VSWF Spotlight: Behind the Scenes

Building the Victoria Spoken Word Festival

This is the fourth year for the Victoria Spoken Word Festival – bringing together more than dozen spoken word artists from across Canada to be the Festival Ensemble, plus spotlight performances by RC Weslowski, Mighty Mike McGee, Jeremy Loveday, 2 Dope Boys and this year’s Poet of Honour Barbara Adler.

But what about the many artists that work behind the scenes to make the festival look and feel as it does? Let’s shine the spotlight on them:

Graphic Designer – Meags Fitzgerald

People’s first impression of an event comes from spotting the poster in the street, or picking up a flyer, or seeing the event on Facebook. So, the role of the graphic designer is absolutely vital. This is second year that the fantastic Meags Fitzgerald has designed the look for the festival (she also designed the 2012 festival).

Meags is an illustrator, designer and exhibiting artist. She holds a Bachelor’s of Fine Arts Degree in Drawing and a Post-Degree Certificate in Design. She also does awesome things with photobooths, and is currently writing and illustrating a graphic novel, Photobooth: A Biography.

Website: http://www.meagsfitzgerald.com/ 

Photographer – Casey Bennett

If a designer is the audience’s first impression, then the photographer is the audience’s last impression – capturing the memorable moments and giving them back to the audience.

Casey is a local event photographer. You can usually catch him behind the lens at live shows and festivals such as Rifflandia and TEDxVictoria. His specialty is protraits - see his street portraits on his website - and this year he'll be capturing each of our festival ensemble poets in their own portrait as well as live performances.

Website: http://caseybennettphotographer.com/ 

Director – Dave Morris

The final product of the festival is the Finale: Inside Story – a show completely conceived , written and developed in one day. But in order to do this, and make it something wonderful on the other end, you need someone to herd the cats, to shape the vision and to guide the artists in collaboration. 

That someone is Dave Morris. Perhaps best known in Victoria as a master improviser and leader of award-winning Paper Street Theatre, this is Dave’s second year as the Director of the Finale. He brings his ability to create instantly, his willingness to take risks and fail joyfully, and his love of collaboration to help guide the ensemble.

Website: http://davemorrisisa.com/

PS - Dave is also the web designer for the festival – go check out his work, and the poets themselves in the Poet Gallery at www.victoriaspokenwordfestival.com

Tickets are on sale now for the Victoria Spoken Word Festival: http://ticketrocket.org/victoria-spoken-word-festival-2/