As part of this year’s COMBINE Art Fair, this virtual roundtable brings the founders of the Art Fair—Monica Reyes Gallery, Unit 17 and WAAP (Wil Aballe Arts Projects)—together with an invited gallerist to speak on the importance of gallery-led collaboration within the Canadian arts ecology and to feature highlights from the fair!

Join us for a hybrid Curator’s Tour with Griffin Art Projects director and curator Lisa Baldissera and visit our residency Open Studios to celebrate the work and research of 2023 Paris-Vancouver Program Resident, Anne Bourrassé, and Griffin x ECU Fellowship Recipient, Maru Aponte! Drop in for a casual chat with the residents between 12 and 5 PM. 

Join us online to hear what the 2023 Paris/Vancouver Curatorial Residency Program Resident, Anne Bourassé, has been up to during her time at Griffin.

Join us online to hear what the recipient of the Griffin x ECU Fellowship Studio Award, Maru Aponte, has been up to during her time at Griffin.

This ongoing series builds on one of Griffin Art Project’s mandates: to make privately held art collections accessible to the public. Join us in person at Griffin Art Projects as Jeffrey Boone, collector and UBC MA candidate in Critical Curatorial Studies, and Glenn Alteen, curator and writer, discuss the embodied relations of art collections.

Join us for a pre-recorded talk by the inaugural recipient of the Emerging Indigenous Artist Studio Award, Miriam Berndt and collaborator, Musqueam Artist, Grace Ulu discussing land-based practices, unveiling family histories, and reconciling stories from their nuanced matrilineal heritage.

If you have always wanted to know how to start an art collection, join us at Griffin Art Projects for COMBINATIONS, an in-person social event for emerging collectors with gallerist Wil Aballe (Wil Aballe Art Projects)!

Join us in-person for a dynamic multi-event reception for SHIFT: Ecologies of Fashion, Form and Textile.

Join us in-person at Griffin Art Projects on Sunday, August 27 for a multi-event celebration to close the summer! From 12 - 2 PM, Griffin will host a reception for Per Diem: The Gerd Metzdorff Collection, a lushly illustrated full-colour publication featuring Canadian and international artists from Metzdorff’s stunning collection. Refreshment, food and remarks from Grant Mann and David Birdsall will celebrate the Metzdorff collection along with artists featured in the publication. At 2:30 PM, the final exhibition tour with Emmett Hanly will provide the inside scoop on this enigmatic collector’s choices. And from 12 - 5 PM, Griffin will also host Open Studios with artists Jaewoo Kang, ECU x Griffin Graduate Studio Award Winner Marion Landry, and August Curator-in-Residence, Bernard Liebov.

Join the recipient of the Griffin x Emily Carr University Studio Award, Marion Landry, live over zoom to learn about her practice and what she has been up to during her time at Griffin.

Join us online to hear from artist and curator, Su Ying Strang, about her work in the arts and past curatorial projects including the archival exhibition and research lab Pulling Back the Paper (The New Gallery, 2021).

Su Ying Strang (she/her) is an artist and cultural worker based in Sikohkotoki on the traditional territories of the Siksikaitsitapi. Su Ying joined the Southern Alberta Art Gallery Maansiksikaitsitapiitsinikssin in 2021 as the Gallery’s executive director, and previously served as director of The New Gallery in Mohkinstsis (2012–2021). She received a BFA from the Alberta University of the Arts (2010), has completed the Rozsa Arts Management Program (2016) and Banff Centre’s Cultural Leadership Program (2017), and was a fellow of the Salzburg Global Forum for Young Cultural Innovators (2020). Su Ying’s work in the arts is informed by an artist-centered and community-driven ethos, prioritizing thoughtful stewardship of artistic practices and accessibility to programming for audiences.

Griffin Art Projects is excited to present this ongoing series, which embodies our mandate to make privately held art collections accessible to the public. Join us for engaging conversations that bring together art enthusiasts, collectors, and experts in an exploration of contemporary art and collecting practices.

