• A Festival of Ideas
  • January 26 - 29, 2023
  • Guelph

2018 Presenters

Amanda Cachia is an independent curator and Assistant Professor of Art History at Moreno Valley College in the Riverside Community College District in Southern California.

Andrew Hunter is the Art Gallery of Guelph’s Senior Curator and an instructor in OCAD University’s Curatorial and Critical Studies Graduate Programme.

Ashon Crawley is an Assistant Professor of Religious Studies and African American and African Studies at the University of Virginia. His research and teaching experiences are in the areas of Black Studies, Performance Theory and Sound Studies, Philosophy and Theology,…

Billy-Ray Belcourt is from the Driftpile Cree Nation in northwestern Alberta. He is a 2016 Rhodes Scholar and is reading for an M.St. in Women’s Studies at the University of Oxford. He was named by CBC Books as one of…

Dani d’Emilia is an artist and educator working in the fields of performance, visual art, devised theatre, radical pedagogy and social justice. She is particularly interested in embodied political-affective practices that merge artistic, activist and spiritual realms, and has been…

DJ Junglecat offers you the finest bass heavy sounds of the UK – specializing in bassline house, UK garage, UK funky, grime, dubstep and jungle/drum n’ bass.

Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning is an Anishinaabe artist and scholar who works at the intersection of Indigenous philosophy and ways of knowing, contemporary continental philosophy, and art.

Percussionist, pedagogue, vocalist, composer, improviser, Dong-Won Kim has studied various forms of traditional music from great Korean music masters. By participating in many intercultural projects, he has been devoted to sharing the profound beauty of Korean traditional culture and music with…

Elwood Jimmy is a learner, collaborator, writer, artist, facilitator, cultural manager, and gardener. He is originally from the Thunderchild First Nation, a Nêhiyaw community in the global north. For close to 20 years, he has played a leadership role in…

Il-Dong Bae is highly regarded as one of Korea’s finest p’ansori singers. “If Volcanoes could sing, then they would sound like Il-Dong Bae. The Korean’s voice has such breadth that it not only fills physical space like a lava flow, but seems…

Philosopher, cultural analyst, and Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto, Joseph Heath presents his lecture, “The Rise of the Counter-Cultural Right.”  Heath will discuss the rise of the alt-right, and the unexpected appropriation by the right of certain radical…

Maikoiyo Alley-Barnes is an artist, filmmaker, writer, and designer who explores the resonance of genetic cultural memory through the mystical and the mundane. Alley-Barnes has exhibited sculpture and films in numerous traditional and new-media-based settings. He has been, and continues to…

Michael Roberson is a public health practitioner, activist, and leader within the LGBTQ community who created The Federation of Ballroom Houses, co-created the National Black Gay Men’s Advocacy Group and the HIV prevention intervention “Many Men, Many Voices.” Michael earned…

Nancy Rowe is an educator, consultant and a Traditional Practicioner of Aanishinaabek lifeways, views, and customary practices.

12 instruments, 10 languages, 7 countries…Okavango African Orchestra brings together the traditional music and instruments of several major African cultures that historically have had little or no interaction. Batuki Music Society Artistic Director Nadine McNulty assembled this cast of eight…

Peter Schuler is an Elder of the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation of the Anishnaabek Peoples.

Melted-pop duo Phèdre make music for escaping. The visually evocative soundscapes emerging on their previous releases take form like a great comic; a concise narrative, bright colours, and psychedelic textures. If comic books had strobe lights Phedre’s certainly would.

Shelley Niro is a 2017 recipient of the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts, and the Scotiabank Photography Award.

Tanya Talaga is a journalist at the Toronto Star, covering everything from general city news to education, national health care, foreign news, and Indigenous affairs. Talaga will be reading from her book, Seven Fallen Feathers: Racism, Death, and Hard Truths…

Blue-eyed synth soul with an ’80s bent, The Magic transcend time and place with their music. The duo of Geordie and Evan Gordon with Jessy Bell-Smith, and Tim Clarke create a sparse, haunting sound focused on Geordie’s croon and falsetto, with…

Vanessa de Oliveira Andreotti holds a Canada Research Chair in Race, Inequalities and Global Change at the Department of Educational Studies, University of British Columbia. Her teaching and research focuses on analysis of historical and systemic patterns of reproduction of…

Versa is an audio/visual collaboration between process-based artist Monika Hauck and musician Alex Ricci. Expanding on their increasing infatuation with live improvisation and sound-responsive visuals, VERSA produce engrossing video backdrops using hand-crafted props and locally-sourced imagery. VERSA will illuminate the…

Founder of the renowned Zab Maboungou / Danse Nyata Nyata Company, artist-choreographer and performer, philosophy professor and author, Zab Maboungou has distinguished herself on all fronts of artistic and cultural action. Through her works and involvement in artistic and cultural…