Council Director
A Winnipeg native, Laird Rankin has had a diversified career in the non-profit sector and the magazine business, most recently as executive director of Canada's National History Society and publisher of its magazine, The Beaver. He has authored two books "The Nonsuch" and "The Return of the Nonsuch" that tell the story of the ship in The Manitoba Museum.

Vonnie Von Helmolt, Producer
Vonnie Von Helmolt  has produced and co-produced a variety of features, television movies, series, documentaries and specials over the last 20 years.

Her projects have won an International Emmy, Canadian Geminis, Manitoba Blizzards, and Best Picture awards from major international film festivals across Canada, Europe and Asia including Best Picture at Sitges Fantasy Film festival. Nominations include US Cable Ace awards, Banff Television Rockies, and numerous international television awards.

Her dance feature drama Dracula - Pages from a Virgin's Diary, directed by noted auteur Guy Maddin, was named to Canada's Top Ten Feature Films, and the Village Voice Critics list of the top 10 films of 2003, in addition to winning numerous international film festival awards, Geminis, Blizzards and an International Emmy.

IMDb recently listed Dracula as 8th best vampire film ever made out of a list of 70.

Her co-production, with Merit Motion Pictures, of the three-hour documentary miniseries Ballet Girls, aired on Bravo! as a 2006 Christmas Special and was nominated for a Gemini. They returned to the Royal Winnipeg Ballet’s school to produce the documentary feature “Ballet High”, which aired on Bravo! in the spring of 2009.

Their theatrical documentary feature, TuTuMUCH, screened across Canada on 60 Cineplex Odeon screens in January of 2010. In May 2010, it screened in Perspectives Canada at the Cannes Film Festival as well as across Australia and New Zealand. It’s currently screening at festivals in Asia and Europe.

Von Helmolt was the founding chair of both Film Training Manitoba and the Manitoba District Council of the Director's Guild of Canada. She is the current Chair of Film Training Manitoba and Co-Chairs the Policy Committee and the Finance Committees of the Manitoba Motion Picture Industry Association.

Company Profile: vonnie VON HELMOLT film
vonnie VON HELMOLT film, has been a part of the Canadian and American film industry since 1980, producing internationally acclaimed and award-winning features, made-for television movies, mini-series, documentaries and television specials.

Von Helmolt’s company focuses on projects based on or featuring the performing arts, literature and comedy, continuing to work with award-winning companies and creators like directors Guy Maddin and Gary Yates, producers Merit Jensen Carr and Liz Jarvis and writers Trish Cooper, Chris Craddock, Miriam Toews and Paul Quarrington. 

Randy Joynt is the Executive Director of Artspace Inc. He also co-founded TRIP dance company with partner Karen Kuzak, and enjoyed a twenty-year career as a contemporary dancer; performing around the world while working with dance companies in Winnipeg, Ottawa and Montreal. He has served on the Manitoba Arts Council’s arts advisory panel, taught numerous grant proposal writing workshops, been a contributor to the Toronto publication the Dance Current, and currently serves on the Board of the Canadian Dance Assembly where he chairs the organization’s advocacy committee.

Arts Community Director
Dr. Shojania is a Research Fellow at St. Paul's College and teaches in the Department of English at the University of Manitoba. She has served on the Boards of Winnipeg's Contemporary Dancers, the Advisory Board of the Institute of Humanities, the Education and Access Committee of the Winnipeg Art Gallery, and the Arts Advisory Committee of the Manitoba Arts Council.  She has also served on the MCO Board for 10 years.

Derek Dabee is very active in community arts, cultural and sports organizations. Derek is a School Board Trustee for the Seven Oaks School Division. Herecently retired ( twenty-five years) from the Department of Culture Heritage and Tourism. He served on several boards and commissions and is the founding president of the Burton Cummings Community Centre. He is a human rights and equity advocate. Derek Dabee is also a columnist for the North Times community news paper.

