Québec City
Bonhomme Carnaval was back in storage, the sky was pure blue and the air icy cold when I arrived in Québec City on Sunday. I come here invited by the network of Québec independent presenters (RIDEAU) to be a panellist at their annual gathering. I seize the opportunity to meet a number of people in the province’s old capital who have an interest in the future of the CCA. Monday starts early: an all-morning workshop starting at 8:30 am, preceded by breakfast with fellow panelists and the moderator. The theme of the debate could not be more appropriate for me: “Associations? What for?” I am in good company, with the former director of Québec’s theatre association, now executive director of the provincial association of city managers; the executive director of Les Arts et la Ville; a consultant in human resources and the communications manager for Amnesty International Canada. It is as a case study of sorts that the CCA has been invited to participate. Being the last presenter, I am able to relate to all the main issues raised by the others: the need for associations to regularly reinvent themselves and reaffirm their pertinence; the crucial importance of engaging members; the key role of communications; the challenges of governance and, of course, the ever present funding preoccupations. Very familiar themes for anyone who has followed my tour of the country over the past month! This is the ideal platform to deliver my message and I am pleasantly surprised to hear the interest people have in our future and in our efforts to reinvent ourselves. People here seem to understand the unique role that the CCA can play in the Canadian cultural sector and at least two volunteer that they will support us financially! Another small step towards our ultimate goal…
This is followed by lunch in a restaurant of the lower town, in an area which over the past several years has gone from almost derelict to fashionable. It’s a working lunch with leaders of the regional cultural council for Québec/Chaudière-Appalaches. It is clear right from the beginning that I am with friends: “We are natural allies”, declares Marc Gourdeau, president of the council and artistic director of a local theatre company. People agree that the CCA should maintain its policy development activities while also becoming a national grassroots organization fostering public engagement in culture. When we part, it appears likely that the council will join the CCA and, it would be the fourth regional cultural council in the province to do so.
Next appointment for the day is with the new director of the Québec National Museum of Fine-Arts, Ms. Line Ouellet. Located at the eastern edge of the famous battle site the Plains of Abraham, the Museum is building a new magnificent wing, slated to open in 2014. This expansion will allow the Museum to present its rich collection of post-1960 Québec art which has been slumbering in vaults for too long. Ms. Ouellet and I get along splendidly as we discuss copyright and the challenges met by museums and galleries seeking to make their collections of contemporary works accessible via Internet. I agree that this is a very important issue which the CCA will look into as soon as possible. Ms. Ouellet is also interested in the role that the CCA can play in building bridges between Québec and English Canada’s institutions, and it is on the perspective of another possible new member that I take my leave.
Saint Valentine’s Day offers me the opportunity to address the assembly of RIDEAU members: in ten minutes, I deliver the gist of the CCA message I have been presenting across the country. This is well received and echoed by supporting comments of RIDEAU’s President Jean-Pierre Leduc and Executive Director Colette Brouillé. After a quick coffee with my friend Diane Saint-Pierre from the Institut national de recherche scientifique du Québec (INRS), I meet CCA Board member André Leclerc who accompanies me for my meeting with Québec Minister of Culture and Communications. Mrs. Saint-Pierre welcomes me as her former boss! (it must be said that as luck would have it, I did hire her for her fist job as journalist several years ago, when I was managing editor of the radio newsroom for Radio-Canada in Montréal!). We discuss the Copyright Bill and the role of the CCA in this file, other topics of shared interest and the future of the CCA which she seems concerned with. I mention our ambitious National Policy Conference project for next year on drafting a new cultural agenda for Canada, a project of that clearly catches her attention. I mention how important it is for us that her Ministry is an affiliate member of the CCA. Before I leave, she suggests that I should meet some of her colleagues at the first opportunity and I leave on a promise of follow-ups soon.
And then, I am on my way to Halifax, last but one leg of my cross-country tour and the object of my next blog!
- Alain