Two creative new art exhibitions are on display at the Old School House Arts Centre in Qualicum Beach.
Muxmuy’e is a powerful show featuring Indigenous women artists mo xiye’, moxwaju, di'qe, g̱a̱da̱luḵ’widze and mexwiye, according to Illana Hester, executive director of TOSH.
The exhibition includes items from the artists' own homes, examples of creative practices such crocheted blankets, rug hooking, quilts made to wrap their children in and prints that hang on their walls.
“I think there is a really interesting spectrum of what we consider creativity and it’s important to constantly be reflecting on that," Hester said. "Like what you wear is just as creative as the cup you drink out of, is just as creative as a print or more formal ways that we have seen of making artwork.”
Most of the artists are women from Qualicum First Nation, Hester added. The exhibition was curated by Carrie Reid, also a member of Qualicum First Nation.
“We tried to make it look like a home. So there’s a bedroom and a living room and a storage area,” Reid said, and added the artists were "trying to emphasize that our homes are a lot like non-Indigenous homes, but they’re different, so that was where we were coming at.”
Reid said the starting point for the exhibition was the 215 suspected unmarked graves found through ground-penetrating radar at the former Kamloops Indian Residential School — and the idea that each one of them had a mother.
The theme of the show was originally 'mother', she added, but it was switched to 'muxmuy’e', which means ‘umbilical’.
“Our word for for our umbilical chord has the same root as our word for the land, so that tie too, between ourselves and the land,” Reid said. “Women were like the cultural treasure boxes."
Muxmuy’e includes entire rooms, such as a bedroom, a living room and a storage area, Reid said.
“It’s really neat to be able to showcase lived-in work,” Hester added.
In recent years there has been a "huge shift" in museums and galleries to recognize art forms such as weaving, rather than categorizing it as “women’s work”, according to Hester.
There is a range of art that includes everything from beading, to cedar bark, cans of salmon, cradles and weaving looms.
Reid included pieces such as rugs, knitting, crocheting and a woodworking piece. She has been working in these art forms her whole life.
“It’s supposed to feel like at home,” Hester said.
Also on display at TOSH this month and next is Mothering without a Mother, a black and white photography series by Megan LeFebvre.
The exhibition is a documentary photography project exploring her experience mothering after losing her own mother in March 2023.
"Shortly afterward, I asked myself, ‘How do I mother without my mother?’" LeFebvre said in her artist statement posted on TOSH's website. "Subsequently I began photographing my kids, Miles and Margot, differently. I felt free to photograph my kids how I saw, and felt, when I was with them."
The exhibit includes an audio component, so viewers can bring their headphones and scan a QR code to listen to the artist talk about her work as they walk through the exhibition.
LeFebvre earned a PhD in Public Health from the University of Alberta in 2014. She loves hanging out with her study participants and learning their stories. She used a research method called ethnography to ask them questions. Recently she brought her love for ethnography and photography together, according to her artist statement.
"I’m making these photographs for Miles and Margot to show them how much I love them. Ultimately, however, I’m making these photographs for myself and my mom," she said. "I must believe, somehow, she is 'up there' with us. These photographs are my way to let her know that we are okay."
In 2024 LeFebvre earned an emerging artist grant from the Canda Council of the Arts which supported her photography project.
Both exhibitions will be on display at TOSH (122 Fern Rd.) until April 26.
