Asinnajaq and Camille Georgeson-Usher
Sydney Frances Pickering

November 8–December 19, 2021

Curated by Becca Taylor

Asinnajaq and Camille Georgeson-Usher, this world, here; nesting, 2018. Courtesy the artists.

The land is marked by ephemera from our actions and active existence. Markings of our histories, knowledge systems, homes and activism are present and leave imprints on the landscape. We, as Indigenous peoples, continue to create an ongoing narrative about our bodies’ connections to the land, regardless of past and present colonial attempts of displacement from our communities and the lands we are connected to. This image set, Living Memories, aims to acknowledge the Indigenous body and the actions it takes as a site and method of expression, examining the physical presence of Indigenous peoples with and on the land.

Living Memories features images by collaborators Asinnajaq and Camille Georgeson-Usher, and Sydney Frances Pickering. Each artist’s work documents performative actions that took place on remote land not easily accessible to large public audiences. These living works are meant to be witnessed over time by those who unexpectedly come across them, inviting the viewer to spend time and to reflect on how structures, documents, and markings are made—and who left them behind. These images convey histories of forced removal, the displacement of peoples, Indigenous placemaking, and the building of temporary structures meant to live and die in nature. Collectively, the images question how we as Indigenous peoples interact with and leave our legacies on the land.

As a set, Living Memories acts as an open invitation for deep(er) listening, and for reflection on the marks that living memories make on the land. In each of the works something is left on the land that is not meant to be permanent; rather, these marks are meant to live and leave traces that will eventually decay or disintegrate over time. These ephemeral markings are layered, left through generations of people moving through and living on the land. These artists’ images animate questions like: How do we witness and experience our histories? What does presence teach us about absence?

—Becca Taylor

Visit the Blackwood Gallery website for documentation, materials, and resources. Interpretative video tours with Educator-in-Residence Shalon T. Webber-Heffernan, a Respondent Program, and Attunement Session, will be released throughout the series.

Respondent Program

Across the six-part lightbox series Crossings: Itineraries of Encounter, each curator activates a Respondent Program that brings artists into dialogue with an image set. The Blackwood is pleased to welcome Cheyenne Rain LeGrande to respond to Living Memories.

Attunement Sessions

Facilitated by Educator-in-Residence Shalon T. Webber-Heffernan, six interdisciplinary practitioners have been invited to develop an Attunement Session that responds to an image set with prompts that challenge viewers to open new ways of understanding what we see. Each of these sessions offer pedagogic tools to assist audiences with “tuning-in” by means of embodiment, perception, texture, joy, meditation, encounter, touch, intimacy, sound, intuition, or other senses.

Visit the Blackwood Gallery website for responses and educational resources throughout Crossings: Itineraries of Encounter.

About Crossings: Itineraries of Encounter
A six-part lightbox series

September 13, 2021–August 28, 2022

Photo: Toni Hafkenscheid

Artists: Asinnajaq & Camille Georgeson-Usher, Nydia Blas, Widline Cadet, Michèle Pearson Clarke, Jasmine Clarke, Ali Eyal, Emily Jacir, Jenny Lin, Morris Lum, Sydney Frances Pickering, Walid Raad, Zainab Sidera, and more to be announced.

Curatorial Consortium: Amin Alsaden, Noor Bhangu, Letticia Cosbert Miller, Ronald Rose-Antoinette, Becca Taylor, Ellyn Walker

Educator-in-Residence: Shalon T. Webber-Heffernan

Over the course of spring-summer 2021, a group of independent curators met during a series of working sessions to curate a public lightbox program on the UTM campus for the 2021–2022 academic year. The Curatorial Consortium fosters a unique connective and dialogical space in which to hold commonalities, in an effort to think together through negotiating differences. The resulting program, Crossings: Itineraries of Encounter, responds to this exercise in collaborative composition while honouring the independent thinking that makes group work possible—at a moment when the need to protect independent thought and academic freedom (within and beyond the university) is both palpable and deeply urgent.

For the full curatorial statement, please visit the Blackwood website. Virtual programming and interpretive materials will be released throughout the series.

The Blackwood gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Ontario Arts Council, and the University of Toronto Mississauga.

The Blackwood
University of Toronto Mississauga
3359 Mississauga Rd.
Mississauga, ON L5L 1C6

www.blackwoodgallery.ca
blackwood.gallery@utoronto.ca
905.828.3789
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Please note: The Blackwood’s gallery spaces are currently closed to the public. Crossings: Itineraries of Encounter is FREE and open to the public, and accessible 24 hours a day in four outdoor lightboxes across the University of Toronto Mississauga Campus. Some movement throughout the campus is required—ramps and curb cuts are in place across the University premises.

Please respect social distancing protocols while on campus.

Image descriptions: 1) A person in a squatting position works on an oversize spiral floral arrangement, surrounded by various naturally grown plants. 2) An empty lightbox on UTM campus is photographed at dusk. The oversized, horizontal-format lightbox hangs on a concrete wall along a walkway, with a courtyard in the background.