Monkman will discuss his exhibition, Shame and Prejudice: A Story of Resilience, with Jennifer Kramer, MOA Curator (Pacific Northwest), and Roberta Jamieson, President and CEO of Indspire.

Kent Monkman’s Shame and Prejudice takes you on a journey through the past 150 years of Canada. It is a journey that reclaims and reinserts Indigenous voices into the collective memory of our country, challenging and shattering colonial ideas of our history. The exhibition is on view now at MOA—until January 3, 2021.

Kent Monkman is a Canadian artist and Indspire Award Laureate of Cree ancestry who works with a variety of media, including painting, film/video, performance, and installation. His work is known for its provocative reinterpretations of Romantic North American landscapes, and it explores themes of colonization, sexuality, loss and resilience—the complexities of historic and contemporary Indigenous experience.

Presented with Indspire

Whose stories are we reading and hearing in the books and media that we consume? Learn about how multiple stories, and in particular, Indigenous stories, can shape the way we view histories and change the way we think about cultures. Inspired by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED Talk, Jill will explore how storytellers find their authentic cultural voices and the critical misunderstandings that can occur when we only hear a single story.

Participants will be guided through images of works in MOA’s Indigenous art collection and the words of their makers, including Susan Point, John Marston, Tracey Williams, Marianne Nicolson, Bill Reid and many more. Together we will challenge our assumptions and stereotypes of Indigenous histories and communities through exploring these works and artists.

Artists whose works and knowledge we draw from and will discuss in this webinar include: Susan Point, Musqueam; John Marston, Coast Salish; Tracey Williams, Squamish; Marianne Nicolson, Kwakwaka’wakw; Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas, Haida; Ian Reid, Heiltsuk; Mikael Willie, Kwakwaka’wakw; Bill Reid, Haida; Willy White, Tsimshian; Peter Morin, Tahltan; Tania Willard, Secwepemc.

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TED Talk will be screened as part of the webinar at 11 am, or you can choose watch it on your own beforehand (watch it here), then join the webinar for Jill’s presentation and discussion at 11:25 am.

Program schedule

Screening of Adichie’s TED Talk | 11–11:25 am
Presentation by Jill Baird | 11:25 am–12 pm
Follow-up discussion and question period | 12–12:30 pm

Register on Zoom (link below), or watch the webinar live on YouTube.
The webinar will also be recorded and shared online at a later date.

Photo: IMICH SIIYEM, 1997, by Susan Point. MOA Collection 2625/1. Photo by Derek Tan.

Jillian Christmas is MOA’s featured poet for National Poetry Month. Through a focus on anti-oppression initiatives in spoken word, Jillian has developed programs in partnership with the Toronto Poetry Project, UBC and the Vancouver Opera and has worked with youth and adults across Canada.

“When I teach workshops, I work on connecting and reminding youth and adults alike that their voices have value, power and are absolutely necessary. I hope that my classes bring people closer to themselves and each other.” ~Jillian Christmas

Please Note: This workshop was originally announced as an in-person event at MOA on April 19, from 12:30 – 3 pm, but has now been moved online in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. This event is now free with pre-registration and will be held from 11 am – 1 pm.

Artist Bio

Born and raised in Markham, Ontario, Jillian Christmas serves as Artistic Director of Versəs Festival of Words. An enthusiastic organizer and activist in the Canadian arts community, Jillian’s focus is to increase anti-oppression initiatives in spoken word. Jillian’s work has been featured in numerous publications including the Huffington Post, and published in a number of collections, including Matrix New Queer Writing (issue 98), The Post Feminist Post, Plenitude Magazine, Room Magazine and celebrated anthology, The Great Black North. She has participated in, developed and executed programs in partnership with Toronto Poetry Project, Wordplay, Brendan McLeod’s Travelling Slam, University of British Columbia, Vancouver Opera, and the CULTCH Mentorship, and facilitated spoken word workshops for youth and adults across the country.

Experience a powerful and passionate response by local poets of African descent to the African objects in the Museum’s care, as part of an initiative to decolonize MOA’s African collection—led by MOA’s Curator of Africa and South America, Nuno Porto and the UBC Africa Awareness Initiative.

