Eastside Culture Crawl goes online, and hopes its audience comes with it

This is the first in a four-part series about artists, arts organizations and festival trying to survive during the pandemic.

In a make-shift gallery in a non-descript industrial area of East Vancouver, a few artists are putting the finishing touches on their displays. 

The large concrete room with floor-to-ceiling windows has been sitting empty these past few months, but now it has come to life with paintings, sculptures and more.

Pilar Mehlis is one of nine artists renting the space, called Gallery George, during the Eastside Culture Crawl this year. 

"The impact of the work on some people ... you can see it on their faces when they walk into your studio," Mehlis said, her face lighting up.

"That's so fulfilling."

The Crawl, as it's affectionately known, is one of the most important times of the year for artists like Mehlis.

Normally, thousands of people roam the streets exploring artist studios across East Vancouver. The festival is a welcome deadline for artists always trying to perfect their work. It's also a significant source of income.

"It's funny, when you sell a piece, you always think, how many months of rent is that?" Mehlis said.   

But this year, as is the case with almost everything in life, the pandemic has changed all that.

Artists and festivals are quickly learning to adapt to the new COVID-19 reality. They're gambling that the changes they make will keep them relevant to the thousands of patrons who support them every year.

For this year's edition of the Crawl, that means the usual throngs of people have been replaced by limited in-person viewings booked online, spread over two weekends.

Studio tours go virtual

About half of the studios declined to participate in in-person activities because their spaces can't safely accommodate groups of people. 

To compensate, the festival used an emergency grant from the Vancouver Foundation to bolster its online offerings and include virtual studio tours instead.

The pivot to digital is no small feat for an organization whose executive director, Esther Rausenberg, boasts being one of the few remaining people in the free world who doesn't own a cellphone. But it's a change Rausenberg insists was necessary to survive.

"I think every single arts organization is going to find a way to move around this pandemic and be able to produce work, present work, in whatever capacity," she said. 

Source of income gone

Rausenberg says the technical adaptations this year have expanded the audience and extended the festival's reach. She thinks a lot of the lessons learned in the past few months will apply for years to come.

Soldiering on with the festival was important for Rausenberg because visual artists like Mehlis have lost most of their usual sources of income. 

Mehlis, who makes a living solely from her art, says an important exhibit in her home country of Bolivia fell through earlier this year because of COVID-19.

Then, the classes she teaches at the Anvil Centre in New Westminster were cancelled. 

'They needed somewhere to go'

When Mehlis found out the Crawl would still be happening this year, she was thrilled to finally showcase some of the pieces she's been working on for years. 

"They were just sitting around in the studio," she said. "They needed somewhere to go."

Rausenberg says putting on the festival this year also means offering a sense of hope and normalcy for the thousands of people who attend each year.

Andrea Godding was one of the people who booked an online viewing at the George Gallery on opening night last Thursday. Godding says finding safe ways to take part in her usual activities has been an important source of respite from the pandemic. 

"I think it's really important to do what you can, and I really enjoy the Culture Crawl every year," she said.