Monica is a principal with Hilderman Thomas Frank Cram Landscape Architecture and Planning. Her ongoing investigation of the social, physical and psychological impacts of human environments on children and youth, immigrants and marginalized groups, aging and physically impaired, serves as a foundation for her progressive work on educational grounds, urban spaces, parks, culturally sensitive lands and healthcare facilities. Monica combines her human centric people-driven approach to design with a dedication to practical place -specific construction solutions to enhance Winnipeggers quality of life, sense of place and environmental stewardship.  Some of Monica’s most recent projects in the city include The Variety Heritage Adventure Park at The Forks National Historic Site, The Millennium Library Park, and The Winnipeg Humane Society Grounds. As an avid supporter of art in the public realm Monica regularly travels to research new developments in other places while working with artists and artisans to enrich her work at home.

Christine Fellows arrived in Winnipeg in 1992. The warm welcome she received from the city’s vibrant arts community caused her to stay. Fellows has since enjoyed a unique twenty-year career as a songwriter, performer and interdisciplinary collaborator. She tours internationally, working with visual artists, choreographers, filmmakers and musicians to create performance works, albums, scores and spectacles. In her work, she strives to bridge musical and artistic disciplines, and to foster relationships within the creative community at large, championing the art of songwriting and the spirit of collaboration.
 
Fellows was Composer-in-Residence at Winnipeg’s Contemporary Dancers (2007-08), Artist-in-Residence at Le Musée de Saint-Boniface Museum (2009), and Dawson City Music Festival Songwriter-in-Residence (2011). With collaborator Shary Boyle, she was commissioned by Toronto’s Harbourfront Centre to create Everything Under the Moon, a theatrical work for children, which premiered in a sold-out run at Harbourfront Centre’s Enwave Theatre in February 2012. She is currently working on her sixth solo album, while collaborating with a five-member cast on its companion, an interdisciplinary performance work entitled Burning Daylight. Along with her partner and frequent collaborator, John K. Samson, she will be Writer-in-Residence at University of British Columbia and University of Manitoba Centre for Creative Writing and Oral Culture in 2013.

Arts Community Director
Perry Grosshans became the General Manager for the Winnipeg International Writers Festival in 2006, after two years of successful contract work with the organization in marketing and production roles. He has been an active member of the Board of Directors of Prairie Fire Press since February of 2002, as Treasurer for two years and President for the past five.  He chaired Prairie Fire's recent strategic planning initiative, and over the years has participated in numerous seminars on board governance and fundraising. Perry is a writer and games enthusiast, and is an avid supporter of many of the city's cultural activities, including the RWB, Manitoba Opera, WSO and Fringe Festival.

Reid Harrison has been active in Winnipeg’s arts community for many years as an instrumentalist, a singer and actor, a theatre director, an educator and as an arts administrator and board member.  He was recently inducted into Rainbow Stage’s Wall of Fame, testament to his twenty-seven productions at that theatre, fifteen on stage and twelve in the pit, as well as to his many other contributions to Winnipeg’s arts life.  During thirty-four years as a high school teacher of English, Music and Drama, he directed twenty-five musical theatre productions at Grant Park and Kelvin High Schools.  He was a founding member of the Gilbert & Sullivan Society of Winnipeg and has sat on the Society’s board for twenty years including two terms as President.  He performed in principal roles in the early years of the Society’s productions followed first by seven years as resident conductor and most recently as the director of the last five productions.  He is co-founder and co-artistic director of Dry Cold Productions, a local professional company specializing in contemporary musical theatre and now in its ninth season.  In addition to acting in two Dry Cold shows, he has conducted three productions.  He is also the business manager of Dry Cold.  As a cellist, in addition to his work at Rainbow Stage, he has performed with the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Winnipeg Ballet, the Winnipeg Philharmonic and the Manitoba Theatre Centre.  He has recently begun his third term as a member of the Manitoba-Nunavut Council Policy Advisory Group for Canadian Actors’ Equity Association.  He is also a member of the Winnipeg Musicians’ Association.

Ann is a Winnipeg-based theatre and opera director.  Directing credits include Manitoba Theatre Centre, Manitoba Opera, Calgary Opera, Prairie Theatre Exchange, Theatre Projects, Dry Cold, Edmonton Opera, Vancouver Opera, Great Canadian Theatre Company, Blyth Festival, Persephone, Shaw Festival, and Opera Lyra.  Career highlights include a directing workshop with Peter Brook (National Theatre, London), directing the 2002 North American Indigenous Games Opening and Closing Ceremonies, and directing MTC’s recent production of August: Osage County starring Martha Henry.  In addition to directing, Ann has written numerous adaptations of classic operas for young audiences which are frequently produced by companies across Canada, and wrote the libretto for Vancouver Opera’s acclaimed production of Naomi’s Road.  Ann is a graduate of the National Theatre School of Canada.

