Canada turns 150
Museums and galleries across Canada are holding a vast array of exhibitions and events to mark 1 July, the day of confederation 150 years ago
Behind the peaceable and ordered image of modern-day Canada, and its enduring cordial relationship with Britain, lies a complex, protracted and bloody history.
Centuries of colonial rule by the French and British saw expansion and exploitation, until a series of wars and rebellions culminated in the British North America Act of 1 July 1867, creating the Federal Dominion of Canada.
This year Canada celebrates 150 years of what is known as confederation, although the second largest country in the world did not become a single nation until the province of Nunavet joined it in 1999.
The diverse stories of this huge landmass, its 10 provinces and three territories, and its multicultural population of 36 million, from indigenous peoples to 21st-century immigrants, are told in Canada’s six national museums, which are mostly grouped around the capital, Ottawa, and the city of Quebec.
There are also hundreds of regional and independent museums, and art galleries from the Pacific west coast to the maritime eastern seaboard, reflecting their provinces’ histories, cultures, languages, faiths and spiritual beliefs.
Canada’s national museums are headed by the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec, which focuses on human history. It is one of Canada’s oldest museums, established in 1856 but now occupying buildings designed by aboriginal architect Douglas Cardinal in 1989 (who also designed the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC).
The Ottawa museums group comprises the Canadian Museum of Nature, also founded in 1856; the National Gallery of Canada, which has the most comprehensive Canadian art collection in the country and is known for its Andy Warhol works; and the Canada Science and Technology Museum, which was created in 1967 as a centennial project.
The Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 (Canada’s Ellis Island) in Halifax, Nova Scotia, tells the story of the one million -plus immigrants who came to Canada between 1928 and 1971. The Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is the country’s newest national museum, and focuses on ideas rather than artefacts.
CMHR has a partnership with the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, a legacy of the commission that published its final report in 2015 into the Indian residential school system. Of the 150,000 children who attended these schools, more than 6,000 died while in residence. The theme of reconciliation is woven through CMHR’s 13 galleries, although its mandate is also to look at broader human rights themes and issues through permanent displays, exhibitions and education programmes.
On the west coast, the Royal British Columbia Museum on Vancouver Island has superb natural and human history collections, particularly in its First Nations galleries, and Vancouver Art Gallery and the Audain Art Museum in Whistler have important permanent historic and contemporary collections of artworks by First Nations artists.
The British Columbia Museums Association has awarded a series of Canada 150 grants to create cultural legacies across the province to enable museums and cultural institutions to refresh displays and invest in new galleries, monuments and online 3D images.
National treasures
The anniversary of confederation has presented museums and galleries across the country with opportunities to explore its diversity and notions of nationhood through a huge range of exhibitions, events and education programmes. The flagship Canadian Museum of History opens its new Canadian History Hall on 1 July, the anniversary of the 1867 Constitution Act and also Canada Day.
“Canada is a relatively young country with a short period of recorded history,” says Mark O’Neill, president and chief executive of the Canadian Museum of History.
“The Canadian psyche is such that we don’t talk about national treasures in the way that you perhaps do in Britain. Many artefacts and artworks are in private ownership or dispersed across collections elsewhere. But we have used the 150th anniversary to acquire new material. The new hall is artefact-rich and based on historical record.”
One item, on loan from the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace, is the field cloak of General James Wolfe. Greenwich-born Wolfe (whose statue is outside the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park in London) was killed within minutes of the start of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham (also known as the Battle of Quebec) in 1759.
This pivotal battle was part of the series of global conflicts between the European powers known as the Seven Years’ War, which led to British rule within a few years and ultimately to the Constitution Act.
But the new hall also considers events from the perspective of indigenous peoples and the chilling brevity of the act’s assertion of power over “Indians and the land reserved for Indians”.
“Canadians continue to deal with issues of extreme gravitas, and our fundamental multiculturalism and evolving sense of who we are has to be truthfully represented in our museums,” says O’Neill. “We have been reticent about dealing with some of the darker passages of our history in a comprehensive way, and the new hall will place a significantly different lens on that history.”
The museum has also created a touring show titled 1867: Rebellion and confederation. This focuses mainly on the three tumultuous decades that led up to the signing of the treaty in 1867, but the idea is for each host museum to adapt it to fit their identity and perspective.
Untold histories
CMHR, for example, offers stories and narratives around human and civil rights’ struggles across the country. “Canada 150 begs the question: 150 years of what?” says John Young, the president of CMHR.
“It’s not necessarily a focus for celebration and could be problematic for indigenous people, for example.”
Some of these stories are only now starting to be understood, says Young. One example is that of Viola Desmond, a black Canadian from Nova Scotia who challenged the segregated seating policy in a cinema a decade before the more widely known bus protest by Rosa Parks in the US.
