Guide to Archival Holdings /

Finding Aids

I sighed my mother’s ancient sigh

Lena Chen and C. Ryu

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Lena Chen and C. Ryu create socially engaged projects uplifting Asian American & Pacific Islander experience.Their work has included exhibitions and collaborations with Korean American art collective Gyopo, the late Yong Soon Min, the work of Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Museum of Contemporary Art Jacksonville, 41 Ross, Anthology Film Archives, Korea Arts & Culture Education Service, Korea Foundation, ICA SF, and United States of Asian America Festival.  Working with communities such as sex workers, trauma survivors, abortion workers, immigrants, and AAPI youth, they have been recipients of awards and fellowships from Mozilla Foundation, Sundance Institute, AHL Foundation, B3 Biennial of the Moving Image, Pittsburgh Foundation, Duolingo Community Arts Program, Center for Cultural Power, New Media Caucus, East Bay Community Foundation, and UC Berkeley Center for Interdisciplinary Critical Inquiry. Chen and Ryu hold MFAs from the Carnegie Mellon School of Art. Currently based in Los Angeles, Chen and Ryu were named the 2022 People of the Year by Pittsburgh City Paper for their work as the co-founders of JADED, the largest AAPI cultural platform in Western Pennsylvania.

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See You There: Mall Memories Workshop

May 24th, 2025
The New Gallery, 208 Centre St S

One year after Eau Claire Market’s closure, see you there // meet me here: echoe of eau claire investigates the complicated emotions and memories surrounding what we may be losing or gaining with the demolition of this iconic mall.

Through installations and found objects, as well as still images, video work, and audio captured in the final weeks before the mall's official closure in May 2024, this exhibition showcases the mall during the last few moments of its 30-year life.

Throughout its history, the mall struggled with its identity, and underwent varying states of growth, decline, and uncertainty. Even now, in its death throes, the demolition site remains in a state of ambiguity about its future.

Sometimes, we unwittingly find ourselves acting as archeologists of our own lives. As we grow older, so grows our mental catalogue of all the people, places, things, and ideas that have gone extinct within our lifetime.

We unearth remnants of our past, and we can either choose to carelessly discard those memories, or to carefully preserve and treasure them.

Eau Claire Market was a strange place. What pieces of it are worth remembering? What should we forget?

As someone born and raised in Calgary, I have so many memories of Eau Claire Market during its 30-year lifespan.

A mall is a difficult object to remember, especially one that was as porous as Eau Claire Market. Its identity was always shifting, and the retailers and food establishments were constantly in flux. Depending on when you visited the mall, your memories of it will be radically different from other visitors from other eras.

In the 1980s, plans were announced to pave over historic bus barns, and redevelop this area as our version of Granville Island in Vancouver. There were setbacks and delays even during the construction phase, and ownership bounced from one financier to another.


The mall finally opened with great optimism on August 13, 1993. The 170,000 square foot building was built to house 125 stores, services, and entertainment venues. On the day it opened, it had 10 full-service restaurants, 60 stores, a fresh-food market with 40 stalls, 20 buskers, and a five-screen 1500 seat Cineplex Odeon. The IMAX theatre would open in September 1993, but then it would close down in 2004.

It's impossible to know all the retailers who passed through those doors. Entrepreneurs with big dreams were mostly left with only disappointment. But a few long-standing stores weathered the storms as best they could. Good Earth was the longest original tenant of the mall. The Garage lived there for 28 years, Son of the Pharaoh for 27 years, Sweet Surprise served candy for 25 years, a hairdresser worked there for 24 years, and Island Foods lasted 21 years.

I remember those early days of the mall. My grandparents would take me to a toy store called Who's Who in the Zoo, I'd get a balloon animal from one of the many roaming street performers, and then we’d eat at the Hard Rock Cafe.

But eventually, the crowds disappeared. Then the retailers. Then so did my grandparents.

By 1998, the debt of the market exceeded its value, so it was sold. Then it was sold again. By 2004, Harvard Developments bought the mall for $28 million and announced they were going to demolish and redevelop the mall.

But then the recession hit, and the project was cancelled.

In 2013, they announced another plan to demolish the mall and build five towers, 1000 residential units, 800,000 sq feet of office space, and 550,000 sq feet for retail space.

But again, it never happened.

In 2023, they announced they would be demolishing the mall to build mass transit, the Green Line. They officially closed the mall on May 31, 2024.

But yet again, this project has stalled, and is currently in a state of pessimistic uncertainty.

I can't help but imagine what this mall could've been in another life. What if we had actually believed and invested in transforming it, instead of always threatening to tear it down?

Maybe in a parallel universe it's still alive as a food hall, or an arts space, or a grocery store.

There's so many things the mall could've been, but wasn't.

There's so many times when its owners could've made different decisions, but didn't.

And now it's gone.

In a time when we could use more physical spaces to gather together in, we've demolished a place that was never fully realized.

We live in a city that loves to pave over our history and move on. But what if we fight the urge to forget, and force ourselves to remember this imperfect place?

Maybe we can dig through those co-mingling feelings of relief and dread, and find something to grasp onto amidst the rubble of all this wanton destruction. Maybe together, we can assemble the fuzzy edges of our memories into a story of this mall that makes sense.

So friends, gather here with me as we excavate this site together, one last time.

Let's walk hand-in-hand through empty, echoing corridors outlined with teal, purple, red, and lime. There’ll be sunlight streaming in through the atrium windows, and we’ll watch our shadows flicker across those bare concrete floors.

Eat a meal in the food court, stuff your pockets full of candy, and then we'll ride the escalator upstairs to soak up some darkness.

see you there

meet me here

eau claire market

In my recent series of paintings and digital animations, I explore the themes of identity and femininity. In my painting process, I create brushstrokes that mimic threads, I use weaving as a metaphor for feminine labor weaving together abstract elements. By interlacing body forms and brushwork, I build intricate, layered compositions that delve into women's physical and psychological experiences. The threads in my work introduce a sense of tension and disorientation, evoking the labor-intensive act of weaving—historically associated with women's work—and its meticulous process of interlacing to form patterns. This mirrors the layers of experience, resilience, and creativity present in feminine labor.

The digital animations draw inspiration from my paintings, where I experiment with modern technology to breathe movement into still images. By presenting these works side by side, I aim to bridge the gap between traditional and contemporary mediums, creating a cohesive body of work that invites the viewer to experience the themes from multiple perspectives.

In my works, the interwoven lines and textures reflect the complex psychological space of women, with vivid colors and intricate structures adding emotional depth. The abstract body forms represent how a woman experiences herself, often appearing constrained or entangled, symbolizing the psychological and societal pressures tied to femininity and the body. The recurring theme of tension between constraint and freedom suggests the burden of societal expectations.

Through my energetic brushwork and complex compositions, I reflect on the emotional and psychological aspects of femininity, as well as the weight of representation placed on women's bodies in contemporary society.

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Wei Li is a Calgary-based artist working in painting and digital media, exploring identity and experience through the lens of her Chinese-Canadian heritage as a female artist. Li completed her BFA (with Distinction) at the University of Alberta in 2017 and has since participated in shows/residencies across Canada and the United States. Li was a finalist in the RBC Canadian Painting Competition, and her work was shown at the National Gallery of Canada. Since the pandemic, she has ventured into the digital realm. Her debut digital series, Vessels, received widespread recognition, and she was awarded the Emerging Digital Artist Award in 2021.

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在我最近的一系列绘画和数字动画中,我围绕着自己的身份和当代女性特质的主题进行了探索。在我的绘画过程中,我通过笔触模仿线条,用“编织”作为女性劳动的隐喻,将抽象元素交织在一起。我通过交错的身体形态与笔触,构建复杂且层次丰富的构图,深入探讨女性的身体和心理体验。作品中的线条引入了一种紧张感和迷失感,并且唤起了与编织这一劳动密集型工作的联想,编织在历史上与女性劳动联系在一起,以及编织过程中通过精心交错形成图案的细致过程。这反 映了女性劳动中蕴含的经验、韧性和创造力层次,与我在绘画中的表达相互呼应。我的数字动画从绘画中汲取灵感,我通过现代技术为静态图像注入动态感。将这些作品并列展示,我旨在弥合传统与当代媒介之间的鸿沟,创造一个连贯的作品集,邀请观众从多重视角体验这些主题。在我的作品中,交织的线条与纹理反映了女性复杂的心理空间,鲜艳的色彩与复杂的结构为作品增添了情感深度。抽象的身体形态表现了女性如何感知自己,往往看起来受到限制或纠缠,象征着与女性特质和身体相关的心理和社会压力。作品中反复出现的紧张感,象征了在束缚与自由之间的冲突,暗示着社会期望所带来的沉重负担。通过充满活力的笔触和复杂的构图,我反思了女性特质的情感和心理层面,以及当代社会对女性身体的表现所施加的压力。