Jeffrey is a Winnipeg based performer, director, choreographer and instructor in theatre and dance.  Performing highlights include: Wizard of Oz (Scarecrow), Joseph (Rueben), Full Monty, Chicago, Footloose, and Crazy For You (Rainbow Stage), Guys and Dolls (MTC, TC, Citadel western tour), White Christmas (MTC), Canadian National Tap Championships (Riesa, Germany).  Other highlights include: Burning Love (PTE - choreographer) Little Shop of Horrors (MDA for PTE - choreographer) Guys and Dolls (MDA for PTE - Director) and Bloodless: The Trial of Burke and Hare (White Rabbit Productions-Producer).  Jeffrey co-founded and currently serves as the director of operations for White Rabbit Productions - a project-based arts organization which creates original works in music, theatre and multimedia.  As an instructor, Jeffrey has taught theatre and dance in many studios, public schools, universities and conventions over the past years - most recently at Steps - a public school dance convention at the Winnipeg Convention Centre, where there were over 1000 dancing children from across the city.  Jeffrey sees the arts community in Winnipeg thriving and is grateful to live in a city with such cultural and artistic diversity.  Long live art!

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Theresa Harvey Pruden has spent thirty years in the Provinicial Public sector, and has volunteered for numerous organizations including the Canadian Association for the Advancement of Women, Sport and Physical Activity, Go for Green, and Coalition for Active Living among others. She is the recipient of a Governor General's Awad for Voluntarism, and is currently working as a consultant to develop a major women's heart health initiative with St-Boniface Hospital Foundation and St-Boniface Hospital and Research Centre.

Mary Reid is the Director/ Curator of the School of Art Gallery at the University of Manitoba. She was formerly the Curator of Contemporary Art and Photography at Winnipeg Art Gallery (2004 to 2011). She is a member of the Public Art Committee for the City of Winnipeg, the Image Committee of the Downtown Biz, co-chair of Nuit Blanche 2011 & 2012 and former President of the Board of Winnipeg’s Contemporary Dancers.  In 2010, she worked with the Winnipeg Arts Council as part of the Cultural Capital program of events to coordinate My City’s Still Breathing, a symposium that explored the many dimensions of the arts, artists and the city.  Over the last decade she has curated numerous exhibitions on contemporary art.  In addition to exhibition coordination, Reid has project-managed and contributed essays to several catalogues, brochures and magazines, which support her various projects.
 
Reid has lectured and taught at Georgian College, University of Winnipeg and the University of Manitoba on issues in modern and contemporary art, curating and museum practice as well as critical writing. Prior to her move to Winnipeg in 2004 she was the curator at the MacLaren Art Centre, in Barrie, ON. Reid received her Master’s degree in Art History from York University, Toronto in 1999.

Sheila Spence is an artist, activist and arts administrator living and working in Winnipeg, Manitoba.  Spence’s photographs investigate notions of portraiture, self-portraiture, community and identity.  Her portraits have been exhibited locally, nationally and internationally and are included in public and corporate collections across Canada.

From 1991 to 1995 Spence worked collaboratively with Noreen Stevens under the name Average Good Looks creating work about gay and lesbian issues for the public domain.  Over the course of her career, Spence has received numerous grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Manitoba Arts Council and the Winnipeg Arts Council.  In 2009, Spence was awarded a Manitoba Arts Council Major Grant.  On several occasions Spence has adjudicated on behalf of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Manitoba Arts Council for various award programs.  A tireless volunteer she has been a governing member on the Boards of the following non-profit arts organizations: Floating Gallery, Artspace; CARFAC Manitoba; Mentoring Artists for Women’s Art (MAWA); Institute of Contemporary Art and Design; <Site>; St. Norbert Arts and Cultural Centre and Ace Art.  She has been a mentor twice for MAWA (1991-92 and 1995-96).  She is currently the Executive Director of Manitoba Printmaker’s Association (Martha Street Studio).