The Bolting Brassicas and Friends Circus Show!
The underground circus comes to town!
Written By Leonard W. Lionheart
Web site: www.boltingbrassicas.ca
Victoria, B.C. - Friday, June 4th 2010 8pm- Live from Lasqueti Island: The Bolting Brassicas and Friends Circus show, at the Sunset Room, 401 Herald Street at Store Street, behind the Value Village, Victoria, B.C. Performing two sets of Balkan Gypsy and Klezmer Marching Band music with Circus Performances and followed by three DJ Music sets.
Fresh from their successes at Honk Fest West Marching Band Festival in Seattle and Ederlezi Balkan Music Festival in Vancouver:
For one show only in the big city before returning once more to their candlelit cabins in the woods!!! Victoria's Sunset Room will rock and thump when a 14 piece Brass and Percussion Marching Band from the untamed wilds of Lasqueti Island are let loose to wow and loot Victoria!
The Bolting Brassicas Marching Band are a street-side ensemble that play a stirring catalogue of Balkan Gypsy and Klezmer tunes which are loud, happy and danceable! THIS is not your Grandma's Marching Band!
Later on, stay up and strap on throughout the night to dance with acclaimed Rainbow Cathedral DJs: Beatfarmer from Lasqueti as well as Mountain Eyes from Victoria and Ambrosia from Galiano will be spinning their tunes!
The story of the Bolting Brassicas from Lasqueti Island is not the story of your everyday Balkan Gypsy Klezmer Marching Brass Band from any remote community . . .
The story of the Brassicas is a heartwarming tale of struggles met and adversities overcome by a ragtag gaggle of stalwart musicians from a remote Island where the fine trappings of culture, like espressos, electricity, soap and Blackberries, are hard to come by.
Our story began with a candle-lit meeting over hot cups of nettle tea on a cold, rainy night in a little cabin with future band leaders Pachiel Smith and Jacob King. Jacob had just taken an inspirational road trip to Honk Fest in Boston, a marching band festival. While listening to a few CD's he had picked up, they came to hear the essence of their their own souls echoed in the joyful exuberance of the Roma, the wandering Gypsies, and the proud and hopeful Klezmer music of the Jewish people. They mused at how amazing it would be to form a Brass Band on small, remote Lasqueti Island and to play this music from the other side of the world. They thought how funny and stunning it would be for people to witness a full brass band march out of the woods like some sort of carnivalesque apparition from a Fellini film. Permanently shelving their ubiquitous guitars, they set out to accumulate and master enough brass instruments for a Marching Brass Band, as well as to accumulate enough passionate bandmates to bring their dream to fruition: to form a Marching Band on a remote island. Eventually, their fledgling band had fourteen members who would put down their pitchforks, wash their hands and pick up their instruments to perform at local community events.
Fast Forward a few years: The Bolting Brassicas have now catapulted themselves from the woods and into festivals and concerts all over BC and Washington and has developed a worldwide following online. They have quickly become known as an amazing band not to be missed!
Mudgirls Create New Cordwood Cabin!
Building a webmaster's home!
Written By Leonard W. Lionheart
I'm am happy to report that we're working with the Mudgirls on a lovely cob and cordwood cabin made 99.9% from natural or recycled materials, with materials costing less than $2000. It has gone splendidly, and the cabin is more than 3/4 completed! This fall we had a workshop where 10 Mudgirls, 17 participants, 3 infants, 4 toddlers and 2 older kids, 5 dogs and two cats from Lasqueti to as far away as Toronto came for a whole week of work, sharing and camaraderie! We have had two prior workshops on the cabin, and with dozens of Mudgirls and other folks coming to help out over the past year! Great Revolutionary work gals!
