Notice Board

Since 2011, the University of Lethbridge and the RMIT School of Art have enjoyed a rich exchange of innovation and creativity in contemporary Indigenous art.  Applications are gathered from across Canada for the chance to represent the important perspective connecting and illuminating Indigenous culture and expand on ideas of Indigeneity during a six to eight-week residency in the heart of Melbourne, Australia.

For the 2017 exchange, the committees have selected Judy Anderson to travel across the Pacific Ocean for a residency from April 10-May 21, 2017.  

Judy is a Cree artist from Gordon First Nation in southern Saskatchewan.  Currently an Assistant Professor of Canadian Indigenous Studio Art at the University of Calgary, Judy’s work includes individual and collaborative projects in the form of installation, painting, graffiti, beadwork, hand-made paper, and three-dimensional pieces.  In her words, her work is “deeply personal with a focus on issues of spirituality, family, graffiti and critiques of mainstream culture’s representations of Aboriginal people.”

With a BA in Native Studies and BFA in Painting from the University of Saskatchewan, and an MFA from the University of Regina, Judy has been exhibiting across western Canada since 2002.  She participated in an international studio and curatorial residency in Brooklyn, NY, just last year, and spent Fall 2014 in England as a visiting scholar to the Princes School of Traditional Art.   She has also been involved in over a dozen lectures, talks, and panels at schools and galleries, co-facilitated workshops and presented at conferences across Canada. 

While in Melbourne, Judy will be continuing her work on “The Sole Project”, a collaborative collection of multi-media objects referring to shoes, feet or shoeboxes, for the purpose of honoring women that have left significant impact on her life: friends, teachers, and family.  “I have created shoeboxes,” she writes, “that are really modern-day parfleche, the traditional rawhide carry case of Plains Indians. Using a multi-media approach I created these boxes to specifically represent each of the four women I selected and inside each box are collected and/or created items that represent the woman being honoured.  As a result, each shoebox is an individual installation that uniquely represents the women I have chosen to honor.”  With four pieces already completed, Judy is planning an additional three. 

The University of Lethbridge will soon be announcing the selected Australian or New Zealander artist that will be participating in the complementary residency in October and November of 2017, in the Gushul Studio in Blairmore, Alberta.

Questions regarding the residency exchange can be directed to Sarah Hilliard at sarah.hilliard@uleth.ca.  Full details available here on the ulethbridge.ca website.

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We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $157 million to bring the arts to Canadians throughout the country.

Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien. L’an dernier, le Conseil  a investi 157 millions de dollars pour mettre de l’art dans la vie des Canadiennes et des Canadiens de tout le pays.