Curatorial Fellowship
We are proud to announce the Curatorial Fellowship Program made possible by the generous support of TD Bank Group through the TD Ready Commitment. The program was conceived of as an experimental and collaborative process through which emerging curators can cultivate personal curatorial methodologies, and realize a substantial curatorial project within the framework of the Toronto Biennial of Art. The inaugural fellows are Sebastian De Line (Haudenosaunee-Métis-
“Through the TD Ready Commitment, our global corporate citizenship platform, we are proud to support the Curatorial Fellowship Program as part of the 2021 Biennial program. We strive to help create opportunities for under-represented individuals to navigate and develop their careers in the artistic sector as well as advance the amplification of diverse voices in arts and culture. This program will allow for collaboration, storytelling, and meaningful connections through art, igniting new conversations and learning for the artists themselves, the curators, and all audiences.” Said Stuart Keeler, Senior Curator, TD Corporate Art Collection, TD Bank Group.
"Ngozi: We Might Listen for the Shimmerings" by Chiedza Pasipanodya
Curatorial Fellowship Audio Introduction:
Fellowship Theme
Ngozi: We Might Listen for the Shimmerings is an ongoing curatorial project grounded in ideas of belief, death, and embodied listening. Following a series of familial roadside deaths surrounded by myth and uncertainty, this exhibition embarks along tributaries of thought exploring the unfinished nature of death with three artists – Timothy Yanick Hunter, Anne Zanele Mutema, and Buhlebezwe Siwani. These artists record through sound, images, and objects interrogations and reinterpretations that are shimmering – moving in and out of focus according to the angle of ones’ gaze – while colliding with the parallel systems of colonialism and violence responsible for this break in the continuity of the life cycle. The word Ngozi itself is a shimmering word across the African continent with myriad meanings or truths such as danger in Xhosa, blessed in Igbo, an accident in Swahili, and an avenging spirit in chiShona.
Artist: Anne Zanele Mutema
Site: 72 Perth Ave
Anne Zanele Mutema’s practice invites us to consider alternative belief systems through the idea of an Event defined for her as a phenomenon located at a single point in time in the context of self, culture and history.
Systemic Necropolis is an installation engaged in a philosophical inquiry on the nature of the thing – whether we are given our identities by the objects that surround us, the use-value they provide or whether they in fact afford identities to us.
Artist: Buhlebezwe Siwani
Site: Arsenal Contemporary Art Toronto
Buhlebezwe Siwani’s artistic practice focuses on black women, their place and role in the cultural tradition of African spirituality and religious rituals through which beliefs are performed. The presence of the black female body in her performances brings into play a subjectivity committed to repossessing and refocusing attention on historically violated and silenced, if not repressed and marginalized, black women – seers, prophets and healers belonging to a long tradition.
Upcoming Program – In Conversation: Dr. George Mahashe and Buhlebezwe Siwani
Artist: Timothy Yanick Hunter
Site: Small Arms Inspection Building
Timothy Yanick Hunter’s practice considers the impact of colonial, capitalist histories, and their lasting effects in Africa and throughout the Diaspora. Hunter’s strategies of bricolage examine non-neutral relationships, centring Black and Afro-diasporic experiences as well as concurrent strategies of decolonization. His approach alternates between exploratory and didactic; with a focus on the political, cultural, and social richness of the Black Diaspora often delving into speculative narratives and the intersections of physical space, digital space, and the intangible.
"The Shape of Sound" by Sebastian De Line
Curatorial Fellowship Audio Introduction:
Artist: Jatiwangi art Factory
Site: Small Arms Inspection Building
Comprising over fifty multimedia artists, musicians, designers and curators, JaF’s artistic practices emphasise local rural life in relation to land and the terracotta industry in Jatiwangi District. Clay is central to all their artistic and cultural activities in the spirit of community empowerment. As April 2nd, 2022 marks the beginning of the month of Ramadan in Canada, JaF rings in the opening of the Biennial while calling forth a time of fasting, introspection, and prayer observed by many community members of Toronto. The material remnants of this performance remain at the Small Arms Inspection Building for the duration of the exhibition.