I cannot strongly recommend enough the awe inspiring experience of hiring a battalion of Mudgirls who will descend on your place like Muddy Superheros to create inexpensive, beautiful and nearly carbon-neutral homes, sheds, ovens, walls, outhouses, natural renovations and more, while building skills and teaching others . . . The Mudgirls are a great example of a functioning anarchist, non-hierarchical, consensus-based collective Natural Building Employer which succeeds in getting real work done, employing women in Natural Construction and working mainly but not exclusively with Women to work hard to build, disseminate and promote natural building techniques. These techniques date back to ancient non-corporate-dominated eras of humanity fused with cutting-edge Natural Building techniques. These techniques will be needed in the future, post-crash, as they were needed in the past, pre-globalization. The Mudgirls are a pioneering group whose work seeks to address many of the overwhelming and at first seemingly insurmountable problems humanity now faces . . . such as global warming, pollution, household toxins, oil addiction, corporate and financial sector domination of our lives. To me, activists like the Mudgirls address these problems by saying: We needn't ignore, deny, give up, or bury out heads in the velvet decadence of western hedonism. Answers are out there, and they are not all inconvenient truths. Some of them are Beautiful, Natural Structures! Mudgirls combines Art with Applied Activism! This is no hand-sitting lefty organization! This Collective Empowers Women with Building Skills to cut our impact on the great Mother Earth and our blessed Paradise Isle, our very own Never-Never Land. . .
Mudgirls For Hire!
For more info about Building the Mudgirls Revolution and how to make natural building manifest at your place, please call
Mudgirl Rose at: (250) 753-711
ALL WOMAN NATURAL BUILDING CREW SHOW OFF THEIR SKILLS!!
Event at the &Loan Gallery!
Written By Chelsey Braham
The Mudgirls Natural Building Collective may be best known for taking natural building to an extreme with their commitment to local materials. They have been building homes and studios using a building material called cob. Cob is a sculptable mix of sand, clay, straw and water, and creates strong and charming buildings.
The Mudgirls have been building with cob and other alternative building materials on the gulf islands and remote areas of Vancouver Island for the past three years, including building walls with Wattle and Daub, an ancient building practice that is currently being revived.
They have been exploring the world of natural building and have been travelling all over western BC to work on some very unique properties. Some of the properties they have travelled to to build on include farms, quirky restaurants, people living off the grid, retreat centres and b&bs. Some of these clients have been building small cabins in order to rent out and gain income from their property.
There is definitely room for natural building to find a place in the urban environment as well with eco- renovations being the newest techniques the mudgirls are exploring.
"There is definitely some confusion in the world regarding the popular term green . Our goal is to strip away some of the green washing out there and show people what they can do with the materials in their own backyards." says one fiesty mudgirl.
The Mudgirls, are hosting a project showcase on Dec. 6 at the & Loan Gallery. The public is invited to come and check out samples of the types of natural finishes that can be applied to drywall, or other common wall surfaces.
The Dec. 6th event will showcase a variety of natural plasters and paints. Expect to see examples of the creative side of these practical plasters, whose consistency lends itself to sculptural raised-releif. There will also be samples of clay-based natural pigment paint, which can be applied directly to natural or conventional walls for a finished but earthy look with no volatile organic compounds.
Also on display will be samples of the building technique known as wattle and daub, and a some fresh cob for visitors to see and feel. The event will be open between 12 p.m. and 5 p.m., and the & Loan Gallery is located at 33
Victoria Crescent in downtown Nanaimo.
Rose reflects on the year. . .
Autumn Reflections
Written By Rose Dickson
Although summer is giving us one last hurrah, fall is also in the air, and our building season is pretty much over for the year. Although we still have a couple of jobs to finish up, all our major building jobs and workshops are behind us, and that means time for retrospection. This summer has been a great learning experience for me. I didn't work a lot, but I worked enough to observe a pattern. Wherever we go, we create community, and it's becoming as much of what we're known for as natural building.
When we are hired simply as a crew, the community that deepens is amongst ourselves. There were thirteen working Mudgirls this year, and as Jen pointed out at our boot-camp, that's the perfect number for a coven. Any more and you get members who don't get a chance to connect with each other. Each and every job we do has us rotating around so that we get an amazing opportunity to get to know each other better. For me, and I suspect I'm not alone, the Mudgirls have become my tribe. They are among the best friends I may ever have had, and I am so grateful that I have this amazing community of women. Things aren't always super rosy. We can all have bad moods, misunderstanding, or disappointment for whatever reason, but we also always have honesty and trust. Practicing Non-Violent Communication with each other, and knowing that it's not only our right but our responsibility to discuss our disagreements in an open and truthful way—to communicate with each other from the heart—it truly saves us as a collective, and brings us closer together every time.