In this upcoming in-person event, Griffin’s adjunct curator, Dr. Karen Tam, will moderate a conversation with three Vancouver-based art collectors who will share their invaluable experiences and passion for art. We are thrilled to welcome Ann and Marshall Webb, and Andrew Booth to this discussion. Seasoned art collectors, Anne and Marshall will talk about acquiring and living with art for over thirty years. Andrew Booth, curator of the renowned Vancouver Art Blog, an Instagram account devoted to promoting and showcasing Vancouver's vibrant contemporary art scene, will bring his perspective as a collector who embarked on this journey just a few years ago.

Together, Dr. Karen Tam, Andrew Booth, Ann, and Marshall Webb will delve into various topics surrounding contemporary collecting practices. Their extensive knowledge, experiences, and personal insights will offer a unique glimpse into the challenges, joys, and rewards of building and maintaining an art collection. Join us as they discuss the evolution of their collections, their collecting strategies, the importance of community, and the transformative power of sharing their collections.

Join us in person for the launch of Griffin Art Projects’ recent publications, with informal remarks by contributors Su Ying Strang (Whose Chinatown? conference organizer), Karen Tam (Whose Chinatown? curator), Patrik Andersson (The Great Exchange: Teeth, Loan and Trust Company, Consolidated: The Trylowsky Collection, curator).

How might the pandemic shape the future of Toronto’s Chinatown? Five scenarios tackling this question are imagined by Asian Canadian youth, with their speculations brought to life by a visual collage of dreamlike LiDAR 3D modeling scans.

Join artist-in-residence Jaewoo Kang in the first half of a two-part Intergenerational Eco-Fashion Workshop in person at Griffin Art Projects’ Residency Space, presented in conjunction with the upcoming Fall exhibition project at Griffin, SHIFT: Fashion, Form & Textile which features work at the intersection of contemporary art, textiles and fashion through Canadian and international artists.

Join artist-in-residence Jaewoo Kang in the first half of a two-part Intergenerational Eco-Fashion Workshop in person at Griffin Art Projects’ Residency Space, presented in conjunction with the upcoming Fall exhibition project at Griffin, SHIFT: Fashion, Form & Textile which features work at the intersection of contemporary art, textiles and fashion through Canadian and international artists.

Join artist Matilda Aslizadeh in the studio for an informal in-person chat about the work she has undertaken during her time at Griffin. Drop-ins welcome!

Join the recipient of Griffin Art Projects’ North Shore Studio Art Residency Award, Matilda Aslizadeh, to learn about her practice and what she has been up to during her time at Griffin

Join Lisa Baldissera, Griffin Art Projects director and curator of Per Diem II: The Gerd Metzdorff Collection, for an in-person curator’s tour followed by a Q&A.

With the passing of this enigmatic and remarkable collector, Gerd Metzdorff’s stunning collection is presented to the public for the first time at Griffin Art Projects.

Join us in person at Griffin Art Projects with gallerist Tobin Gibson (Unit 17) for wine, cheese, and a chat about starting your own art collection. We will be discussing collecting from different angles in a casual environment.

Join us in person for the opening of Per Diem Part II: The Gerd Metzdorff Collection, with collectors Grant Mann and David Birdsall in attendance for a casual meet-and-greet.

Join our artists-in-residence Miriam Berndt and Phoebe Bei in the studio for an in-person chat about the work they have undertaken during their time at Griffin!

Miriam Berndt is a Plains Cree and Irish woman living in cə̓snaʔəm (so-called Marpole, Vancouver BC), with roots in Kahkewistahaw First Nation and an upbringing on Six Nations of the Grand River territory. Her mixed media art explores themes of generational healing, hybrid identity, and land-based epistemologies through abstract expressions. She specializes in land-based design through a landscape architecture lens.

