Over the years I have attended, worked with and organized hundreds of festivals and events. With this new series, "INSIDE with the Festival Nomad", I want to give you an "inside" look at some of the festivals and events that I have been involved with or that I have visited. Along the way, I have had a lot of fun and sometimes frustration, but I have never been bored!
Canadian Parks Partnership
(Part One)
Planning
For the National Presentation...
A
number of years ago I worked for Edwin
Matthews, who owned both the Gallery-on-the-Lake
in Buckhorn and Buckhorn Fine Art Publishing.
One of the projects I worked for with Ed, was with the Canadian Parks Partnership. This was the Federal Government’s department
that coordinated with all of the "Friends
of" organizations for the Federal
Parks and Museums across Canada. Ed and his star wildlife artist, Michael Dumas, had developed a series of
prints that depicted Canadian wildlife. These prints were beautifully packaged and
were going to be offered in Park and Museum stores across Canada. My job was to
help promote these products to all of the “Parks
Partners – Friends”. To introduce this National program, the Federal Government
decided that they would “kick” the program
off in Banff. Edwin asked me if I would accompany Michael to Banff and the “kick-off” ceremonies. I, of course, was delighted
to accept the offer. The ceremony was to be officiated by the then Federal
Minister, Lucian Bouchard. As described
on Wikipedia, "In 1988, Bouchard returned to Canada to serve as Mulroney's
Quebec lieutenant, and was elected as a Progressive Conservative
from a Saguenay-area riding. He was immediately named to Cabinet
as Secretary of State and later Minister of the Environment. While still a strong
Quebec nationalist, he believed that Mulroney's Meech
Lake Accord was sufficient to placate nationalist feelings and keep Quebec in
Confederation. However, after a commission headed by Jean
Charest recommended some changes to the Accord, Bouchard left the Progressive
Conservatives in May 1990, feeling that the spirit and objectives of Meech were
being diluted. Mulroney rejected his reasoning, later commenting that his most
regrettable and costly error as Prime Minister was having trusted Bouchard. Bouchard
sat as an independent for a few months. After the failure of the Meech Lake Accord,
Bouchard formed the sovereignist Bloc Québécois with five former Tories and two
former Liberals." Our airplane tickets
were purchased, hotel reservations confirmed and automobile rented! Everything
was set!
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