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The third annual IndieFest, and the first fully in-person festival, takes place from Nov. 16 to 27.

Photo by Jess MacAleese

IndieFest brings indie opera companies to the forefront

By Hannah Scott

Published 12:09 PDT, Fri November 4, 2022

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The third annual IndieFest celebrates BIPOC and LGBTQ2S+ artists and showcases new work by indie opera companies.

Co-produced and curated by Richmondite Stephanie Wong, the festival takes place Nov. 16 to 27 in Vancouver. After an online inaugural year in 2020, then a hybrid event in 2021, this will be the first fully in-person IndieFest.

“Coming from a theatre background and musical background, (I found) myself wanting a place in the arts sector where I felt that my voice could be fully heard and embodied,” says Stephanie. “Recognizing that need for a lot of other folks in the artistic sector, this was a ground for creating new works and bringing new ideas that don’t get a lot of attention in arts programming.”

The festival is produced by re:Naissance opera, a company founded in 2017.

“Debi Wong, the artistic director and founder, understood that the opera sector was not really serving its more marginalized community members, and wanted to carve out those voices in the indie sector and the operatic sector,” says Stephanie.

Putting together this year’s festival, Stephanie says it was important to provide artists with access to emerging technology and shared space, giving them tools to expand their craft and amplify their works.

“Because the offerings are so diverse, what we found in previous festivals is that our audiences for each event look very different,” says Stephanie. “That was reflective of the diversity of artistic forms that we were
programming and the diversity of the people that resonated with the programming.”

Stephanie highlights a few performances that will be part of this year’s festival: Angel’s Bone is the event’s large production, a 2017 Pulitzer Prize-winning opera about human trafficking. The re:Naissance team worked with a social context committee, including social workers and survivors, to shed light on the realities of human trafficking.

Another highlight is the first in-person performance of Live from the Underworld II: Eurydice’s Calling, which features live opera singers and dancers in motion capture suits. The production has been streamed online on YouTube in the past, although the in-person presentation allows a peek into the underlying technology.

And Stephanie’s own event, part of a larger concert series called Imaginarium, was “created to empower four different BIPOC artists at different stages of their careers,” she explains.

“My event is called The Liminal. Reflecting on imagination, from where we’ve come from to where we’re going—it’s really about change, introspection, and connection,” says Stephanie.

Given this is the first in-person festival, Stephanie is excited to share space with other community members.

“One thing I hope we continue with is the Imaginarium program, bringing in new BIPOC creators every year,” she says. “That expands different programs and seeing different experiences of what should be curated or programmed in the arts.”

Going forward, she wants to empower artists to change the narrative and reimagine the future of storytelling. Despite challenges, she says arts companies are feeling a lot of hope and optimism.

“That’s what we hope audiences will leave with as well—being introduced to new works, fusions, and collaborations that expand what art means and inspire them to continue to imagine what art means,” says Stephanie.

For more information on this year’s IndieFest, visit reopera.ca/indiefest/