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Saying goodbye to summer this year was hard. Not only are long, hot days and sultry nights addictive, but this was also the first season in a long time when we could properly pick up our lives. Visiting friends and family I hadn’t seen in years was both restorative and emotional. Leaving them again was harder than ever. There is no more taking the next trip back for granted.
Gathering together, it turns out, is everything. And not just with those closest to you. I have been lifted up again and again by the communal energy and joy of experiencing live music once more. Sharing a moment of bliss with a crowd of strangers is dizzying in its effect; the power of art to cut through our differences never fails to astound me.
The human need for community in all its forms has never been more evident. Looking over the stories in this issue, it’s obvious how much it drives us forward to create, succeed, explore—even at our most individual, we only reach our potential when part of a community. This magazine is no different. It exists not only because of the hard work of the team behind it, but because of you, the community of readers who open its pages. It’s symbiotic; without both, there is nothing.
Breaking bread, eating together, is one way we share community, and at his restaurant St. Lawrence, chef/owner J-C Poirier has built a space where food is not simply about the quality of dishes but also about evoking memories and a sense of place. Five years in, he is celebrating with the release of a cookbook and a recommitment to cooking food from his heart and homeland, Quebec.
The power of childhood memory is something Dr. Gabor Maté has spent years unpicking in his groundbreaking work. Connecting our past with our present, identifying trauma as the root of addiction, Maté is a pioneer of holistic health. We were delighted to sit down with him to discuss his new book, The Myth of Normal.
Improving the health of our communities is important work regardless of the space in which we operate, whether art, science, business, or sport. Joey Rycroft’s passion is horses, and he works to keep them safe during competition, designing courses for show jumping where the rider is tested, and the animal protected.
Architecture literally creates community. We look back at the early days of celebrated Vancouver architect Ron Thom as he developed his signature style in North and West Vancouver, and forward to new ideas for communal living in a West Side home created by Leckie Studio to house multiple generations for more than a century. We also travel to the hamlet of Bamfield, where new road infrastructure is set to affect all aspects of this remote B.C. community, and to Scotland, where ancestral roots create community in the mind, if not in reality.
All the years of back-to-school for myself and with my children makes me associate autumn with a clean page, the possibility for redirection and transformation. These are principles Medhi Walerski embraces year-round. The artistic director of Ballet BC is passionate about artistic freedom and creating community through it. I had the pleasure of visiting the studio as the dancers prepared for their November program and talked with him about the vulnerability and discipline required to make original, compelling art. However you experience community this season, I hope you will embrace it, along with the connections and ways of seeing it surely brings.
Read more from our Autumn 2022 issue.