The opening event on April 2 will feature live readings of poetry and spoken word by Jillian Christmas and other poets. Following this live showcase night, the recording from the event will be transformed into a sound installation to be played every Thursday evening in MOA’s Multiversity Galleries throughout the month of April.

Schedule

April 2 | Live poetry with Jillian Christmas and guests, 6 – 7:30 pm (reception to follow)
April 9 | Poetry Sound Installation, 5 – 9 pm
April 16 | Poetry Sound Installation, 5 – 9 pm
April 23 | Poetry Sound Installation, 5 – 9 pm
April 30 | Poetry Sound Installation, 5 – 9 pm

Jillian Christmas will also be offering a poetry workshop on Sunday, April 19. Learn more here.

Jillian Christmas

Born and raised in Markham, Ontario, Jillian Christmas serves as Artistic Director of Versəs Festival of Words. An enthusiastic organizer and activist in the Canadian arts community, Jillian’s focus is to increase anti-oppression initiatives in spoken word. Jillian’s work has been featured in numerous publications including The Huffington Post, and published in a number of collections, including Matrix New Queer Writing (issue 98), The Post Feminist Post, Plenitude Magazine, Room Magazine and celebrated anthology, The Great Black North. She has participated in, developed and executed programs in partnership with Toronto Poetry Project, Wordplay, Brendan McLeod’s Travelling Slam, University of British Columbia, Vancouver Opera, and the CULTCH Mentorship, and facilitated spoken word workshops for youth and adults across the country. Learn more here.

Hear about these stunning and thought-provoking works—and the 11 BC-based artists of Playing with Fire: Ceramics of the Extraordinary, that created them—directly from the exhibition curator.

The exhibition catalogue will also be available for sale for $16.95 in the MOA Shop.

Limited capacity.

In contemporary Western cultures, there is a tendency to avoid the subject of death until it touches us, but learning about other cultures can help us pause to reflect on our own attitudes and practices. In this workshop, participants will explore the spiritual significance of funerary objects in the collections and then create a personal work inspired by these ideas in self-drying clay and paint.

Holly Ratcliffe is currently ceramic artist-in-residence at MOA.  She brings a unique combination of anthropology and theology to her own ceramics and her ongoing explorations of funerary art and practice. Before she became a potter, Holly earned an MA in anthropology and a PhD in the history of Christian spirituality. In this workshop, she shares her passion for investing clay with personal sacred meaning.

All supplies and materials included.

This event is now SOLD OUT.

Drop in to learn about the cultural significance of earthquakes around the world in MOA’s exhibition, Shake Up: Preserving What We Value through some thought-provoking questions. Then build your own earthquake-proof museum structure and test out its seismic stability on a shake-table. Earthquake shake-tables are used extensively in seismic research, as they enable engineers to move structures in a way that simulates true earthquake ground motions.

MOA’s Shake Up exhibition draws visitors’ attention to the wealth of Indigenous knowledge and culture formed around the phenomenon of earthquakes in the Northwest Coast in conjunction with earthquake science. Discover how the lessons held in Shake Up offer visitors hands-on opportunities for creative exploration.

All ages welcome.

**We are sorry to inform everyone that the Build Your Own Earthquake-Proof Museum workshop scheduled for Saturday March 14th has been cancelled. This is a precautionary measure that MOA is taking under the current COVID-19 situation to avoid museum events that involve the shared handling of materials.

MOA continues to follow the recommendations of the British Columbia Government and the University of British Columbia and remains open to the public. All other MOA programs and events will take place as advertised.

For information on how UBC continues to monitor the development of the situation, including resources, visit https://www.ubc.ca. **

Ethnographer and writer, Sultan Somjee will present a talk, “Building Museums of Peace: Decolonizing Material Culture” and students will share progress in their research. The Program for Undergraduate Research Experience (PURE) is aimed at broadening access to, and enhancing, undergraduate research experience as a central priority in UBC’s new strategic plan. Students who are participating in the program are currently researching African history and cultures in order to revise the catalogue descriptions of the museum’s Africa collections.

