THE INFORMER PAGE 3

OCTOBER 18, 1989

Survival and Love

Voluntarily attending a workshop on the Holocaust may
seem on the surface to be a masochistic act. Who needs to see
and hear of mass genocide? What good can it do?

Graham Forst, Cap English instructor and co-chair of
Vancouver’s Standing Committee on the Holocaust believes
deeply that it is a very good thing to do. Along with Robert Krell
and Helen Karsai of the committee, Graham has organized
Holocaust Awareness Day for November 5 to coincide roughly
with the 50th anniversary of the beginning of World War II.

The day, subtitled “an interfaith symposium” will feature
lectures, panel discussions, seminars, and a debate between John
Dixon, Cap philosophy instructor, and Ira Nadel, English
professor at UBC on Canada’s hate literature laws.

The Holocaust committee is firmly grounded in Cap’s
history. Its founder, Robert Gallacher was the Religious Studies
instructor here. A year after he started the committee, Graham
joined, and he has been working on it ever since. The committee
organizes an annual conference for high school students, so
Graham is familiar with most people’s reluctance to look at
history. “The students are always afraid to go, afraid they will
fall into an abyss, but they don’t. In fact, they tell us after that the
event has changed their lives.” Graham says the students are
most impressed by their interview with a survivor, whose
message is always love. “These people are optimists. They
learned to forgive.”

The Holocaust Awareness Day will be held at UBC’s
Woodward Library in the Instructional Resources Centre from 1
to 6 p.m. Call Graham at 2413 for more information.

Graham firmly believes this sort of reminder is necessary.
“A precedent has been set. We have been shown that
governments can be strong enough to promote genocide and
people weak enough to permit it. We know it could happen
again. We have to protect ourselves against its recurrence.” He
adds, that: "As a teacher, I have to believe that education can
free you from error.”

The obligatory Sushi-making lesson. Wayne catches on fast.

i

Wayne Eastcott with Bishop Sakamoto of Kyoto.

Eastern Success

Wayne Eastcott sits in his small, cluttered office on the
second floor of A building and points to the Japanese posters
lining his walls that advertise his work. In Canada, Wayne is a
respected artisan in a somewhat suspect area of art. In Japan, he
is a celebrity.

A printmaking instructor with Cap’s Art Institute (which
provides working space and equipment to established artists)
Wayne recently visited Japan to attend a small exhibit of his
work. “We sold almost everything, at 2 - 1/2 times the price I
could get for it in Canada.” Wayne’s first major exhibit in Japan
several years ago established his reputation, and he has been
returning for brief, energizing visits since. On this trip in May of
’89, he was invited to lecture at the prestigious Tama University
in Tokyo, (second only to the University of Tokyo) which
devotes an entire building to the art of printmaking and offers
both under- and post-graduate programs. Wayne’s lecture was
videotaped by a Tokyo T.V. station and attended by
representatives from Canada’s External Affairs Department and
members of the exclusive Japan Printmaking Society (initiates to
the society must serve ten years’ probation). Wayne is sending
work by Art Institute members to Tama University to be
displayed there next month.

In addition to his lecture, Wayne cemented plans for future
exhibits and two major publishing projects. The prestigious Hei
Hangwan Geijutsu (a printmaking magazine distributed
throughout Europe) will devote 20 full-colour pages to his work,
and they have confirmed plans for a book, including 1,000
“deluxe” leather-bound editions which will sell for $1,000.
Future exhibits will include a major showing in 1991 to coincide
with the opening of the new Canadian embassy in Tokyo, and in
three years’ time, Wayne's prints will be the subject of a major
museum exhibit in Kyoto, sponsored by an important patron of
the arts, Bishop Sakamoto, pictured above with Wayne.

Wayne, naturally enjoys all this recognition from the country
where printmaking is a long-valued tradition. "Painting is more
accepted in Canada."