“A willingness to examine our stories and collective memories is fundamental to the museum,” says Young. “Many Canadians are only now learning about their history, and we encourage debate around what has been a pervasive culture of denial, particularly regarding the abuse perpetrated in the residential school system. We see our role as an educational one about the consequences for the survivors – and those who did not survive – and the impact on the generations that followed.
“Canada 150 sits within our broader vision and is not meant to finish at the
end of the year. We want Canadians to understand the achievements of previous generations in the human rights arena, but also to recognise their responsibilities and obligations, and consider how we can improve and pass those improvements
on to future generations.”
The complex and diverse make-up of Canada means it is impossible to classify artists as simply indigenous or Canadian, and many do not identify as either, says Andrew Hunter, the Fredrik S Eaton curator of Canadian art at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) in Toronto. “Canada is a dynamic work in progress,” he says. “Settlement is complex and messy.
But there were people here from all over the world long before what we now call multiculturalism. We are also dealing with the history of colonisation and the break-up of the British empire. For example, a substantial Caribbean community arrived in the 1950s and 1960s, via the UK, following independence in former colonies.”
Beyond cliches
AGO’s temporary exhibition to mark Canada 150 is Every. Now. Then: Reframing Nationhood, which reflects this complexity through themes of absence, erasure and memory. “We are trying to get beyond the cliches of Canada – ice hockey and the Great White North and so on,” says Hunter.
“The exhibition focuses on what it means to be Canadian now, but also addresses hidden histories and how they relate to current issues, many of which stem from the obscuring and erasure of indigenous cultures and their experiences.”
AGO has been able to commission ambitious work from established First Nations artists such as Robert Houle, but also from younger artists who immigrated to Canada and are part of its new demographic.
For example, Abedar Kamgari, an Iranian-born video artist who came to Canada as a child, has made a video about her two homes – where she grew up in Hamilton (near Toronto) and in Iran. They are both close to mountains and this becomes a repeated image and metaphor in her film.
“We need a more nuanced conversation about what it means to be displaced, and our new art commissions explore notions of home and nation,” says Hunter.
AGO also has arguably one of the world’s most important collections of Inuit art and more than a third of the artists in Every. Now. Then are indigenous.
“The AGO’s collecting and commissioning strategy reflects the importance of contemporary practice,” Hunter says. “Many people don’t realise that indigenous culture is a contemporary and vibrant one, with artists dealing with both their history and current issues, so it’s a concept of art as both a historic object and an art object.
“Canada 150 is not a celebration for everybody. For indigenous people it’s
more of a moment of reflection and critique. Much of our art is not rooted in western contemporary practice and we made a decision not to make a show just about confederation, because for too many of our artists it’s a blip on a great wheel of endless time. We wanted to look forward. You can’t understand Canada by only focusing on post-1867 history.”
The year 1867 is not necessarily an anniversary all Canadians would want to celebrate. The Witness Blanket is a powerful artwork by native artist Carey Newman, which is touring the country in 2017. An estimated 150,000 First Nations, Inuit and Métis children were taken from their families and communities to be “assimilated” at Indian residential schools across Canada between the 1890s and the end of the 20th century.
Newman, who is the son of a residential school survivor, visited 70 sites of these schools across the country that aimed to “take the Indian out of the child”. Many children suffered forced labour, abuse and deprivation, as well as disease and death through neglect and overcrowding.
Their experiences affected not only their own lives, but also those of subsequent generations. The artist selected 800 found objects from these sites to weave onto a cedar framework. Everything – from the rubble of ruined buildings to photographs and fragments of lost languages – was pieced together to create a healing national monument that reflects the struggles for the rights of indigenous peoples, and official recognition of the attempted erasure of their culture.
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
Death in the Ice: The Shocking Story of Franklin’s Final Expedition
Exhibition developed by the Canadian Museum of History in partnership with National Maritime Museum, with finds and forensic research from explorer John Franklin’s fateful last expedition to the North-West Passage in 1845.
14 July-7 January 2018
British Museum
Where the Thunderbird Lives, Cultural Resilience on the North-west Coast of North America
Exhibition displaying 10,000 years of traditions and cultural artefacts of the First Nations people of Canada’s western coastline from Alaska, British Columbia and Washington state, featuring traditional wood carving to contemporary prints.
Until 27 August
British Library
Canada Through the Lens
Exhibition from the British Library’s Canadian photographic collection displaying images of the young and growing nation between 1895 and 1924.
Until 10 September
The National Gallery
A Celebration Featuring Aerial Inspiration
A day of free events and activities for families in collaboration with Canada House to create a Canadian landscape taking inspiration
from the gallery’s renaissance paintings.
