Tania Willard (b. 1977) is a mixed Secwépemc and settler artist whose research intersects with land-based art practices. Her practice activates connection to land, culture, and family, centering art as an Indigenous resurgent act, though collaborative projects such as BUSH Gallery and support of language revitalization in Secwépemc communities. Her artistic and curatorial work includes Beat Nation: Art, Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture at the Vancouver Art Gallery (2012-2014) and Exposure: Native Art and Political Ecology at the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, Santa Fe (ongoing). Willard’s work is included in the collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery, Forge Project, Kamloops Art Gallery, and the Anchorage Museum, among others. In 2016, she received the Hnatyshyn Foundation’s Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art. In 2020, the Shadbolt Foundation awarded her their VIVA Award for outstanding achievement and commitment in her art practice, and in 2022 she was named a Forge Project Fellow for her land-based, community-engaged artistic practice.
In this artist talk, Tania Willard speaks about her work Affirmations for Wildflowers: an Ethnobotany of Desire (2020), a recent acquisition by the Belkin and part of the What is Welcome? exhibition.
Willard discusses Affirmations for Wildflowers in relation to the changing of the seasons and the cycles of wildflowers. The work was originally created in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic and displayed in the windows of the SFU Galleries’ Audain Gallery. In both iterations, the work speaks to the viewer in a transformative time of global crisis, offering hope and a space for reflection.
Tania Willard (b. 1977) is a mixed Secwépemc and settler artist whose research intersects with land-based art practices. Her practice activates connection to land, culture, and family, centering art as an Indigenous resurgent act, though collaborative projects such as BUSH Gallery and support of language revitalization in Secwépemc communities. Her artistic and curatorial work includes Beat Nation: Art, Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture at the Vancouver Art Gallery (2012-2014) and Exposure: Native Art and Political Ecology at the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, Santa Fe (ongoing). Willard’s work is included in the collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery, Forge Project, Kamloops Art Gallery, and the Anchorage Museum, among others. In 2016, she received the Hnatyshyn Foundation’s Award for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art. In 2020, the Shadbolt Foundation awarded her their VIVA Award for outstanding achievement and commitment in her art practice, and in 2022 she was named a Forge Project Fellow for her land-based, community-engaged artistic practice.
What Is Welcome? includes works from the Belkin's collection and long-term residency that question the art institution's language, boundaries and potential for change. From performance to works-in-process that effect institutional practices, the artists included operate with, and at the same time counter, the institution to address the what, how and the why of gallery operations.
[more]This reading room offers resources relating to and exceeding the themes present in the exhibition What Is Welcome?, which includes works from the Belkin’s collection and long-term residency that question the art institution’s language, boundaries and potential for change. From performance to works-in-process that effect institutional practices, the artists included operate with, and at the same time counter, the institution to address the what, how and the why of gallery operations. Artists include Allyson Clay, Claudia Cuesta, Andrea Fraser, ReMatriate Collective, Holly Schmidt, as well as recent acquisitions of work by Skeena Reece, Kika Thorne and Tania Willard.
[more]Join us for a guided tour of the Belkin’s 2023 summer collection exhibition, What Is Welcome? The tour offers insight into the key themes of the show, including Indigenous sovereignties, feminisms and power dynamics, by focusing on select works in the exhibition and contextualizing them within historical frameworks (such as Institutional Critique).
[more]A year after it was first performed and in collaboration with composer Patrick Carrabré, Métis soprano Melody Courage will interpret Tania Willard’s Woodpile Score (2018) through vocal performance at Haida House outside the Museum of Anthropology, UBC. In the fall of 2020, Courage performed this same work as part of the exhibition Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery for an online audience.
[more]On October 2, Emerge invites you to join a virtual studio visit with Tania Willard (Secwépemc Nation). During this studio visit, Willard will give an introduction to her art and practice, particularly focusing on her work in the exhibition Soundings: An Exhibition in Five Parts. The studio visit will be followed by a short Q&A.
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