When we are hosting a workshop or a workparty, we bring a group of others into that community, and create new community, even if only temporarily. In every case, the participants are responsible to work to the best of their abilities, and everyone also takes on a share of the camp maintenance duties. This shared responsibility means everyone is equally a part of what is going on. Further, we circle on a regular basis, going from person to person and encouraging them to express their highs and lows. Often, if there is discomfort, it can be alleviated by sharing it, or through the simple shifts and changes in the actions of the community. It is so apparent to me that if one part of a whole is experiencing a problem, that is a problem for the whole, and only when it is acknowledged and action to remedy it has been taken, will the whole truly be functional. Everyone has something valuable to offer, and everyone's offering is valued and will ultimately enlighten the group. Again, it doesn't mean it's always easy, but with the clarity of hindsight, I see that every issue that came up had its reason, and we are all better for having heard it and processed it.
No matter what happens in this world, it is apparent to me that cooperation is so much more affective than conflict. Maybe I have that perception because I just finished reading Starhawk's The Fifth Sacred Thing, but no, my experience working with the Mudgirls confirms it: By expressing what doesn't work for one part of the whole, to the whole, new solutions can be innovated that are far more affective for the whole whole than if that one part had sat on it's problem either because it saw it as insignificant, or because it feared judgement. If the whole realizes that the wellness of every part is essential for it to function, there is no judgement when concerns are voiced, there is no resistance to change, only gratitude that communication can create wholeness.
OK, maybe I'm getting a little esoteric. Maybe I'm a little blissed out at the love we all shared working on Adam's cabin last week. But it is such an honour to share community with all of you, everyone who works with us and everyone who reads this. You are a part of our community too, and no matter how small a part, yours is still a part.
Sharing Works! Love is the Answer!
Much love to you all,
Rose.
A Brief History of The Mudgirls . . .
Building A Revolution . . .
Written By Jen Gobby
I am so proud to write that I began the Mudgirls Collective. It grew from a need inside me for a community of women, for new skills and to be independent, a space in which to become strong, able and together with other women. I had just been to a 4 month natural building course for women in Winnipeg. Then I moved to Lasqueti, this little island off the west coast. Coming from a background of women's studies and complex division of labour where everything can be bought and nothing is more important that independence... on Lasqueti I found a community of extremely intelligent people working the land and being creative and healthy, but still the men built and took care of the electric systems and the fire wood, and women raised the kids and grew the food. An understandable division of labour. But it was too traditional gender role-ish to me and I wanted to believe that living close to the land like our ancestors does not mean women returning to the kitchen. I wanted to build, I wanted to hunt, to chop fire wood. I want to feel strong and capable and free.
In brainstorming ways of bringing this feminist spirit to the island, I has walking along the road one evening when the bartering collective idea came to me. It came to me with such a bang, the clear excitement, that I knew this was something to give my life to for a while, maybe longer. And so I advertised in our local monthly paper. Fifteen women responded, women of all ages, and we met in December 2004 to talk about what we wanted to do....in that meeting I asked what shall we call ourselves? I suggested "The Lasqueti Women's Natural Building Collective?" A bit wordy perhaps. Darzo, a long time Lasqueti resident and activist and artist blurted out..." How about...The Mudgirls?" Everyone agreed instantly. We began by building a cob oven on a rainy January weekend in 2005. We used a note book to keep track of the hours we worked on each others' projects. And thus began our bartering.
