French Toast: February Melting Pot

We are in the heart of the winter and there is only one way to survive cabin fever: by tasting everything that the cultural life in the Francophonie has to offer. It begins with the Available Light Film Festival presenting Incendiesby Quebec auteur Denis Villeneuve, adapted from Wajdi Mouawad’s play,Scorched.

The film has been nominated for the Best Foreign Film award at this year’s Oscars. Incendies will be screened in French and Arabic with English subtitles on Saturday, February 12 at 7:30 pm at the Yukon Art Centre.

If you are nostalgic for Francophone music success from the ’80s, you shouldn’t miss The Lost Fingers. This Québec City trio has a special preference for French Canadian musicians such as Phillipe Lafontaine, Boule Noir, Marjo and many more.

The Lost Fingers are Alex Morissette on backup vocals, rhythm guitar and double bass, Christian Roberge on lead vocals, guitar and other instruments, and Byron Mikaloff on backup vocals and guitar. They will perform Tuesday, February 15 at 8 pm at the Yukon Arts Centre.

From February 18-20, there is the annual Frostbite Music Festival. This year’s festival will include the band Le Chat, a special French group here in the territory, with a program of original compositions that include influences of folk, pop, country and “chanson française”.

On February 23 at Yukon College, the cultural branch of l’Association franco-yukonnaise presents a one-of-a-kind cultural activity with the presentation ofParlons d’art, a Francophone workshop about Contemporary Art.

For this forum, you need a visual art background to appreciate the information. In Parlons d’art, Marie-France Beaudoin asks: why is it important to understand contemporary art and why is it so meaningful in our societies?

“Contemporary art is used to describe the practice and the realizations of artists who treat actual issues. They use the mediums of their time to represent their subjects,” Beaudoin says.

Parlons d’art is one of the first conferences about visual art presented in French in Whitehorse.

The following day, in the gymnasium of École Émilie-Tremblay, don’t miss the traditional talent show, which allows everybody to present their artistic work to the public.

Dancers, musicians, magicians, poets, rappers or acrobats, young or old, amateur and professional, will put their talents together to present an original and diversified variety show.

At the end of the month, the Yukon Sourdough Rendezvous will feature the most popular activity of the Francophone community: the Sugar Shack.

Can you imagine eating maple toffee until you die? It’s now possible with this unique winter event. You have three days to take advantage of the best sugar venue in the territory – February 25 – 27 at Shipyards Park.

It’s a Rendez-vous!

Virginie Hamel is a regular contributor to What’s Up Yukon who keeps tab on events in Yukon’s francophone community.

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