SummerWorks at 401 Richmond

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About

"Phantom Postal Service" is a participatory performance installation which playfully acts as a post office to send and receive messages to deceased, distant, or other loved ones. The work is co-created with participants, and facilitated by Vicki Sue Manchin, Erin Poole, and Steffie Bouche.

SummerWorks expands the possibilities of performance. Anchored by our annual SummerWorks Performance Festival in August, SummerWorks offers a year-round program of creation, presentation, and learning opportunities for artists and audiences.

Vicki Sue is an interdisciplinary choreographic artist based in Montreal and Ottawa. She holds a BFA in Performance Dance from Toronto Metropolitan University and trained in Pochinko clowning in 2019. Her work, including the participatory installation *The Phantom Postal Service* and a solo performance at *So You Think That Was Dance?*, explores themes of self-making, friendship, and elegy through art and social practice.

Erin Poole is a dance artist and maker with the Toronto Dance Theatre since 2017. She is passionate about collaboration and views dancing as a conversation about being together and with oneself. Her recent choreographic work includes research at CLEaR Forum with Mocean Dance and the ATLAS Program at ImPulsTanz Vienna, as well as a solo project featured in Nuit Blanche 2022.

Steffie Boucher (she/they) is a Black queer visual artist from the Caribbean, now based in Montreal. Their work focuses on structures and the dancing body, seeking to evoke and explore urban and natural architectures. Steffie’s art often features trees and nature, reflecting an obsession with revealing the secrets of her connection to both the city and the natural world.

Organizer

Ontario Culture Days

The Ontario Culture Days Festival is an annual celebration of arts, culture and heritage taking place each fall across the province. Each year, we work with organizers of all disciplines to produce this province-wide festival. Organizers host programs throughout Ontario and invite the public to participate for free.

Ontario Culture Days lives at the local level. We support organizers from the smallest hamlets to the largest cities, while coordinating with other national and provincial Culture Days partners. We support the success of our sector colleagues through resources and network development, while highlighting the breadth and heterogeneity of Ontario’s arts and culture to the wider public.