李维是一位居住在卡尔加里的艺术家,主要从事绘画和数字媒体创作。她创作的主题围绕着其作为一位华裔加拿大女性移民,对自己的移民身份和女性经验的探索。李维于2017年在阿尔伯塔大学获得美术学士学位(BFA),此后参与了在加拿大和美国的多个展览和艺术驻留项目。她曾入围RBC加拿大绘画大赛决赛,其作品曾在加拿大国家美术馆展出。自疫情以来,她开始涉足数字领域。她的首个数字系列作品《Vessels》获得了广泛认可,并于2021年荣获新兴数字艺术家奖。

“我们常常在回顾事件时发现某种模式,这种模式让我们直觉上感受到有一种看不见的灵魂在引导和指引我们的道路。” ——贝尔·胡克斯,《爱的全部》李维的绘画中,那些湿滑、波动的形态让我不由得将双手放在柔软的腹部,紧抓着衣服的布料。这种感觉很熟悉——我曾在自己的身体和深夜的游离思绪中感受到过。在绣珠时,线缠绕着自己,弯曲起伏,随着拉针穿过皮革,张力加大,一个越来越紧的结悄然形成,直到它阻止了所有动作。我在串珠创作中遇到过很多结,学会了仔细地挑开它们,直到它们解开。珠饰背面讲述了它的创作过程,艺术家的印记存在于每一针每一线之中。这让我想起李维画作中的那些结、构造和编织。画中的血肉以一种奇妙的超现实方式翻滚,我的头昏沉,急切地寻找一个柔软的地方落脚。缝制珠子的过程需要极大的耐心,而我并不总是有这种耐心。就像我并不总是有耐心去理清交织在我生活经历中的身份政治和社会责任。有时候,我不得不走开,带着疲惫和挫败感。我把半完成的草莓形状的耳环放进“暂停区”,以后再回来处理。去年秋天,我刚和我的丈夫结婚,自己也融入了“妻子”这一新的身份。“丈夫”和“妻子”的新身份让我内心颤栗,一种对过去的自我的背叛感从胸口和脊柱扩散到指尖。我继续串珠,为正在制作的草莓耳环缝上一颗粉色珠子。小时候,我吸收了90年代的女权主义之声,我的脑海里回响着BikiniKill的《Rebel Girl》、辣妹组合的《Wannabe》以及Alanis Morissette的《You Oughta Know》。我是否背叛了自己的价值观?这种想法在婚礼前和蜜月结束后经常在我的脑海和心中徘徊。绿色的珠子从容器中洒出,是时候绣上草莓叶子了。我的内心渴望反叛、颠覆、与常规背道而驰,但我有戒指,我是兄弟姐妹和朋友中第一个结婚的人。我的婚姻经历交织着爱、稳定与不安、审判和性别包袱。我凝视着成熟的草莓,准备将它们剪下并完成。女性的女性化表现与社会价值密切相关,而我
对我的女性气质因婚姻而获得的认可感到不安——我只想让婚姻与爱情有关。我想揪出并解开我所置身的纠缠,本能地在混乱中寻找秩序。值得探讨这种感觉,并在我为自己积累的所有牵绊中停留在不安之中。我花了很多时间和李的画作相处,在观赏动画、拆开画作、准备展览安装之间来回穿梭。沉浸于这些编织的纹理、抽象的身体部位,和我的朋友家人讨论作品,撰写这篇展览文本。《柔软的身体》赋予了这片混乱中的抽象以物质形态,编织物能够抵御裂缝和质疑。尽管在社会、政治和关系层面上谈判这些沉重纠缠带来了诸多不适,但也有连接的点,有伸出援手的时刻,拒绝让自己被施加的束缚所限制。现在,我允许自己靠在椅背上,欣赏红色的草莓耳环,凝视那些成熟的血肉般的画作和活泼的动画作品。”

May 15th - 17th, 10AM-6PM

@ The New Gallery, 208 Centre St S

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+ even more!
Come to SHOPPERS Art Mart to find out what other goodies we have for sale ;)


︎Accessibility Notes

careworn & coil undertakes the ongoing photographic and written documentation of my disabled body through invisible physical and mental illness. The project aims to showcase the daily negotiations that occur within myself, replicating the complexities and comfort of living as a spoonie. I work to challenge notions of able-bodied productivity, using photographs and sculptural installation to task viewers with challenging their perceptions of the human experience, creating an environment that emphasizes the emotional vulnerability of placing private life into the public sphere. careworn & coil breathes the concept of "Crip Time", a term coined by academic Alison Kafer – disabled people’s relationship to time rather than monoculture’s ideas productivity in a given day – and bell hooks’ “Oppositional Gaze” – allowing Black bodies the right to “looking”. The project asks viewers to interrogate their perceptions of invisible illness and how it manifests in the body. Within the images, light and shadows act as a catalyst for both these theoretical concepts and how they specifically interact with my navigation of fatness, depression and chronic pain.


The project applies research-creation as a means of situating itself within the broader conversation of disability theory; notably from a Black Feminist disability politic that is oftentimes understudied. Incorporating the works of racialized disabled scholars such as Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, Mia Mingus and Alice Wong allows me to take hold of my personhood while rejecting palatability. Ultimately, in staking myself on these terms, I allow for an active viewership that challenges ableism and supposedly “correct” ways of being consumed.

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by Sarah-Tai Black

“We must leave evidence. Evidence that we were here, that we existed, that we survived and loved and ached. Evidence of the wholeness we never felt and the immense sense of fullness we gave to each other. Evidence of who we were, who we thought we were, who we never should have been. Evidence for each other that there are other ways to live — past survival; past isolation.”

— Mia Mingus

There is something divine that happens when we are able to commune together to give testimony and bear witness to our realities as Black crip folks. It isn’t simply the neoliberal machinations of representation or a reductive identity politics at work, but a form of access intimacy given further specificity (that is, care) through the experience of living as disabled and chronically ill people in an anti-Black world.

It is a form of Black crip kinship that recognizes the ways in which Black lives are expected to endure the expectation of supposed futurelessness; the ways that our current world’s privileging of able-bodied experience precludes access to space, relations, and supports, in turn, further compounding this deathbound assumption of Black life, rather than wholly reorienting it (as it often does for non-Black crip folks).

But we know this. It is in the safety of care for the context of our daily lives — offered without being bound to the labour of legibility — that this space of kinship, whether that be literal space, virtual space, or otherwise, can be cultivated and stewarded. Even if sometimes all too fleeting, this feeling of communion with other Black crip bodyminds expands the bounds of our current space and time to encompass multiple worlds and, hopefully, future models of possibility.

Here, access needs (and desires) are no longer an accommodation but an understood necessity; disability is no longer invisibilized or made to answer to the white supremacist call to undoubtedly name oneself and present a meticulously documented archive of diagnosis and condition as so-called proof; being in relation to one another no longers comes with the demand to centers ableist comforts, but considered effort to collectively safeguard and offer our bodies and minds to be just as they need to be in that moment.

For many of us, spaces like the ones offered by the work of Careworn & Coil are few and far in between, offering a buoy upon which we are offered rest and refuge alongside those who have experienced and been oriented in the world likewise. They are an invitation to name and welcome our vulnerabilities with grace, to share the often enigmatic nature of what our bodies know and how they come to know it, to release the expectation of not just action or productivity, but the emotional labour of performing being “well” (or perhaps, more truthfully, just “okay”) as a form of survival in a world structured by, not just ableism, but anti-Black respectability politics.

Here, the act of looking is one that relocates our experiences — so often these aspects of Black crip life we know for certain but are continuously asked to deny or neglect — from the made-private to the public. This defiant looking radically bends time — cripping time — protracting it into a more fully prismatic expression of our experience as it is often reshaped and reformed by our bodyminds in what feels like a multiplicity of moments at once.

It’s an act of recognition that opposes our current world’s violent desire to not only negate our individual and collective experiences, but also to disavow us, structurally and spiritually, of our interdependence. It is a sterling reminder that we are able to find life sustaining kinship in such acts of seeing and being seen, in all ways and by all means. As our Black crip ancestors did, as we do, as our futures must: we exist together, past survival, past isolation.

Christina Oyawale (b. 2000 Toronto; lives and works in Toronto and Winnipeg) is a self-proclaimed “anarchist punk boy” and emerging multi-hyphenate artist, graphic designer, researcher + curator. Working with film, photography and text, they use memories, shared Black feminist history and knowledge exchange in order to create work that emphasises curiosity of learning and documenting the necessity of slowness. Currently they are attempting to break free from the expected/frequent uses of identity politics under our current neo-liberalist society, that requires marginalized people to sell their identity in exchange for “visibility” in the art world and academia.

