SPEAKERS Ontario

GRoove TALKS: Building Creative Community

The Groove Yoga Festival is a celebration of creativity. We believe that yoga should inspire us to live in deeper connection with one another—and we facilitate this primarily by inviting live music, dance, and visual arts into our yoga space. In this workshop, we’ll explore the question of how we use creative practices both on and off the mat in order to build vibrant, resilient communities. Our invited panelists are all artists: Hanna Back, Larry Scanlan, and Mark Reinhart will explore this question through storytelling and discussion. Michael Cooke will moderate.

HANNAH BACK.

Hanna Back is an established artist who has worked for over 35 years in clay sculpture and pottery. She is a member the of Grace Arts volunteer committee, which is part of South Frontenac Community Services in Sydenham. This group of artists organizes exhibitions and concerts with the aim to promote and celebrate the arts, cultural heritage and diversity of creative expression in our community. Hanna is also a member of the Organization of Kingston Women Artists (OKWA) whose aim is to increase awareness and appreciation of women's art and to help redress an historical imbalance in public and institutional recognition of women artists. For the last 13 years, Hanna has been teaching yoga at her home in the countryside near Holliford.

Larry Scanlan.

Larry (Lawrence) Scanlan has worked in newspapers (literary editor of The Whig-Standard, editor of The Nelson Daily News), magazines (managing editor of Harrowsmith) and radio (producer with CBC Radio’s Morningside as well as Writers & Company). He has won three National Magazine Awards and, as a freelancer, written scores of articles on many subjects, including science, sports, literature, travel and medicine. He has written over twenty books including the best seller A Year of Living Generously. He rarely practices on the mat.

MARK REINHART.

Mark Reinhart is a mover, and a thinker. His curatorial work involves giving space and stage to artists and communities who may otherwise rest in the cracks of the social ground from which we can all rise. In his personal art practice, he looks for, and looks to create, colour and rhythm where they perhaps are not expected.

He can commonly be found climbing trees, painting with duct tape, and creating intersections, with all the wonderfully creative and progressive thinkers with whom he has the pleasure of quietly colliding.

"Mark Reinhart's magnanimous creative genius is matched only by his rad sense of humour and the radiance of his toothless smile. In a previous life he was definitely a unicorn." –Liz Huntly

MICHAEL COOKE.

Michael spent most of his career in education as a teacher, administrator and community activist. More importantly, he’s a proud parent and grandparent. He lives on a little 13 acre farm north of Kingston where he’s learning about gardening, sustainable living and building dry stone walls. He practices yoga regularly to help him learn balance, patience and paying attention.

He likes to ride his bicycle and has cycled from Vancouver to St. John’s Nfld. This reminded him to pay attention to the journey rather than the destination.

Michael is the Coordinator for Keep The Promise (KTP), a national campaign designed to renew Canada’s commitment to ending child poverty in this country. He also provides consulting services to a range of Ontario community colleges and non-profit organizations. He is the President of the Carold Institute, a national foundation devoted to advancing citizen participation and adult education in Canada and he is Co-Chair of the PeaceQuest, a new organization focused on renewing the commitment to peace and peacemaking as a core value of Canadian citizens.

Michael went to school. He studied French and Spanish at the University of Windsor. He holds a BEd from the University of Toronto, an L. ès L. and an M. ès L. in French Literature from the University of Toulouse, France and a PhD in Higher Education from the University of Toronto. However, he looks to his five children and three grandchildren as his best and wisest teachers.