Western Front Society, Vancouver

Western Front is an artist-run centre located in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was founded in 1973 by eight artists who wanted to create a space for the exploration and creation of new art forms. After they purchased the former Knights of Pythias lodge hall located in Mount Pleasant, Vancouver, it quickly became a centre for poets, dancers, musicians and visual artists interested in exploration and interdisciplinary practices. Many of the Western Front's early works reflect this interdisciplinary ethos with early influences of Duchampian and Fluxus-based investigations into mail art, telecommunications art, live electronic music, video and performance art. Western Front also supported a number of political and activist projects - in one of their most famous performance pieces, founding member Vincent Trasov adopted the personality of Mr. Peanut, gave a number of performances and in 1974 ran for mayor of Vancouver. Mr. Peanut was so highly regarded that he was picked by The Vancouver Sun as one of the province's 100 most influential people as the end of the millennium approached in 1999. As a focal point of experimental art practice through the 1970s and 1980s, the Western Front, in connection with other centres like it, played a major role in the development of electronic and networked art forms in a national and international context. ()