The City of Barrie’s 23^rd annual Winterfest & Festival of Ice is this weekend, February 4^th & 5^th.  Named one of the Top 100 Festivals in Ontario, Winterfest celebrates the season with outdoor fun for all ages in Heritage Park and Memorial Square from 10:00am to 5:00pm.   Amazing outdoor activities include horse-drawn wagon rides, snow slide, helicopter rides, midway, lumberjack shows, ice maze, and so much more.  The Festival of Ice features spectacular three hundred pound blocks of ice carved into beautiful ice sculptures – this year’s theme is Frozen in Time.  Check out the sculptures at night with a special showing on Saturday evening.

New this year – Memorial Square will be filled with the sounds of live entertainment.  Daytime will feature a variety of family programming in English and French.  A very special Saturday evening concert from 5:00pm to 9:00pm will feature headliner Ubiquitous Synergy Seeker, known as USS, and a line-up of amazing local artists including Brittney Fulton, Dead Mechanics, MAPS and Swaying Tuesdays.  The Winterfest stage and entertainment have been made possible by funding provided by the Government of Ontario’s Celebrate Ontario program.

Other weekend activities not to be missed:

·         City Aquatics and Fire & Emergency Services host Barrie’s great Polar Bear Swim on Sunday, 12:00pm at Centennial Beach.  No pre-registration required – just show up ready to take the plunge!  Spectators welcome.

·         Start your weekend at the 20^th annual Winterfest Pancake Breakfast at Central United Church.

·         Go skating for only $1 per person at many of Barrie’s arenas at designated times.

·         Stop by the Barrie Farmers’ Market, Barrie Public Library, MacLaren Art Centre, Grey & Simcoe Foresters Regimental Museum, and many more downtown locations for fun activities to get you out of the cold.

·         Enjoy other great events throughout the weekend, including the February Blues Festival, Easter Seals Chili Fest, Soup’s On! for the Heart & Stroke Foundation, and the Reel Stories weekend film festival.

For all of the details, visit the City of Barrie’s website at http://www.barrie.ca/CULTURE/FESTIVALS/Pages/Winterfest.aspx.

Grab your mittens and celebrate winter in Barrie this weekend!

Arin Donnelly
Community Events Programmer

City of Barrie

Central Ontario’s Premier Waterfront Community

Department of Culture

24 Maple Avenue, 2nd Floor

PO Box 400

Barrie ON  L4M 4T5

Tel:  705-739-4220 ext. 4506

Fax: 705-739-9160

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Plan to join the Department of Culture in the City Hall rotunda on Monday February 13^th between 6:00 and 7:00 p.m. to celebrate the Barrie Arts Awards Recipients 2011.  Light refreshments will be served and those in attendance will be treated to piano performances by Curley Bridges, jazz pianist and winner of the Excellence in the Arts Award and Abigail Johnson, recipient of our Most Promising Youth artist award.  Performances will be also given by dancers from Carla Tucker’s Moving Art School, Carla is the recipient of the Contribution to the Community award.  The dynamic singer song-writer, Sarah Melody that recently performed at the Downtown Countdown, will also delight us with a few of her original songs.  Barrie’s own Poet Laureate, Bruce Meyer will perform a poem written for the occasion.

Please mark your calendars and plan to join us to demonstrate your support and appreciation for what our local artists have accomplished.  No RSVP’s required.

Elaine Britnell

Administrative Assistant to the Director of Culture

City of Barrie

Central Ontario’s Premier Waterfront Community

Mailing Address:

70 Collier Street

P.O. Box 400

Barrie ON  L4M 4T5

Office Location:

24 Maple Avenue, 2nd Floor

Barrie ON  L4N 7W4

Tel:  705-739-4220 ext. 4356

Fax: 705-739-9160

This E-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and erase this E-mail message immediately.

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The City of Barrie, Department of Culture is seeking arts practitioners dedicated to enhancing the arts experience for students in their community, to volunteer for the Adopt- A-Class pilot program.  Adopt-A-Class is a new program in which artists in any discipline, interested in contributing to the artistic development of students in their community, can adopt a local class and share the joys, challenges, skills and unique experiences involved in being an artist.  For more information, please see the link below or contact the Department of Culture at culture@barrie.ca or 705-739-4299. 

http://www.barrie.ca/Culture/Pages/AdoptaClass.aspx

Rudi Quammie Williams, MBA, BFA

Director of Culture

City of Barrie

Central Ontario’s Premier Waterfront Community

Department of Culture

Mady Centre for the Performing Arts

Mailing Address:

70 Collier Street, PO Box 400

Barrie ON L4M 4T5

Office Location

24 Maple Avenue, 2nd Floor

Barrie ON  L4M 4T5

Tel:          705-739-4220 ext.5213

Fax:         705-739-4238

rwilliams@barrie.ca

This E-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and erase this E-mail message immediately.

