http://www.thecapilanoreview.com/

The Capilano Review, Vancouver, BC (2026)

06/16/2026

The Capilano Review is pleased to announce the winner of our 2026 Spring Writing Contest as selected by guest judge Bhanu Kapil. The winning work is “A place for birds” by iman ādam.

“The 45 entries of the longlist I received were extraordinary. I was particularly struck by the number of poems that combined somatic and political engagement with new techniques and possibilities for what a poem might be. Thank you for sharing your work, and trusting me to read it.

The winning entry is composed in epistolary, yet intensely verbal and condensed blocks. These poems propose the face as a construction, but also portal: “When you see a face in such a state you can’t help but want to free it, to say something comforting, to open a door.” The sequence of poems unfolds as a series of questions and answers that work against embellishment even as the images they evoke are dream-like, occluded and intimate. I was moved by the world of these poems: the counterpoint of their vulnerability with a constraining yet mutable form. Sometimes a question, for example, is unanswerable:

"Where is your brother now?
Can we just listen to the birds?"

– Bhanu Kapil

About the winner:

iman ādam is a Mombasa-born writer and artist who does not believe in borders. They grew up in kenya and france and received their MFA from Rutgers-Newark, where they now teach. Most recently, they received a 2026 Fellowship from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts.

The Capilano Review would like to extend additional congratulations to the runner-up and shortlisted writers:

Runner-up:

Heather Simeney Macleod for “The Tactile Qualities of Nowhere in Particular”

Shortlist:

Rukan Saif for “Four Poems”

Kath Healing for “Score for Saying It (With Safeguards)”

Alexei Perry Cox for “[SPACE]making Texts”

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Photo by Emily Greenberg.

05/29/2026

Saturday, June 13, 2-4pm
Saturday, June 14, 2-4pm
In-person at Centre A (Unit 205, 268 Keefer Street, Vancouver)
Registration Fee: $45 / Free for Indigenous participants / PWYC

We are excited to present the first workshop in the summer season of our 2026 interdisciplinary workshop series, Lines into the Air: The Question of Language is the Answer to Power, with SF Ho.

Worlds and experiences are suffused within the formation of language. Conversely, existing socio-political realities are reinforced through the written word. Taking a cue from the title of a poem by M. NourbeSe Philip, this workshop will consider the relationship between environment, society, and the materiality of language. Our concerns include how writing can move beyond strategies of representation and how language may decompose. We will play around with experiential activities and deconstructive techniques. Participants are invited to bring writing and drawing materials, paper or a notebook, and a text that they dislike. Some walking or movement may be involved—please get in touch with [email protected] if you have mobility needs.

SF Ho is a porous object. They live on the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ peoples. Operating somewhere between words and whatever words can’t be, their work is informed by feminist methodologies, land-based practices, and grassroots community networks. Ho has presented their art and writing both regionally and internationally. They published a book about love and aliens called George, the Parasite. They’re cultivating a practice of wary sociality, never finishing books, and being sort of boring.

ASL interpretation is available upon request. If you would benefit from ASL interpretation at the workshop, please indicate so in your registration form when prompted. Information regarding accessibility at Centre A can be found here: https://thecapilanoreview.com/app/uploads/2026/05/Centre-A-Accessibility-Information.pdf.

05/28/2026

Registration is now open for our Lines into the Air summer workshops!

Lines into the Air is a year-long series of interdisciplinary writing workshops that take up the communal practice of writing as an urgent means of being and thinking together — across boundaries, fields, and forms.

Highlighting the myriad ways in which writing practices not only exist but flourish outside of disciplinary and institutional bounds, this series brings together facilitators and participants from diverse backgrounds and areas of expertise to reposition creative writing as expansive community inquiry, offering, and exchange.

Each generative, two-session writing workshop will take place either online or in-person across a number of venues located throughout Vancouver’s Lower Mainland.

✏️ Registration is now open for our Summer 2026 season, featuring workshops with SF Ho, Tiziana La Melia & Ada Smailbegović, and Fan Wu.

