Cascadia: Now, More than Ever

by Mike Hodges

On November 6, 2012, the United States – of which roughly the southern half of Cascadia is currently a part – had an election. Perhaps you heard of it? There was a little bit of media coverage. There was a little bit of stress, for some of us, over which candidate would move to, or remain in, Washington D.C. and occupy, or continue to occupy, the most prestigious and powerful position within United States politics.

However, the flood of coverage and debate and worry in some ways obscured a larger truth: the United States presidential election was largely irrelevant to the future of the Cascadian movement.

This might seem like a bold claim, but consider:

- If (as I think) one of our arguments is that the federal governments of the United States and Canada are structurally incapable of meeting our needs in the way our bioregional community can, then, by definition, the election was not going to result in any of our concerns being allayed or our arguments being weakened.

- If (as I think) one of our arguments is that the national borders that divide states and countries do not represent and never have represented the realities of our lived experiences, then unless one candidate or another was proposing to entirely eliminate those borders and allow communities and bioregions to reconfigure themselves across those vestigial elements, nothing about that argument was going to change.

- If (as I think) one of our arguments, perhaps our primary argument, is that Cascadia is culturally, socially, geographically, and ecologically distinct from the rest of the United States and Canada in ways that are irreconcilable within any existing political framework, then, barring something totally unforeseen and unreported on throughout the campaign (perhaps plans by one candidate to build a Death Star and destroy the planet), the election was not going to result in a change in the status of that claim.

Sure, one party or the other might provide a slightly different context within which to express those arguments, but the arguments themselves are untouched. No matter how well or how badly the federal governments of the United States or Canada are run, from whatever political orientation they are run, the arguments for Cascadia remain the same. So why were we so absorbed in the election?

Why were we so worried? Why did so many of us gather in bars on election night and drink (okay, so it’s not like most of us need an excuse) with our eyes glued to the television screens that glowed red, white, blue, and Wolf Blitzer in the air above us?

I’d suggest that our stress over the election, our worries over whether Barack Obama or Mitt Romney was going to become the next president of the United States, was a sign of two things.

First: it was a sign that our residual self-conceptions as people whose identities are constructed not bioregionally, but nationally. The extent to which Cascadians believed that the American elections were important to them, that they could in any way represent their interests, was a sign of the extent to which Cascadians still thought of themselves as Americans. This provides an opportunity for those of us whose first identity category is as Cascadians to look at ourselves and consider to what extent we’ve truly identified with our bioregion.

Second, and I believe that this was the more significant case with many of us: it was a sign that Cascadians are, as much as anything else, a compassionate people. Regardless of our beliefs within the political framework of American or Canadian politics, we want people to live fulfilling lives, whether those people are Cascadian or not. Our worries over the future of the United States were worries not about the country as a political entity, but over the people who live within it.

The United States presidential election, then, provided an opportunity – and one that we took – to express the arguments for Cascadian self-determination within the framing of an argument as to why the presidential election was irrelevant to our cause, and why we need to continue building our communities on a bioregional rather than a national basis; moving forward, then, we might consider other non-Cascadian political events – elections, movements, factionalisms – in the same way. It was not an event that was in any way crucial to or determining of the future of Cascadia.

Cascadia is not the United States, even though part of our bioregion falls within that country’s borders. The arguments for Cascadian self-determination are not arguments that can be resolved or allayed by any change in the United States; our arguments stand on their own. We are a bioregion, not a nation-state. Cascadia continues, and will continue, regardless.

New Batch of Cascadia Scarves Available!

Cascadia Scarf Doug Flag

Some would say that Soccer in America is defined by the support of the game in the Pacific Northwest. Designed by Abe Schmidt, this scarf was created with the mission of showing your pride for Cascadia and keeping the cup. The rivalry between Seattle, Portland and Vancouver is a rivalry unlike anything else in American or Canadian Soccer.

Just in time for a new season, and in the midst of the Cascadia Cup TM debacle, we're excited to announce a new batch of Cascadia Scarves has arrived.  These scarves are sturdy, well made, nice and long and absolutely perfect for guarding your lungs from flare smoke, or for representing Cascadia wherever you might end up.

