An event for artists and cultural workers to come together and connect!

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An event for artists and cultural workers to come together and connect!

View the exhibition Botannica Tirannica  (on view May 30 – October 20, 2024) at Koffler Arts with a tour by Koffler’s Head of Artistic Engagement and exhibition coordinator (at approx 6:45pm).

Light refreshments will be served. Kashrut observed.

Free. Registration required. Click here to register.

 

In partnership with UJA Federation of Greater Toronto, CANVAS, the Kultura Collective and Koffler Arts.

 

About the exhibition:

Koffler Arts is proud to present Botannica Tirannica by award-winning Brazilian artist Giselle Beiguelman. The exhibition explores how common botanical names both mirror and perpetuate societal prejudices against racial, cultural, gender, and social groups. Beiguelman was inspired to create this exhibition after receiving a gift of a Tradescantia zebrina seedling, commonly called “Wandering Jew”, a name referencing the 13th-century myth that recurred in Nazi propaganda. This led Beiguelman to investigate the complex, interwoven histories of botany, taxonomy and colonialism that often result in discrimination against specific groups of people.

Beiguelman will work closely with two Indigenous experts to situate the exhibition in a Canadian context: Dr. Jonathan Ferrier, a Mississauga, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) scientist and a Biology professor at Dalhousie University, and Isaac Crosby, a Black/Ojibwa knowledge keeper, gardener and agriculture expert. Dr. Jonathan Ferrier will act as Indigenous botanical content lead and collaborate with Beiguelman on a display of living plants each with prejudicial names. Isaac Crosby will create The Garden of Resilience outside the exhibition in front of the Youngplace building on Shaw Street. It will include various plant species – considered to be invasive “weeds”. These weeds, which usually don’t grow together, are a metaphor for human migration.

Alongside the display of plants, visitors to the gallery will engage with two series of images created using Artificial Intelligence (AI) – one series of still images, the other series in video – of reimagined hybrid plants that are positioned as resistant and resilient life forms in a post-natural, decolonialized garden. The exhibition will also include a soundscape by São Paulo-based composer, visual artist, and researcher Gabriel Francisco Lemos.

Botannica Tirannica originated at the Museu Judaico de São Paulo, Brazil (2022), curated by Ilana Feldman, and has since been exhibited in whole or in part at the 3rd Karachi Biennale in Pakistan (2022); Museo Sartorio in Trieste, Italy (2023); and Sesc Taubaté, São Paulo, Brazil (2023). Koffler Arts is the exclusive North American host.

 

Presented by:

In Partnership with:

Koffler Centre of the Arts, CANVAS

Start Date: June 24, 2024

6 PM – 8 PM

Downtown Toronto

Koffler Arts, 180 Shaw St., #104, Toronto

Website:

Free

Accessibility

If accessibility options not listed, please contact the venue to confirm

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