Tyshan Wright: Maroon Town
Maroon Town is an immersive exhibition by Kjipuktuk (Halifax)-based artist Tyshan Wright. Following their forced exile after the Second Maroon War with the British, Jamaican Maroons were exiled to Mi’kma’ki and the British colony of Nova Scotia in 1796. Despite sustained resistance and protest, the majority of Maroons departed Nova Scotia centuries ago, however, many Maroon descendants still live in this province where the legacy of Maroon culture endures. In this exhibition, Tyshan Wright creates a staged Maroon house and settlement that includes expertly handcrafted iterations of the ceremonial and everyday domestic objects that Maroons were forced to leave behind in Jamaica, as well as those they use today. This staged settlement imagines Jamaican Maroons and Maroon life thriving across time and place. Maroon Town celebrates historic Maroon resilience and present-day acts of sovereignty that build a vibrant and conne
cted tomorrow for Maroon descendants.
Lisa Hirmer: Everything We Have Done Is Weather Now
Lisa Hirmer’s gorgeous photographs of weather data bridge the divide between everyday conversations about weather and the enormity of the climate crisis, thereby helping to open up possibilities for imagining different futures for our planet. The exhibition is organized and circulated by the University of Lethbridge Art Gallery and is part of The Weather Collection, a network of digital and in-person exhibitions, hands-on art-making, research, and artist projects that use visual art to encourage creative perspectives on the environment and build new relationships with the future of the planet.
Kayza DeGraff-Ford: Portals
This exhibition of new work by Kayza DeGraff-Ford showcases their recent digital experimentation in virtual reality programming. Part of an ongoing story within DeGraff-Ford’s practice, this immersive installation features a cosmic aqua-portal via the humble entry point of bathroom plumbing. Channelling the literary genre of Magical Realism and exploring African diasporic and trans experiences, Portals takes the viewer through a healing wormhole in time.
Taskoch pipon kona kah nipa muskoseya, nepin pesim eti pimachihew | Like the winter snow kills the grass, the summer sun revives it
Taskoch pipon kona kah nipa muskoseya, nepin pesim eti pimachihew aims to address and initiate a discussion on how Indigenous languages intertwine with Indigenous epistemologies and how the dormancy and extinction of Indigenous languages leads to a hindrance of culture and knowledge. Bringing together emerging and established Indigenous artists based in so-called Canada, the exhibition gives space back to those artists whose practices deal with Indigenous languages in each of their visibilities, vulnerabilities, and regional voices. Organized and circulated by TRUCK Contemporary Art, presented at MSVU Art Gallery in partnership with Eyelevel.
Heather Hart, Northern Oracle, Installation, 2017, photo: Heather Hart, Northern Oracle (2017)
Heather Hart: Northern Oracle
Northern Oracle is an ambitious rooftop installation that emerges from the floor of the gallery, and is accompanied by a series of mixed media drawings. Hart considers Black histories, access to ownership, taking up physical space, and the significance of having a place to call home. Visitors may access both the rooftop and its floor level attic, while contemplating and enacting upon these vantage points. Northern Oracle provides a performative area: a locale for demonstration of power, influence, and for “shouting from the rooftop.” The “Oracle” is the heart of the work and a shrine where visitors may leave offerings.
Megan Kyak-Monteith, Whale Hunt: I Think Everyone is Here, Video, 2019
Prospect 19: Megan Kyak-Monteith—Whale Hunt: I Think Everyone is Here
Exhibitions in the Prospect series introduce artists in the early phase of their careers. Megan Kyak-Monteith is a recent graduate of NSCAD from Mittimatalik (Pond Inlet), NU who lives and works in Halifax. In her painting, Kyak-Monteith often combines images from her memory with stories shared with her by others. This new animation brings her painting to life, merging the labour of community endeavor (here, the whale hunt) with the work of turning still images into moving ones.
