Join us for the next online, round table conversation on
Thursday, March 24, 2022, 5:30-7:30 p.m. AST
featuring presentations by Tania Willard, Srimoyee Mitra, Michelle Jacques and Toby Lawrence.
Join the Zoom event
Passcode: 1Prwm7
The discussion will be moderated by OCADU’s Peter Morin and NSCAD’s Carla Taunton and Leah Decter.
Photo – left to right: Tania Willard, Srimoyee Mitra, Michelle Jacques and Toby Lawrence
Presenters bios
Tania Willard
Tania Willard, Secwepemc Nation and settler heritage, works within the shifting ideas around contemporary and traditional, often working with bodies of knowledge and skills that are conceptually linked to her interest in intersections between Indigenous and other cultures. Current curatorial contributions include co-curating Exposure: Native Art and Political Ecology for the Museum of Contemporary Native Art, Sante Fe.
In 2016 Willard received the Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art from the Hnatyshyn Foundation and was recognized with the Shadbolt Foundation VIVA award for outstanding achievement and commitment in her art practice in 2020. Willard’s ongoing collaborative project BUSH gallery, is a conceptual land-based gallery grounded in Indigenous knowledges and relational art practices. Willard is an Assistant Professor at UBCO in Syilx territories (Kelowna) and her current research intersects with language learning, and land-based art practices.
Srimoyee Mitra
Srimoyee Mitrais a curator and writer whose research interests lie at the intersection of exhibition-making and participation, building platforms for dialogues on migration, statelessness and settler colonialism. Mitra worked as an arts writer for publications in India such as Art India, Time Out Mumbai before moving to Canada to pursue a master’s in art history at York University in 2008. In 2011, she was appointed the Curator of Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Windsor, where she developed an award-winning curatorial and publications program.
Her exhibitions Border Cultures (2013-2015), We Won’t Compete (2014), and Wafaa Bilal: 168:01 (2016) were awarded “Exhibition of the Year” by the Ontario Association of Art Galleries. Mitra was born and raised in Mumbai, and has lived in Canada and India, before moving to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where she is currently the Director of Stamps Gallery, Stamps School of Art and Design.
Michelle Jacques
Michelle Jacquesis a curator, writer and educator. She is the Head of Exhibitions and Collections/Chief Curator at Remai Modern, situated on Treaty 6 Territory and the Homeland of Métis. She was the Chief Curator at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria in British Columbia for eight years and has held curatorial positions in the contemporary and Canadian departments at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto. She has made a long-term commitment to growing the relevance and public responsibility of visual art museums.
Toby Lawrence
Toby Lawrence is a settler-Canadian curator of mixed European ancestry. Her practice centres collaborative approaches grounded in anti-racist, decolonial and intersectional feminist methodologies. She has held curatorial and programming positions throughout British Columbia, at the Vancouver Art Gallery, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, Nanaimo Art Gallery and Kelowna Art Gallery.
She was also a coordinator for the UBC Okanagan Indigenous Art Intensive, a contributing curator for the inaugural Contingencies of Care Residency hosted by OCADU, Toronto Biennial of Art and BUSH Gallery, and a curatorial resident at the Otis College of Art and Design Emerging Curators Retreat in LA. Toby holds a PhD from UBC Okanagan, supported by the SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship, and is a Curator at Open Space Arts Society in Victoria, BC
The Beyond Unsettling Speaker Series is co-presented by the Centre for inter-Media Arts and Decolonial Expression (CiMADE), OCADU and NSCAD Media Arts Division.
The series is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, NSCAD Office of Academic Affairs and Research, CiMADE and Anna Leonowens Gallery.