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This article was published 12/10/2023 (727 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Manitoba mountaineering featured in film night

Thursday, Oct. 12, 7:30 p.m.

Park Theatre, 698 Osborne St.

Tickets $15 at myparktheatre.com

Manitoba’s surprisingly vibrant mountain-climbing community will be on display during Adventure Film Night at the Park Theatre.

Flatlanders is a new docu-series from filmmaker and climber Ivan Hughes about the continued fascination with mountaineering in one of the flattest places in the country. In a media release, Hughes describes the films as an entertaining look at “what many would think would be an obscure passion here in the Prairies.”

Tonight’s screening will feature five Flatlanders films: The Origins, The Ice, The Gym, The Obsession and The 1992 Mount Manitoba Expedition. The latter explores the first successful ascent of the Yukon peak completed by a group of pioneering local climbers, including two Free Press reporters. The expedition was organized by the Alpine Club of Canada, which, fun fact, was founded in Winnipeg in 1906.

The lineup also includes Spindrift — The Barry Blanchard Story, Hughes’s profile of a world-renowned mountain climber who suffered a serious brain injury.

The Flatlanders series is available to stream on Bell Fibe TV1.

— Eva Wasney

Dermot Kennedy headlines Canada Life Centre

Wednesday, Oct. 18, 7:30 p.m.

Canada Life Centre

Tickets $63.25 to $73.50 at Ticketmaster

When Irish singer-songwriter Dermot Kennedy performed at Canada Life Centre in the summer of 2022, it was as an opening act for Shawn Mendes, who ended up cancelling the rest of that tour, citing mental-health reasons, the very next day.

The loss of that opportunity could have been a major blow to an early-career artist, but Kennedy pivoted, returning to his busker roots and performing a series of intimate shows called the Sonder Street Sessions to raise money for various charities, including the Shawn Mendes Foundation.

Next week, the raspy-voiced pop balladeer will be headlining the downtown arena in his own right. He’s still on the road in support of his second album, 2022’s Sonder, which has had him taking North America’s biggest stages for most of the year. After this current run of Canadian dates, he’ll head down under for the Spilt Milk Music Festival and a three-night stand at the Sydney Opera House.

It’s clear Kennedy isn’t suffering from the sophomore slump.

— Jen Zoratti

Art exhibit highlights struggle for gender equality in Iran

Friday, Oct 13, 6-8.30 p.m.

Buhler Hall, Canadian Museum of Human Rights

Our Story Is One, a one-day exhibition to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the execution of 10 women in Iran, takes place this Friday at the CMHR.

Forty years ago, in June 1983, 10 Baha’i women were executed by the Islamic Republic of Iran for refusing to renounce their Baha’i faith, whose central beliefs include promoting the principles of gender equality as well as unity and justice.

Most of the women were in their 20s; one was just 17.

Following their arrests and for six months prior to their execution, the women faced brutal interrogations and torture in an effort to force them to recant their faith. They chose to stand for equality and justice. They were hanged in succession, each one forced to watch the previous woman’s death.

The exhibition will feature the work of Canadian Baha’i artists from across the country.

A reception with light food and beverages will be served from 6 to 7 p.m., followed by a short program featuring a detailed introduction, music and personal accounts from the surviving relatives of the 10 women.

—AV Kitching

Uncle Sinner performs live at Into the Music

Friday, Oct. 13, 7:30 p.m.

Into the Music, 245 McDermot Ave.

One of Winnipeg’s most beloved record shops has launched a free Friday night concert series, programmed by local writer Leigh Lugosi, bringing an eclectic lineup of city artists to the Exchange District to perform amid the vinyl.

So far, the shop has hosted Meanspath, the gloomy electronic project from Riley Hill, a member of local alt-rockers Mulligrub; Garden City’s resident raspy-voiced folk raconteur Sam Singer; the funky synth producer C. Samms; and Jamboree, the indie rock quartet whose Life in the Dome was among my favourite albums of 2022.

This week, the multi-instrumentalist Uncle Sinner joins the show, bringing along with him a sound that’s been called everything from “gothic Americana” to “death country.” Taking cues from Appalachian folk and Hill Country blues, Uncle Sinner’s music is well-suited to snaked roads, forked paths and abandoned memories.

– Ben Waldman

Jon Klassen launches The Skull: A Tyrolean Folktale

Saturday, 2 p.m.

McNally Robinson Booksellers, Grant Park location

Free admission

Winnipeg-born, Ontario-raised and L.A.-based writer and illustrator Jon Klassen brings his latest children’s book to town as part of Thin Air 2023: the Winnipeg International Writers Festival.

Klassen is a bestselling artist whose work includes the Caldecott Medal-winning This Is Not My Hat as well as I Want My Hat Back, We Found a Hat, The Rocks From the Sky and more.

In his new book, The Skull, Klassen revisits a spooky folktale from the Tyrol region of Austria in which Otilla, a young girl, has escaped from danger and, while lost in the forest, stumbles upon a lonely, seemingly abandoned house. Inside she finds the skull, who fears a nightly visitor.

Can Otilla save the skull from the danger that lurks? The answer lies within Klassen’s dark, often foreboding images and words.

Klassen will read from, discuss and sign copies of The Skull on Saturday afternoon at McNally. The event is also being streamed on the bookstore’s YouTube channel.

— Ben Sigurdson

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