Learn more and register here: https://thecapilanoreview.com/lines-into-the-air-writing-across-disciplines/

05/20/2026

We are so excited to share a new see to see— review by Emma Jeffrey, now available on our website.

Jeffrey offers a thoughtful and carefully attentive review of Tania Willard's "Photolithics." "Photolithics" is on view at The Polygon Gallery until May 31.

"Bark, root, stone, pigment… these are not materials chosen for their symbolism – they are here because they have always been here. They have been doing the work of holding memory long before anyone thought to call it an archive."
– Emma Jeffrey

Read the full review: https://thecapilanoreview.com/emma-jeffrey-on-tania-willards-iphotolithics-i/

Image: Installation view of the exhibition Tania Willard: Photolithics at The Polygon Gallery, 2026. Co-curated by Monika Szewczyk and Serena Steel. Photo by Dennis Ha.

05/14/2026

We are grateful to remember G. Maria Hindmarch through her words in the pages of The Capilano Review.

"From the Archives / Remembering G. Maria Hindmarch," a reflection by Sharon Thesen, is now available on our website: https://thecapilanoreview.com/from-the-archives-remembering-g-maria-hindmarch/

05/11/2026

The Capilano Review is excited to be participating in the 2026 Vancouver Art Book Fair, taking place this weekend! Come say hello, browse our issues, and snag some merch. We can't wait to see you there!

Dates:
Friday, May 15 – 5:00pm to 9:00pm
Saturday, May 16 – 11:00am to 6:00pm
Sunday, May 17 – 11:00am to 5:00pm

Location:
Roundhouse Community Arts & Recreation Centre

Entry:
Free, no registration required

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Exhibitors and attendees at Vancouver Art Book Fair 2025. Photo by Dennis Ha. Courtesy of Vancouver Art Book Fair.

05/07/2026

We are delighted to announce our upcoming Spring 2026 issue. love bends / the mover: The Roy Miki Issue celebrates the work and legacy of Roy Miki. The texts and artworks in this issue come together within and across many of Miki’s varied communities: artistic, activist, academic, and Asian Canadian among all of these, considering subjects like asiancy, archives, and, crucially, Miki’s imperative to action.

Issue 4.6 (Spring 2026) features reflections on Miki’s friendship, teachings, and influence by Michael Barnholden, Larissa Lai, Nicole Markotić, and Fred Wah; a textual and visual response to Miki’s poem “Flow Nation” by Cindy Mochizuki; new artwork by Sena Cleave; biotextual writing and art by Tiziana La Melia and Echo Quan; reflections through poetry across archives by Carolyn Nakagawa and Yoriko Gillard; and new writing by Gloriah Amondi, Ranbir K Banwait, Wayde Compton, Khashayar “Kess” Mohammadi, Daphne Marlatt, Carolyn Nakagawa, Vivek Sharma, Yilin Wang, Rita Wong, and shō yamagushiku.

📬 Pre-order a single copy by May 20th for 25% off: https://thecapilanoreview.com/product/issue-4-6-love-bends-the-mover-print/
Subscribe to receive Issue 4.6 along with our forthcoming Fall 2026 issue: https://thecapilanoreview.com/subscribe/

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Cover image: Cindy Mochizuki, sound of Carpenter Creek, 2026, pen and ink on paper. Courtesy of the artist.

04/10/2026

Tuesday May 12, 1:30-4pm
Tuesday May 19, 1-3:30pm
In-person at Museum of Vancouver, 1100 Chestnut Street (Sen̓áḵw Village)
Registration Fee: $45 / Free for Indigenous participants / PWYC
This is a two-part workshop. The registration fee covers both dates.

What does it mean to sense our histories to the lands we live with, in the present? This workshop will take place over two sessions at Sen̓áḵw, where we will spend time listening to/with place and connecting that experience through writing to our own histories and positionalities. In response to Lee Maracle’s short story “Goodbye, Snauq,” we will write through a sequence of continuing arrivals, hellos, landings, and visitations, as attempts at naming our relationships to Coast Salish lands.

