The Sixties — Style and Substance
The 2003 McCord Colloquium revisits a dynamic decade

Montreal, Wednesday, April 30, 2003 — Everything old is new again at the McCord, where this fall the Museum's annual colloquium will explore the material and historical legacy of the 1960s. Scholars and museum professionals from across the continent and as far as the United Kingdom will come together on November 6, 7 and 8 for the 2003 McCord Colloquium, entitled The Sixties — Style and Substance.  

This year's event was organized in partnership with the Département d'histoire of the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQÀM), with Dr Magda Fahrni of UQÀM serving as academic coordinator. The dialogue among participants of The Sixties — Style and Substance promises to be rich and varied, with researchers presenting recent work on subjects such as art, architecture, fashion, the counterculture, Expo '67, student activism and the Vietnam War.

Two keynote speakers are also expected to shed light on two very different cultural developments of the era. Gretta Chambers, O.Q., C.C., is well known to Montrealers as a former chancellor of McGill. Her talk will have a local focus, touching upon her experiences as a journalist during Quebec's Quiet Revolution. An astute analyst of Quebec's political scene and one of the first female anglophone journalists to take an interest in francophone Quebec, Mrs Chambers is a respected political commentator who has contributed significantly to English-French dialogue. Dr James Chapman of the Open University, UK, will deliver the closing address. Dr Chapman is lecturer in film and television history and has authored and co-edited several books on the 1960s, including Licence to Thrill: A Cultural History of the James Bond Films (1999), and Windows on the Sixties: Exploring Key Texts of Media and Culture (2000; co-editor with Arthur Marwick and Tony Aldgate). He will speak on his latest book, Saints and Avengers: British Television Crime-Fighter Series, 1960-1972 (2001).

The McCord is better known as a repository for 19th-century Canadiana, but in the past few years the Museum has acquired numerous 20th-century artifacts and documents, many of which date from the 1960s. Costume in particular, as well as archival documents and the photographic collection, have benefited from recent donations. Participants of The Sixties — Style and Substance will have the opportunity to examine these new additions up close with McCord curators, who will lead behind-the-scenes workshops during the conference. Some of these objects and documents will also be incorporated into a new 1960s module, to be added to the Museum's permanent exhibition Simply Montreal — Glimpses of a Unique City in 2004.

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Source :
Nike Langevin
(514) 398-7100, ext. 251

The McCord acknowledges the support of the Ministère de la Culture et des Communications and the Arts Council of Montreal