Their work and research attempts to foster communal conversation surrounding capitalism, anti-Black racism, queer-/trans-phobia and ableism. Many of these socio-political conditions that they believe we should be fighting to dismantle. Their current research interests and musings surround: Social Reproduction Theory, the works of Angela Davis, Naomi Klein and Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò, queer USSR and Black feminist disability theory. 


Sarah-Tai Black (they/them) is an arts worker, curator, and critic born and (mostly) raised in Treaty 13 Territory/Toronto whose work aims to center Black, queer, trans, and crip futurities and freedom work. Their curatorial work has been staged at Cambridge Art Galleries (Cambridge, ON), Dunlop Art Gallery (Regina, SK), MOCA (Toronto ON), PAVED Arts (Saskatoon, SK), and A Space Gallery (Toronto, ON) and they have worked in public arts spaces such as Art Museum at the University of Toronto, McMaster Museum of Art, and as Interim Artistic Director of Paved Arts.

Crip - a word reclaimed by the disabled community that can be used as a noun, adjective, or verb to refer to disabled people; see also, crip theory.

Bodymind - a term used in disability and feminist studies to describe the idea that the body and mind are interdependent and cannot be separated.

Spoons/Spoonie - Spoon theory is a metaphor describing the amount of physical or mental energy that a person has available for daily activities and tasks, and how it can become limited. The term was coined in a 2003 essay by American writer Christine Miserandino. Those with chronic illness or pain have reported feelings of difference and alienation from people without disabilities. This theory and the claiming of the term spoonie is utilized to build communities for those with chronic illness that can support each other.

中文翻譯 (Chinese Translation)

The Shining @ Globe Cinema
Halloween Movie Fundraiser

October 23rd, 6PM - 10:30PM

Globe Cinema, 617 8 Ave SW, Calgary, AB, T2P 1H1

On October 23rd, we are hosting a fundraiser at the Globe Cinema that includes a screening of The Shining, silent auction and raffle. 

Advanced tickets are $10 each and tickets at the door are $15.





Proceeds from this fundraiser will support The New Gallery in continuing to create  equitable and accessible platforms for artists to practice and showcase meaningful social and political art, while fostering honest relationships and community connections through dream-driven contemporary art initiatives. More specifically, we want to continue to pay artists fair fees for their work, support the production of their projects throughout development and create opportunities for the public to engage with contemporary art through workshops and artist talks.

This movie is Rated R for mature audiences only. 

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Schedule:

6:00PM - Doors open - Silent Auction & Raffle start! Costume Contest winners announced!

7:00PM - Movie starts

9:30PM - Movie Ends - Bids are finalized, raffle winners are announced. Bidders and Rafflers collect their items!

10:00PM - Close

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August 30 – October 19, 2024

Andong Zheng, Lan “Florence” Yee, Beichen Zhang, Shellie Zhang, Yuxiang Dong

Curated by Tangent Collective
(Brubey Hu & Simon Li)

“All memory is individual, unreproducible—it dies with each person. What is called collective memory is not a remembering but a stipulating: that this is important, and this is the story about how it happened, with the pictures that lock the story in our minds.”

—Susan Sontag, Regarding the Pain of Others

For Shellie Zhang’s full

text click ︎here

I grew up in the native region of the Huangshan pine. A once fortuitous encounter with one of them at the summit of Mount Huangshan led me to a plaque bearing a Latin plant name: Pinus Taiwanensis Hayata. Tracing this historical thread of botanical taxonomy, a controversy across the 20th century gradually unfolded regarding the naming of three closely related taxa—Pinus hwangshanensis Hsia, Pinus taiwanensis Hayata, and Pinus luchuensis Mayr. The imperial knowledge lineage illuminated how these taxa were defined within the framework shaped by the colonial contexts of botanical studies at its time. Amidst the paradox between following these existing knowledge structures and striving to transcend them, I embark on a journey to the habitats of these pine trees.

From the Last Glacial Maximum to the present, the rising sea levels gradually submerged the land bridges that link the habitats of these closely related species. Long before the expeditions, collections, naming, and mapping endeavours of Heinrich Mayr, Bunzō Hayata, and Wei-Ying Hsia, the natural history of these habitats had already unveiled profound connections between these species.

As I confronted these East Asian pine landscapes in person, I reverted to introspection on the gesture of looking itself. Operating in the gap between knowledge in mind and sensory input on-site, I aim to reconstruct the composite time-space of these pine landscapes from the vantage point of an individual with roots in East Asia.


Andong Zheng (b. 1992, Hefei) lives and works in The Hague, Netherlands. He received his MFA in Photography from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2019 and is currently pursuing studies in the Master Photography & Society program at the Royal Academy of Art, The Hague. With a background in engineering, Zheng was trained to focusing on micro details within strict causal frameworks but often found himself doubting macro structures. Inspecting and destabilizing are his frequent gestures to engage with the external world photographically. He is curious about how images traverse the boundaries of rationality while refusing to simplify his practice to the mapping of established knowledge systems. His recent work investigates the intersection of botanical studies (with its colonial past) and contemporary geopolitical contexts.

11565KM

11,565 Kilometers Project tracks the path of an artifact from the Shandong province (China) to the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology (USA). This work highlights issues related to the circulation of Chinese artifacts, the complexity of Chinese colonial histories. It portrays the long migration of this Chinese coffin, its historical colonial background, and the power dynamics within institutional museum collections.

Zhang utilized historical documents to shape his perspective of history; his exploration reflected the dynamic changes behind postcolonial Shandong. With Western historians and Chinese archaeologists’ help, Zhang collected hundreds of pieces of evidence of German and Japanese colonial occupation and their involvement in antique looting and acquisitions.

This project seeks to maintain cultural relics as carriers of history, and the intricate connection between the circulation looted artifacts and the collections of Western museums. When going through the process of textualization in museums, the historical narratives residing in artifacts are institutionalized and obscured by a form of “inauthenticity.” As participants of history, artists can prompt new historical narratives, as Zhang’s investigation through photography attempts to reconstruct artifacts’ original contexts and uncover veiled histories; the making of artifact’s specimens and archives employ material information to confront the muted historical narrative beyond textualization. The “imagined artifact exhibition” constructed upon the image and archive enumerated above can form new sites that interrogate the power dynamics of museum space and the cultural structures embedded within the institutional narratives of artifactual histories.


The practice of Beichen Zhang often manifests in the form of photography, essay films, mixed media installations and institutional research. His multimedia works query and investigate the relationship between cultural heritages and Asian colonial history, archive and geopolitical vicissitude, and the identity’s fluidity within a postcolonial context, with visual metonymy as a carrier of personal narratives that encompass archaeological and anthropological research. Zhang has exhibited on numerous international platforms, such as the 8th Daegu Photo Biennale in South Korea, the 34th Image Forum Festival in Tokyo, the 2022 Jimei X Arles International Photo Festival and more. He has received numerous international accolades, including the nomination for the Foam Paul Huf Award 2023, the nominations for the C/O Berlin Talent Award 2023, the Best Portfolio Prize of the 8th Singapore International Photography Festival (2022), the selected Artist of Top 20.21 Chinese Contemporary Photographer (2021) and more.

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Recovered—Recipe Book

Misprints from Lan’s previous fabric photo prints were cut up and reassembled as weavings through plastic twine, the kind of cord they found all around them in Tkaronto’s Chinatown (where they live), typically used in fruit crates and newspaper packaging. The mundane materials mirrored their cellphone photograph, cluttering a digital archive with decontextualization. The resulting object takes on an accelerated loss of information, being made less legible from their reproduction. For Recovered—Recipe Book, the shiny red, green, and blue thread mimic RGB digital image rendering, the only remnant left of an artwork that got lost in shipping in 2022.


Lan “Florence” Yee is a visual artist and cultural worker based in Tkaronto/Toronto & Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang/Montreal. They collect text in underappreciated places and ferment it until it is too suspicious to ignore. Lan’s work has been exhibited at the Textile Museum of Canada (2023-24), Darling Foundry (2022), the Toronto Museum of Contemporary Art (2021), and the Gardiner Museum (2019), among others. They obtained a BFA from Concordia University and an MFA from OCAD U as a Joseph-Armand Bombardier SSHRC scholar. Lan has been awarded grants from the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Council for the Arts, and the Toronto Arts Council. They are a recipient of the William and Meredith Saunderson Prizes for Emerging Artists (2023). Lan is a member of JIA Foundation as curator of the Chinatown House MTL.

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Believe it or Not

Believe it or Not developed from Shellie Zhang’s research in Treaty 6/Saskatoon. During this time, Zhang came across omitted and fictionalized narratives of early Chinese settlers which led her to search for accounts outside of the dominant historical context.