Over 2 years we built about 14 small structures...ovens, outhouses, generator sheds, cookie stands. This was exciting and I began having dreams of larger projects..like a retreat cabin for myself! I decided I was now skilled and confident enough to lead a workshop with folks from off island coming to learn to build while I get help building my very own cabin. Somehow this worked out brilliantly. Fifteen women applied and came to camp and learn and we built our asses off. I learned the ins and outs of leading a group, how to teach what I know, how to get people inspired. One of the participants was Auguste. She seemed to unconsciously pick up where I left off in leadership, she'd be at the cob mixing station singing and dancing and getting everyone all revved up and making it so much fun. She was the cob cheerleader....by the end of the workshop I asked her if she would lead my next one with me. She thought for a few seconds and said "Of course". And so another workshop took place that fall, working further on my cabin which now had full dry stack foundation and walls half way up, and 6 posts and 3 beams and lots of sculpture and mosaic growing out of the walls. The second one was great too. Another amazing group of women for 10 days. Over that winter my best friend Adam and I created a website for the Mudgirls. Still working with the bartering collective, I began to work towards making a living with natural building. The whole thing evolved rather intuitively. The next summer Auguste and I lead a workshop on Cortes to build a cabin for a woman who had come to one of the workshops the previous summer. We built the entire walls of this 16 foot circle in 10 days of workshop time. We also got the Cortes community to come out and build the garden wall at Trude's Cafe. My partner Pachiel and I lead a workshop on our land too - to work a bit more on my cabin, to build a woodshed with a recycled tire roof outside of his house. In the afternoons we also shared with the Participants some skills around water catchment, alternative electrical systems, greywater systems, permaculture gardening.
Things picked up momentum, and I was contacted more and more by folks who wanted to build their own cob structures. I began to see the potential of employment and empowerment for many women other than myself. So I sent a email out to various women who had come to workshops, and invited them to form a working collective with me. In April of 2007, twenty women came to my land for Mudgirls Bootcamp to train up, build their skills and muscles and have hours and hours of consensus based decision making meetings to work out all the details of how our new collective would be formed. And The Mudgirls as we know it now was found. Women from Courtenay, Nanaimo, Saltspring Island, Lasqueti and even a few from the interior of BC formed the collective. And so we went to work.....Crews of us, teams of facilitators, cooks and child care travelled about working on Lasqueti Island, in Courtenay, on Saltspring Island, on Hornby, and in Cedar. That summer we finished my cabin and worked on 5 cabins, built three out houses. A prolific first building season. We Gave'er. By the end of the summer I was ready to give it all up and head back to a 'regular job' or sleep for two months. So much organizing and building and teaching. But with in a couple of weeks of things slowing down I was starting to get excited about next season. Now we are starting our second year of creating this collective and building together. We now have a collective Wo-Manual - 43 pages of policy and procedure, and on on-line forum through which we communicate when we're not together. We have fancy brochure, business cards, T-shirts and this zine as we get out there again as spring springs, and I am full of pride and inspiration, excited about the people I will meet this summer, the skills I will build on and share, the beautiful lands I will see, the hope we will share.
Mudgirls Presents: "Lasquirkus" The Lasqueti Circus!
The Circus is coming to town!
Written By Jen Gobby
Event Dates:
Errington: Erington Community Hall -April 11th
Saltspring Island: Beaver Point Hall -April 12th
Hornby Island: Hornby Island Community Hall -April 13th
Lasqueti Island: Lasqueti Island Community Hall -April 24th
Nanaimo - The &Loan Gallery - 33 Victoria Crescent -April 25th
During a long rainy winter on an off the grid gulf island with no car ferry, it's amazing what residents will come up with to pass the time.
From riding unicycles, to experimental jazz, building mud houses, walking on stilts, making clothes and art, growing food, blowing in to big brass instruments and dancing just to keep warm, the locals of Lasqueti Island know how to keep themselves and others entertained.
This spring an eclectic assortment of Lasquetians are coming to your community hall to present "Lasquirkus - The Lasqueti Circus", all all-ages event that has something for everyone.
"We are catapulting ourselves out of the forest and in to other communities to make contact with the outside world and to show them what we've been up to", says event organizer and bass drum player Jen Gobby.
"We aim to entertain but also to inspire within our extended west coast community a sense of hope found through laughter, joyous music and the rebellious, inventive, resourceful spirit that is Lasqueti.
Beginning at 4pm there is a slideshow and open circle discussion about Building a Better World hosted by the Mudgirls Natural Building Collective. The Mudgirls, of which Gobby is also a member, are a group of women building low cost sustainable housing here on the coast.
A Potluck dinner follows the discussion at 5:30 pm - bring your own local homemade specialty! Dinner is accompanied with live jazz by Zygoat, and offers a time to browse and purchase some of the Lasqueti-made arts and crafts and fashions on display.
At 7pm, Clever Trever and Mr P take over the stage with "The Suitcase Show", a slapstick comedy show that combines clowning, circus tricks and live music.
