Art, digital and wellness

Biographical notes

Danser dans le métavers

Martin Lemay

Martin Lemay is a professor in the Department of Physical Activity Sciences at UQAM and a researcher at the Centre de réadaptation Marie Enfant at CHU Sainte-Justine. His areas of expertise include motor learning, kinesiology, rehabilitation, adapted dance and virtual reality. Over the past few years, Martin Lemay and his team have developed and evaluated some ten dance programs (including two teledance programs) for young people with disabilities. He has also developed expertise in the use of active video games and virtual reality on the motor functions of young people with disabilities.

https://professeurs.uqam.ca/professeur/lemay.martin/

Simon Drouin St-Pierre

Simon Drouin St-Pierre is a strategic partnership consultant with OVA. He previously co-founded the Montreal-based start-up Replay, also specialized in immersive technologies. OVA develops tools for training and simulation using virtual and augmented reality. Simon holds a bachelor’s degree in Entrepreneurship, Innovation and Creativity from HEC Montréal.

https://www.ova.ai/

Keven Lee

Keven Lee is a researcher and multidisciplinary artist. Trained as a healthcare professional as well as a professional dancer, his doctoral project focused on better understanding the experience of carers and people living with Alzheimer’s and related conditions. He was mainly interested in known and improvised movement experiences in relation to care, particularly in the context of the movement exploration group, Moving-with/ Bouger-ensemble, which he designed and investigated. He is currently a postdoctoral researcher at McGill in the Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, a faculty member at the McGill School of Rehabilitation, and research coordinator for the Centre national de danse-thérapie des Grands Ballets canadiens.

Le Centre national de danse-thérapie

The Centre national de danse-thérapie (CNDT) is a social and cultural action department of Les Grands Ballets canadiens dedicated to promoting and making accessible the benefits of dance to vulnerable and marginalized communities and populations. The Centre thus contributes to reinforcing the usefulness of dance and art in general as a means of prevention and well-being. The Centre’s activities are focused on three areas: social and therapeutic interventions through dance, training in dance for well-being, and involvement in research projects on dance as an intervention tool.

https://grandsballets.com/fr/centre-national-de-danse-therapie/a-propos-du-centre/

Le Centre de réadaptation Marie Enfant du CHU Sainte-Justine

The Centre de réadaptation Marie Enfant at CHU Sainte-Justine offers specialized and superspecialized adaptation-rehabilitation, social integration and participation services for newborns, children and adolescents with motor or language impairments.

https://readaptation.chusj.org/fr/Accueil

Les pieds en haut

Martine Asselin

Martine Asselin is a filmmaker and documentarian. A founding member of the Kino video artists’ group in Quebec City in 2001, she has contributed to the movement’s international influence by taking part in numerous Kino Kabarets – creative events at festivals where short films are made on location in 48 to 72 hours. A committed filmmaker, she was an active member of the feminist artist center Vidéo Femmes from 1997 to 2014. Most of her work deals with social issues. She also campaigns for the positive recognition of all forms of diversity, including able-bodied diversity and neurodiversity.

https://martineasselin.com/

Annick Daigneault

Annick Daigneault is founding president of Sur le Fil – Fondation pour l’inclusion. Trained in theater, communications and philanthropic management, she has extensive experience in event management and communications. She has worked with several community organizations, notably as coordinator of the Ma Vie en Premier program, an initiative inspired by the resilience and leadership approach, implemented in three Montréal-Nord high schools. An activist, author and campaigner, she is socially and politically committed to the positive recognition of neurodivesity and the inclusion of every distinction that enriches humanity.

https://annickdaigneault.com/

Ludociels pour tous

Ludociels pour tous is a Montreal-based social economy company dedicated to promoting digital inclusion. Co-founders Thomas Gaudy (PhD in computer science) and Stéphanie Akré (physiotherapist) are interested in all forms of digital projects with a social vocation, as well as the accessibility of video games. The organization contributes to the creation and promotion of inclusive, participative and collaborative digital entertainment, activities and cultural facilities.

https://www.ludocielspourtous.org/

Enrico Sinatra

Enrico Sinatra, co-founder of Lalilala.org with Coralie Girard, is a software and user experience (UX) designer with a collaborative, cross-cultural and human-centered approach. He also acts as a coach and creative leader to accompany artists, artisans and teams in participatory processes and website prototyping experiments. He is a close collaborator of the co-founders of Ludociels pour tous.