Referencing the murder mystery game Clue, each image and set of archival materials in the work serves piece together the stories she learned, with objects/props standing in as witnesses, evidence or recreations of them. Stories include focuses on the Quong Wing v Rex Supreme Court case, the Moose Jaw Exchange Café, a laundry tax petition in Saskatoon, a proposed Chinatown gate in Saskatoon, Saskatoon’s first Chinatown, and the Golden Dragon Café.

Believe it or Not is a case study on the politics of believability, how legacies of colonial narratives have been longstanding contributors to prevailing misconceptions of truth, whom the distance of fiction comforts and the power of local history.


Shellie Zhang creates images, objects and projects in a wide range of media to explore how integration, diversity and assimilation is implemented and negotiated, and how manifestations of these ideas relate to lived experiences. Zhang is interested in oral and local history, and how the objects and iconographies of culture are remembered and preserved.

Zhang has exhibited at venues including Asian Art Initiative (Philadelphia) and the Institute of Contemporary Art San Diego. In 2017, She was an Artist-in-Residence at the Art Gallery of Ontario. In 2021, she was a recipient of the Toronto Friends of the Visual Arts Artist Award. Her work is in public collections such as the Robert McLaughlin Gallery and the McMaster Museum of Art. Zhang is a founding board member of the Toronto Chinatown Land Trust. In Fall 2024, she will be pursuing a Master of Fine Arts in Sculpture at Yale University.

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Central Union Railroad & Saint Denis

Central Union Railroad & Saint Denis investigates the history of Chinese migrant workers during the construction of the First Transcontinental Railroad between 1863 and 1869 in the USA. Through a series of darkroom contact prints with digital negative transfer film made out of video game screenshots, this body of work experiments with the materiality of photography across the digital and the analog and examines contemporary racial representations and historical narratives in the video game industry.

Yuxiang Dong (born 1990, Wujiang, Jiangsu Province, China) is an art, educational, and social worker. His current practices and research are driven by the contradiction between ethnography in the Anthropocene and speculation of object-oriented ontology. He received an Honorable Mention of the PhMuseum Photography Grant (2023) and was a longlist of The Lumen Prize for Art and Technology (2023) and a finalist of the Three Shadows Photography Award (2016). He has exhibited at Hermitage Museum & Gardens, Norfolk, VA (US), OCAT Institute, Beijing (China); Verzasca Foto, Canton of Ticino (Switzerland); Jakarta International Photo Festival, Jakarta, (Indonesia); PhMuseum Days, PhMuseum, Bologna (Italy); and other international venues. His documentaries and filmic works have been screened at Obskuur Ghent Film Festival (Belgium), Doc. Boston Documentary Film Festival (US), Stay Art Festival (China), and other global festivals.

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中文翻译 Chinese Translation
...
记忆之轨 Memory Lane

“所有的记忆都是个人的、无法被复刻——随着每个人所逝去。所谓的集体记忆，不是缅怀，而是一种约定俗成：一个关于故事的如何发生，以及图像如何将故事锁定在我们脑中。”

—苏珊·桑塔格《旁观他人之痛苦》

记忆是个矛盾体，近在咫尺却又模糊不清，图像既是对于过往的存储也是屏障。在此展览中，艺术家董宇翔、余承佳、张北辰、张雪莱、以及郑安东的作品致敬了记忆的非连贯性，从个人层面的不可复刻拉拽至集体记忆的约定俗成，将记忆转换为一个冲突性的场域。

余承佳和张北辰的作品都尝试与记忆的流失做和解。余承佳将ta的感性触角掷于在过度复刻中逐渐流失的日常及亲缘记忆；张北辰则在检索依附于掠夺之物的个人记忆中、将殖民主义的根植的榨取逻辑逐渐放大。郑安东的“迎客松”，是帝国操纵叙事的工具，结合对于黄山松的文化想象，将日常的观看重新定位成一种具有政治目的的行为，解构植物分类学背后根深蒂固的帝国情怀。董宇翔和张雪莱的作品挖掘了档案中的种族经济延伸出的华裔形象，与其在现实与历史编纂过程中的单一化与重复性。

记忆的年轮迂回曲折，行走在个人与集体相互交织的冲突场域上，怀旧情结诱使人们试图重新定位和过去的亲缘关系。在追寻的过程中，人们与素未谋面的场所和小路擦肩而过，这扭曲了人们的视野，部分的过往变得难以接近，部分则被雕琢的更加清晰。

郑安东，
《如何（未）命名一棵树》，2024

我出生和成长在在黄山松的故乡。一次偶然的机遇，我在黄山山顶的一棵黄山松的铭牌上看到了一个被混用的拉丁文学名：Pinus Taiwanensis Hayata。循着这条植物分类学历史的线索，一个横贯二十世纪的围绕着黄山松（Pinus Hwangshanensis Hsia）、台湾二叶松（Pinus Taiwanensis Hayata）与琉球松（Pinus Luchuensis Mayr）三个近缘种之间定名问题的争议图景向我缓缓展开。帝国知识的谱系为我指出了这些近缘种是如何在当时植物学研究的殖民背景下所定义，在按图索骥与试图跳出这种知识结构之间的矛盾中，我踏上了去往这些松树各自的栖息地拍摄它们的旅程。

自冰盛期至今，全球的海平面不断上升，逐渐淹没了这三个近缘种栖息地之间曾经互联的陆桥。早在海因里希·迈尔（Heinrich Mayr）、早田文藏和夏纬英的远征、采集、命名与制图之前，这些栖息地的自然历史就已显示了这些物种间更为深远的联系。

当我切身地面对这些东亚的松景时，我最终回到了观看本身。在所知与所见的夹角中，我试图审视与再次想象观看这一动作，以一个来自东亚内部的个体视角，重新渲染这些松景的复合时空。

11，565公里项目试图重构一件文物由山东省（中国）到宾夕法尼亚大学考古与人类学博物馆（美国）的流通与转移的路径。该影像项目重点调查了中国文物的海外流通，中国殖民历史档案的复杂性，描绘了名为Object#40-35-4的汉代坟墓碎片由中国开始的长期迁徙，背后的其历史殖民背景以及美国博物馆机构的权力动态。

张北辰将错综复杂且隐秘的历史图像探索视为一种对他个人历史观的塑造过程，由个人叙事出发对于景观背后的权力动态变化进行了反思。在西方历史学者以及中国考古学家的帮助下，张从各方搜集而来数百张图像和历史档案，包含了德国与日本在山东殖民历史等等。

该项目强调：作为历史载体的海外离散文物，在经历不同国家文化系统，博物馆收藏系统以及策展人文本化之后，其背后历史的阐述已然机构化，其语境亦丢失了部分“原真性”。而艺术家作为参与者可以推动新的叙事产生，张通过摄影调查尝试重建文物的原始语境并揭开被掩盖的历史；文物标本与档案的制作则利用物质信息正视文本之外的被缄默的历史叙事。在上述图像和档案的基础

此系列作品来自于余承佳之前印制的布料照片上的错印，剪碎后重新用塑料麻绳编制起来，这种麻绳在多伦多的唐人街（ta所居住的地方）随处可见，通常用于水果箱和报纸的包装。这些平凡的材料与ta的手机照片如出一辙，失去语境后使数字档案变得杂乱无章。由此的产物加速了信息的流失，再制的过程降低了可读性。《修复》系列中的作品《菜谱》，由闪亮的红、绿、蓝三色线模仿RGB数字图像渲染，这是2022年运输过程中丢失的艺术品里唯一的残留物。

《中央联合铁路与圣丹尼斯》调查了1863年至1869年间美国第一条横贯大陆铁路建设期间的中国移民工人的历史。通过数字化转印游戏截屏为底片，并通过暗房接触印刷产出，此系列作品通过数字和底片摄影材料性的试验，审视了电子游戏产业中的当代种族形象和历史叙事。 

中文翻译 Chinese Translation

On August 30th, 2024 from 6-7PM there was a curators tour of Memory Lane where Brubey Hu and Simon Yantong Li of Tangent Collective guideded us through the works of Yuxiang Dong, Lan “Florence” Yee, Beichen Zhang, Shellie Zhang, and Andong Zheng. Afterwards was the opening reception of Memory Lane, in The New Gallerys Main Space.

Fish Skin Tanning Workshop
with Morgan Possberg Denne

December 2nd & 9th, 2023

This workshop has 2 parts, participants are asked to attend both parts of the workshop.

@ The New Gallery
208 Centre St SE

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Cradleboards have been used for thousands of years by our ancestors to carry and love for our future generations. They have protected us, acted as an external womb, and given us a place as children to watch our parents' culture and learn from a safe distance. I’ve always wondered if the fact that neither my father, his father, or myself was ever put in a cradleboard may have had a long term impact on our development, personhood, and our coping mechanisms to the ways that colonialism, residential schools and the foster care system has affected my family.

