Tag: Shalon Webber-Heffernan

POOLBODY is a new multi-site performance series unfolding across Toronto from August 6–9.
Pools are complex spaces—sites of leisure and competition, public gathering and private escape, play and surveillance, intimacy, memory, access, exclusion, and joy.

POOLBODY brings together performances, conversations, workshops, and site-responsive projects that move through these tensions.
Featuring Aisha Sasha John, Aysia Tse & (H)annah Kryworuchko, Hannah Palmer, Mikiki, Nyda Kwasowsky, Ranganathan Rajan, and Tess Martens. PLUS, a Seniors Movement Workshop with Roxy Menzies, and a Kids Pool Art Exhibit & watercolour workshop with Richa Baghel.

This series is made possible with support from Toronto Arts Council | Toronto Arts Foundation – Arts in the Parks, FADO Performance Art Centre and Dancemakers Curators in Community Fund.

PROGRAM – all events are FREE and OPEN to all

THURSDAY, AUGUST 6
(1) FADO Performance Art Centre, The Commons, 401 Richmond St. W. (MAP)

6:00 PM: Performance Lecture & Opening Reception
Pool Maintenance by Hannah S. Palmer

FRIDAY, AUGUST 7
(2) Flagstaff Park, 42 Mercury Rd, Rexdale (ACCESS INFO & MAP)

12:30–1:30 PM: Kids’ Pool Art Exhibition & Kid’s Watercolour Workshop with Richa Baghel
1:00–2:00 PM: Seniors’ Movement Workshop led by Roxy Menzies

2:30–4:00 PM: Performances
Lifelines (a pilgrimage with, to and for the waters) by Nyda Kwasowsky
Phantasmagoria by Ranganathan Rajan
PAPER. BAG. SAG. DOLL… by Tess Martens

SATURDAY, AUGUST 8
(3) Hart House Pool, University of Toronto, 7 Hart House Circle (ACCESS INFO & MAP)

6:30–8:30 PM: Performances
pool notes and (mis)alignments by Aysia Tse & (H)annah Kryworuchko
SPLASH PAD by Mikiki

SUNDAY, AUGUST 9
(4) Private Pool (Baby Point Road)

6:00 PM: Performance
my astonishing wealth by Aisha Sasha John

ACCESS INFORMATION

(1) The Commons
@ 401 has a barrier-free entrance on the northeast side of the building, with an automatic door. The Commons is on the fourth floor and can be reached by elevator. Accessible washrooms are available on the first and fourth floors.

(2) Flagstaff Park and pool deck is wheelchair accessible. Some activities will take place on grass, which may be uneven or difficult to navigate with a mobility device. The pool washroom has one step at the entrance and is not fully wheelchair accessible. ASL interpretation will be available for the seniors’ movement workshop and the pool performances.

(3) Hart House Aquatic Centre
has barrier-free entrances and an elevator that serves all floors. The pool is on the lower level. A universal washroom is available on the basement level, near the Arbor Room. On weekends, visitors using the barrier-free entrance should enter from Tower Road. ASL interpretation will be available for the performance.

(4) Baby Point Road
location is a private home and backyard pool. Unfortunately, the venue is not wheelchair accessible.

For access questions or to request additional accommodations, please contact Shalon at shalonwh@gmail.com

© Poster image: Manny Trinh (@mannytrinh), Acrylic on paper, 2026.

ARTISTS
Amy Hull
Claudia Edwards
Joyce LeeAnn
Sasha Singer-Wilson
Trish Lanns

Curated by Shalon Webber-Heffernan

not knowing is the most intimate explores themes of collective and personal grief, and the ways in which we might connect through shared vulnerability. Inspired by the Buddhist koan, “not knowing is the most intimate,” the project embraces the uncertainty of our contemporary emotional landscapes, inviting both artists and audiences to move into the discomfort of uncharted waters.

While reading Vanessa Machado de Oliveira’s Hospicing Modernity, I was struck by the idea that domination often involves a deliberate denial of relationships and a suppression of the senses. Drawing on Dwayne Donald’s assertion that sensory atrophy is central to this process – disrupting traditional knowledge systems and relational connections—I began to consider how deeply this numbness has seeped into the fabric of modern life. What would it mean to counter this—to resist detachment—through intimacy and attunement? This question sits at the heart of this curatorial series, exploring how performance can reawaken connection through embodied presence and shared vulnerability in times of grief.

Bringing together artists whose work grapples with death, mourning, collective grief, climate anxiety, somatics, and rituals of healing, the series unfolds across live performances, an immersive book installation, a sound bath and guided meditation inspired by the tradition of living funerals. It is an experiment in shedding emotional armour – to feel, to connect, to soften. It is an invitation to let grief become a shared language that unites rather than isolates—guiding us beyond knowing and into the realm of embodied presence and relationship.

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All performances are FREE. Accessible building.

