Adorned

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Adeyemi Adegbesan, “We Need More Warriors Soon” (detail), 2019

digital print, wheat pasted (photo by Portia Priegert)

The diversity and cultural richness of clothing and other bodily decorations is the focus of Adorned, an exhibition at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria that is bracketed by two striking series.

At one end are three large photographic images by Vancouver-based Hunkpapa Lakota artist Dana Claxton that show women draped in masses of Indigenous beadwork. The images, bright and cheerful, are utterly original and reveal Claxton’s usual conceptual clarity. As the accompanying wall didactic suggests, these works extol cultural abundance in a playful way. The women’s hidden faces speak not to individuality but to the importance of women in Indigenous societies. 

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Dana Claxton, “Headdress – Dee,” 2019

LED firebox with transmounted chromogenic transparency (courtesy the artist).

Meanwhile, the opposite wall similarly displays three large portraits, these ones black and white, but also striking for their graphic dynamism. They explore what the artist, Toronto-based Adeyemi Adegbesan, calls the duality of blackness – the reality of its vast diversity across regions, ethnicities, religions and cultures, yet its singular understanding through the Western lens. To that end, he draws together a broad range of source materials within an Afrofuturist perspective to create a speculative and wide-roaming visual narrative. We Need More Warriors Soon, for instance, includes symbols like the Lion of Judah to represent the strength and courage required for activism and resistance. The lion symbolizes African sovereignty in Rastafari, a religious and political movement that started in Jamaica in the 1930s and spread globally. It is also associated with the Ethiopian monarchy and Haile Selassie, the emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974.

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Karin Jones, “Dread,” 2018

steel, human hair, brass, steel wire, used horse tack (leather) handmade brass mount on wood panel (photo by Portia Priegert)

Nearby, work by Vancouver-based Karin Jones reflects both her training in jewelry-making and her MFA at NSCAD University in Halifax. Jones, in pondering how historical narratives shape identity, uses various materials, including leather horse tack and human hair, in three works that refer to the restraints used to subjugate slaves. Dread, for instance, is a leather collar large enough for a human neck. It includes chains, dangling hair and small pendants that resemble padlocks. 

“As a descendent of some of these enslaved peoples, I have grown up with an understanding that this historical narrative is an important part of who I am, or perhaps, more accurately, how the world sees me,” Jones writes in her artist statement.

“I am presenting some of the complicated emotions I feel when reflecting on this period of history.”

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Sho Sho Esquiro, “Protest Kookum,” 2021

ribbon, rayon scarf and trim, cotton, wool, rickrack, recycled cow hide, acrylic patches, beads, ostrich embossed cow hide, antler, repurposed wool hat (photo by Portia Priegert)

The show, which continues to Nov. 20, includes works that Yukon-raised Sho Sho Esquiro, of Kaska Dena, Cree and Scottish heritage, recently exhibited at the Bill Reid Gallery in Vancouver, as well as works by other contemporary designers. Also featured is a T-shirt woven by Meghann O’Brien, of Kwakwaka’wakw and Irish descent, using wolf moss, mountain goat wool and yellow cedar bark. The work plays with the idea that goat’s wool is hard to come by, while mass-produced T-shirts are everywhere. O’Brien says the shirt’s final stitches are left undone to encourage viewers to reflect on how objects come into being. Interesting in this regard are the mounds of raw materials displayed beneath the garment. 

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Unattributed makers, “Manchu Woman’s Domestic Informal Robe,” no date

silk damask, fushia and silk thread and “Child’s Mandarin Jacket,” no date, silk, gold thread (collection of Art Gallery of Greater Victoria; photo by Portia Priegert)

Other works include the stunning Milky Way Necklace, made by renowned Haida artist Bill Reid as a gift for his wife, Martine, and various historical objects, including a Manchu woman’s silk robe from the early 20th century and an earlier Mandarin child’s jacket, both from the gallery’s large Asian collection.

This is the latest in a recent cycle of Canadian exhibitions centred on clothing, including the Glenbow’s Christian Dior show in 2019 and the nod the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts gave to French designer Thierry Mugler, also in 2019. Adorned is more diverse, pulling in some familiar works – Claxton’s imagery has been widely circulated – as well as items by artists and designers who are less known. The room is not large and the volume of work with differing display requirements – some in glass cases, some on bronze-coloured mannequins perched on a walkway – boost the visual clutter. Still, there is some stunning work and individual pieces are interesting, as are the diversity of approaches. ■

Adorned at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria from June 11 to Nov. 20, 2022. Work by Dana Claxton, Karin Jones, Adeyemi Adegbesan, Sho Sho Esquiro, Atelier COĪN by Cameron Ray Lizotte, Meghann O’Brien, FarLee Mowat, Simranpreet Anand and Ay Lelum: The Good House of Design. Curated by Jaimie Isaac.

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