Coast Salish Weavings In SFU's New Indigenous Curriculum Resource Centre

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Commissioned weavings by Atheana Picha (left); Chepximiya Siyam Janice George and Willard “Buddy” Joseph (right) in the Indigenous Curriculum Resource Centre

installation documentation, 2023, W.A.C. Bennett Library, SFU Burnaby (photo by Rachel Topham Photography)

Simon Fraser University’s Indigenous Curriculum Resource Centre (ICRC) moves into its first physical space in the university’s W.A.C. Bennett Library this month.

To mark the occasion, SFU Galleries partnered with the SFU Library to commission four Coast Salish weavings by Chepximiya Siyam Janice George and Skwetsimeltxw Willard “Buddy” Joseph (Skwxwú7mesh), Debra Sparrow (xʷməθkwəy̓əm), Angela George (Skwxwú7mesh and Səl̓ílwətaɬ), and Atheana Picha (q̓wa:ńƛəń), which will all be on view in the new space.

“Asserting Coast Salish presence in the ICRC through these weavings aims to reconfigure the university library from a space of colonial dispossession into one uplifting and centring Indigenous worldviews,” according to a news release from the university.

“The ICRC aims to incorporate Indigenous knowledge and ways of knowing into the practices of the institution, and redress historical and current practices that have centred Western learning and caused immense harm to Indigenous peoples.”

Several other Coast Salish artworks from the SFU collection have also been included in the new space, including Susan Point’s Circles in Time series, which draws from her studies of ancient spindle whorls. Screenprints by lessLIE (Penelakut and Esquimalt), Qwul'thilum (Lyackson and Snuneymuxw) and Maynard Johnny Jr.(Kwakwaka’wakw and Coast Salish) will be on view, too.

Source: Simon Fraser University

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