Phoebe Bei is an emerging interdisciplinary artist whose practice addresses politics of land, cultural memories, and collective identities. Working largely in photographic processes and installations, her research is rooted in critical studies on ‘the image’ and representation. Her work navigates fictional and existing embodiments of land and how land is occupied, manifested and disseminated in our production of place, culture and identity. Currently, she has found fictitious unions between disparate subjects like land, language, affect, and body/bodies constructive in her understanding of self as an inconclusive and often confusing entity. However, it is through an exchange in dialogues—this sifting of what is retained, projected and disposed of that she has found fertile in informing her contemporary conditions.

Ali Ahadi and Babak Golkar, the artists behind Alibaba Conundrum, will host an artist talk in discussion with a panellist to be announced, followed by a Q+A.

Working together as Alibaba Conundrum, they note, “This exhibition critically examines how different ways of seeing, and subsequently those of saying, are manufactured today through the hegemony of the English language, globally conditioning the possibilities of thinking. It also explores how the link between the socio-economic structures of the neoliberalism, Christian theology, and the global institution of art with its English grammar, maintains the contemporary habitus of thinking through diverse regimes of image production and media cybernetics (...)”.

Curated by Griffin Art Projects’ Adjunct Curator, Dr. Karen Tam, join us for an online streaming of the second of two feature-length films around language.

Haida Gwaii, 1800’s. At a seasonal fishing camp two families endure conflict between the nobleman Adiits’ii and his best friend Kwa. After Adiits’ii causes the accidental death of Kwa’s son, he flees into the rainforest, descending into madness and transforming into Gaagiixid – “the Wildman.” When the families return in the spring, they discover Adiits’ii has survived the winter. Can he be rescued and returned to his humanity? Meanwhile, Kwa wrestles with his deepest desire – revenge. SGaawaay K'uuna (2018, dir. Gwaai Edenshaw and Helen Haig-Brown) is the first feature-length film made entirely in the Haida language.

Join “Through a BIPOC lens” series’ artist in residence, Phoebe Bei, to learn what she has been up to through her time at Griffin!

Phoebe Bei is an emerging interdisciplinary artist whose practice addresses politics of land, cultural memories, and collective identities. Working largely in photographic processes and installations, her research is rooted in critical studies on ‘the image’ and representation. Her work navigates fictional and existing embodiments of land and how land is occupied, manifested and disseminated in our production of place, culture and identity. Currently, she has found fictitious unions between disparate subjects like land, language, affect, and body/bodies constructive in her understanding of self as an inconclusive and often confusing entity. However, it is through an exchange in dialogues—this sifting of what is retained, projected and disposed of that she has found fertile in informing her contemporary conditions.

This ongoing series builds on one of Griffin Art Project’s mandates to make privately held art collections accessible to the public. Join Griffin Art Projects in conversation with collector Haitian-Canadian Yves Pierre-Louis and gallerist Hugues Charbonneau for a virtual discussion revolving around alternative art-collecting economies.

Join Griffin Art Projects for a virtual panel discussion between three Indigenous curators as they discuss their methodologies and approaches to curation.

Lorilee Wastasecoot (Legacy Art Gallery), Aliya Boubard (Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art), and Jocelyn Piirainen (National Gallery of Canada) will discuss their approaches to the curation of Indigenous art within a field still largely dominated by colonial values of art, culture, and space. Panelists will provide insight into their past projects, curatorial methodologies, and about the overlap between Indigenous art and the Western fine arts world.

Curated by Griffin Art Projects’ Adjunct Curator, Dr. Karen Tam, join us for an online streaming of the first of two feature-length films around language.

Those Who Come, Will Hear (2017, dir. Simon Plouffe) proposes a unique meeting with the speakers of several Indigenous and Inuit languages of Quebec. The film starts with the discovery of these unsung tongues through listening to the daily life of those who still speak them today. Buttressed by an exploration and creation of archives, the film allows us to better understand the musicality of these languages and reveals the cultural and human importance of these venerable oral traditions by nourishing a collective reflection on the consequences of their disappearance.

Join our artists in residence, Rain Cabana-Boucher and Natalie Purschwitz, in the studio for an in-person chat about the work they have undertaken during their time at Griffin!