Talks of a potential new performing arts centre hit Grande Prairie City Council during their Monday evening meeting.
Councillor Grant Berg, a prominent figure in the city’s art scene, says he as been waiting for over a decade for the discussion to return to the chambers. He says the city lacks an important piece of quality of life in the form of a dedicated live theatre-style event space.
“I was so excited back in 2010 when a report came out that Grande Prairie was due for a performing arts centre, it is something to start working towards [but] still to this day, 33 years later, I still don’t feel that we’ve filled that,” he says.
Berg says the potential to install and utilize an event space like a performing arts centre has been a driving factor in his career as a city councillor, and he says it is important to him that projects like these are accomplished sooner rather than later.
“I’ve been waiting for this report knowing it was coming for quite some time, and I’ve actually been on committees throughout my life where the report comes out and it gets shelled and it disappears,” he says. “These projects take anywhere from four to ten years and if we don’t start acting now, ten years from now we’re once again going to be having these conversations and we still won’t have a performing arts centre.”
According to Berg, the city is “not even a consideration” for groups that choose to tour through the Peace Country, with most productions opting for our neighbouring communities like Dawson Creek in British Columbia to host their shows.
Currently, Bonnetts Energy Centre functions as the main venue for several of the bigger acts that come through the city, with smaller acts choosing venues like the Douglas Cardinal Theatre at NWP, or the Grande Prairie Live Theatre; however, Berg says between those two extremes, the lack of a mid-sized space deters much of the live shows that come through the area.
“A lot of these events that are on tours are not going to play in hockey rinks, it’s just not feasible,” he says. “Artists take pride in their music and I want to hear good quality, and we have that with the Douglas Cardinal Theatre, but it’s simply too small, the live theatre does a great job but again they’ve only got so much seating capacity.”
According to Berg, a facility between 1,000 to 1,250 seats would be adequate for many of the acts, and he says a dedicated theatre space would not only benefit residents wishing to see live shows, but many of the local acts would be able to utilize the space for events like dance competitions.
“Part of it is developing our internal culture, we’ve got so many dance groups that could put on some fairly big competitions here, and that’s part of that tourism piece.”
Berg adds that the only pause from council comes from funding, and talks are set to continue to establish what the space might look like based on community needs and desires.
