{"id":2722,"date":"2017-02-10T14:56:54","date_gmt":"2017-02-10T21:56:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/?p=2722"},"modified":"2017-02-10T14:59:32","modified_gmt":"2017-02-10T21:59:32","slug":"dirtbag-festival-gathering-happening-celebration","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/blog\/dirtbag-festival-gathering-happening-celebration\/","title":{"rendered":"Dirtbag Festival; The Gathering. The Happening. The Celebration."},"content":{"rendered":"

What binds a community together? What makes us proud to call the place we live home?<\/em><\/strong> In Kimberley, for over 92 years, it was the holes we dug in the ground, the thousands who gathered to extract precious metals from the world\u2019s largest lead and zinc mine. It was a town toughened by grit, the damp echoe beneath us. Yet when the mine closed in 2001, we began the search for a new identity, beyond the one previously carved underfoot\u2014an identity that celebrated our stunning landscape and the small-town charm that drew us towards it.<\/p>\n

In 2007, an event was born in Kimberley that became an integral part of our identity: The Dirtbag Festival<\/em>, a visual celebration of the elusive dirtbag lifestyle. The festival, entering its 10th anniversary, is a local cultural phenomenon. It consistently sells out two consecutive nights, and has included a variety of formats toasting the dirtbag lifestyle: the ever-popular community slide show, an eclectic compilation of Kimberley residents\u2019 photographs; locally-produced films, some which are national award winners; spoken word; after parties; presentations by adventure gurus, such as 2016\u2019s keynote Will Gadd; and beyond these events, the pervasive buzz leading up to the weekend, the constant chatter: \u201cAre you going to Dirtbag?\u201d<\/p>\n

What exactly is a festival that honours dirtbags? According to its Facebook page, the Dirtbag is, \u201c\u2026a celebration of story gatherers as well as the story tellers, told by dirtbags living in the rebel realms of\u00a0the wild spaces they call home, through film, photography, spoken word and art. It is a community of artists, activists, pranksters, and adventurers who carry us through dark winters by sharing their stories.\u201d It poses a question to Kimberley residents: \u201cWhat awes & inspires you? What keeps you going? What\u2019s your place on earth? What\u2019s your story?\u201d<\/p>\n

In its 2007 inaugural opener, local dirtbag icons attempt to explain the term \u201cdirtbag\u201d. According to Dave Quinn, \u201cThe most valuable thing a dirtbag has is time to spend with friends and to explore passions. Way down on this list is money.\u201d Quinn believes to call someone a dirtbag, \u201c\u2026is to lay a really nice compliment on them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dirtbag co-founder (along with Kevin Shepit) and host of the Travel Channel\u2019s \u201cBig Crazy Family Adventure\u201d Bruce Kirkby says, \u201cDirtbag\u2019s got a bad sound, but it\u2019s really a great thing:\u00a0 You put your money\u2014what little you have\u2014into the things that count. You don\u2019t spend all your time trying to make money. You do things that are fun.\u201d\u00a0 Kirkby believes that the success of the Dirtbag Festival is that it speaks, \u201cto what we value, and why we were here. And folks like seeing what their friends and neighbours shot in the last year, as opposed to going to Banff to see what the entire world has produced.\u00a0 So it\u2019s become a very intimate event.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shepit believes that the Dirtbag Festival was embraced from the beginning. \u201cIt represents letting go,\u201d he says. \u201cLetting go of tomorrow’s worries, yesterday’s mistakes, workload, debt load, stress load, and the celebration of being able to, at a moment’s notice, simply notice the moment.\u201d The new man behind Dirtbag\u2019s curtain, Steve Tersmette, believes, \u201cDirtbaggery is our lifeblood. Look out our backyard. How can we not be a town of dirtbags?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Vid\"<\/a>

Still wondering what a dirtbag is? \u00a0Check out the Dirtbag Festival 2013 Opening Film.<\/p><\/div>\n

Dirtbag films have showcased a collage of wild adventures: family canoe trips through Alaska; 15-year-olds urban skiing off downtown rooftops; solemn Indian pilgrimages; the quiet narration of multi-day treks through the St. Mary\u2019s Alpine; and the ever-popular openers, featuring Jedi dirtbag John Haner (see link above).<\/p>\n

The spirit of Dirtbag brings a community together in the most unusual ways: Ryan Lunge\u2019s 2014 Dirtbag Film winner, \u201cPirates of the Kimberlean<\/a>\u201d featured ten neighbourhood children from three to six years of age. It included special effects, green screen, waterfall cable cam shots, pirate outfits and props crafted by parents, and a 16-foot long pirate ship replica Lunge built in his back yard. Lunge, who had never shot a video before, learned everything from a book, and watching YouTube. \u201cIt became a bit of an obsession for the year prior to Dirtbag,\u201d Lunge said, \u201cbut we had such a blast.\u201d<\/p>\n

How does a town celebrate its identity and culture? It gathers in a sold out theatre, hoots and hollers as photos and films flash upon a screen. It stands teary-eyed, smiling, sending ovations to the dirtbags we\u2019ve lost. It celebrates the lifestyle of living in the Kootenays, among the people who are proud to call Kimberley home, and the Dirtbag its festival.<\/p>\n

Dirtbag Dates:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dirtbag Festival 2017 (March 24-25, 2017)<\/p>\n

Submissions Open: December 15, 2016
\nSubmissions Close: February 19, 2017
\nTicket Sales Open: Feb 1, 2017<\/p>\n

More information on the Dirtbag Festival Facebook page<\/a> & Website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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What binds a community together? What makes us proud to call the place we live home? In Kimberley, for over 92 years, it was the holes we dug in the ground, the thousands who gathered to extract precious metals from the world\u2019s largest lead and zinc mine. It was a town toughened by grit, the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":2736,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[68,39,37,42,43,22,96,87,97,25,45],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2722"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2722\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2736"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skikimberley.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}