July 18 – April 11
Emergent Formations will consider the lasting implications of an 1884 British Empire military mission which set in motion an extraordinary collision of worlds. As documented in participant’s accounts, the expedition included British, Irish, Scottish, Indian, Egyptian, and Sudanese workers, as well as 379 voyageurs from across Canada. Among the 379 Canadian boatmen recruited for this military rescue mission in Khartoum, Sudan, were more than 100 Métis, Mohawk, and Haudenosaunee men — skilled navigators whose river mastery had already been called upon during the Red River Expedition of 1870 in newly formed Manitoba. These were people whose homelands had been profoundly disrupted by colonial forces, now hauling wooden whaling boats against the Nile’s fierce currents, wading through rapids, and undertaking gruelling portages across the Nile River delta.
Petros will examine the visual and textual languages used to depict the expedition, focusing on how its diverse participants and the environments they moved through were represented. He will incorporate archival materials, including maps, illustrations, banners, images of boats, and historical photographs produced in Canada, Britain, Egypt, and Sudan – to explore and question how this multicultural encounter was documented and understood. Collectively, these works link events, communities, languages, and geographies often imagined as remote from one another. Petros’ art responds to this complex event through multiple site interventions displayed throughout the Aga Khan Museum’s public spaces.
Petros’ work will be installed in three phases at the Aga Khan Museum starting on July 18. It will be completed for the opening of the 2026 Toronto Biennial of Art on September 26.
Commissioned by the Toronto Biennial of Art and the Aga Khan Museum and made possible with the generous support of RBC and Fonds Hamelys. The Museum wishes to thank The Khimji Foundation for its support of this installation.
Bio
Bio
Dawit L. Petros
Dawit L. Petros is a visual artist and educator who examines the intertwined and multiple narratives of African and European colonialism and modernity. He draws from his study of history to highlight displaced or forgotten histories. Petros conducts extensive research and travel to inform his production across materials and mediums, including photography, sculpture, screen prints, video, sound, performance and sound. A sensitivity to political and historical engagement is fused with aesthetic language that pays keen attention to color and abstraction, reflecting Petros’ long-standing preoccupation with traditions of minimalist sculpture and conceptual artmaking. This enables Petros to engage in a metaphorical dialogue with contemporary issues of displacement and place-making that challenge traditional forms of narrative representation associated with documentary imaging.
Petros completed the Whitney Independent Study Program, an MFA in Visual Art from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and Tufts University; a BFA in Photography from Concordia University; and a BA in History from the University of Saskatchewan. Recent national and international venues that have exhibited his work include Liverpool Biennial, Haus der Kunst, Munich; Kunsthal KAdE, Amersfoort; Wereld Museum, Rotterdam; Tate Modern, London; KØS Museum for Art in Public Space, Nørregade, Køge; Ozangé Spanish Biennial of African Photography, Malaga; Oslo Kunstforening, Oslo; Huis Marseille Museum of Photography, Amsterdam; The Studio Museum in Harlem, NYC; The National Museum of African Art in Washington, DC; and the Bamako Biennale in Mali.
Petros has been recognized with numerous accolades, such as the Scotiabank Photography Prize, the Terra Foundation for American Art Research Fellow, a Fulbright Fellowship, the Paul De Hueck and Norman Walford Career Achievement Award in Art Photography, an Art Matters Fellowship, and Artist Residencies at The Studio Museum in Harlem, The McColl Center for Visual Art, and Addis Ababa Photo Fest.
Dawit L. Petros is a co-founder with Heba Y. Amin of Black Athena Collective. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Studio Art at Dartmouth College. Petros is represented by Tiwani Contemporary in London, UK, and Bradley Ertaskiran in Montreal, Canada.
Location
- Accessibility
Aga Khan Museum
Accessibility: Accessible entrance, washrooms, elevator, AODA compliant Building
- Getting There
Aga Khan Museum
Parking: Limited Paid – paid underground and surface parking are available at the Aga Khan Museum.
TTC: near Aga Khan Park & Museum Station (Line 5 Eglinton LRT); a direct bus ride from several subway stations, including Broadview, Pape, and Eglinton.
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