3 April 2013 6pm - 8pm

A public conversation with Wanda Nanibush, Andrea Fatona and cheyanne turions

What is difference? What constitutes difference? And what does difference mean? This series of questions has been at the forefront of Idle No More, post-colonialism, feminism, Marxism, and other cultural theory and still continues to influence much artmaking today. This conversation engages the public to (re)consider what it means to belong, or alternatively, to be ‘different;’ and how artists, curators and cultural workers today work with or against these positions.

For more information, please contact Ellyn Walker, RG*RG Program Coordinator at ellyn@mercerunion.org

Wanda Nanibush is an Anishnawbe-kwe curator, writer, consultant, and media artist. She has a Masters of Visual Studies from the University of Toronto. As a curator, her work has largely concentrated on re-contextualizing Indigenous time-based media and performance art to examine the underlying philosophical complexity of the work, as well as rethinking how culture and identity are framed by contemporary artistic discourses.

Andrea Fatona is an assistant professor at OCAD University. She was formerly the Curator of Contemporary Art at the Ottawa Art Gallery, Ontario, Programme Director at Video In, Vancouver, Co-Director of Artspeak Gallery, Vancouver, and Artistic Director of Artspace Gallery, Peterborough, Ontario. She is a regular contributing editor to Fuse magazine, Toronto. Fatona holds a master’s degree in Cultural Studies and Critical Pedagogy from the University of Toronto, and completed her doctoral degree at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education where her research focused on racial equity and policy formation at the Canada Council.

cheyanne turions is an independent, Toronto-based curator and writer who holds a degree in Philosophy from the University of British Columbia. Conceptualizing curation and criticism as social gestures, she uses discourse as an entrance point to taking up art. As a curator, she seeks that moment of the verb, the vital and poetic occasion where meaning emerges from the meeting of the art object with the eye and mind. In addition to her curatorial work and writing practice, she is the director of No Reading After the Internet (Toronto), is part of the Editorial Advisory Committee at FUSE magazine and sits on the Board of Directors for Fillip magazine. Currently, she is the Shop Manager/Curator at Art Metropole.