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Oakville native, beatboxer helps put on Toronto Unity Festival by Julia Le Oakville Beaver Staff Artscene 55 | Friday, August 1, 2014 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insideHALTON.com "Connected to your Community" Gary Mananquil was beatboxing before he knew what it really was. The 39-year-old Etobicoke resident who grew up in Oakville told the Oakville Beaver he was experimenting with the vocal art in the 1990s, but more so in the early 2000s when he and a number of other beatboxers decided to form Sick Sound Syndrome. With a passion for producing drum beats, rhythm, and musical sounds using their mouths, lips, tongues, and voices, the crew members broke onto the Canadian hip-hop scene, quickly making a name for themselves. "We became a beatbox band and from there on, came up with so much music that not one single beatboxer could do, but as a group, it was totally possible," said the St. Thomas Aquinas Secondary School graduate, whose stage name was Gary Goudini, a play on illusionist Harry Houdini's name. Mananquil doesn't do as much performing anymore, but he's still at the heart of the beatboxing community. A director at Beatbox Canada for a number of years, he Oakville native and renowned beatboxer Gary Mananquil helped organize part of the Toronto UNITY Festival last month. | photo supplied by Gary Mananquil recently helped co-ordinate the beatboxing portion for the UNITY Festival, which took place in Toronto July 23-26. The annual event brought together youths to use artistic self-expression to make positive life choices leading to more produc- tive citizens, safer schools and healthier communities. The four-day event featured emerging talent in beatbox, breakdancing, spoken word and other art forms. Mananquil said he organized a two-vs.-two beatbox competition showcasing Canada's best beatboxers. He said he's been dedicating a lot of his time behind the scenes to help grow the beatboxing community and guide the next generation of beatboxers to develop the skill even further. He also wants to provide up-and-coming beatboxers with a platform so they can showcase their skills. Mananquil said he's always looking for ways to push the art form a little more. That's evident in the events he helps organize. Mananquil noted how he's also looking forward to the fifth annual Canadian Beatbox Championships, which will take place at the Virgin Mobile Mod Club in Toronto Nov. 8. He said his old crew Sick Sound Syndrome will be reuniting for the night to perform. "We will show a tribute to the pioneers of Canadian beatboxing and lining up an all-Canadian, original line-up," he said. For more information about the Unity Festival or Beatbox Canada, visit www.unitycharity.com or www.beatboxcan.com. Local painter receives award in France Arts-Sciences-Lettres gives silver medal to Michele Van Maurik by Julia Le Oakville Beaver Staff P L A N T M U S I C As if exhibiting at the Louvre Museum wasn't enough of an achievement, Michele Van Maurik can now add earning the silver medal from the Arts-Sciences-Lettres academy to the milestones in her career. The Oakville painter was presented with the award in Paris, France in June in part for her Sunflower painting, which was on display at the Carrousel du Louvre Salle Le Nôtre from Dec. 13-17 last year as part of the Société Nationale des Beaux-Arts' annual exhibit. Among a Canadian delegation that included 20 artists from Alberta, Ontario and Québec, Maurik said it was "a dream come true" to see her work in the show at the Paris museum that has exhibited works by renowned French sculptor Auguste Rodin in the past. She considers it among her proudest moments in life, right up there with giving birth to her now 12-year-old daughter Riley. The show helped her get noticed by the Arts-Sciences-Lettres President Jacqueline Vermeer, who saw her piece in the Paris museum and nominated her for the silver medal award. She was then asked to submit a portfolio of 10 of her paintings, which included Sunflower. Van Maurik said she feels like she's only beginning to scratch the surface of her potential and is looking forward to creating more paintings. Over the last four years since settling into Oakville and creating a home studio, she said she's been concentrating more on the fine arts. Her previous work included painting murals on the sides of buildings across Canada, including one in Midland that depicts SainteMarie among the Hurons. Van Maurik credits her ability to create large-scale pieces to her father, who was also a painter and got her involved in one of his projects by letting her paint the relish on a series of hamburger billboards when she was just six years old. She's also exhibited at the McMichael Canadian Art Gallery in Kleinburg, Ont. and other local galleries in town like CJ's Café, Allegro Cafe in Whole Foods Market and the Sea and Craft Gallery. She's now looking ahead to when she'll be exhibiting at The Artistes du Monde, held in Cannes in September and judged by Marina Picasso. Summer will also be the time when she'll be creating pieces inspired by her visit to the Rodin Museum in Paris where she said she took many photos and hopes to do a series of Rodin's gardens. "I have completely embraced Paris, its culture and lifestyle," she said. "I was particularly impressed by the sculptures of Rodin Joshua Creek Heritage Centre played host to the Tesla Health Festival earlier in July. The event paid tribute to and spent a lot of time in the gardens at the museum where I became inspired to create a Serbian-American inventor Nikola Tesla. While most people know Tesla for inventing alternating current electricity, few people realize he is also the father of `energy medicine. The festival at the 1086 Burnhamthorpe Rd. E. new series of florals." centre featured a multimedia art exhibition about Tesla, his vision, inventions and life. There was also antique Van Maurik added she takes pride in each and modern Tesla electrotherapy healing machines, electrotherapy books, crystal radios, radionic machines, piece she creates and loves meeting with poquartz crystal gem stones, Tesla souvenirs and a labyrinth. Bob Connoly uses crystal to stimulate these four tential buyers to show them how her pieces plants that are connected to modified lie detectors to show how plants respond to electromagnetic fields could "enhance their homes." producing plant music. | photo by Graham Paine ­ Oakville Beaver (Follow on Twitter @halton_photog or For more information about Van Maurik, www.facebook.com/HaltonPhotog) visit www.michelevanmaurik.com.