Kenyan-born, Sultan Somjee is a Canadian-based ethnographer and writer whose publications include Material Culture of Kenya (1994), the novel Bead Bai (2013), and the story collection Home Between Crossings (2016). For over three decades he worked on Indigenous knowledge for education, and during the 1990s—when conflicts plagued eastern Africa, he looked towards Indigenous traditions of conflict resolution. He found here the inspiration to build museums of peace as grassroots civil societies providing spaces for dialogue through performances and displays of Indigenous heritages of peace. Today, there are sixteen community-based Museums of Peace in Kenya managed by curators he has trained. In 2001, the United Nations named him one of twelve global ‘Unsung Heroes of Dialogue Among Civilizations’, and in 2002, he was appointed to the Global Advisory Board of Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies.

Free and open to all.

Through the voices of women from a wide variety of cultural backgrounds, we explore what it means to be a woman—in this time, in this city, in this world. This special night at MOA features dance, rap, song, poetry, improvisation and powerful words by Vancouver’s emerging and established women artists. The night showcases the diversity, strength, breadth and depth of women’s experiences, their resilience and unique voices through the power of the arts.

International Women’s Day is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women and also marks a call to action for accelerating gender parity.

Co-curated with dancer, rapper and community organizer, Kayla Vargas; JUNO-winning violinist and community organizer, Meredith Bates and singer/songwriter and musician, Chelsea D.E. Johnson.

Program schedule

Musqueam Welcome + Opening Remarks | 7 pm

Zahra Shahab | 7:10 pm
An exploration of spirituality, sexuality, and the veil through movement. Zahra looks to her Islamic past and plays with the burqa as a site of amorphous transformation.

Vancouver Improvised Arts Society | 7:25 pm
A jazz performance that celebrates the intersections of gender, race, and social status by encouraging the mingling of mediums and genres.

With Barbara Bourget (Kokoro Dance), dancer; Olivia C. Davies (O.Dela Arts), dancer; Johanna Hauser, clarinet; Andromeda Monk, bass clarinet; Marina Hasselberg, cello; Lisa Miller, keys

Kathara Pilipino Indigenous Arts Collective Society | 8:10 pm
A traditional Filipino dance performance by a community-based company dedicated to the promotion of the cultural arts and history of the Philippines Indigenous peoples.

Kaya Ko (Kayla Vargas) and Her Tribal Roots | 8:25 pm
A rap, music and dance performance from Vancouver’s powerhouse community builders and cultural connectors.

With vocalist and MC, Kaya Ko; Alyssa Amarsi, dancer; Ariane Custodio, dancer; Marisa Gold, dancer

Chelsea D.E. Johnson + Friends | 8:40 pm
Soul, funk and poetry from a Vancouver veteran musician who will also lead an interactive, soul-rising choir of women and audience in song.

With Vitoria Monterio, Corina Keeling, Desiree Dawson, Jillian Christmas, Lola Whyte, Jasmine Liddel and Ana (Nasti Weather)

All ages welcome!

At 12 pm, Debra Sloan will be begin the afternoon with a brief tour at of the Koerner European Ceramics Gallery, where Sloan’s work is featured as part of MOA’s new feature exhibition, Playing with Fire: Ceramics of the Extraordinary.  

Visitors are then invited to drop into MOA’s Learning Lab for an afternoon of all-ages fun. Discover and experiment with a variety of clay techniques, including press molding, carving, and painting. Then, take matters into your own hands by applying these techniques onto a ceramic tile that reflects your own story. Participants will then contribute their completed tile to a clay tiled stove, similar to the one exhibited in the Koerner Gallery, as they help build a new collective story.

Debra Sloan is a Vancouver-based artist who is alumni of both the Vancouver School of Art and the Emily Carr University of Art + Design. She has exhibited with and served on a variety of boards throughout British Columbia, and her work has been exhibited and published nationally and internationally. In 2015, she was honoured with the Vancouver Mayor’s Arts Award for Craft and Design. Working mainly as a figurative artist, Sloan was the first sculptor to have ventured in the sculptor/commentary direction at the Leach Pottery in its 95-year history.