Making Space | The Soil Between Plants
Curated by Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet and Sanaa Humayun with
Shalaka Jadhav
December 3 – January 29, 2022
Opening Reception : Friday, December 3, 2021 at 7 PM
FEATURED ARTISTS
Ana Ruiz, Ashley Beerdat, Ashna Jacob, Cheyenne Rain LeGrande ᑭᒥᐊᐧᐣ, Dana Belcourt, Darrell Spearman, Gabriel Esteban Molina, Holly Aubichon, Ilsa Ahmad, Joni Cheung, Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet, Kyla Yin, Madeline LeBlanc, Matias Martinez, Michelle Campos Castillo, Paxsi, Raneece Buddan, Sanaa Humayun, Sunny Chen
PANEL DISCUSSION | JANUARY 27, 2022 at 6:30 PM MST (ONLINE)
With artists Joni Cheung, Matias Martinez, Ashley Beerdat, Shalaka Jadhav, Darrell Spearman, Paxsi, Cheyenne Rain LeGrande, and curators Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet and Sanaa Humayun!
Watch Recording Here
Latitude 53 is pleased to welcome Making Space to the gallery for a new group exhibition emerging out of the group’s first year of activity.
Since Making Space’s founding in 2020 as a BIPOC peer mentorship collective by Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet and Sanaa Humayun, Latitude 53 has been honoured to offer support and resources to the group, and this winter this relationship will be crystallized in this exhibition of work by artists from across so-called Alberta and beyond. the soil between plants also includes writing curated by Shalaka Jadhav.
Curatorial Statement
the soil between plants explores how we tend to ourselves, our ancestors, the land, and to each other. This exhibition celebrates the collaborative works and collective growth of emerging and mid-career BIPOC artists, designers, and writers in Making Space.
Making Space began in August of 2020 between friends and co-organizers, Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet and Sanaa Humayun, following the need for a space to share stories, skills, and to be in community alongside other BIPOC emerging artists. Our pilot year as a collective grew through mentorship, guidance, and financial support from Latitude 53 and the Mitchell Art Gallery. As part of this pilot year, Latitude 53 extended an invitation to share space through a curatorial project and exhibition, the soil between plants.
When we tend, we look towards softness, tenderness, patience, and the less explainable. The work of tending isn’t without acknowledging the hardships, or the anger; it extends into where we get stuck, how we categorize and are compartmentalized, and where we’re extracted from. We want to honor our labours, the immeasurably important work we do in holding our secrets close, with our hands in our garden's soil, in reliability, resistance, play, in what is exploited under disconnection, and in the invisible and visible work of healing from it all.
To tend is to show care through consistency, to nourish that feeling in our bellies that self-soothes. To pause, to hold, and hold steady.
the soil between plants is curated by Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet and Sanaa Humayun, with writing curated by Shalaka Jadhav. This statement was written in collaboration between Kiona, Sanaa, and Shalaka.
We’d like to thank the EAC for their support in making this project possible, through their program Grants for Individuals and Collectives: Major Artist-Driven Projects
Making Space is a visual-arts focused BIPOC peer mentorship collective. They prioritize collaboration and individual agency through free drop-in workshops, artist visits, studio hangouts, and a shared love of gossip, support, and privacy.
Kiona Callihoo Ligtvoet (she/her) is a mixed Cree, Métis, and Dutch-settler artist coming from scrip land, and descending from Michel First Nation. Kiona is currently practicing in amiskwaciwâskahikan, exploring stories of grief and tenderness. Her practice uses a non-linear telling of memories through narrative work as a form of personal archiving. It draws from feelings of loss, displacement, and enfranchisement, but also from moments of deep belly laughter.
Paired with her studio practice, Kiona has also been working alongside other artists in initiatives of community care, co-organizing Making Space in partnership with Sanaa Humayun, and co-curating the soil between plants. She is a capricorn sun, with a sagittarius moon, and a leo rising.
Sanaa Humayun (she/her) is the child of Pakistani immigrants currently living and residing in Mohkintsis, on treaty 7 land. She is an artist, writer, & curator, with a practice that thinks about non-narrative story telling, and the histories held within objects. Her art is a tender exploration of dominant narratives, and how they can be re-written in order to make space for herself and the people she loves. She primarily works in textile and paint, and is an avid weaver. She is passionate about fostering community, through means of food, laughter, and an unapologetic love of gossip.
Along with Kiona Ligtvoet, Sanaa co-organizes Making Space, and is co-curating the soil between plants. She is a scorpio sun, with a capricorn moon, and a capricorn rising.
