Before Intermedia Society

Drafting a prehistory of artist-run centres in British Columbia

Abstract

The first artist-run centre to receive funding from the Canada Council for the Arts, and therefore to be recognized as part of the institutional art system in Canada, was a homegrown product of what is known as Vancouver, British Columbia. Intermedia Society, which was active between 1967 and 1972, has been mythologized as having put into motion the Canadian artist-run centre movement as we know it today. As the first experimental multimedia collective to receive federal cultural funding, Intermedia may be considered the beginning of the institutional history of artist-run centres, which had previously manifested as ad hoc artists’ collectives and groups. This article drafts a prehistory of artist-run centres in British Columbia, which starts with citizen-led efforts to establish civic galleries in the prewar era, becomes amplified in the 1960s, and ends formally at the dissolution of Intermedia in 1972. By establishing this prehistory, I aim to answer the question: Why did the institutionalized artist-run centre movement start in British Columbia? I propose that a strong history of civic engagement with culture, combined with the geographical, social, and cultural specificities of British Columbia, played a role in developing a homegrown artist-run centre movement. The article develops a genealogy for British Columbian artist-run centres that includes citizen- and artist-led initiatives that spearheaded the development of the province’s cultural infrastructure. This genealogy revisits the early histories of the Vancouver Art Gallery and the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria and chronicles a rich record of local engagement with conceptual art practices and arts networks.