Tania Willard Explained

Tania Willard
Birth Place:Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada
Nationality:Canadian Secwepemc
Known For:Artist and Curator
Website:taniawillard.ca

Tania Willard (born 1977) is an Indigenous Canadian multidisciplinary artist, graphic designer, and curator, known for mixing traditional Indigenous arts practices with contemporary ideas. Willard is from the Secwepemc nation, of the British Columbia interior, Canada.

Willard was the co-curator for the art exhibition, Beat Nation: Art Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture, which toured in major galleries across Canada.

Biography

Willard was born in 1977 and grew up in Armstrong, British Columbia, as well as back and forth to her father's Indian reserve.[1] A formative moment in her life happened when she was 16 and selling fruit for her aunt at a powwow; while there she saw a group of kids breakdancing.

Career

"Interconnectedness is the root system of my work as an artist. Land-based art, community engaged practice, printmaking, painting are the mediums I most often work in, these ways of working are tied to me, I am tied to my ancestors, we are tied to the land." - Tania Willard [2]
Willard is an artist, graphic designer, and curator who focuses on mixing traditional Indigenous arts practices with contemporary ideas, often working with bodies of knowledge and skills that are conceptually linked to her interest in intersections between Aboriginal and other cultures.[3] In the opening essay to Willard's exhibition, Claiming Space, at the Kamloops Art Gallery, Acting Director Beverley Clayton, writes: "...inspired by geological landforms on traditional Secwepemc land and by other aspects of the place, Tania Willard's art work acts as a conduit between generations and cultures."[4] She works with oil and acrylic painting, printmaking, pen and ink drawing, watercolour, mixed media, and collage.[5] She also makes public art, including a collaborative community mural with the artist Guillermo Aranda and the Secwepemc Native Youth Network entitled Neskonlith Mural, in 2013.[6] Willard is a member of the artist collective New BC Indian Art and Welfare Society.

From 2013 to 2015, Willard was the Aboriginal Curator in Residence at the Kamloops Art Gallery. She is the recipient of the Hnatyshyn Foundation Visual Arts Awards for Curatorial Excellence in Contemporary Art.[7] In 2017 Willard had a solo exhibition at the Burnaby Art Gallery entitled dissimulation.[8]

Curatorial work

Beat Nation: Art Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture

Willard curated the exhibition project Beat Nation, which started as an online project for grunt gallery. It features visual art, videos, music, and writing.[9] Beat Nation the Exhibition toured starting in Vancouver to Toronto, Kamloops, Montreal, Halifax and Saskatoon. Willard states that, "it was a really important journey to take this exhibit to different places; the context of the exhibition is to present indigenous artists today who respond to both socio-political states of Indigenous peoples and struggles, as well as use a mix of quite contemporary mediums and ancestral ideas." Beat Nation started with a very artist-run-centre approach—very immediate and somewhat more flexible. The intention was never to create a large scale traveling exhibition.

BUSH gallery

BUSH gallery is an experimental land-based, Indigenous-led artist residency that takes place on Willard's land in Secwepemc Nation in interior British Columbia. In an issue of C Magazine guest-edited by Willard and Peter Morin the editors state, "BUSH gallery is a series of on-going gatherings of like-minded folks united under questions concerning art making, land, Indigenous art history and interventions into the colonial."[10] This issue also included the BUSH Manifesto.[11]

#callresponse

  1. callresponse is a multifaceted project, co-organized by Tarah Hogue, Maria Hupfield and Willard, and in partnership with grunt gallery, supported by the conciliation initiative of the Canada Council for the Arts, the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation, and The Circle on Philanthropy and Aboriginal Peoples in Canada. It includes a website, social media platforms, touring exhibition, and catalogue, which aim to strategically centre the vital presence of Indigenous women across multiple platforms. The project features five commissions from Indigenous women around Canada, such as Willard, Christi Belcourt, Hupfield, Ursula Johnson, and Laakkuluk Williamson-Bathory. Each artist invited a guest, including Isaac Murdoch, IV Castellanos and Esther Neff, Cheryl L’Hirondelle, Marcia Crosby and Tanya Tagaq, to respond to their work.

Exhibitions

Select artist exhibitions

Select curation exhibitions

External links

Notes and References

  1. Sandals. Leah. Q&A: Tania Willard on Life Beyond Beat Nation – Canadian Art. Canadian Art. 28 June 2013. 14 June 2016.
  2. News: Episode 50. Interview with Tania Willard. Broken Boxes Podcast. 2018-03-10. en-US.
  3. Tania Willard. Mice Magazine.
  4. Book: Bose, Chris. Tania Willard: claiming space / essays by Chris Bose and Jordan Storm ; foreword by Beverley Clayton.. Kamloops Art Gallery. 2009. 978-1-895497-78-6. Kamloops, British Columbia. 7.
  5. Ryan. Ming. Project Space. Projectspace.ca. 10 September 2014. 14 June 2016.
  6. Web site: Neskonlith mural. Tania Willard Neskonlith mural. October 18, 2019.
  7. Web site: 2016 Recipients - Mid-Career Awards The Hnatyshyn Foundation. www.rjhf.com. 2017-03-04.
  8. Web site: Tania Willard: dissimulation. www.burnaby.ca. 2018-03-16.
  9. News: Hui. Stephen. Geek Speak: Tania Willard, curator of Beat Nation: Hip Hop as Indigenous Culture. 14 June 2016. Georgia Straight Vancouver's News & Entertainment Weekly. 17 July 2009.
  10. Morin. Peter and Tania Willard. Site/ation. C Magazine. 2018. 136. 8.
  11. Web site: BUSH Manifesto. C Magazine.
  12. Web site: LORE, May 9 - July 4, 2009. Foreman Art Gallery. 2019-02-06.
  13. Web site: Claiming Space. 2009. Kamloops Art Gallery. en. 2019-02-06.
  14. Web site: Witnesses: Art and Canada's Indian Residential Schools. 2013. Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery. en-CA. 2019-02-06.
  15. Web site: UnsettledSites - SFU Galleries - Simon Fraser University. www.sfu.ca. 2019-03-01.
  16. Web site: Unsettled Sites: Haunting Canadian Colonialism. Boisjoly. Raymond. Gray. Jonah. Canadian Art. en-US. 2019-03-01.
  17. Web site: The Shape of The Middle. Open Studio. en-US. 2019-03-01.
  18. Web site: BEAT NATION Art, Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture. 2012. Vancouver Art Gallery. 2019-02-06.
  19. Web site: unlimited edition. Gallery. Kamloops Art. Kamloops Art Gallery. en. 2019-02-28.
  20. Web site: CUSTOM MADE / Tsitslem te stem te ck'ultens-kuc. Gallery. Kamloops Art. Kamloops Art Gallery. en. 2019-02-28.
  21. Web site: Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun. Museum of Anthropology at UBC. en-CA. 2019-02-06.
  22. Web site: Nanitch: Early Photographs Of British Columbia From The Langmann Collection. 2016-04-02. The Polygon. en-US. 2019-03-01.
  23. Web site: One on One: Work to Rule: Krista Belle Stewart Kelowna Art Gallery. en-US. 2019-02-28.
  24. Web site: Curators. Landmarks 2017. en-US. 2019-02-28.

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Wikipedia article "Tania Willard".

Except where otherwise indicated, Everything.Explained.Today is © Copyright 2009-2024, A B Cryer, All Rights Reserved. Cookie policy.