Hamilton Artists Inc. and Ushi Mart have created platforms for customers to safely buy from small businesses
With heightened uncertainty, evolving public health guidelines and many people heading online to shop for gifts, many winter markets have closed this holiday season. However, a few have stayed open by pivoting to the physically distanced shopping experiences. Quirky AF | art fair hosted by Hamilton Artists Inc. and Winter Holiday Market by Ushi Mart are two local makers’ markets that have found ways to keep their doors open despite the ongoing pandemic.
View this post on Instagram
Quirky AF is a curated art, craft and design market that showcases handmade pieces by local artists. The pop-up market went from Nov. 17 to 30 and featured jewelry, zines, clothing, accessories and many other items by uniquely talented and avant-garde makers from Hamilton and the surrounding areas.
The market first launched last year at Hamilton Artists Inc. during a James Street North art crawl. It garnered a lot of traffic and was an important weekend for many local vendors. However, this year in light of the pandemic, the Inc. cancelled all of its in-person programming.
Instead, the Inc. decided to host the market virtually through their website. The high engagement and support from the community for their other online programming motivated them to bring back Quirky AF. The market was also met with great support and response from the community.
The primary reason for opening the market was to continue supporting local artists who had lost many opportunities to showcase their work due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the cancellation of large fairs and events such as Supercrawl.
The primary reason for opening the market was to continue supporting local artists who had lost many opportunities to showcase their work due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the cancellation of large fairs and events such as Supercrawl.
“The main goal is to create excitement around the market and each of the vendors, and really try to emphasize that . . . these are artists that have been really impacted by [the COVID-19 pandemic],” said Jasmine Mander, the communications and outreach coordinator at Hamilton Artist Inc.
View this post on Instagram
Supporting local businesses during this difficult time is critical as the arts are often one of the industries that are affected first and the most heavily during an economic crisis, such as the current pandemic.
Overall, Mander says the pandemic has presented both advantages and challenges. It has made the market, gallery and other programming at the Inc. more accessible as a heavier online focus has pushed them to improve their accessibility features such as closed captioning at speaker events and adding alternative text for pictures on their social media. However, the formation of real connections are limited online.
“It will be interesting for me when we go back to [in-person events] to compare this year to see how we can maybe merge [online and in-person programming]” said Mander. “I think [the COVID-19 pandemic] has made a lot of people rethink the way they have been doing things for a very long time.”
“I think [the COVID-19 pandemic] has made a lot of people rethink the way they have been doing things for a very long time,” Mander said.
Another market similarly impacted by the current pandemic is the Winter Holiday Market organized by Ushi Mart, a shop located at The Cotton Factory. Ushi Mart is run by a collective of artists and clothiers who create one-of-a-kind, sustainable and upcycled clothing, textiles and embroidery.
Winter Holiday Market is open until Dec. 28, and it’s the first year running. The market features around 35 vendors and all the proceeds from the market admission ticket will go toward Wesley Urban Ministries, a non-profit organization that offers support to those who are homeless or living in poverty in the Hamilton, Halton and Brantford regions.
View this post on Instagram
The collective behind Ushi Mart decided to open a winter market this year due to the cancellation of many markets, which is especially important for local and small businesses during the holidays. Ashley Bullock, the founder and chief executive officer at Ushi Mart, says she wanted to create something safe with the space she has to promote local businesses.
The Winter Holiday Market is organized for visits by appointment only, with a maximum of five visitors per hour. Visitors can also book an hour of personal shopping experience. Depending on the evolving situation and status of COVID-19 cases in Hamilton, they are also prepared to take their market online.
So far, the response to the market has been positive.
“For the businesses, [the Winter Holiday Market] is a way that we can group together, promote as a whole and really support each other. For people who are shopping and who are looking for items, it's a great way to [explore] a variety of businesses, so later on down the road, you'll know in the city that you're living who you can support rather than going to larger corporate stores,” said Bullock.
“For the businesses, [the Winter Holiday Market] is a way that we can group together, promote as a whole and really support each other," said Bullock.
Despite hurdles placed by the current pandemic, local artisans and businesses have come together to support each other and survive the pandemic. While our favourite fall and winter markets have been postponed until next year, it is fortunate that a few have found ways to remain open and support the community and local businesses.
By: Areej Ali
This past November marked the launch of “Tax-Free Tuesdays,” an initiative proposed by McMaster Students Union president Ikram Farah during the 2018 presidential election.
The pilot project, created in collaboration with McMaster Hospitality Services, entailed offering students a 13 per cent discount at La Piazza during the month of November.
Farah initially created the initiative in effort to promote food affordability on campus.
“Food insecurity is real. The MSU invests in the operations of the MSU Food Collective Centre to offer immediate food support to students,” said Farah in a Silhouette article about the project from November.
With the winter semester coming to an end, McMaster Hospitality Services director Chris Roberts has confirmed that “Tax-Free Tuesdays” project will not continue in the future.
The aim was to have increased traffic flow in La Piazza, which would offset the financial losses resulting from giving students the discount.
According to Roberts, La Piazza did not see increased traffic in November.
