When I was an undergrad, one of my housemates papered the walls of his room with maps, mostly of Europe and North America. A history major, he relied on them as a visual reference of the places he studied: “the story of those places in a nutshell.” I didn’t fully appreciate this idea until I read Derek Hayes’ Historical Atlas of Vancouver and the Lower Fraser Valley, which tells the story of the region through a collection of maps categorized as “faithful to reality, fanciful, or strictly promotional.” Certainly, most locals know the west was settled by real estate speculators, but many need the blanks filled in. Here’s your filler. Hayes documents most major historical issues and events from settlement to 2005 (the year of publication), relying always on maps, posters, and photographs. It’s an excellent, unsurpassed introduction to the Lower Mainland’s spatiality.

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Last weekend, MOV participated at IDSwest and our booth featured animals from our upcoming exhibit Ravishing Beasts. Specifically: a vole, a snow owl, and a dog by the name of Lucky—all three of them taxidermied.

We’d prepped for possible blow back (”Displaying a stuffed dog? Are you out of your mind?!”), and while there was a bit of that, more often there were double takes followed by incredible conversations, ranging from animal rights to the Museum’s new vision and how Ravishing Beasts fits within it. What a time.

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When we were deep into our revisioning process (a two-year effort that was half-launched in the spring of 2008 with the exhibit Movers and Shapers, and half-launched this past June with the unveiling of our new brand identity and the opening of Velo-City—confused yet?), we looked to other city museums around the world for inspiration. One institution we kept returning to was the Stockholm City Museum.

The museum’s main building is a trove of photographs, oil paintings, and artifacts, including a vast collection of objects salvaged from buildings that were demolished during the city’s rapid modernization period in the 1950s to 1970s (wallpaper, tiles, mouldings, etc.).

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Committed readers of the Vancouver Courier will be well-acquainted with the material in Lisa Smedman’s Vancouver: Stories of a City. The 12 essays that form the basis of the book are based on a series the newspaper ran in 2006 and 2007. What began as a look at how prominent Vancouver streets got their names evolved into a detailed history on the settlement of city neighbourhoods. If you want to know why Kingsway slashes through the city’s grid pattern, or to read excerpts of Gassy Jack’s letters home, this is the book.

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Quick post: After 16 years, we’ve concluded our fall “Haunted Vancouver” trolley tours. Ghost sightings, unsolved murders, simulated autopsies… It all made for campy fun, but it was time for a change of pace. To the tour’s many loyal followers out there: sorry to disappoint.

There’s good news.

This year, we’re going darker. In the spirit of Ravishing Beasts, our soon-to-open feature exhibit, we’re hosting a Halloween-inspired event on the evening of October 30. It will involve music and a cash bar, guided tours of the exhibit, and a screening of Alfred Hitchcock’s classic Psycho, the film that left an indelible mark on the practice of taxidermy (and is, by far, creepier than all of its sequels and remakes combined). Note: Our vintage 1968 wood-paneled theatre accommodates just over 200 audience members, which makes for an intimate viewing experience but does limit our numbers. Click here to buy tickets…

Is this an obvious choice? Absolutely. Can’t be helped. City of Glass continues to capture the zeitgeist of this place (well, minus the bit on “monster houses”; that battle has been fought and lost). With compelling photos, graphics, and illustrations, author Douglas Coupland has efficiently catalogued what makes Vancouver, Vancouver. Fleece as uniform. Sushi as fast food. Grouse Grind as singles bar. And how the city can stand in for just about anywhere on film. These things are now cliches, liberally quoted. This is the original source material.

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Vancouver Matters is less a book than a bound exhibit, which may partly explain its appeal to us. Using photographs, illusrations, and short essays, the various writers (mostly artists, and students and faculty from UBC’s School of Architecture + Landscape Architecture) present Vancouver as an unfinished work rather than an accomplishment (a subtle dig at “Vancouverism” proponents?).

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So, summer has run its course. The air has changed. Kids in school uniforms have reclaimed the city buses. And here at Museum, the fall book catalogues have arrived, something that always prompts lively conversations about the most compelling books about Vancouver, set in Vancouver, written by Vancouverites—or some combination of the three.

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Mark your Outlook calendar or iPhone or whatever you’re using these days: Amanda Gibbs, MOV’s director of audience engagement, is speaking at the opening night event of the Interior Design Show West (better known as IDSwest). It’s happening Thursday, September 17 at the Vancouver Convention Centre. Doors open at 6 p.m., Gibbs talks shortly thereafter, and then there’s a special edition of Pecha Kucha happening at 7:15 p.m. The lineup includes Nancy and Niels Bendtsen of Inform Interiors and Bensen-furniture fame, architect Bruce Haden of Hotson Bakker Boniface Haden, and Todd MacAllen of Molo Design (MacAllen and design partner Stephanie Forsythe were the only Canadians featured in 10 X 10_2, Phaidon’s round up of the world’s most exceptional emerging architects). Tickets to the event go for $15 and can be purchased on the night of, or online here. Good deal.

IDSwest runs until September 20. Be sure to stop the MOV booth for a preview of Ravishing Beasts and to learn about our fall/winter program schedule.

We’re in the final stages of acquiring objects for Ravishing Beasts, our featured exhibit on taxidermy and, more broadly, on MOV’s history of collecting. The exhibit opens October 22; more details are linked here.

The subject matter makes for interesting shipments, each one more unusual, random, quirky, and politically charged than the next. Recently arrived is a gopher diaorama from the wilds of Torrington, Alberta (pop. 200+). The town isn’t as well known as its RV-sized “Torrington Gopher Hole Museum,” which presents 71 stuffed gophers arranged in anthropomorphic scenes (one example is pictured). Imagine: Gopher as cowboy; gopher as farmer; gopher as bank robber. The one featured in Ravishing Beasts is dressed as a tourist—complete with toque, luggage, and a map of Canada—and was created from Torrington’s cache of frozen gophers.

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