28 July
Centuries of colonial rule by the French and British saw expansion and exploitation, until a series of wars and rebellions culminated in the British North America Act of 1 July 1867, creating the Federal Dominion of Canada.
This year Canada celebrates 150 years of what is known as confederation, although the second largest country in the world did not become a single nation until the province of Nunavet joined it in 1999.
The diverse stories of this huge landmass, its 10 provinces and three territories, and its multicultural population of 36 million, from indigenous peoples to 21st-century immigrants, are told in Canada’s six national museums, which are mostly grouped around the capital, Ottawa, and the city of Quebec.
There are also hundreds of regional and independent museums, and art galleries from the Pacific west coast to the maritime eastern seaboard, reflecting their provinces’ histories, cultures, languages, faiths and spiritual beliefs.
Canada’s national museums are headed by the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Quebec, which focuses on human history. It is one of Canada’s oldest museums, established in 1856 but now occupying buildings designed by aboriginal architect Douglas Cardinal in 1989 (who also designed the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington DC).
The Ottawa museums group comprises the Canadian Museum of Nature, also founded in 1856; the National Gallery of Canada, which has the most comprehensive Canadian art collection in the country and is known for its Andy Warhol works; and the Canada Science and Technology Museum, which was created in 1967 as a centennial project.
The Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 (Canada’s Ellis Island) in Halifax, Nova Scotia, tells the story of the one million -plus immigrants who came to Canada between 1928 and 1971. The Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR) in Winnipeg, Manitoba, is the country’s newest national museum, and focuses on ideas rather than artefacts.
CMHR has a partnership with the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, a legacy of the commission that published its final report in 2015 into the Indian residential school system. Of the 150,000 children who attended these schools, more than 6,000 died while in residence. The theme of reconciliation is woven through CMHR’s 13 galleries, although its mandate is also to look at broader human rights themes and issues through permanent displays, exhibitions and education programmes.
On the west coast, the Royal British Columbia Museum on Vancouver Island has superb natural and human history collections, particularly in its First Nations galleries, and Vancouver Art Gallery and the Audain Art Museum in Whistler have important permanent historic and contemporary collections of artworks by First Nations artists.
The British Columbia Museums Association has awarded a series of Canada 150 grants to create cultural legacies across the province to enable museums and cultural institutions to refresh displays and invest in new galleries, monuments and online 3D images.
National treasures
The anniversary of confederation has presented museums and galleries across the country with opportunities to explore its diversity and notions of nationhood through a huge range of exhibitions, events and education programmes. The flagship Canadian Museum of History opens its new Canadian History Hall on 1 July, the anniversary of the 1867 Constitution Act and also Canada Day.
“Canada is a relatively young country with a short period of recorded history,” says Mark O’Neill, president and chief executive of the Canadian Museum of History.
“The Canadian psyche is such that we don’t talk about national treasures in the way that you perhaps do in Britain. Many artefacts and artworks are in private ownership or dispersed across collections elsewhere. But we have used the 150th anniversary to acquire new material. The new hall is artefact-rich and based on historical record.”
One item, on loan from the Royal Collection at Buckingham Palace, is the field cloak of General James Wolfe. Greenwich-born Wolfe (whose statue is outside the Royal Observatory in Greenwich Park in London) was killed within minutes of the start of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham (also known as the Battle of Quebec) in 1759.
This pivotal battle was part of the series of global conflicts between the European powers known as the Seven Years’ War, which led to British rule within a few years and ultimately to the Constitution Act.
But the new hall also considers events from the perspective of indigenous peoples and the chilling brevity of the act’s assertion of power over “Indians and the land reserved for Indians”.
“Canadians continue to deal with issues of extreme gravitas, and our fundamental multiculturalism and evolving sense of who we are has to be truthfully represented in our museums,” says O’Neill. “We have been reticent about dealing with some of the darker passages of our history in a comprehensive way, and the new hall will place a significantly different lens on that history.”
The museum has also created a touring show titled 1867: Rebellion and confederation. This focuses mainly on the three tumultuous decades that led up to the signing of the treaty in 1867, but the idea is for each host museum to adapt it to fit their identity and perspective.
Untold histories
CMHR, for example, offers stories and narratives around human and civil rights’ struggles across the country. “Canada 150 begs the question: 150 years of what?” says John Young, the president of CMHR.
“It’s not necessarily a focus for celebration and could be problematic for indigenous people, for example.”
Some of these stories are only now starting to be understood, says Young. One example is that of Viola Desmond, a black Canadian from Nova Scotia who challenged the segregated seating policy in a cinema a decade before the more widely known bus protest by Rosa Parks in the US.
