talks

creative mornings vancouver

Objectively Speaking, What Makes Good Art?

This CreativeMornings talk features Pennylane Shen discussing how people judge art and what it means to call something good. She examines the idea of objectivity in art and challenges the belief that taste is purely personal. Drawing from her experience as an artist, curator, and educator, she explains how research, context, and critical thinking shape creative work. The talk encourages viewers to be more thoughtful and informed when forming opinions about art and creativity, and to balance emotional response with deeper understanding.

TedX

Building Your Art Bucket List: A Visual Pilgrimage

Pennylane reflects on four important works of art which over the years appeared on what she calls her Art Bucket List. Not necessarily the most popular or beloved, these pieces nevertheless had such a significant impact that she eventually made pilgrimages to see them, arranging her work and travels and, truly, her life in order to do so. The goal was in part to witness artistry of tremendous cultural and political power--artistry that broke barriers and challenged the status quo. But more importantly, she sees now, each pilgrimage allowed her to travel back in time to a moment when an indelible mark was left and to honour a time and space in which she gained strength to endure and grow through life's challenges.

PechaKucha vol. 43

Everyone is the Same, Everyone is Different

This PechaKucha talk features Pennylane Shen reflecting on her experiences meeting and working with thousands of artists over the course of her career. She shares the patterns she has observed over time, including the ways artists are remarkably similar in their struggles, doubts, hopes, and dreams, as well as the ways they differ in background, motivation, and approach. Alongside these observations, she weaves in her own story of how she got started in the art world. Through short, fast-paced slides in the PechaKucha format, the talk offers an honest and empathetic look at what it means to be an artist.

Notions of Home: Chinatown Storytelling Center

Overwhelming and Familiar

Join Pennylane as she explores differing ideas of home through a series of three short creative writing pieces —a story, a memory and a ballad (not sung!). Each piece is inspired by a place Pennylane has lived or spent time in. The first is a childhood story centering around the family van, the second, a playful limerick about a very old apartment, and the last, a unit of the hospital Pennylane knows all too well.

Both humorous and heartfelt, these reflections on home deal with childhood as well as adulthood; with the magic of home but also the ways it might let us down. The talk will be an opportunity for listeners to reflect on how we shape and are shaped by our home spaces—and how we can move on from the homes that no longer suit us to the ones that do.