“The data clearly showed that our transactions on the Tax-Free Tuesdays were no different than previous Tuesdays ,which resulted in a significant loss in revenue over the course of the pilot,” said Roberts. “This indicates that students continued their usual habits regardless of the discount.”
He cites Union Market’s elimination of their boxed water, suggesting that McMaster Hospitality Services must continue to operate in a financially responsible manner.
As such, the “Tax-Free Tuesdays” project will likely not resurface next year.
When asked for her comment on McMaster Hospitality Services’ decision, Farah did not provide a response to The Silhouette.
There is a lack of clarity with respect to McMaster students’ feedback from the project, including whether or not they believe there was sufficient advertising from the MSU.
Farah and the MSU have also yet to publicly respond to Roberts’ comments and McMaster Hospitality Services’ decision.
“I believe there are other initiatives that we could look at that serve the needs of students who are financially challenged that will not affect our financials in a negative way,” said Roberts.
An example of one such initiative is Bridges Cafe’s new “Cards For Humanity” program, a pay it forward initiative through which students donate to other students.
According to Roberts, students can expect to see various food accessibility initiatives emerge, but “Tax-Free Tuesdays” will no longer be one of them.
From side tables to sex toys, Hamilton-based artist Lauren Goodman’s work is all about blending functionality, feel and form.
Formally trained in fine woodworking at Williams & Cleal Furniture School in England, Goodman has a business designing and creating handmade furniture.
She also collaborates with other artists at Hamilton Audio Visual Node (HAVN), a multimedia arts collective. Additionally, she co-founded Sister Moon Collective, which focuses on fostering community and safer spaces through art.
In 2013, she helped create sex-positive submission-based zine Milkweed, where she was introduced to the erotic art scene. However, it was only recently that she began making erotic art of her own. She began creating hand carved wooden sex toys as a way to experiment with erotica.
“A friend of mine and I were talking about how wood is not a medium that people make sex toys out of,” said Goodman. “So just kind of sort of playing around using these offcuts to make different shapes and forms and sort of coming to forms that I like.”
Sex toys are a personal project for Goodman. Whereas her furniture is commission-based, her sex toys are more about personal exploration.
“This is me exploring my sexuality and what I want, and breaking down stigma that I have myself,” she said.
Through her erotic art, Goodman aims to normalize discussions about sexuality. By making beautiful, artistic sexual objects, she hopes to help break down taboos around sexuality and encourage people to explore sex openly.
“The idea is to break down this stigma of sexual objects, that they have to be in a little box under your bed,” Goodman said. “Why can't we put our ‘dirty’ thing on a plinth in our living room, and then when we want to have sex we grab it off the plinth and go have sex?”
Goodman finds that the sex-positive movement is slowly becoming more widely accepted. In some ways, Instagram is helping to encourage this shift.
Instagram facilitates connections between like-minded artists from around the world, and in doing so builds an online community for an art form such as erotica that may have otherwise been considered niche.
Additionally, sites like Instagram provide opportunities for people to explore sexuality while maintaining some level of anonymity. Goodman notes that people who are reserved about sexuality in real life can find a sense of liberation and openness through social media.
However, the advent of digital media presents a unique set of challenges for Goodman. As a woodworker, the visual element of her work is only one part of the picture. The tactile component of her art is also vital.
“Even with the tables that I make, or lamps, or anything like that — I want you to touch them and feel like it's silky.,” she noted. “I want it to be tactile pleasing as well as aesthetically pleasing, as well as functionally working. And all of these things intersecting to make a beautiful piece of art.”
As online markets replace brick and mortar stores, consumers lose the ability to physically interact with work and provide real time feedback.
Goodman noted that many queer-centric, sex-positive shops are shutting their doors. This means that people lose tactile access to sex objects, as well as the ability to talk to people about sex.
Goodman points to the need for an independent, sex-positive sex shop in Hamilton.
“I would love a Girl On The Wing that just sold sex toys — you know, like the local stuff, really curated with nice colours — that would be amazing, that would be a great store,” she added.
The absence of sex-positive shops in Hamilton speaks to a larger observation about the city’s approach to sexuality.
While Hamilton is known for being an artistic city, it does not have an erotic art scene. She observes a history of sexual repression that pervades into the present day, noting that Hamilton only legalized burlesque last year.
“I think that those deep-seated ‘ickies’ towards sex is really fervent here. And that's maybe why it's a little stifled on the erotic side,” she said.
Goodman also points out that the absence of an erotic arts scene in Hamilton is in part to due with the city’s proximity to Toronto. Hamilton-based artists can take their work to Toronto if they are interested in pursuing erotic art in an already established scene.
Despite the lack of an erotic art scene in Hamilton, Goodman finds that artists often explore themes of sexuality in their work. She finds the artist community in Hamilton to be open, progressive and welcoming.
For Goodman, this openness is key. By exploring sexuality openly and honestly in her work, Goodman hopes to work away at her own internalized shame, and encourage others to do the same.
[thesil_related_posts_sc]Related Posts[/thesil_related_posts_sc]
