2021 is the 30th anniversary of the publication of Douglas Coupland’s first novel, Generation X. To mark it, there will be an online international conference – the first on Coupland’s work – on 23–24 April. ‘Douglas Coupland and the Art of the Extreme Present’ will ‘explore the richness of Coupland’s engagement with contemporary life’ through his writing and art.
Doug Coupland has written twelve more novels since Generation X, including Life After God (1994), Girlfriend in a Coma (1998), Hey Nostradamus! (2003), and Generation A (2010). He has written and performed for the Royal Shakespeare Company and has frequently contributed to The Financial Times, The New York Times, e-flux, and other publications There have been two major retrospectives of his art: Everything is Anything is Anywhere is Everywhere (2014) at the Vancouver Art Gallery, The Royal Ontario Museum and the Museum of Contemporary Canadian Art, and Bit Rot (2016) at Rotterdam’s Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art, and Munich’s Villa Stücke. In 2015 and 2016 Coupland was artist in residence in the Paris Google Cultural Institute. In May 2018 his exhibition on ecology, Vortex, opened at the Vancouver Aquarium.
You can read my interview with Doug from 2004 here.
You’ll be able to watch these interviews and chat live with other viewers even if you are not registered for the conference. Some of the other elements of the conference may well be published subsequently.
Dr Andrew Tate (author of Douglas Coupland [Manchester University Press, 2007]) has recorded a conversation with contemporary artist, writer, and speaker Makoto Fujimura about the original piece he has created in honor of the 30-year anniversary of Coupland’s Generation X. Find out more about this piece here.
The interview will premiere on YouTube on Friday 23 April, 2:15-3:15pm BST
The interview Dr Mary McCampbell, Dr Andrew Tate, and Dr Diletta De Cristofaro recorded with Douglas Coupland will premiere on Youtube on Saturday 24 April, 8:30pm BST.
Image credit: © dimthoughts, used under a Creative Commons licence