Now as an adult I deeply wish I could rewind the clock and put myself, and my father before me, and his father before him in a cradleboard as a child. To softly sing songs to us, give us safety, and to give us a connection to our culture in a safe environment. Maybe this would fix things. As kids when we were supposed to be kept safe and playing in the woods we were instead being prepped for the meat factory - the eternal meat grinder of colonialism.

The western world teaches us to push aside this childhood imagining and innocence - “These things can’t be undone!”, but what if they could? In another world somebody took better care of us, in another time we learned to drum and sing and dance, in another place we were listened to by adults who had the capacity to love and care for us.

These hot chest and aching throat feelings, the times of biting back angry tears and saying “It’s fine” have to count for something….right?

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In this text Morgan and Jordan speak on consent and permission, considering what is sacred and sharing their feelings on relational community.

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Morgan Possberg Denne is Two-Spirit millennial scoop and foster care survivor; with settler, Cree, Metis, and Chippewa blood connections. They have grown up in treaty 7 territory, and have relatives in southern and northern Ontario. Morgan creates imaginative, illustrative objects which could be seen as pieces of possible narratives, different ways to connect with the past and potential futures through layers of abstraction with no right or wrong answer. What matters to them is not accurately recreating the past or to predict the future, but rather to capture an inner truth and a possible alternative reality of colonial experiences. In a sense, creating new culture from a series of “what-ifs” and new stories / lore. Their work has been recently shown at the Confederation Centre for the Arts and Gallery Gachet.



Jordan Baylon (they/she/he) is a second generation PilipinX artist, critic and community worker imagining justice and abundance for equity-deserving peoples within the spaces of all our relations: personal, communal and societal. As an artist, Jordan explores queer and racialized identities as liminal spaces: both and neither; between, across and through; both inside and outside; and both literal and imagined. Jordan’s community practice leverages a decade of experience in the non-profit arts and culture sectors, where they developed their critical lens around equity, anti-racism and systems change. After many years navigating institutions, Jordan now devotes their interest and attention to working at grassroots alongside equity-deserving individuals and communities.--




中文翻译 Chinese Translation ...

我父親的搖籃板

數千年來，我們的祖先一直使用搖籃板來承載和愛護我們的後代。 它們保護我們，就像一個外在的子宮，給了我們一個作為孩子的地方，讓我們在安全的距離觀察父母的文化並學習。 我一直在想，我的父親、他的父親和我自己都沒有被放在搖籃板上，這一事實是否會對我們的成長、人格和我們的應對機制產生長期影響，就像殖民主義、寄宿 學校和寄養系統對我們家庭的影響一樣。 現在，身為一個成年人，我深深希望時光能夠倒流，讓我自己、我的父親和他的父親在孩提時代都放在搖籃上。 在一個安全的環境中，輕輕地為我們唱歌，給我們安全，讓我們與我們的文化建立聯繫。 也許這樣就能解決問題。 當我們還是孩子的時候，我們本應在森林中安全玩耍，但我們卻被送進了肉類加工廠--殖民主義的永恆絞肉機。 西方世界教導我們將這種童年的想像和純真推到一邊--"這些事情無法挽回！"，但如果可以呢？ 在另一個世界，有人更好地照顧我們；在另一個時代，我們學會了擊鼓、唱歌和跳舞；在另一個地方，我們被有能力愛護我們的成年人傾聽著。 這些胸口發熱、喉嚨疼痛的感覺，那些反擊憤怒的淚水，說 "沒事 "的時候，說“沒事”的時刻，這些都應該值得一些什麼……對吧？

Morgan Possberg Denne是雙靈千禧世代的領養倖存者；與定居者、克里人、梅蒂斯人和奇佩瓦人都有血緣關係。 Morgan在第 7 條約區長大，在安大略省南部和北部都有親戚。 Morgan創作的作品充滿想像力，圖文並茂，可以被視為可能的敘事片段，透過沒有對錯之分的抽象層次，以不同的方式與過去和潛在的未來聯繫起來。 對Morgan來說，重要的不是要準確地再現過去或預測未來，而是捕捉內在的真相和殖民經驗可能的替代現實。 從某種意義上說，從一系列 "假設 "和新故事/傳說中創造出新的文化。 Morgan的作品最近在聯邦藝術中心（Confederation Centre for the Arts）和Gallery Gachet展出,並與2023 年冬季在新畫廊舉辦個展。

Jordan Baylon（他們/她/他）是第二代菲律賓裔（性別中立）藝術家、評論家和社區工作者，致力於在個人、社區和社會的各種關係空間中構想公正和豐盛，為那些應 得到平等的人爭取正義。 作為藝術家，Jordan探索酷兒和種族特徵的身份，將其視為邊緣空間：既是又不是；既在兩者之間，又穿過兩者；既在內部又在外部；既是真實的 又是想像的。 Jordan的社區實踐借助了在非營利藝術和文化領域積累的十年經驗，其中他培養了對公平、反種族主義和系統變革的批判性視角。 在經歷了多年的機構工作後，Jordan現在將興趣和注意力致力於與應得平等的個體和社區一起進行基層工作。

中文翻译 Chinese Translation

ᓄᐦᑕᐃᐧᕀ ᐊᐢᑯᑖᐢᑯᐱᓱᐣ
nohtawiy askotâskopison
My father’s cradleboard

A conversation between
Jordan Baylon and Morgan Possberg Denne

In this text Morgan and Jordan speak on consent and permission, considering what is sacred and sharing their feelings on relational community.

M - Going into this conversation I think it's best to be chill with things. When things are overly planned, or you think about it too much it becomes academic, and that's not the purpose or goal. There's nothing wrong with academic, but it's not accessible or the vibe.


J - Yeah I think the accessibility is an important part.


M - Yeah it shows. You can have these deep conversations about art, feelings and the world and how one person might process those things but still have it be understandable is important. How we all are inhabiting our own worlds but processing them differently. I think that relates to what I wanted to talk about. The main things I'm thinking of lately when I make work is permission and consent, which I think are linked together.


J - That's when I become interested. Let's break that down.


M - What's the difference?


J - What does either one feel attached to that's real for you, in either case, or both, or neither?


M - When I think about permission vs consent, I think both can be given and taken away. Permission is something you give yourself, but I’m not sure if you’d give yourself consent?


J - Both of these things are very connected to the container that surrounds them. Which is a situation or a context. For example, if this is about me having to locate my individual agency, that means a really different thing on an interpersonal level vs systemic or structural or societal or cultural or communal level. Permission seems more connected to….something that feels raw and unfiltered. Some sort of relational space. vs consent feels very specific to a shared cultural experience around things like sexual violence, hegemony, oppression, colonialism, right? We use the word consent when we’re discussing the points of interface with other humans that often are connected to potential for the most harm. We’re using that word to invoke what a collective space of safety looks like.

M - Consent as related to harm mitigation.


J - Yes , in how I have a relationship to the word. As connected to the Me Too movement and how over politicized that word has become. Not just what we’re talking about, but a culture as well. Permission seems so personal, not as connected to harm. Connected to acceptance, affirmation, holding, welcoming.


M - When I think about permission; it's an oversimplification to say it's a more positive word than consent but it almost is. I feel that there is something more sacred about permission. My association is that you would give yourself to do something, or be ok with something, or to feel something, that feels like a very deeply internal personal healing process. vs. consent I don't have that association with that.


J - I've been thinking a lot about the dichotomy of what is sacred vs what is merely expensive. What is priceless vs something that can be bought. I don’t know if consent even fits into that


M - I think consent can be bought, but permission can not. At least in how I understand them.


J - Consent is connected to negotiation, but permission seems deeply personal. When you offer permission its to yourself and the other on a sacred level, It has to do with your sense of self. Whereas consent is describing a shared space that we may not completely inhabit in and of ourselves. This is connected to the Filipino cultural concept of kapwa, the personal sacred permission space and the ways we relate to each other in a good way, in a community shared space are one and the space in kapwa. We see our individual selves as inextricable from our collective shared experience and identity of being in community.


M - From what I know of most indigenous cultures we would see things that way too. You as an individual and how you experience the world can’t be removed from community, your nation and the land. That's where a lot of the harm of colonialism has come in. This western idea of having to be this special individual is actually quite harmful. Traditionally you’d see yourself as part of a community in kinship with people and the land.


J - Being separate is the original wound for humans. I’m connecting to that. Another way of looking at this is that the word of consent is burdened with our unaddressed wounds. That's why it has a diff feeling space than permission. It resonates with a collectively and systemically perpetuating harm. Cups spilling over generations and generations. I also think about it on a fractal scale too, if the permission is on the level of taproot deep sense of self and values and ancestors, consent is the community space. I think there's other names and words for how we describe the condition of relating on a macro level in society. But we’re not past consent yet. The level of harm that's possible simply in our most intimate personal moments is so high. This word doesn't have the joyful ringing of permission. Permission I can think of sentences for permission. When I think of permission, if I'm giving it it's also reciprocal. If it's myself I’m saying I’m allowing myself to live in a world where this exists. If it's another person, that they exist and their wholeness exists, even if it's not the same as mine. But we affirm each other in that. That's a well shaped emotional space. Even if we can’t always embody that all the time.