Saturday, May 10

6:30 PM, please arrive at 6:20 PM
What Will I Tell Her? by Sasha Singer-Wilson
A grief ritual and performance exploring uncertainty, care, and parenting in the polycrisis.

8:00 PM – 9:30 PM
Embracing the Waves of Grief: A Sound Healing Meditation with Trish Lanns
Please register for the event HERE.

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Saturday, May 10 | Thursday, May 15 | Friday, May 16 | Saturday, May 17

10:00 AM – 5:00 PM
take “somethymes grief goes for a walk,” for a walk, by Joyce LeeAnn
An archivist/artist book installation + immersive walking experience. Audience members are invited to check out the book from the FADO library for an intimate self-guided exploration involving bibliomancy, release, and remembrance rituals. Drop in anytime during open hours, or pre-book a walking session by emailing shalonwh@gmail.com.

About the book in the words of Joyce LeeAnn: “Adrian Scott McLaurin was my best friend and my lover. When he committed suicide in 2007, what remained was documentation of many of the moments we shared through videos, photos, handwritten notes, transcribed text messages, etcetera. Self-publishing somethymes grief goes for a walk was my way of revolting against fleeting memory and lingering grief. I transmuted my pain through writing, so that I could keep living. My grief desired its own preservation too; every time I return to this archival text, I realize my mourning became an organism that lives within those pages to comfort other grievers.”

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DROP-OFF DAY: Saturday May 10, from 12 PM – 4PM
REPAIR DAYS: May 15 – 17, from 10 AM – 5 PM

Everything I Can Fix Versus Everything I Can’t by Claudia Edwards

Hole in your favourite sweater? Bike tube needs a change? Lamp won’t turn on? Hair needs a trim? Can’t make your mind up? News got you down? Heart-broken?

In this three-day durational performance, you are invited to bring me your items and issues in need of a fix. For three consecutive days, from the working hours of 10 am to 5 pm, I will attempt to repair as many items as I can. The art gallery will become my workshop, equipped with basic tools and supplies for woodworking, sculpting, soldering, metalwork, jewellery, sewing, knitting repairs, haircuts & trimming, and more. The gallery space will be split into two halves: on one side, the things I can fix, and on the other, the things I cannot. During this repair marathon, I will attempt to move as many things as I can from one side to the other: equal parts experiment in racing the clock, while confronting all that can’t be fixed; courting failure; being with brokenness.

On Saturday May 10, you are invited to bring something you would like repaired, restored, renewed. On Thursday May 15 to Saturday May 17, I will do my very best to fix everything.

Drop Off Notes: Broken physical items can be dropped off Saturday May 10, 12PM – 4PM. Anyone interested in bringing physical items for repairs are encouraged to bring them in on the designated drop-off day, so there is sufficient time to triage and attempt to fix all items. For metaphysical repairs, matters of the heart, and other problems in need of solutions, feel free to drop by anytime during the three-day performance.

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Saturday, May 17

2:00 PM
Grieving Circle by Amy Hull
An invitation to collectively hold space for personal and communal grief in response to ongoing global traumas. This offering invites the audience to reflect on the fragility of comfort and safety. Through remembrance, we can begin to imagine and move toward another possible world.

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Sunday, May 18

3:30 PM, a virtual talk with Joyce LeeAnn
releasing control of how things become whole, again
Joyce LeeAnn will lead a sacred virtual gathering to transmute mourning into fuel for continued living, discussing her book somethymes grief goes for a walk, and her artistic and archival practice.

Register here for the ZOOM link.

The Hemispheric Encounters dinner party series is a collaboration between Joyce LeeAnn, Jess Dobkin, Shalon Webber-Heffernan and Justice Walz. 

These gatherings are an offering – and importantly, an experiment – for artists, academics, archivists and activists to gather across borders, language, time zones and cultures for sensory, intimate connection in pandemic times. 

This series of dinner parties were made possible by Hemispheric Encounters, a partnership project supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council and FADO Performance Art Centre.

Hemispheric Encounters: Developing Transborder Research-Creation Practices is a partnership project that seeks to develop a network of universities, community organizations, artists, and activists across Canada, the US, and Latin America actively working in and with hemispheric performance as a methodology, a pedagogical strategy, and tool for social change. 

For information and to follow projects as they develop, visit the Hemispheric Encounters website.

Canada
www.shalontwh.com

Shalon T. Webber-Heffernan is an independent curator and scholar with a PhD in Theatre & Performance Studies. Her work engages with somatics, contemporary art, and performance, with a particular focus on themes of grief, disappearance, attunement, memory, and violence across North America. She recently contributed to the University of Toronto’s Integrated Arts Education Department and is a core member of The Toronto Performance Art Collective (TPAC). In addition to her curatorial practice, Shalon teaches Critical Theory and Philosophy at Dance Arts Institute (formerly the School of Toronto Dance Theatre). Her writing has been featured in leading publications, including Theatre Research in Canada, Performance Research, Comparative Media Arts Journal, C Magazine, Peripheral Review, Performance Matters, and several others.