Dana Claxton and Dorothy Grant are both revered for their transformative, groundbreaking works of Indigenous Northwest Coast Art. Dana Claxton’s work has been displayed in museums across the globe, while her contributions to art history continue through her role of Professor of Art History at UBC. Curve!: Women Carvers on the Northwest Coast is no different, offering an eighty-year overview of wood and argillite carving by Indigenous women artists on the Northwest Coast. Meanwhile Haida designer, Dorothy Grant, made it her life’s mission to bring her culture’s traditional art into contemporary fashion while adhering to the principle of Yaguudang, or respect for oneself and others. Dorothy Grant: An Endless Thread celebrates her remarkable career. In conversation together, and alongside visuals of magnificent artworks, they discuss the rich landscape of contemporary Indigenous art. Moderated by Damara Jacobs-Petersen.
Presented in partnership with the Museum of Anthropology at UBC and The Polygon Gallery.
More information about the Festival:
Box Office | Accessibility | Venue Map
Event Participants:
DANA CLAXTON is a critically acclaimed, award winning artist and filmmaker. Her practice investigates indigeneity, beauty, the body, the socio-political, and the spiritual. Claxton’s work has been shown internationally and is held in major public and private collections throughout Canada and the United States. In 2013, her film He Who Dreams won the Best Experimental Award at the imagineNATIVE Festival in Toronto. Claxton is a Professor and Head of the Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. She is member of the Wood Mountain Lakota First Nation in Saskatchewan. “I am grateful to the sun and my sundance teachings – mni ki wakan – water is sacred. Mni wichoni = water is life.”
DR. DOROTHY GRANT, CM was born into the Raven Clan of the Kaigani Haida in Hydaburg, Alaska, in 1955. She began sewing at age thirteen and learned traditional Haida arts in the early 1980s from Florence Edenshaw Davidson of Old Masset, Haida Gwaii. After graduating from the Helen Lefeaux School of Fashion Design in Vancouver she launched Feastwear, a fusion of traditional Haida art and haute couture, in 1989, and continues to produce bespoke garments for clients as well as wholesale and retail clothing lines. Her work has appeared in exhibitions around the world and is held in the permanent collections of numerous institutions, including the Museum of Anthropology at UBC, the National Gallery of Canada, the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian, and the American Museum of Natural History. Her many awards and honours include the Order of Canada (2015) and an Honourary Doctorate of Arts from Simon Fraser University (2017). Recently Grant has been visiting Indigenous communities to mentor young entrepreneurs and teach the art of fur-felted ceremonial hats.
DAMARA JACOBS-PETERSON is passionate and dedicated to the arts and community building and cross-cultural dialogue within museums and educational institutions. She received a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Communications from Simon Fraser University and a Master of Arts Degree with honours in Art & Visual Culture Education from the University of Arizona. Damara is currently working as the Curator of Indigenous Engagement and Native Youth Program Director at the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia.
Damara carries the Ancestral names Cha7awtenaat iy Siyámiya and is proud of her Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), Snuneymuxw (Nanaimo) and African American ancestry. She was born and raised in the villages of Xwemelch’stn and Esla7han (Capilano and Mission Indian Reserves) located in Vancouver, British Columbia. Damara grew up surrounded by educators and artists, an aspect of her identity that leads her to choose a career in creative fields.