We can talk about theory and practice, but where are you personally situated in these feelings? How does it relate to your practice?


M - That's a good question, taking it back to the art and actualization. Maybe I’ll rewind a little bit and say that the reason I wanted to talk about permission and consent; in my experience it's mostly in relation to cultural knowledge and culture. Because of my own lived experience of being mixed Indigenous and going through foster care and then being adopted out and growing up in a territory that isn’t actually my traditional territory. It's kinda being a settler, but also not really in the normal sense of the word. I was placed here in foster care and didn’t choose to be here, but I’m still here. It's a weird thing I’ve always struggled with, and will always continue to. And I should; this is the struggle that should be happening. There's a lot of tension with that around cultural knowledge in art making and permission and consent. This permission and consent around cultural knowledge could be from community, elders, knowledge keepers, peers, or yourself, and I’m interested in how that applies to art making, healing, storytelling, even down to learning actual craft techniques like how to weave something or tan a hide or fish skin which I’ve been doing a lot of. There's a lot of tension there, but it's a really specific type that's specific for Indigenous people in this place. I know this is quite a shared experience of being worried about stealing your own culture. It's difficult. I don't think you can actually steal your own culture. Inherently as a human you have a birthright to your own culture, but because of colonialism we feel like we don't. We’re not always able to give ourselves permission to dive in. I mean there are protocols you have to follow of course. I don’t have an issue with protocol at all, but it's difficult if there's something that's almost died out and it's hard to find the right person with the knowledge. I do think in those cases it's more important to just do the thing to the best of your ability rather than to let a piece of culture die. That's a bit of a point of contention within my community. I do understand the want to protect culture, and feeling like you need to gatekeep, but it's difficult. It all comes back to permission and consent, right?


J - Whats interesting to hear you share that, is it would be easy to respond to you from a place of trying to give you permission. But that's not what we’re doing right now. It's interesting to examine all the layers of this. We feel permission is related to the sacred, and our values and communities, while consent feels further away. The other thing I was thinking of while you were sharing, if we’re talking about permission being sacred, priceless and something that can’t be bought, I think we can diagnose everything you talked about by saying, well, your culture was stolen. I’m using that in the broadest sense, it's the idea that what was sacred was tampered with, was taken away, is either being literally or figuratively or financially or politically controlled by those who should instead live in relation to that sanctity. When it comes to the cultural knowledge of what youre talking about I’m hearing that the word is burdened by the reality of what has been stolen. If it's been stolen, you asked a question about how can you appropriate yourself? Maybe it's a sacred thing of like that can never be appropriated because that's who I am. Who I am is also a part of the fabric of what the collective story looks like. On the other hand maybe it is possible to feel like we’re in the space of the stealing of our actions aren’t bringing that culture collectively back to the sacred. That's what we’re always worried about - like pretendians and people appropriating indigeneity, and allies, other racialized folks displacing you. Other diasporic people displacing the original peoples of this land. It makes sense that the stakes are that high because it doesn't seem safe. Because honestly, we’re not back home yet. And we need to bring it home.

M - I dont think you can appropriate your own culture, but I’ll add a footnote; you do have a right to your own culture because it's yours, but you can misuse it. I’m not qualified to be the singular decider of what “misusing” it is, I mean I have some ideas. Profiting from things that culturally shouldn’t be profited from, or sharing closed practices that shouldnt be shared. I know there's some people who have rights to some very closed ceremonies who decide to share them in germany. They’d rather share the rights to those ceremonies with germans who are paying for it - they’re making $ off of doing this. They'd rather do that then go out in community and connect with youth, and queer, trans, 2S people. The people who are really struggling and may really benefit from having access to those things, often don’t have access to ceremony and culture. In a situation like that, yeah, it's almost like you’re appropriating your own culture. I think that's wrong.


J - I hear us trying to figure out how to talk about it. I feel the emotional throughline of what you’re saying, I understand it. And I also hear you searching for language to match at a communal level what is actually an embodied feeling you have. That's interesting to me. Again, because something is stolen we’re always thinking about credentials now. But if I try to do the futurist thing and imagine a utopia where our values are embodied by us, and we have a space of pluralities. If we’re relating from that place, the relationships themselves are the sacred structure. But we don't have that on a societal level because of colonialism and capitalism. Stolen lands, stolen bodies. It's like we’re looking for criteria on a communal level that is aligned with our values at our most personal, which is where we have to live if we’re people of the global majority who have experienced this colonial violence. It's almost like we need a set of relational criteria. This is the language of people who are stealing, trying to put a price and make money off of the spiritual. The way they have conversations about the sacred is to put a price on it. This related to conversations about representation too. We’re just counting brown faces, wheelchairs etc in spaces. We’re realizing it's not really about whose faces are in these harmful structures, it's about being able to relate in a good way and have structures reflect that. That's what we don't have in a societal way. You’re just trying to be yourself. How many hyphenations do you have to do, impossible metaphysical existential calculus around just to solve that equation. Because you don't have someone to say, ‘OMG morgan it's ok to just be you’. The respect is born out in your relationality. You will respect your knowledge and teachings because you're of your community. I’m still trying to figure this out for myself in my community too. A lot of it is trying to be an elder to yourself sometimes. You’re like an elder, you do have experiences that are very valuable. We have so much more relating to do across so many gradations of experience, making sure the whole family is at the table.


M - A little bit ago you mentioned hyphenations, I see that actualized for Indigenous people in our last names. Lots of people have 2, 3, 4 last names, often hyphenated together, sometimes not. It's our own attempts to understand our own community, and place ourselves into something that has been so colonized that it's hard to even process. But it's actualized in our attempts at cobbling together last names. It's related to something I’ve been thinking about too; we’re trying to climb out of this hole of colonialism and everything related to it, but we’re still grasping for colonial solutions to the colonial problem.


J - That's the thing, yeah! I thought after 2020 we’d still be having more conversations about this, the word structure is being co-opted. I remember talking about intent over impact in 2020. This isn’t new, it's very bedrock, but not reflected in the way we talk about things, or the frameworks of meaning making that we’re applying to our situations which are still very much colonial. I think it's getting more and more confusing to try to work it out on the level of the communal. For folks like us who share a very liminal and venn diagram relationship to all of our structures because we both also have relative privilege and those sorts of things, I also feel like we’re missing that permission space. We don't have spaces to have the sacred kind of conversations. What is the accounting of the cultural currency that we think we’re trading? If we’re looking at it on that level are we willing to also look at capitalism and its interconnectedness with colonialism, and white supremacy? That's a hard conversation, but people want to have it on the level of public discourse, so it just becomes things like policing each other's language. What does the proper certification look like? A lot of people I work with want me to give them a gold star, when like, I want them to just be able to relate to me in the space we’re in - it's messy.


M - It's that fear of vulnerability, but you have to be vulnerable if we’re going to try to move together through this.


J - Vulnerability is the gift. It's the permission to be intimate with what's real for you. One of the cultural artifacts of colonialism is the individualism, every white man for himself and then everyone else is disposable. That's connected to all of this as well. We’re imagining vulnerability as a resource like a fossil fuel - there's already a violence in how we’re framing that. Instead we could choose permission to be who I am. Even though we know that the textures of that, experiences of that, societal implications of that have different stakes for people in different bodies. That's a gift, I think. How do we think about this interpersonal alchemy? How do we do that fractal, portal jumping? It's going back to myself, even just checking in, like do I feel good, is my whole self present in the conversation? Even thinking about Pam Tzeng, another person in our communities, thinking about choices. Choices feel connected to sacred somehow to me. If I'm in relation that means I choose it. The personal agency has meaning because I'm navigating that with others. That's the dance and the music of it all, of relating in a good way.


M- You’re making me think about one of my friends, Cowboy, he talks often about ghosts, and how people often become ghosts in response to colonialism, as a defense mechanism of having to move through the world in the way that it is. One thing he's talked about that stuck with me, is that the tactic of shaming didn’t exist in indigenous cultures pre colonialism. Like shaming others because of something, or as a tactic to do something or not to do something, or to agree with you, or not take action when something is wrong. I’ve experienced that too in workspaces or in the arts, the use of that shaming tactic via white supremacy. I feel this is also very related to permission and consent.


