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Documentary film fest brings truth to Cinematheque

Documentary film is the star of the month at the Dave Barber Cinematheque.

Starting today and running through Nov. 8, Cinematheque and the Winnipeg Film Group play host to the 18th edition of the Gimme Some Truth festival, an annual event devoted to sharing new and restored local, Canadian and international documentaries.

Artist and curator Christina Oyawale — a recent graduate of the University of Manitoba’s master of fine arts program — is the festival’s short-film programming assistant.

Oyawale, who uses they/them pronouns, says the goal of the festival “feels like the opportunity to sit in our collective humanity,” by presenting films about some of the “most human topics affecting us as a society.

Ready to launch: Inside the massive undertaking to revitalize the beloved Nonsuch replica

For 44 years, the Nonsuch has been enchanting visitors to the Manitoba Museum, bringing a whiff of adventure and the romance of the sea to our landlocked city.The jewel in the crown of the Hudson’s Bay Company Museum Collection, the replica of the 17th-century fur-trading ship takes those who board her back in time.

Decades’ worth of schoolchildren have clutched the rails at the side of the rickety gangway that leads you onboard and descended the narrow stairs — backwards, please, for safety! — into the fo’c’sle, where they could marvel at the tiny bunks — how short men were back then — and peer out the round portholes, imagining them being lashed by salt spray as you crossed the Atlantic Ocean on a grand adventure to find a new trade route for England.

Few of us on long-ago field trips ever stopped to think about why this Prairie city was honouring a British ship that never actually visited Manitoba — let alone why we had built an entire museum wing around a replica that, while it sailed more than 14,000 kilometres in European, Canadian and American waters, was hauled into Winnipeg in pieces.

As the first phase of its $17.5-million Bringing Our Stories Forward capital campaign, the museum has spent about three years planning its refurbishment of the Nonsuch exhibit, which has remained largely untouched since it was installed in 1974, in part to better tell that story.

How do you decolonize Canada’s museums? It’s a transformation that’s finally getting underway

The Canadian Museum of Human Rights is one of a number of museums across the country working to better their representation of traditionally marginalized groups.

Concert hall under fire: Indigenous teacher alleges racial profiling

An Anishinaabe teacher is calling for a formal apology saying she was singled out by security officers and repeatedly demanded to show ID at a school event hosted at the Centennial Concert Hall.

Seven Oaks School Division administration has requested a meeting with management of the downtown venue to discuss allegations of racial profiling reported by the teacher and a colleague who witnessed security guards confront her.

“I didn’t blend in, in their eyes. I didn’t fit their vision of what a professional teacher looks like,” Pamela Morrison told the Free Press about the moments that left her feeling “dumbfounded” and “othered” upon arriving at the concert hall Tuesday.

Hundreds of Seven Oaks teachers gathered in downtown Winnipeg that morning for the division’s annual professional development conference.

4/20 party organizers lose their mellow

The organizing committee behind the subdued 4/20 cannabis celebration expected at the Manitoba Legislative Building this Saturday has been torn apart by internal political rifts over the past year, as former participants accuse head organizer Steven Stairs of embezzling money meant to fund the event — allegations Stairs vigorously denies.

Tracey Cecchini, who identified herself to the Free Press as a member of the Winnipeg 420 Organizing Committee, said other committee members and event sponsors "all pitched in money" to help fund the event last year.

"Unfortunately the money was never put into the treasury, the money was mishandled," said Cecchini.

"He was using it to throw parties at his house, he was paying his rent, he wasn't putting it back into the 420 (Organizing Committee) for our permits, and (for) what we were going to do for this year."