Understories: Place + Performance
How is performance shaped by this moment in time and space, in Kitchener-Waterloo? How can performance shape this moment
Join us on the afternoon of July 19th for talks and a screening with CAFKA.25 artists.
CAFKA.25: Field Guide to the Understory is an ongoing contemporary public art festival presented in publicly-accessible spaces throughout Waterloo Region, June 7 - July 26.
Event details
Doors open at 12:45
1-2:00pm – In conversation: Ben Gorodetsky, Lauren Prousky, and Jacob Irish
In this collective artist talk, Ben Gorodetsky (CAFKA.25 exhibiting artist and host of Pinch Cabaret), Lauren Prousky (multidisciplinary artist and CAFKA.25 Writer in Residence), and Jacob Irish (CAFKA.25 exhibiting artist and musician) will explore the relationships between place and performance across their artistic practices.
2:30-3:30pm – Performance with Q&A: We are Kitchener
A presentation of selected scenes from this collectively devised short play with music that was presented in Kitchener City Rotunda in June this year to reflect on themes related to the City's Newcomer Strategy. Many reflections in the play were focused on relationship to places and space. Spend time with members of the cast who created the show together based upon their own lived experiences as newcomers to Canada in their unique ways and journeys while exchanging commonalities that bring them together in community around this idea of place. They will present some of the scenes from the play and talk about their experience creating it and their experiences searching and finding home in this place. Outta Work Actors devises theatre through its Two Minute Play Methodology which is part of its Community Based Applied Theatre Laboratory Program. We are Kitchener script was dramaturged and directed by Heather Majaury, Artistic Director of Outta Work Actors.
About the Artists
Ben Gorodetsky
Ben Gorodetsky is a Ukrainian-Canadian performance and video artist, writer and producer based in Kitchener. Their work has been presented by The Art Gallery of Ontario, CAFKA, Movement Research at Judson Church, The Tank NYC, LUMEN, In/On/Out Interarts and Open Ears.
Ben is the curator-host of interdisciplinary variety show Pinch Cabaret, and has performed and directed improvisation internationally. He was the 2022 artist-in-residence with Guelph Dance Fest, winner of the Emerging Artist Award at the Mayor's Celebration for the Arts (Edmonton), recipient of the Anna Pidruchney Young Writers Award, and a nominee for a Canadian Comedy Award and a Waterloo Region Arts Award.
They’re the creator and executive producer of "MY PET ATE WHAT!?" a docu-series for CTV Wild, and the director of feature length documentary “A Hole in the Ground” for Inter Arts Matrix. Ben teaches video and performance at the University of Waterloo. He holds an MFA from Brooklyn College-CUNY and a BFA from the University of Alberta.
They are currently exhibiting a durational performance series for CAFKA.25 called Izabella's Voice.
Lauren Prousky
Lauren Prousky (she/her) is a multidisciplinary artist based on land now known as Kitchener, Ontario. She makes installations, videos, performances, paintings and sculptures and writes poetry, short fiction and experimental essays. Lauren has an MFA from the University of Waterloo and a BFA from Concordia University.
She was a 2023 AGO Artist-in-Residence, where she created the participatory performance project, Black Tie Soup Night. In March 2025, Lauren debuted her first one-woman show, Microsoft Office Suite Presence: I Look Forward to Hearing Back with Femme Folks Fest in Kitchener.
Recent exhibitions include Artcite Inc (upcoming), Ed Video, SPACEMAKER II, Cambridge Art Galleries, The plumb and Xpace Cultural Centre. Lauren has published writing with Textile, BlackFlash, Public Parking, Untethered and Peripheral Review. She has curated exhibitions and hosted events in various DIY spaces, galleries and a public pool.
Lauren is currently a Writer in Residence for CAFKA.25: Field Guide to the Understory.
Jacob Irish
Jacob Irish is an artist of settler descent from so-called Burlington, Ontario, on land described by Treaty 3 3⁄4 and the Brant Tract Treaty 8.
Jacob has exhibited at the Anna Leonowens Gallery (2014), Centre Bang! (2015) and the Art Gallery of Guelph (2016). A Young Canada Works residency at FOFA Gallery (2017) began their twice-built The Miller and the Baker, shown at Hamilton Artists Inc. during Supercrawl 2018, and awarded an OAC Visual Artists Creation Projects grant. They’ve earned a BFA at NSCAD University (2017) and an MFA at the University of Waterloo (2022).
Jacob has maintained a lifelong drawing practice, adding sculpture, video, and audio work along the way; you can find Jacob in the credits of MOMUS: The Podcast, where they have been doing audio post production since 2018.
Jacob is an exhibiting artist for CAFKA.25, his artwork Aloft reflects on experiences as a member of the tenant class.
About CAFKA
CAFKA – Contemporary Art Forum Kitchener + Area takes art outside of the gallery and presents it in public places once every two years to foster community connections, record our stories, and enjoy the common spaces we all share.