Emerging youth artist and musician Tony Eetak explores a VR installation at the Urban Shaman Contemporary Art Gallery in Winnipeg, Manitoba.
Our recent visit to the Urban Shaman Contemporary Art Gallery was nothing short of extraordinary. Nestled in the heart of the city, this unique Indigenous artist-run centre offered an experience that was both enriching and rejuvenating. This amazing and inspiring space is hands-down one our favourite arts spaces.
Our first visit took place in May 2024 for roundtable discussions with the Manitoba Arts Council and Canada Council for the Arts and we’ve been in love with Urban Shaman ever since. It was wonderful to be able to pop in and check out their latest exhibitions.
Here’s a glimpse into what made our time at Urban Shaman so special.
During our visit to Urban Shaman, we had the privilege of experiencing an evocative exhibition titled Hand-Me-Downs by artist Melissa Johns. This remarkable showcase, situated in storywork, material culture, and new media, engages the past in conversation by reawakening forgotten narratives and reinterpreting inherited legacies. The process-based undertaking involves translation, preservation, and archival efforts that transform the nostalgic and familiar through VR, video, digital painting, and beadwork.
Melissa Johns, born in 1993, is a new media artist and educator from a mixed Kanien’keha (Mohawk, Turtle Clan) and French Canadian background, based in Tkaronto. Her visual practice manifests at the convergence of contemporary media, using interdisciplinary methods to collect, preserve, and transform fragments of stories around her. Specializing in virtual reality installations, digital painting, and video art, her work meticulously translates sentimental objects and family histories into new digital forms, investigating the narrative potential of these emergent channels.
Through the material exploration of possessions, photos, and textiles passed across generations, memories are carried with love and digitally reconstructed. Honoring what is lost and remembered situates home and identity in the wake of displacement. The exhibition responds to the lasting impacts of the residential school system, creating a dialogical practice that communes with the past for critical intervention and cultural bridging. Beyond its service to family, Hand-Me-Downs seeks to engage others through evocation and immersion.
This work speaks to those who grapple with displacement, celebrating lived experiences situated between cultures. It reflects who we are as progressive generations of cultural embodiment and challenges us to decide who we want to be.
To learn more about the Urban Shaman Contemporary Art Gallery, visit their web site at: https://www.urbanshaman.org
About our summer programming
This year’s Youth, Arts and Media Team summer activities are supported by Global Dignity Canada, and with funding from Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada. Manitoba Agriculture, the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, and the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership, the OpenAI Researcher Access Program, Agri-Food and Agriculture Canada and the Government of Canada’s Youth Employment Skills Program. We thank them for supporting our youth and programs. We especially thank Debbie Keeper for welcoming us so warmly during our visit, for showing us around the neighbourhood and introducing us to some of the other exciting arts spaces that can be found in and around Winnipeg’s historic Exchange District.
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