“A willingness to examine our stories and collective memories is fundamental to the museum,” says Young. “Many Canadians are only now learning about their history, and we encourage debate around what has been a pervasive culture of denial, particularly regarding the abuse perpetrated in the residential school system. We see our role as an educational one about the consequences for the survivors – and those who did not survive – and the impact on the generations that followed.
“Canada 150 sits within our broader vision and is not meant to finish at the
end of the year. We want Canadians to understand the achievements of previous generations in the human rights arena, but also to recognise their responsibilities and obligations, and consider how we can improve and pass those improvements
on to future generations.”
The complex and diverse make-up of Canada means it is impossible to classify artists as simply indigenous or Canadian, and many do not identify as either, says Andrew Hunter, the Fredrik S Eaton curator of Canadian art at the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) in Toronto. “Canada is a dynamic work in progress,” he says. “Settlement is complex and messy.
But there were people here from all over the world long before what we now call multiculturalism. We are also dealing with the history of colonisation and the break-up of the British empire. For example, a substantial Caribbean community arrived in the 1950s and 1960s, via the UK, following independence in former colonies.”
Beyond cliches
AGO’s temporary exhibition to mark Canada 150 is Every. Now. Then: Reframing Nationhood, which reflects this complexity through themes of absence, erasure and memory. “We are trying to get beyond the cliches of Canada – ice hockey and the Great White North and so on,” says Hunter.
“The exhibition focuses on what it means to be Canadian now, but also addresses hidden histories and how they relate to current issues, many of which stem from the obscuring and erasure of indigenous cultures and their experiences.”
AGO has been able to commission ambitious work from established First Nations artists such as Robert Houle, but also from younger artists who immigrated to Canada and are part of its new demographic.
For example, Abedar Kamgari, an Iranian-born video artist who came to Canada as a child, has made a video about her two homes – where she grew up in Hamilton (near Toronto) and in Iran. They are both close to mountains and this becomes a repeated image and metaphor in her film.
“We need a more nuanced conversation about what it means to be displaced, and our new art commissions explore notions of home and nation,” says Hunter.
AGO also has arguably one of the world’s most important collections of Inuit art and more than a third of the artists in Every. Now. Then are indigenous.
“The AGO’s collecting and commissioning strategy reflects the importance of contemporary practice,” Hunter says. “Many people don’t realise that indigenous culture is a contemporary and vibrant one, with artists dealing with both their history and current issues, so it’s a concept of art as both a historic object and an art object.
“Canada 150 is not a celebration for everybody. For indigenous people it’s
more of a moment of reflection and critique. Much of our art is not rooted in western contemporary practice and we made a decision not to make a show just about confederation, because for too many of our artists it’s a blip on a great wheel of endless time. We wanted to look forward. You can’t understand Canada by only focusing on post-1867 history.”
Powerful witness
The year 1867 is not necessarily an anniversary all Canadians would want to celebrate. The Witness Blanket is a powerful artwork by native artist Carey Newman, which is touring the country in 2017. An estimated 150,000 First Nations, Inuit and Métis children were taken from their families and communities to be “assimilated” at Indian residential schools across Canada between the 1890s and the end of the 20th century.
Newman, who is the son of a residential school survivor, visited 70 sites of these schools across the country that aimed to “take the Indian out of the child”. Many children suffered forced labour, abuse and deprivation, as well as disease and death through neglect and overcrowding.
Their experiences affected not only their own lives, but also those of subsequent generations. The artist selected 800 found objects from these sites to weave onto a cedar framework. Everything – from the rubble of ruined buildings to photographs and fragments of lost languages – was pieced together to create a healing national monument that reflects the struggles for the rights of indigenous peoples, and official recognition of the attempted erasure of their culture.
Canada 150 in the UK
National Maritime Museum, Greenwich
Death in the Ice: The Shocking Story of Franklin’s Final Expedition
Exhibition developed by the Canadian Museum of History in partnership with National Maritime Museum, with finds and forensic research from explorer John Franklin’s fateful last expedition to the North-West Passage in 1845.
14 July-7 January 2018
British Museum
Where the Thunderbird Lives, Cultural Resilience on the North-west Coast of North America
Exhibition displaying 10,000 years of traditions and cultural artefacts of the First Nations people of Canada’s western coastline from Alaska, British Columbia and Washington state, featuring traditional wood carving to contemporary prints.
Until 27 August
British Library
Canada Through the Lens
Exhibition from the British Library’s Canadian photographic collection displaying images of the young and growing nation between 1895 and 1924.
Until 10 September
The National Gallery
A Celebration Featuring Aerial Inspiration
A day of free events and activities for families in collaboration with Canada House to create a Canadian landscape taking inspiration
from the gallery’s renaissance paintings.
28 July