Voix rêvées

Centre Turbine

The Centre Turbine carries out projects that introduce contemporary art to diverse communities by pairing professional artists of all backgrounds and disciplines with art educators. The organization also contributes to reflection, training and the sharing of experience and knowledge on art and pedagogy in communities. Sandrine Côté is the artistic and pedagogical director.

https://centreturbine.org/

Réjane Bougé

Réjane Bougé hosted cultural and literary programs on Radio-Canada radio for nearly fifteen years. A member of UNEQ, she was cultural advisor for literature and film/video at the Conseil des arts de Montréal (CAM) from 2006 to 2016. In 1992, she published her first novel, L’Amour cannibale. Alongside her professional activities, she continues to publish regularly. In all her books, the work of memory is predominant.

Chantal Dumas

Chantal Dumas is a Montreal sound artist trained in rhythmic studies and interactive media. Since 1993, her work has taken the form of narratives, soundscapes, compositions, listening tours and installations. Her work includes a participatory dimension which, depending on the project, takes the form of an immersive experience to be lived inside a device, or active collaboration in the creative process. She asks questions that resonate intimately with each individual.

FICAM – Festival international de cinéma adapté

FICAM is a cultural mediation initiative designed to bring cinema closer to people with physical, hearing and visual disabilities.As part of the festival, a number of documentary, fiction, animation, music video, short, medium and feature-length films will be screened, reflecting the experiences of these people.

www.ficamontreal.ca

Miguel Sorto

Miguel Sorto is an independent artist and director from Honduras. Under the name of his artistic identity La bicicleta, he is the initiator of the FICAM project and director of the festival. A multidisciplinary artist, he has focused more on documentary filmmaking in recent years, making two short and medium-length adapted films: Boccia.qc.ca and 10 km/h. It was while releasing these films that he became aware of the lack of structures designed to show cinema for people living with a disability, which was the starting point for the creation of FICAM as a pilot project in 2022. He is now working on his first feature-length documentary.

Emilie Peltier

Originally from Lyon (France), Emilie Peltier moved to New Brunswick in 2012, where she works in the community and cultural sectors. Born deaf, she decided to move to Montreal to get closer to deaf culture. She met inspiring people, and discovered a new world that helped her deconstruct clichés about deafness and build her new identity. Matin Ecchymose, created in summer 2020, is an experimental project, blending poetry and deaf culture.

Sendy-Loo Emmanuel

Artist, entrepreneur, coach, motivator and banker, Sendy-Loo Emmanuel has been involved in art since childhood. Starting with dance and then visual art, she uses it as her main means of communication to inspire those around her. She holds a DEC in computer graphics, a BAC in business administration and an MBA in management consulting. She is the founder and president of WECAN, a non-profit organization that works with the Afro-descendant artistic entrepreneurial community to support a variety of promising artistic and cultural initiatives.

Annie Leclair

A renowned Quebec film editor and filmmaker, Annie Leclair has enjoyed remarkable international success with her first film ENRACINÉE, selected by UNESCO for its 2023 virtual projection, marking the International Day of Disabled Persons. A passionate self-taught artist committed to her community, Annie has been an editor for film and television for 18 years, and has served on the Board of Directors of the Women’s Creative Industries Alliance. Recipient of the Still I Rise Films bursary for female documentary talent, Annie is completing her 2nd film, LES EAUX CALMES, this year.