Resonant Rest
6. Music and Movement with Vanessa LeFan
Recently being on the front lines at Fairy Creek, music is just such a big part of these movements and completely shifts the energy and morale of a group and a situation.
– Vanessa Lefan
Multidisciplinary artist Vanessa Lefan joins host Oceaan Pendharkar in the penultimate episode of Resonant Rest.
Together, Vanessa and Oceaan discuss sustaining one’s body and time, especially within seasonal structures of work, to imagine and create new futures. They interrogate the grant system and the economic insinuations behind terms like “genre” and “emerging.” Vanessa also shares her dreams of reconnecting music and dance and what the frontlines of the Fairy Creek Blockade have taught her about the power and purpose of song.
And they geek out—just a little bit—about their shared theatre kid roots.
Bio
樂凡 (Van Lefan, she/they) is a multidisciplinary artist born and raised in rural northern Taiwan, where she spent her childhood playing in farm fields, growing food with her grandparents, cultivating a deep sense of connection to the natural cycles of life. In these early years she was drawn to many forms of creative expression including music, movement, poetry, and visual arts. Since her earliest memories, Lefan has been singing with her mother, falling asleep to her father’s lullabies, and being inspired by Taiwanese folk/pop songs by Chyi Yu, Tsai Chin, and Tiger Huang. To her family, songs are the language of love, celebration, struggle, and sadness. When her hometown became industrialized, Lefan watched helplessly as those fields she knew turned into factories that poured toxic dyes into streams once filled with life. When Lefan was 11 years old, she immigrated to the unceded territories of the Squamish, Musqueam & Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, where she currently resides.
These experiences greatly influenced her passion in environmental and social justice. Inspired and mentored by local artist activists such as Tonye Aganaba, Buckman Coe, Corrina Keeling, and Kevin Fraser, 樂凡 sees art as a powerful vessel for healing, idea sharing, storytelling, and connecting communities in ways beyond language. Her multilingual multimedia work “do you understand?你了解嗎?” which addresses her experience as an immigrant exhibited in the 2021 Fraser Valley Biennial at The Reach Gallery. In April 2022, Lefan is releasing her debut album “What Holds Us Together” is a sonic journey that synergizes folk, pop, world music, experimental soundscapes and poetry. Together, these stories weave an immersive tapestry of ancestry, identity, ecological reverence and social justice. Her work holds a mirror up to the audience as both an invitation for self inquiry, and a collective call to action.
@van_lefan
Resources
Music by Van Lefan
“Bodies of Water”
- Vanessa Yuen – Song writer, Vocals, Flute
- Thomas Hoeller – Song Writer (Music), Arrangement, Production, Mixing, Engineer, Guitar, Ukulele
- Jeanse LeDoujet – Bass
- Mary Ancheta – Keyboards
- Chris Couto – Percussion
- Corrina Keeling – BG Vocals, Bodhran
- Jessica Keeling – BG Vocals
- Jessica Vaira – BG Vocals
- Artwork : Marlee Mayors
- Photography: Nic Latulippe
About Resonant Rest:
Welcome to Resonant Rest! Resonant Rest is a Grounded Futures podcast series about musicians and creative practice, rest, sustenance, dreams, and community. Through a series of conversations, we will explore these topics with musicians living on stolen Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), Səl̓ílwətaʔ/Selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) and xwməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) lands (so-called Vancouver). We are interested in collective learning, starting conversations that create real change, and imagining futures where everyone can thrive.
Resonant Rest is hosted by Grounded Futures’ Solo Together Podcast Resident, Oceaan Pendharkar.