At 8pm the event switches into high gear as The Bolting Brassicas Marching Band kick off their set of boisterous songs of revolution, passion and the human struggle. The band will share the stage with stiltwalkers, unicyclist, jugglers, and dancers.
DJ beatfarmer then keeps the energy going as he takes over the sound waves with global rythms as we dance the night away!
The cost of the event is 15$ per person or 30$ for the whole family. No one will be turned away for lack of funds.
Join the quirky folks of Lasquirkus!
Bring a potluck item, dancing shoes, and the whole family!
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Jen's Cob Cottage : Sacred Space Set Aglow!
New Pictures of Jen's Cob Cottage!
Posted By Adam
Exterior with living roof, painted round door
Here are a few photos of Jen's shrine-like cob cottage. This marvel in the woods is a true work of functional live-in art. While sunlight illuminates the interior through the recycled windshields, bottles and recycled skylight in the daytime, the night provides an opportunity to illuminate the space with candle light, creating an almost holy atmosphere. A visit to this cottage is a true inspiration.
Interior, note the recycled bottles, car windshield windows, natural plaster pigments
Cob bench, note car windshield w/ defrost wires, sculptural elements, sculpted-in bookshelf
Car windshield windows, handmade candleabra
Jen's bed knook space
Jen reclining in the round doorframe
Jen lighting the stove
Car windshield windows, handmade candleabra
Fire aglow in wood stove
Jen sitting in the bed knoock with her headlight on
Adam sitting on the cob bench
Sculptural features in cob wall, recycled tile and cut upside-down bottles for candle holders
Summer of Cob Wrap-up
Fall is here again.
Written By Jen Gobby
It's raining here in the forest of Lasqueti, a pot of soup simmering on the stove, mellow music plays, I am at home in the middle of the day. Fall is here.
The first official building season of the MudGirls Collective is coming to a close, much to the relief of many a Mudgirl partner and child.
Molly, Paula, Karin, and Jill are leading a two-week cob workshop on Saltspring at the moment. We on Lasqueti: Emily, Julie, Auguste, Pachiel and Mireille and I have been puttering around at Ray and Soozie's, putting on the cedar shake roof, bringing the cob walls up to the roof. Down Nanaimo way, Chelsea and Rose had the roofing segment of the Earth Master's weekend series last weekend and are working on getting those walls up. Emily lead a mini workshop on Lasqueti two weeks ago at Dave's to get the walls up to the loft height, during which she pulled the much-waiting-to-happen cob joke while doing a morning instructional – showing folks how to read a jar test…then shocking them after determining the clay to sand ratio in the sample, by opening the lid and drinking it down. It was her morning coffee in a mason jar, milky with settled grounds at the bottom!
Since April, our collective of 20 women, with the help of dozens of workshoppers, have been building 4 different cob cabins, a utility shed, 3 outhouses, an earthen oven and a slip straw wall. On Lasqueti, Saltspring, and Hornby Islands, in Courtenay, Cedar, and Vernon, we've been camping and building in all kinds of weather, taking care of each other's kids, eating yummy vegan organic food together, discussing permculture, earth art, women and activism. Trying to balance our personal lives and our building careers and collective work, learning from each other, reaching consensus, making this up as we go… this, our own little part of this global movement of saving the world, saving ourselves. Finding a better way to live with the rest of life on this earth. Getting more and more skilled and independent and stronger and stronger.
We'll have lots of new pictures of all the projects we've been working on…up on this website when we do the annual end of the season update some time soon but here's an idea of the kinds of structures we've been busying ourselves with….
One of the cabins we are building is for Adam, our web man…a cabin for a website… a fair trade! It is a 14 ft circle, 13 feet high to accommodate his height and a sleeping loft too. There's lots of recycled windows, and the walls are cob and cedar cordwood. It has a shed roof with cedar shakes. When we worked on it for a few weeks solid back in May…we built a beautiful dry stone foundation, raised the posts and hauled a hell of a lot materials; window, logs, cob, doors, rocks, cord wood all over his little clearing in the woods, up on to his mossy bluff.
