Lorna Brown

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Join us for a public conversation between the summer 2023 exhibiting artists, moderated by Lorna Brown.

### RSVP
Registration for this event is required. Secure your place [here](https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/talk-gabrielle-lhirondelle-hill-dionne-lee-sesemiya-with-lorna-brown-tickets-636858449767).

### Accessibility
ASL interpretation is available on request. Requests can be accommodated up to 5 days in advance. Please contact [learning@cagvancouver.org](mailto:learning@cagvancouver.org) to book or for more information.

### Biographies
Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill is an artist and writer. Her practice explores the history of found materials to enquire into concepts of land, property, and economy. Recent exhibitions include the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the 59th Venice Biennale; Le Magasin CNAC, Grenoble; the Vancouver Art Gallery; the College Art Galleries at the University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon; and Gallery TPW, Toronto. She is a member of BUSH gallery, an Indigenous artist collective that seeks to challenge Eurocentric art models, and to centre the land and Indigenous epistemologies. Hill is Cree and English, with maternal roots in the Michel Band and Papaschase. She lives on the unceded territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, xʷməθkʷəy̓əm and səlilwətaɬ Nations.

Sesemiya (Tracy Williams) is a knowledge seeker, dreamer, water protector, land defender, lover, mother, auntie, weaver, and cultural practitioner. Her rich relationships with plants, animals, land, and water have taken her to the tops of mountains, the bottom of the ocean, fields of fireweed, and occasionally art galleries. Her work has appeared in exhibitions such as *lineages and land bases*, Vancouver Art Gallery (2020); *Intangible: Memory and Innovation in Coast Salish Art*, Bill Reid Gallery (2017); and *N. Vancouver*, The Polygon Gallery (2017). In 2021, a commissioned work of Sesemiya’s was included in the Vancouver Art Gallery’s presentation of Yoko Ono’s *Water Event*. Sesemiya is a proud member of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) Nation.

Dionne Lee is a visual artist working in photography, collage, sculpture, and video. Her work explores power and personal history in relation to the American landscape, and interrogates historical narratives that exist within photographic representations of land and place. Lee received her MFA from California College of the Arts. She has exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; Feria Material, Mexico City; New Orleans Museum of Art; Aperture Foundation, New York; Silver Eye Center for Photography, Pittsburgh; Museum of Fine Arts Houston; and the San Francisco Arts Commission, among others. Lee was a 2022 Artist-in-Residence at the Chinati Foundation and is a 2021–2023 Artist-in-Residence with Unseen California.

Lorna Brown is a Vancouver-based visual artist, curator, writer and editor. Brown is a founding member of Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, and is an ongoing member of the Other Sights Producer team. She was the Director/Curator of Artspeak Gallery from 1999 to 2004, an artist-run centre focusing on the relationship between visual art and writing. Between 2015 and 2022, she was Acting Director/Curator at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery at the University of British Columbia, curating exhibition series such as *Beginning With the Seventies* that explored the relationship between art, archives and activism. Brown has exhibited her work internationally since 1984, and has taught at Simon Fraser University and Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she received an honorary doctorate of letters in 2015. Awards include the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts Award (1996) and the Canada Council Paris Studio Award (2000). Her work is in the collections of the Belkin, SFU Galleries, the National Gallery of Canada, the BC Arts Council, the Surrey Art Gallery and the Canada Council Art Bank.

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In Conversation - Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill, Dionne Lee and Sesemiya with Lorna Brown.jpg

Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill, Dionne Lee & Sesemiya with Lorna Brown

In Conversation

One Saturday each month, CAG invites a guest host to lead walkthroughs of our current exhibitions, offering their insights and response to the works on view. In February, we welcome Lorna Brown to speak on the work of Kathy Slade. 

### Accessibility
ASL interpretation is available on request. Requests can be accommodated up to 5 days in advance. Please contact [learning@cagvancouver.org](mailto:learning@cagvancouver.org) to book or for more information.

### RSVP
No advance registration required.

### Biography
Lorna Brown is a Vancouver-based visual artist, curator, writer and editor. Brown is a founding member of Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, and is an ongoing member of the Other Sights Producer team. She was the Director/Curator of Artspeak Gallery from 1999 to 2004, an artist-run centre focusing on the relationship between visual art and writing. Between 2015 and 2022, she was Acting Director/Curator at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery at the University of British Columbia, curating exhibition series such as *Beginning With the Seventies* that explored the relationship between art, archives and activism. Brown has exhibited her work internationally since 1984, and has taught at Simon Fraser University and Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she received an honorary doctorate of letters in 2015. Awards include the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts Award (1996) and the Canada Council Paris Studio Award (2000). Her work is in the collections of the Belkin, SFU Galleries, the National Gallery of Canada, the BC Arts Council, the Surrey Art Gallery and the Canada Council Art Bank.

A portrait of Lorna Brown. An orange shawl is draped across her shoulders.

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Saturday Session with Lorna Brown.jpg

Lorna Brown on Kathy Slade

Saturday Session

Join exhibiting artists Charlene Vickers and Faye HeavyShield for an in-depth discussion about their respective practices and the concerns that drive them in a conversation moderated by artist, curator and writer Lorna Brown.

