars in so-called Canada to engage with theories of both pleasure and surveillance—in particular, how “pleasure activism” is a form of healing, care, and radical empowerment (brown 2019). To fully understand its impacts, we must also attend to the ways folx resist and/or engage with surveillance, which may conflict with surveillance studies’ dominant paradigms.
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Participants interested in participating in the research component of the workshop may answer three questions about their experience using the equipment, their artwork, and the workshop, that will be video/audio recorded or written. Participants will receive a 100$ Visa gift card as part of their participation. Furthermore, participants may be invited to submit their artwork created during the workshop as part of a zine to be created by the workshop leaders (subject to copyright fees). Workshop leaders may take photos and videos of the workshop with permission.
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If you would like to be part of the research component of the workshop, we ask that you sign the forms attached, including a consent form and photo release form, and email them directly to stefy.mcknight@carleton.ca.