FLASH traffic—faces of FLASH

Only two more days until the big FLASH photo show on Friday night. We are super-excited to deliver the show we’ve been working so hard over the past several months. I thought it might be a good time to introduce the team. This is especially important to me on my quest to humanize all connections in 2015 and undo anything anonymous. But first a single FLASH note of the day:

• If you’re not able to join us on Friday and you have a ticket, please turn it in on Eventbrite so we can admit someone from the wait-list. Although there are no longer refunds, you will get a credit in your cosmic karma and make somebody very happy. If you’re thinking, “Aw hell, I can’t be bothered to figure out Eventbrite”, please email us at info@flashwr.ca with the name on the tickets and how many you don’t need. Please.

Everything that happens in the community, happens because people think it up, meet and discuss it (a lot), plan it, do the legwork, and then run the show. A lot of the time those people are unpaid volunteers who are carving off time from their families, their jobs, and their other responsibilities. Our FLASH team typifies the “sandwich generation” who are raising kids of various ages and also helping aging parents. When we’re working on the event, there’s somebody at home feeding kids, driving to guitar lessons, and checking homework. It takes a village to put together an event like FLASH.

My reasons for squeezing FLASH in and around my work shifting makebright into a for-profit business are the same as many of my community investments:
1. It’s cool, which is to say it is something I want for myself. Build the community in which you want to live.
2. It’s important. It enriches the cultural ecosystem, gets photographers paid, and hopefully goes into a positive feedback loop to persist beyond one event. That’s inherently good.
3. If I don’t do it, who will? Sometimes the incremental difference of one person’s efforts flip the switch from off to on (and vice versa). On the off chance that I am that person, it seems like a good idea to get in the game.

Above, here is Tony Reinhart, Director of Editorial Strategy at Communitech. Tony has a busy family life and has worked on The Grand Porch Party and Open Streets. He is a modest guy, but I’ll tell you he’s an excellent photographer and he stays sharp by posting daily to Instagram. To his right is Catherine Bischoff, Senior Business and Market Analyst at Canada’s Technology Triangle and co-owner of GoGo Mart serving up fresh healthy food weekdays in DTK. Catherine and her crew are culturally engaged in all sorts of events in the Region and it’s rare that I can tell Cat about a current art show that she hasn’t already seen. She spent a number of years wrangling photographers across Europe for CORBIS so we’re very lucky to have her input on the FLASH effort.

But wait! There’s more…

Gordon Hatt, Executive Director of CAFKA appears everywhere in the cultural scene, pictured above actively participating at the Archive Fever art show at C2G2. Gordon brings his deep experience in the arts to FLASH, on the heels of another successful CAFKA Biennial last year.

Mark Walton is triple-busy as an IT systems contractor, photographer, and builder of the photography group Foto:RE. In addition to doing large projects, extending his own body of photography, Mark has tackled the daunting task of assembling a group to re-examine the state of photography today.

George Tsintzouras, most recently of Christie and now forging his own way as an entrepreneur. Here he is scripting up Photoshop to assemble photographs for presentation on the big screens. George T, has boundless energy and adeptly straddles the domains of people and tech. With three kids under the age of 5, things are hopping at home.

Charles Fraresso (right), Senior Manager, Research and Innovation at Christie, works to connect the tech and art worlds. This photo was taken at the reception of Pascal Dufaux’s (left) show last year in Kitchener. That was the culmination of Christie’s artist in residence program. In fact, it was at this very event where Charles, Tony, Gordon, Cat, and I connected in a stand-up discussion to kick off the effort that would become FLASH.

This is me, Darin White. I’m juggling a busy family, deep community-building investments in Waterloo Region, and a transition of makebright from hobby to business. Oh, I’m also trying to capture the meta-story around FLASH, of course.

That’s us. Real people in the community trying to Get Shit Done and enhance the cultural ecosystem of Waterloo Region. We’re all very friendly, so say hello if you see us at FLASH.

DW