As the CRAG responds to the COVID-19 pandemic, we are exploring ways to adapt our programming, and rescheduling exhibitions as needed. Look for updates that will be posted on our website, Facebook and Instagram, or subscribe to our online newsletter.
HOW WE LEAD
July 20 to November 20, 2020
Artists: Lucie Chan, Justin Langlois
Curator: Vicky Chainey Gagnon
This participatory exhibition involves two artists interpreting the statement “How We Lead” to ask larger questions about: civic engagement and the arts; social well-being; leadership and community building. Members of the public will be invited to free community workshops with local partners to ponder ideas of leadership for themselves.
We are grateful to the British Columbia Arts Council, the Province of British Columbia, and the City of Campbell River for funding.
SUGARBUSH SHRAPNEL
September 24 to November 18, 2020
Artist: Olivia Whetung
Curated by Kimberly Phillips, Assisted by Julia Lamare
Olivia Whetung’s artistic practice extends across a range of media to examine how translation and the transfer of knowledge can be understood, in her words, as “acts of/active native presence.” A significant strand of the Mississauga-Nishinaabe artist’s research has explored ways that knowledge is carried by language, land and bodies of water.
Whetung’s most recent beaded works involve embroidery, a method where beads are sewn with needle and thread onto a surface material that provides the support and background for the imagery. For Whetung, beadwork is a mnemonic device. Knowledge is indexed not only in the beaded image itself, but through the artist’s technique—the embodied act of beading—and encoded in the materials with which she works.
11/0 Selica beads, 6lb Berkley Fireline, rock dust, wood ash
Dimensions variable
Photo: Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver
Whetung also considers questions of climate change and its impact on the animals and plants of her home territories, as well as the transfer of cultural knowledge. Ultra-thin panels of maple, birch and cherry wood veneer stretch vertically from the gallery floor to ceiling like a stand of trees. In the sparest of bead-embroidered and wood-burned lines, sewn through and drawn upon the near-translucent surface of the wood, Whetung traces the fragile—and often undetectable—relationships between species in the forested region in which she lives.
11/1 Miyuki seed beads and wood burning on birch, cherry, maple and oak veneer, river stones, flagging tape
Each 2 x 8 feet
Photo: Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver
Whetung expands these material and conceptual investigations to consider her own connections to the complex ecosystem of her home on Chemong Lake, Ontario, particularly the importance of food sovereignty and the fragility of symbiotic relationships in an era of accelerating climate change and environmental destruction.
Olivia Whetung is a member of Curve Lake First Nation and a citizen of the Nishnaabeg Nation.
Sugarbush Shrapnel is generously supported by the Audain Foundation
HUMOUR AS MEDICINE
Physical exhibition rescheduled to 2021
Artists: Sonny Assu (Ligwiłda’xwnjik, Lori Blondeau (Cree/Salteaux/Metis), Hjalmer Wenstob (Nuu-chah-nulth),
Curator: Jenelle M. Pasiechnik
This group exhibition presents contemporary Indigenous art from the prairies and west coast that addresses how humour can be a powerful coping mechanism for trauma and emotional distress. Underpinning the show is the goal to explore humour as a tool for healing, activism, and open communication.
We are grateful to the Canada Council for the Arts, the British Columbia Arts Council, the Province of British Columbia, the City of Campbell River for funding.