Like many great ideas, containR — Calgary’s first art park — began as a conversation over a bottle of wine. It was 2009, and the Olympic Games were headed to Vancouver the following year.
“There was a call for artists to pitch ideas, but there were no galleries, no venues, no theatres and no sponsorship money,” recalls Nicole Mion, the artistic director of Springboard Performance, the organization that operates containR.
“We said, ‘What if we took a shipping container to a street corner in Vancouver and made it into a theatre space?’” Mion remembers. And so containR — a pop-up arts and community installation made from recycled shipping containers — was born.
“It felt really exciting to have thousands of people connect with the arts and these structures in a different way,” Mion says.
Since its Vancouver debut, containR has moved to seven locations across Calgary from the East Village to Marda Loop to Sunnyside containR’s new home is in Inglewood. It launched in June.
There is also a satellite site in Crescent Heights that hosts various youth muralism camps over the summer.
“You can put the c-cans together like Lego to reflect the needs of the community,” Mion says. In Inglewood, the c-cans are aligned with the railway behind them, so people can see the same structures in two different contexts.
Mion says this iteration of containR is “more dialed-up” than ever before with a stage, a truss system to protect audiences from inclement weather, a toilet c-can and a concession c-can.
Filipino-born Calgary-based artist Harvey Nichol will create the murals on the c-cans in containR. “Calgary’s muralism community is hot and vibrant, and Harvey is amazing at weaving community, history and story in murals,” says Mion.
Inglewood is a particularly exciting spot for containR, Mion says, as the community isalready something of an artistic hub with the Inglewood Night Markets, the Music Mile, and the Esker Foundation.
“When you go to a park, you understand you are going to design your own adventure. We see containR in a similar way. You can come to watch a performance, attend a workshop orartist talk, or to knit with others. You can partici- pate, or you can just sit and listen,” Mion says. “There are so many creatives in Calgary who are doing exciting things. We want to celebrate that outdoors in the summer.”
Through mid-September, audiences can expect a wide variety of activities to animate containR, including dance, poetry and art installations, as well as family-friendly activities such as clowning, circus and puppetry. Springboard aims to program two to four events a week, with almost half of the events available for free to audiences.
While there will be the occasional artist from elsewhere in Canada appearing at containR, Mion says the focus is on celebrating artists from the community, including those who are at the beginning of their artistic careers.
In fact, she says, containR has served as something of a “testing ground” for burgeoning artists due to the affordability and accessibility of the space.
Mion points to the South Asian performing-arts troupe Madhuban as an example of a group containR helped foster.
“containR let them try things out and build an audience and helped them learn about creative producing. Now, Madhuban has a great following and performs across the City,” she says.
Another example is Calgary’s only “dog-inclusive drag show,” Sit. Stay. Slay! The event raises money for the SPCA and “brings drag out of a bar setting,” explains Mion.
Mion says while programming details are still being finalized, people can expect a performance at containR in conjunction with the Music Mile every second week over the summer.
Salsa workshops have already been scheduled for July and August, and a flamenco festival will take over containR at the beginning of August.
containR is also working with an Indigenous organization to feature Indigenous musicians at in the park.
“I’m in such support of what an arts hub and festival can do in terms of bringing community and artists together. We want to connect the two and be part of a hyper-local and national community at the same time,” Mion says. “And we want to celebrate all those idiosyncrasies that are unique to Calgary.”
Check out springboardperformance.com for more details on containR’s summer lineup.