J - We’ve all got the download; you know how when you get a computer they just come with microsoft? You live in colonialism you just get downloaded christianity. All of us have a pretty passing understanding of basic christian tenants. Shame is very connected to permission; to taboo, to the idea that your body is not yours - you don’t make those choices. It took something that is inextricable from my guts and externalized it. But to then take that and extrapolate an  ideological framework and then transmit that through the violence of colonialism,  what you get is a whole society of people who are not connected to where the beauty of community lives, which is also in their bodies. The joy of community is also the joy of getting to be yourself. The joy of being in right relations is the joy of being in harmony, and the joy of allowing your best self to emerge. I really believe that. I want to revisit some old conversations with Cowboy now - ghosts is something I’m working through in my own practice as well. Same christian download of shame and the theft of body autonomy on a basic level. It's brought me to a place now where the ghost thing speaks to a lack of my own substance and presence in one universe and more the reality that as a person who shares these experiences with others, its multiple selves, multiple identities and multiple dimensions some of which are overlapping and some of which are not. When I feel ghostly, its really a description of whatever are the conditions of that universe in which I’m being perceived partially.


M - It's related to people not actually having an understanding of your full self - which, they maybe never can?


J - They maybe never can, but whether they can intuit that or not, the conditions created by colonialism make it so that the material conditions of me being able to exist as my whole self are at stake and theirs are not if they’re privileged within that system and structure.


M - When you're in community the reality that we can’t fully understand each other almost isn’t a concern.


J - Right. It's not a concern because there's capacity and wisdom and experience and a community practice around conflict transformation. In our individualistic society we don't have that, where instead of working through differences we just build up cases against each other, and whoever loses is disposable.

It's at these moments where I become quiet - oh man! I guess what I’m trying to say is that relating in a good way in whatever scale that is connected to the real is already the magic happening. It's the goal and the outcome in itself. If we can live there and build out connections in that space - it's also where we feel the most resourced. It's also where we feel coregulated with other people, yeah, then we can make mistakes. Privileged artists, they don't worry about making mistakes. Across all these equity deserving communities that you and I intersect with, nobody ever feels like they can fuck up.


M - Even when it comes to specific cultural knowledge, like if you're making work to do with your culture - I’m even seeing white artists doing that now, which is fine and valid, but they don’t have the level of struggle. They don't have to think about or worry about self appropriation of culture. But almost every Indigenous artist I've talked to has worried, or thought about it at some point.


J - Because it's been stolen from them. The white folks don’t even know it's a thing. They imagine they inherited it. I would reframe that as their own erasure, not our lack (equity deserving, colonized folks, disabled, queer folks). We don’t have permission to be ourselves a lot of the time. Having permission to relate at that really basic level I feel like. Did I make a big jump there?


M - Part of that conversation was telepathic I think, but vibes were received. These kinds of conversations are so important, but you kinda come to the end of it and you’re almost more confused. Maybe not confused, but maybe you’re nourished but overwhelmed at the same time.


J - I feel that too. I think at this moment I’m nourished, but maybe what makes it feel more chaotic is the idea that I have to have language for this thing that is very deeply body felt.


M - These feelings are such deep body feelings, and it's so hard to translate them to words. I wish I could just interpretively dance them to you instead.


J - This is a limited discourse! Dance works too! There's also play, you know? If we could just relate in a good way all this stuff doesn't have the same stakes. But we keep trying to relate through broken harmful structures; some outcomes that we don’t want are going to keep happening. Why do we keep perpetuating that structure? Even that thing of “we gotta be vulnerable in order to…..” Instead of “we get to be vulnerable if we just give ourselves permission to do that right now?” I love that! It feels confusing too. It's naming the wholeness that's inscribed by the circle of your body.


M - That whole idea of vulnerability, I'm simultaneously on board and yet not on board at all. In that specific situation I am Schrodinger's cat.


J - it's all about boxes! It's literally about where you get to be. The boxes that are placed on us don't fit. When you place vulnerability in the permission space it's a sacred thing, but if you put it into the land of the stolen it becomes exploitative. All of the things we really value, when they are placed in community, relations, and things we really value it becomes a good thing. When it comes into the space of ownership - not everything should be owned. We’re owned by the land. Colonial culture is all about extraction and controlling.


M - Not to minimize this, the conversation, or any kind of theory, but on a visceral level, it's also not that complex! What if you just were nice to other people, and yourself?


J - Lets be specific! What it comes down to for me in my community practice which is anti-oppression in a lot of nonprofits; is grandma stuff. Have you eaten? Did you sleep enough? Little reads like you need to take a nap! Those are the things that are missing from our relational fabric, in oppressive cultures connected to patriarchy. Its that simple, its just figuring out how to be around each other.


M - We need to go back to kindergarten.


J - Yeah we didn't have that! Decolonial kindergarten. We were already being prepped for the meat factory.

SCARAOKE FUNDRAISER

When: October 28th, 7PM - 10PM
Where: The New Gallery Mainspace (208 Centre St SE, T2G 2B6 Calgary, AB)

It’s time to dress up in your Halloween attire and sing your heart out 🔪️❤️️ at The New Gallery’s Halloween Karaoke Fundraiser aka SCARAOKE! This October 28th we can’t wait to hear your screeches and screams and be haunted by your ghostly ballads.
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We will have some excellent mood lighting, a variety of snacks, our regular bar selection, as well as sober cocktails. To pick a song, it’s a toonie and an extra 2$ will bump you up in the queue.⁠
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Your support matters! For more than 45 years, The New Gallery has thrived with the enthusiasm, dedication and collective energy of our community members. All proceeds from this fundraiser will support TNG's programming and our long-term sustainability.

⁠TNG is still strongly recommending masks for the safety of our artists, staff, and community. ⁠
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Can’t wait to see you all there!⁠

October 18th, 2023
1-4PM
@ The New Gallery

208 Centre St SE
T2G 2B6 Calgary, AB

︎Please RSVP here by October 16.

There are limited spots total to participate in this workshop, if you sign up and realize later that you can't make it, please be mindful and email gendaiclub@gmail.com to give your spot up to someone else who may want to participate!

Join Gendai for a contracts workshop on Wednesday, October 18 from 1-4pm. Gendai is a collective based in Tkaronto/Toronto dedicated to envisioning a more equitable art sector through collective research with BIPOC artists and arts workers.

The workshop aims to reform contract language by starting with the material needs of freelance artists/arts workers. We will look at samples of employment or exhibition contracts issued by cultural institutions and critique them as a group. We encourage participants to bring a contract that they are currently struggling with and use our discussion as a leveraging tactic. Participants can also bring an older contract, as an example of what worked and what didn't. Please note that we will not have lawyers present at the workshop.

With your consent, discussions in the workshop will contribute towards materials for Gendai NDA, an online, crowd-sourced database of contracts commonly encountered by contemporary art practitioners. The project informally and anonymously utilizes collective bargaining power to encourage sector transparency and demand more equitable standards for labour conditions in the arts. A beta version of Gendai NDA will launch on The New Gallery's Mainframe platform in November.

For more information on Gendai’s work on contracts, check out their interview in the podcast The Transparency that Helps All of Us by Geneviève Wallen.

If you have any questions/concerns, please email gendaiclub@gmail.com.

About Gendai
Gendai (Marsya Maharani and Petrina Ng) is an art collective based in Tkaronto/Toronto dedicated to racialized artists as the next generation of cultural leaders, radical thinkers, and visionaries.

Throughout its twenty-year history, Gendai has supported experimental curatorial and organizational practices, whilst creating space for East Asian artists and artists of colour. As Gendai’s newest stewards, Marsya and Petrina are investing in the future of racialized arts leadership through collective research and practice. We began with Gendai MA MBA: Mastering the Art of Misguided Business Administration: a year-long capacity-development & network-building think tank between nine majority-BIPOC art collectives to critique and re-imagine institutional practices by centering values of collectivity, equity, and access. This developed into Gendai CO-OP: an ongoing research that responds to toxic labour conditions especially experienced by BIPOC arts workers at museums and art galleries. Using gossip as a methodology to trace the contours of institutional power, Gendai builds relationships with emerging and mid-career arts practitioners of colour to learn about current workplace dynamics in the sector. By offering peer mentorship and access to Gendai’s platform, resources, and network, they invite collaborators to support each other in pursuing non-institutional futures and imagine “off-ramps” from the linear expressway of traditional, capitalist, and institutional career progression in the arts. Gendai also participates in Guidance Council, a bi-monthly casual drop-in organized by Alexandra Hong and Peter Rahul for racialized arts workers to share stories and solicit advice from each other. Gendai has published their research in the Gossip issue of C Magazine, titled “We Should Talk: Obvious Truths About Working in the Arts.”

Gaining knowledge is riddled with challenges and triumphs. The journey of doing so is abundant in opportunities to grapple with developing a new skill and confronting our insecurities as we face trial and error firsthand. It is in that experience of building our understanding, whilst coming to terms with the investment required to truly master its execution, that we are humbled and proud—of ourselves for what we have achieved, of those who came before who have taught us, and those who will come after who will learn.