For those worrying about the increasing monetization of Cascadia related products and supporter group made competitions, all money made from these sales simply pays back investors, goes directly back into creating more merchandise, and supporting local grassroots Cascadia related clubs throughout the Pacific Northwest.

Scarves are now available for purchase for $22 + $3 SH ($25 total) and can be purchased either below or by accessing our merchandise store here: https://www.wepay.com/stores/cascadiascarves

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Cascadia: New Art Exhibit in British Columbia

Cascadia, a new exhibition, will be running from January 24^th to March 31^st at The Reach Gallery Museum in Abbotsford, British Columbia. The show explores diverse art practices of visual artists from various regions in the Northwest Coast who are examining and exploring diverse concepts of the landscape (rural and urban) as well as social, cultural and political issues from a Pacific Northwest perspective.  These artists provoke a re-imaging of a specific social, cultural and political landscape to establish a dialogue between artists living in different place addressing different audiences as well as one another and demarcating zones of cultural production.

One of the objectives of Cascadia is to establish a dialogue between visual artists from Washington, British Columbia, Alaska and the Yukon and explore the similarities and difference of art practices from those specific regions.  Cascadia is a visual framework in which diverse artistic points of view are initiated and new dialogues multi-media art works mediate between artists and cultures on North America’s Pacific North Coast.

"Cascadia... still retains a sense of self identity. This exhibition explores that identity."

Scott Mardsen, Curator.

Participating Artists

Exhibition by Marten Berkman (Yukon), Michael Brophy (Oregon), Judith Currelly (British Columbia), Owen Kydd (British Columbia) and Vanessa Renwick (Oregon)and curated by Scott Marsden.

Marten Berkman's multi-media approach explores the parameters of new technologies interpreting and reflecting the landscape and offers the viewer a complex layer of meaning and relationships between the Earth and global industrial culture. His creative process challenges assumptions and dualities that provide a contemporary vehicle for sensitive relationship with the planet’s remote and “wild” places. He is a a visual artist, film maker and photographer living in Canada’s subarctic. The theme of his work is the land and our relationship with it as an industrial culture. His practice has led to explorations ranging from the manufactured spaces at the heart of our urban centres, to the wilderness of remote environments on six continents. Work with his clients and partners range from photography for Canadian Geographic magazine, HD and full dome video production for Yukon and Yukon First Nations at the Vancouver 2010 Olympics, to photography and film production for the National Film Board of Canada.

Michael Brophy's paintings make reference to and attempt to manipulate authoritative nineteenth century pictorial traditions to create critical perspectives on the contemporary social landscape of the Northwest. Brophy explores the transformation of the landscape from an idealized vision of the landscape to a contemporary examination of the relationship between landscape and power in the Pacific Northwest.  He graduated from the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland with a Bachelor of Fine Arts and has shown extensively in the Northwest, notably in one-person and group exhibitions in Seattle and Portland. Brophy was the subject of a mid-career survey, The Romantic Vision of Michael Brophy, organized by Tacoma Art Museum in 2005.

Judith Currelly’s paintings are inspired by the stark vastness of Northern British Columbia and the Yukon and speak about finding a relationship with Nature and the environment. It forms the basis for simplified, stylized landscapes and wildlife forms painted in a beautifully restrained palette. In her paintings, Currelly employs various tactile techniques such as scraping, scoring, bevelling and staining the surface of the wood to imply geological forms. In her printmaking, she incorporates woodblock and lino printing techniques into the paintings. Etching and scraping reflect the permanence of mark making, as they do with petroglyphs, pictographs or fossils.

Owen Kydd's photographic work investigates the pictorial intersections of photography, video and film. Kydd’s focus is urban encroachment on rural spaces in the form of strip malls, gas stations, drag-strips and fast food outlets.

Vanessa Renwick’s video work reflects an interest in place, relationships between bodies and landscapes, and borders. Working in experimental and poetic documentary forms, Renwick produces films, videos and installations that explore the possibility of hope in contemporary society.

Artists Talks

Thursday, January 24 @ 6pm: Vicky Marshall and Pat Service Friday, January 25 @ 12 noon: Michael Brophy and Vanessa Renwick Thursday, January 31 @ 7pm Brian Brett

For more information, details can be found on the Reach Gallery website at:

http://www.thereach.ca/exhibitions/upcoming-exhibitions