Folks, we have had to postpone Marketing The Arts Workshop until we can arrange another date with Jacoba Knaapen.  For those of you who have registered, I will keep your name on file and contact you when we have another date set, which should be in February or March.  An email will be sent out at that time as well.

Thank you for your understanding. 

Original Email Below

Marketing The Arts – January 13 and 14, 2012

The current market place is a highly competitive environment and arts organizations of all mediums and sizes are struggling to attract and retain their audience.  Marketing has become one of the most important elements in the sustainability of arts not-for-profit organizations.  Register early to find out how to broaden the scope of your target market, get your audience involved, and acquire new ideas on how to attract and retain a younger demographic.

This workshop will be held on Friday, January 13, 2012 and Saturday, January 14, 2012 at City Hall, 70 Collier Street in the Sir Robert Barrie Room.  The hours of the workshop will be from 2:00 – 7:00 pm on Friday and then again on Saturday, January 14 from 9:30 a.m. until 1:30 pm.

This workshop is being facilitated by Jacoba Knaapen, Executive Director for the Toronto Alliance for the Performing Arts (TAPA) and Marc Hill of MHConnects.  TAPA is an arts service organization that represents 175 professional theatre, dance and opera companies in the city of Toronto.  Jacoba is also the producer of the Dora Mavor Awards, which she has been producing for the past ten years.  Jacoba is an active member of ArtsBuild Ontario, Toronto Arts Council Foundation, Committee for the Theatre Performance Program at Humber Institute and Arts Vote Toronto 2010.  Marc Hill is the proud owner of MHConnects, a public relations firm based in Barrie and he will speak to the importance of utilizing social media in marketing the arts.  Marc is a member of the Barrie Arts and Culture Council and a devout patron of the arts.  Together Marc and Jacoba bring with them a wealth of information that you won’t want to miss learning about.

If you are an arts organization or artist please call The Department of Culture at 705-739-4299 or email culture@barrie.ca now to register or get more information.

Elaine Britnell

Administrative Assistant to the Director of Culture

City of Barrie

Central Ontario’s Premier Waterfront Community

Mailing Address:

70 Collier Street

P.O. Box 400

Barrie ON  L4M 4T5

Office Location:

24 Maple Avenue, 2nd Floor

Barrie ON  L4N 7W4

Tel:  705-739-4220 ext. 4356

Fax: 705-739-9160

This E-mail message (including attachments, if any) is intended for the use of the individual or entity to which it is addressed and may contain information that is privileged, proprietary, confidential and exempt from disclosure. If you are not the intended recipient, you are notified that any dissemination, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please notify the sender and erase this E-mail message immediately.

ü Please consider the environment before printing this email.

The Writers’ Union of Canada (TWUC) is offering the Professional Development Workshop HOW TO BE YOUR OWN PUBLICIST in Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Vancouver, and Victoria, in February and March of 2012. The workshops take place from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm. For those who can’t attend in one of the participating cities, a 3-hour webinar will be offered, distilling the highlights of the workshop.  

Authors Elizabeth Ruth and Ann Douglas will present on traditional but innovative book marketing strategies as well as new media opportunities for writers.  Kelly Duffin, Executive Director of The Writers’ Union of Canada, will update participants on the latest evolutions in the publishing landscape.

Whether you are an aspiring writer wanting to develop your audience before publication; an emerging writer who needs to stay visible; or long-published and looking for new tips and techniques, this full-day workshop is for you.

Participants will leave the workshop having gained the know-how and confidence to creatively promote their own future works, and an expanded, inspired sense of what it means to be a writer in the current publishing context.

Most workshops of this calibre charge hundreds of dollars. The price of this symposium is $89.00 and covers costs, including lunch, $75 for members of The Writers’ Union of Canada. For registration information please go to www.writersunion.ca/registration.pdf.  Please circulate this information to writers you think might be interested in coming to this event. Space is limited so register today.

Many thanks for your time and attention.

Kelly Duffin

Executive Director

The Writers’ Union of Canada acknowledges the support of the Government of Canada through the Department of Canadian Heritage for these Professional Development workshops.