Future Worldings exhibition showcases the works of Canadian and South African artists

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The Future Worldings exhibition will bring artists from Canada and South Africa together to show their work and reflect on decolonial practices from Sept. 28 to Dec. 15 at the Griffin Arts Projects gallery in North Vancouver. 

The exhibition will feature three artists from Canada and three from South Africa presenting their work in a variety of media, offering each other a cross-cultural exchange of perspectives and understandings around decolonization. 

“Artists might not all say, ‘Our work is about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.’ They wouldn’t, in fact, but … they deal with themes of repatriation, cultural knowledge, ideas of urban rezoning and urban planning, ways of thinking about gender violence,” Griffin Art Projects Director Lisa Baldissera says.

“There are all kinds of ways the artists are working where it touches on those themes in really diverse ways.”

The exhibit is part of a larger project, which covers three in-person residencies, a one-day conference, and a public program series. 

One in-person residency took place in May and June, where master carver and Squamish Elder Xwalacktun travelled to South Africa’s Johannesburg to meet with other artists and curators.  

“Xwalacktun has been working on Salish forms as a Squamish Nation Elder, and that’s a really powerful political act, because … the northwest coast forms of Indigenous practice had been really nurtured for the tourist trade, and so Salish practices were quite quiet for a while,” Baldissera says.

“He’s been part of that real renaissance of understanding and promoting Salish work, iconography, and carving.”

Another residency took place in August at the Similkameen Artist Residency, where artists had an immersive experience in Keremeos, Penticton, and Kelowna.

“We [had] a series of workshops where they [got] to know [each other],” Baldissera says. “It’s a really wonderful opportunity to be properly introduced to Indigenous cultures here as well.” 

The final residency will take place in Vancouver where artists will engage in cultural community events. 

The public program series includes an open studio event on Sept. 15 from noon to 4:00 pm, and an opening reception and artist walk-through on Sept. 27 from 6:00 to 8:00 pm. The series will give attendees the chance to find out more about the participating artists’ works and projects. 

The Future Worldings conference will be the final event on Sept. 28 from 9:00 am to 7:00 pm at the Emily Carr University of Art and Design. It will feature four panels — “Distance and Proximity,” “Navigating Turtle Island,” “Weaving, Dancing and Activating Memories,” and “​​Future Worldings Artist + Curator Roundtable.” 

Sun Forest is one of the artists from Canada, and will present ceramic sculptural works, porcelain works, and biomaterials in an installation at the exhibit.

“I’ve taken an entire head of cabbage, taken apart each leaf, cast each single leaf, then poured liquid porcelain slip into it, and manipulated each ceramic leaf into the folds and gestures that I would make when I’m making kimchi,” Forest says about one piece in her installation. 

For the installation, Forest is making use of sseugaechima, a head covering used during the Joseon Dynasty in Korea to cover women’s faces in public.

“I’m redesigning it so that it becomes anti-surveillance cloaking devices made out of biomaterials that directly touch the skin to create healing properties and moments of rest and security from hypervisibility.”

Forest says the installation dives into people’s relationship with non-human species, reciprocity, cycles of life, racialized surveillance, violence, and what it means to find moments of rest, healing, and resistance.

“Much of my practice is focused on the complexities that surround how we understand where we’re from, where we belong, how we operate within a nation state in which we are constantly surveyed, and in turn, facing lots of racial profiling and control,” Forest says.

“It’s a really important conversation to have as somebody who is an uninvited guest [living] in these unceded territories and lands.” 

Baldissera says events like these are unique and offer an opportunity to make the understanding of Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission more nuanced, in addition to exchanging perspectives.

“It really helps us understand our country’s colonial practices with a bit more insight,” Baldissera says. 

For more information about the Future Worldings exhibit, visit bitly.cx/OM95c.