### Biographies

Charlene Vickers is an Anishinaabe artist based in Vancouver. Her painting, sculpture and performance works explore memory, healing and embodied connections to ancestral lands. She is the recipient of the 2018 VIVA Award. Recent exhibitions include a co-presentation with Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun *Lets’lo:tseltun*, Macaulay & Co. Fine Art (2021); *Rain Shadow*, Nanaimo Art Gallery (2021); *Where Do We Go From Here?*, Vancouver Art Gallery (2020); *Biennale nationale de sculpture Contemporaine*, Quebec (2020); *An Assembly of Shapes*, Oakville Galleries (2018); *Speaking with Hands and Territories*, SFU Galleries (2018); and *Vancouver Special: Ambivalent Pleasures*, Vancouver Art Gallery (2016). International group exhibitions include *the map is not the territory*, Portland Art Museum (2019); *Connective Tissue: New Approaches in Contemporary Fibre Art*, MoCNA, Santa Fe (2017); *From The Belly of The Beast*, Grace Gallery, Brooklyn (2017); and *If We Never Met*, Pataka Art Museum, Porirua, New Zealand (2016). Vickers graduated from Emily Carr University of Art and Design (1994) and Simon Fraser University (Critical Studies of the Arts, 1998; MFA, 2013).

Faye HeavyShield is a member of the Blackfoot Confederacy from the Kainai (Blood) Nation in the foothills of Southern Alberta. She is a fluent speaker of the Blackfoot language and studied at the Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary. HeavyShield has exhibited in solo and group exhibitions across Canada, including *Nations in Urban Landscapes*, Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver; *rock paper river*, Gallery Connexion, Fredericton; *Into the Garden of Angels*, The Power Plant, Toronto; and *blood*, Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge. Her work is held in collections including the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; the McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg; the Heard Museum, Phoenix; the Glenbow Museum, Calgary; and the MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina.

Lorna Brown is Acting Director/Curator at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, University of British Columbia and a visual artist, writer, educator and editor, exhibiting her work internationally since 1984. Brown was the Director/Curator of Artspeak Gallery from 1999 to 2004 and is a founding member of Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, a collective of artists, architects and curators presenting projects that consider the varying conditions of public places and public life. She has taught at Emily Carr University of Art and Design and Simon Fraser University. Brown received an honorary degree from Emily Carr University of Art and Design (2015), the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts Award (1996) and the Canada Council Paris Studio Award (2000). Her work is in the collections of the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, the National Gallery of Canada, the BC Arts Council, the Surrey Art Gallery and the Canada Council Art Bank.



Three black and white portrait photographs are placed side by side. From the left to the right, the photographs are of Charlene Vickers, Faye HeavyShield, and Lorna Brown. 

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Charlene Vickers & Faye HeavyShield with Lorna Brown

Once Removed, a photo/sculpture installation by Vancouver-based artist Lorna Brown, is being presented by the Contemporary Art Gallery, December 5 – January 16. Brown was born in Oxbow, Saskatchewan and graduated from Simon Fraser University's Centre for the Arts in 1984.

In recent years, Lorna Brown's work has received increasing exposure across Canada with exhibitions in Toronto, Montreal and Regina. *Once Removed* is the most ambitious installation she has conceived for a Vancouver audience. The work consists of four-large sculptural constructions composed of styrofoam, cord, pulleys, and weights and 8 foot photographic images on mylar. Each image portrays part of a woman's body and each sculpture forms a letter that in combination spells out ONCE.

The sculptural components are further accompanied by wall-mounted tear sheets with textual narratives that convey personal and fragmentary stories told by women who have left one place and moved to another. Removal and displacement forms the basis of this installation providing a poetic affirmation of women's experience, and an acknowledgement that such voices are potent.


Essay: "Weight of Movement in Lorna Brown's Once Removed," Mona Kin Cagnon

An artwork suspended in a gallery space. The work. is composed of a large photo that shows someone cutting a thread from their tank top. A rolled cable hangs from the bottom of the photo. 

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An artwork suspended in the corner of a gallery space. The work is composed of a photo printed on mylar, showing a person in a black robe, suspended from a cardboard oval hanging from a black cable. 

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01-LornaBrown-1992.jpeg

Two artworks mounted on a wall. One consists of two wooden pieces which suspend a large photo printed on mylar. A small stack of round, pink sheets hangs from a small metal rod in the wall.

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02-LornaBrown-1992.jpeg

A closeup of a small stack of round, pink sheets hangs from a small metal rod in the wall. The sheets have an image faintly printed on the background and small black text on the foreground. 

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04-LornaBrown-1992.jpeg

A large photo stretched between two wood beams. The beams have a slightly curved foot to them, resembling a serif on the letter "N." The structure has cables that hang from the ceiling attached to it.

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05-LornaBrown-1992.jpeg

A thin, open book rests on the opening of a dark, brushed metal plinth. The plinth appears to be hollow and has a small divot to hold the spine of the book. The background shows a white wall.

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06-LornaBrown-1992.jpeg

A large, translucent, black and white photo stretched between two wood beams in a gallery space. The beams have a slight curved foot to them, resembling serif on a letter "N."

Lorna Brown

Exhibitions

Talks & Events