In Courtenay we built a 107 square foot (staying under the maximum square footage for an outbuilding to avoid ‘code' battles) post and beam and cob structure. It has a slate and urbanite dry stack foundation, a metal roof, lots of cute cob features like a cold storage nook, a cob and marble bench seat, and a bicycle rim drying rack.
On Lasqueti, Ray and Soozie's cob cabin has been our big project of the summer. Shaped like a four leaf clover, with two stories, two levels of shake roof, the upper one supported by 19 ft cedar posts we got off a local beach. I got to indulge myself in some inspired natural stained glass work I've been longing to do. Using scrap pieces of coloured glass (can use stained glass scraps, broken bottles, beach glass, marbles, crystals, beads…) and pressing it right up flush with a window (make sure glass and window are both clean) and using thin strips of stiff sculptable litema (horse manure and clay) plaster as the ‘lead' to hold all the pieces together and to the adjacent walls. It works well. Looks amazing when the sun shines through! The plaster dries hard, strong, and so far no condensation between the window and the glass. I want to do lots more of this! Whole images made like huge glass mosaics. What an effect!
I want to build a cob cathedral!! Like the Notre dame in Paris or Sagrada de Famillia in Barcelona... Exceptionally high vaulted ceilings…. 20 foot tall arched stained glass windows depicting all of nature, gods and goddesses, telling the story of everything… towering pillars and an endless spiral staircase leading to all that is good and wonderful and goes no where but now. We will go there and get down, kiss the earthen floor and give Praise for Being Alive on this Planet. ……And ask Her what she knows….
But that project will have to wait till next summer.
Cause the rainy season is here and I'm staying in.
Welcome to the Mudgirls Natural Building Blog!
Your Friendly Neighbourhood Mudgirls Launch their own Blog
Written By Jen Gobby
This month we made Mudgirl history. There were three simultaneous projects being led by three different groups of Mudgirls...We were here on lasqueti leading a workshop while building a shed, meanwhile up in Courtenay another bunch of gals were cobbing up a storm on the two story cob cabin, and down on Saltspring some MG's were plastering the interior of a converntional house with clay and horse manure! What a summer of non stop back to back crew work and workshops and planning and organizing and meeting, folm crews and reporters....and it's funny what happens when our big dreams come true.... I' tired. But fullfilled. My wedding ring is constantly caked with mud and my clothes never stay clean for more than 5 minutes out of the laundry.
The most amazing moments of this summer so far...swims after building post and beam up in courtenay during heat wave of early July... the vegan wheat free cholcolate cake bethany (our cook) made for her birthday.... 10 women raising our 13 ft posts and 16 ft beam up on the foundation....20 women all being able to agree about stuff...learning to listen to the rocks tell us where they want to be...Auguste inspring 30 odd songs with the word 'rock' in it....mixing cob in torrential down pours back in June (it is possible!)....learning and practicing NVC on Hornby while we built a cob out house....inspiring the old-timey lasqueti builder guys to start scheming what they're gonna build out of cob... leaving behind the plumb bob and embracing the cob saw... watching the Mudgirsl children growing up fast, their first steps, first sentences... many communal veagn and organic meals eaten in circles by haungry builders in forrests, fields, back yards...cob cob cob.
And now a blog, I've never read a blog....what's a blog? Adam, my best friend and Web man told me to do it, and I wonder what one writes...What is of interest to folks...
Maybe some answers to some frequently asked questions....
1) No we don't mud wrestle. We build.
2) We don't hate men, and we are not all lesbians, and we do love when men come by and build with us, but not to flirt, to oogle, or to tell us how it can be done better, faster.
3) Cob houses are appropriate for our west coast climate.
4) There are no corn cobs in our buildings.
5) wea re a women's collective because....There's a writer from a vancouver feminist magazine coming to our work site tomorrow to interview and it's got me thinking....what is the connection between women, cob and saving the freakin' earth....to me it's the look in a woman's eyes after she's installed her first window, raised her first post, built her fist wall....when she realizes if she can build a house...she can do anything, and there's nothing that's ever given me hope for the world like that energy... that light shining from a woman , sweaty, muddy and hard hatted....who knows she can do anything. That gives me hope for humanity. This is why I satrted this collective, cause i need those moments, that shining hope. This summer has been full of that!
Thanks for reading!
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