Dylan Robinson is a xwélmexw (Stó:lō / Skwah First Nation member) artist, curator, and professor based at the University of British Columbia. Robinson’s curatorial work includes the international touring exhibition Soundings (2019–2025) co-curated with Candice Hopkins, and his book Hungry Listening (University Minnesota Press, 2020) examines Indigenous and settler colonial practices of listening. His current research focuses on public art’s role in the interpellation of Indigenous and settler subjectivities.

ASL interpretation is available. If you would benefit from ASL interpretation at the workshop, please indicate so in your registration form when prompted. Further accessibility information can be found here: https://museumofvancouver.ca/museum-hours-and-admission

You can learn more and register here: https://www.zeffy.com/en-CA/ticketing/lines-into-the-air-xwlalamet-senawlistening-to-senaw-with-dylan-robinson

🗓️ Register by April 28, 2026.

04/01/2026

The Capilano Review is pleased to invite submissions to our Spring 2026 Writing Contest, “And what would you say if you could?,” guest-judged by Bhanu Kapil. Submissions are open from April 1 – 30, 2026.

"And what would you say if you could? When I was invited to select the theme for this contest, this was the phrase that immediately filled my mind. I’ve carried this question for a long time, answering it in my own way, and I’m so curious to know what your response might be.

I welcome writing (poetry, hybrid works) that responds to this question, that lives this question as an aspect of content or form. How does this other kind of language appear on the page, scored for the attempt to do so? Is the poem that place, or is another kind of writing necessary now? Also, how will you navigate questions of vulnerability and exposure that might accompany this writing that is also a speaking up/out/with/to? Can you place something in your writing that protects it even as it’s being written?"

—Bhanu Kapil

Learn more: https://thecapilanoreview.com/and-what-would-you-say-if-you-could-spring-2026-writing-contest/
Submit your work: https://thecapilanoreview.submittable.com/submit

03/31/2026

Saturday, May 2, 2-4pm PST
Sunday, May 3, 2-4pm PST
In-person at Maplewood Flats (2649 Dollarton Highway, North Vancouver)
Registration Fee: $45 / Free for Indigenous participants / PWYC
This is a two-part workshop. The registration fee covers both dates.

We are excited to present the second workshop in our 2026 interdisciplinary workshop series: Water Keeps Us Honest, with Rita Wong

As Lee Maracle wrote, “the water owns itself.” When we focus on respecting the waters enabling our lives, how might we shift our language and our practices? How might we learn from and with the waters flowing through us, or the plants and creatures that water enlivens? Alongside the səlilwətaɬ inlet that is the origin and beloved grandmother of the Tsleil-Waututh people, we will walk together and practice listening to the place that holds us up, stretching towards healthier relationships than colonization allows. We’ll aim to learn from friends like fireweed how to outgrow fascism and stay dedicated to life, in all its vulnerabilities, fierce love, and surprises. Bring a poem to share for these times, a notebook to write in, and a heart open to learn from one another — human and more-than-human companions.

Guided by questions of respect for water, collective health, and just relationship, Rita Wong has written several books of poetry attending to the intersections of life, language, and land, and co-edited the anthology Downstream: Reimagining Water with Dorothy Christian. She is dedicated to collective action to address both the climate crisis and systemic inequities through an economy of care and solidarity. Wong has received the Latner Griffin Writers’ Trust Poetry Prize, the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize, and the Asian Canadian Writers Workshop Emerging Writer Award. From the Burrard inlet to the Gitxsan lax’yip, we are all endangered by the TMX and PRGT pipelines, which we cannot afford if we want a livable planet.

ASL interpretation is available. If you would benefit from ASL interpretation at the workshop, please indicate so in your registration form when prompted.

Learn more and register: https://www.zeffy.com/en-CA/ticketing/lines-into-the-air-water-keeps-us-honest-with-rita-wong

🗓️ Register by April 17, 2026.

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Photo by Hiromi Goto.

The Capilano Review

06/16/2026

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05/20/2026

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