That relationship with learning is further complicated when its preceded by barriers of trauma and genocide—when the people who would have shared their stories and abilities are denied the right to do so by violent force. When Indigenous communities on Turtle Island had the lands they cared for stolen, children abducted and murdered, and cultural practices banned, their colonizers intended to purge Indigenous peoples from history so settlers could determine the narrative’s retelling. And yet, Indigenous people persist.


Resilience is not an adequate word to describe confronting generations of harm, disputing a continued effort to historicize a living population, and criticizing the deeply held anti-Indigenous beliefs that run rampant in Canada. Resilience implies overcoming the hardships an unbiased universe proposes, rather than surviving a concerted effort to violate and destroy; both are admirable, but the latter is a necessity. Julia Rose Sutherland’s work is much more than resilient; it is haunting and beautiful, pointed and evocative, and encourages an appreciation for practices that are maintained rather than archived.


In her performance Gesipatl Iga’latl” (Pain and Release), porcupine quills pierce Sutherland’s flesh, rendering her body sacred and precious. She mirrors the beloved birchbark boxes that are delicately woven with quills by her Mi’kmaq community, honouring her people by using those same slender barbs against her skin and calling attention to the commodification of Indigenous bodies often denied dignity and life. Sutherland embodies a resonant autonomy because she is not an object for a glass case and her actions are not for you. They are a tribute and we are simply fortunate she has decided to share that moment with us.


In this, Sutherland compromises one of the foundations of colonialism. Rather than enabling the legacy of a white supremacist lens that would fetishize or exoticize her actions and maintain a hierarchy of power, she has repurposed the frame to reflect the strength of Indigenous peoples as they persevere and thrive. Simultaneously, Sutherland exposes the intimate ties between privilege and complacency as she bleeds to reconcile with Canada’s colonial history and honour her Mi’kmaq ancestors.


It is in Sutherland’s stoic gaze that we are denied any indulgence in her pain. Instead, we are asked to watch as Sutherland draws the explicit parallels between seeking colonially forbidden knowledge and the mutilation of her body, a spiritual gesture that is deeply tied to endurance and kinship in certain Indigenous ceremonies and does not abide by the comfort of an audience who may be unfamiliar with its significance.


In the end, Sutherland is generous with her rich metaphors and references, but it is up to us to learn from them. Her example provides insight into the terms we must embrace when addressing Canada’s colonial history that has largely been left to fester, and inspiration for the possibilities that lie ahead.

Julia Rose Sutherland (b.1991) is a Mi’kmaq (Metepenagiag Nation) / settler artist and educator (Assistant Professor at OCADU) based out of Tkaronto (Toronto, Canada). Sutherland’s interdisciplinary art practice employs photography, sculpture, textiles, and performance. She earned her MFA at the University at Buffalo (2019) and BFA in Craft and New Media at the Alberta University of the Arts (2013). She has recently shown work at  The Biennale d’art contemporain autochtone (BACA), Bemis Center of Contemporary Art (where she was also a summer 2021 Artist in Resident), the Mackenzie Art Gallery, K Art Gallery, WAAP Gallery, and 59 Rivoli Gallery in Paris, France. Sutherland is a recent recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts Creating Knowing Sharing award and the AFA Indigenous Individual Project grant.


Brandon Giessmann is a visual artist and writer who explores trauma, identity, and memory. He received his BFA from the Alberta University of the Arts in 2018 and his MFA at SUNY: University at Buffalo in New York in 2020. His interdisciplinary practice often uses performance, photography, and installation to bridge generational gaps in knowledge and experiences of the closet and genocide, consider the effects of the ongoing AIDS crisis, and reflect upon the role that institutions play in the conservation and presentation of queer histories.

The New Gallery is thrilled to invite our community to join us for a quillwork on birch bark workshop with Julia Rose Sutherland, Saturday, November 5th, 2022, 11 AM to 2 PM.


Please join Artist Julia Rose Sutherland in an interactive workshop exploring the foundations of porcupine quillwork. This workshop will run for three hours and will cover how to clean and apply colour through natural dyes, basic quillwork applications, and stitches to create patterns and design motifs. Participants will be provided with birch bark and porcupine quills gifted by the Artist.


Please note that we are asking participants to wear masks for the safety of our community, artists and staff. The workshop will be held in TNG’s Resource Centre, which is not wheelchair accessible. There will be a 30 to 45 minute break during the workshop for lunch. Spaces are limited and registration is required. 


Julia Rose Sutherland is a Mi’kmaq (Metepenagiag Nation) / settler artist and educator (Assistant Professor at OCADU) based out of Tkaronto (Toronto, Canada). Sutherland’s interdisciplinary art practice employs photography, sculpture, textiles, and performance. She earned her MFA at the University at Buffalo (2019) and BFA in Craft and New Media at the Alberta University of the Arts (2013). She has exhibited nationally and internationally, recently showing work at the Bemis Center of Contemporary Art, the Mackenzie Art Gallery, K Art Gallery, WAAP Gallery, and 59 Rivoli Gallery in Paris, France. Sutherland is a recent recipient of the Canada Council for the Arts Creating Knowing Sharing award and the AFA Indigenous Individual Project grant.

Sorry, We’re Open

Rachel Lau

Sorry, We’re Open is a glib imagined apology from seemingly unapologetic participants of gentrification in Chinatown. Originally presented as a publication, Sorry, We’re Open is an ugly hand-bound compilation of text and images documenting gentrification in Vancouver’s  Chinatown. 

The violent displacement of low-income and racialized communities is not exclusive to Vancouver’s Chinatown, however. Across North America, Chinatowns are faced with the pressing reality of displacement by real estate developers, retail businesses, and art spaces  under the guise of revitalization and renewal.

Sorry, We’re Open is an invitation to reflect on how we may be complicit in gentrification in  Chinatown and the urgent need to redistribute resources to support the improvement of material living conditions affecting communities that have been historically redlined and discriminated  against through policy and social exclusion.

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Rachel Lau is a multidisciplinary artist, writer, and community worker based on the unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, colonially known as “Vancouver”. Inspired by the tenderness and strength of queer and racialized communities, they create work that embraces feeling and communality. Their current practice includes sound art, poetry, photography, drawing, and zine-making.

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Sorry, We’re Open was developed with financial support from Libby Leshgold Gallery and first exhibited at Out of Bounds from July to August 2022.

中文翻译 Chinese Translation...

中文翻译 Chinese Translation

Cris Mora is a Filipino-Canadian artist and cultural worker. He was born in Manila in 1984 and moved to Toronto at the age of four. Mora studied Visual Art and Economics at the University of Western Ontario in Canada. He works across disciplines and media to explore the relationship between politics, migration and identity. In addition to his art practice, Mora is also an experienced cultural worker. He has worked as an arts administrator in North America, Europe and Asia. He is currently the Public Art Coordinator at the City of Surrey, BC. Mora has exhibited in Canada, Singapore and the Philippines.

Notes From an Artist-Run Archive

Online Archive Launch & Publication

The New Gallery (TNG) is thrilled to present our newest publication, “Notes From an Artist-Run Archive” written by Steph Weber: “From June until August, 2022, [Steph] was employed via a Canada Summer Jobs grant with the task of addressing TNG’s collection of unpublished archival material: a collection housed in various locations-- cataloged digitally, sorted into filing cabinets, and, in large part, haphazardly arranged in unlabelled cardboard boxes, relics of the multiple institutional relocations in TNG’s recent history.”


You can pick up a free copy of this publication at TNG during gallery hours, or through our publication mail out program, “You’ve Got Mail”

In addition to the launch of this publication, The New Gallery invites you to explore our newly published online archive. This online archive was organized and published by Steph Weber with help from our Mainframe Coordinator, Winona Julian. Our online archive features exhibitions, by artist name, year, and exhibition space all the way back to 1975. It also has a comprehensive guide on how to use TNG’s physical archives, which are open and available for public viewing. For more information, or to explore the archives, head to the link in the bio.  

Take a stroll down memory lane, or discover an artist you never knew before - Click the link below!

︎Online Archive︎

Syrus Marcus Ware – I am because you are. Image courtesy of the artist.

Annie Wong – Braids in the Front, Braids in the Back, 2021.

‘P’ from The Yellow Pages (set of 26 images), Ho Tam, 2021. Image courtesy of the artist.

Milton Lim – whitepages.

Artists in Conversation: Eva Birhanu & Khadijah Morley

Click Here to Read

Bannock and Tea with Loonette the Ghost and House-Head the Home, performance still from IKG Live 2 (2018) at the Illingworth Kerr Gallery. Photo credit: Jeremy Pavka⁣

Kasie Campbell and Ginette Lund –  Matrilineal Threads, 2019.

Carrie Allison – An Identity Metaphor, 2017, beads on pine with reflective surface.