Since closing at the Maltwood Art Museum, the Shashin exhibition has had very successful showings at the Langley Centennial Museum in Fort Langley, BC (June 30-Sept. 25), and the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre in Kamloops, BC (Oct. 5-Nov. 15). It will open in December at the Gendai Gallery at the Toronto Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre.

Community partners, UVic faculty members and student researchers gathered together for a two-day conference, which took place at the Newcombe Conference Hall at the RBCM and the Senate Chambers at the University of Victoria. Keynote speaker Bob Turner delivered a paper entitled "Old Boats Reveal their Secrets Slowly: Empathy, Authenticity and Heritage Sustainability," and Kevin Neary facilitated five sessions on themes of knowledge sharing between the community and the university. A transcript of the conference in PDF form is available for download.

Mark Renauld, President of SSHRC

Message to CURA participants from the President of SSHRC

As you meet for your final conference, I send warmest congratulations from SSHRC for the exciting, innovative and incredibly successful work you have accomplished as one of the first CURA we funded. I retain wonderful memories of my half-day site visit with several of you in Victoria. The passion and intellectual engagement was palpable and infectious -- particularly that of the students, several of whom said this CURA had fundamentally changed their lives. The academic researchers and community partners were equally eloquent about the new avenues of discovery it was opening to them. Ever since, each of the many times I have mentioned your project to other audiences, I say you have been re-constructing the history of British Columbia -- literally unearthing all kinds of artefacts telling rich and unique stories about hitherto unknown people and their influences, as if they had suddenly stepped into the present. You have truly embodied what the Council hoped for when it embarked on the CURA program. You are a testament to the remarkable power of partnership based on mutual respect and deeply shared goals. You have provided new partnership models and ways of engaging wider community interest. Most importantly, for me, you have enabled astounding numbers of students to gain first-hand research experience in a rich and creative intellectual environment. They are your gift to the future. From the bottom of my heart, I salute and thank you all.

Sincerely,
Marc Renauld, President
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada

Researchers from the "A Woman's Place": Art and the Role of Women in the Cultural Formation of Victoria BC, 1850s-1920s project will be participating in an Old Cemetaries Tour hosted by John Adams. A number of prominent women were buried in the Ross Bay Cemetary, including Hannah Maynard, Kathleen O'Reilly, Sister Mary Osithe, and the Douglas's youngest daughter Martha Harris. These women lived fascinating lives and played integral roles in the artistic, cultural, and economic development of Victoria in its formative years.

The Japanese Canadian Photographers Exhibit is now on at the Royal BC Museum, and will run until May 2. Among the eighty photographs chosen for this exhibition are prints made from more than 800 dry glass negatives `found’ in Cumberland, on Vancouver Island. They are from the studio of Messrs. Hayashi, Kitamura and Matsubuchi (1913-1932), and represent the residents of this coal mining town. In contrast, the photographs taken by the studio of P.L. Okamura (1902-1937), of New Westminster, are largely portraits of the town’s elite and of civic events, as Mr. Okamura held a respected position in the community, as Professor of Drawing, at the Oblats’ St. Louis College, since 1893. Son of a Japanese nobility, he came to Canada with education from Japan’s newly established Technical Fine Arts School, in Tokyo, which hired Western masters to teach arts and science. While these two studios drew their clientele from the community in which they served, the seven studios, located in Vancouver, served the Japanese immigrant communities, in Vancouver (Japan Town), Steveston, and the Fraser Valley, and their photographs document occupations, social events, and interest groups.

Noteworthy amongst the Vancouver photographers is Shuzo Fujiwara (1910-1941), who studied with a famous Japanese professional photographer, Hikoma Uyeno (1838-1904), in Nagasaki, before emigrating. Mr. Fujiwara and Mr. Okamura, two early photographers to Canada, educated in Japan, may be said to have influenced the quality and style of the development of early Japanese Canadian studio photography.

An exhibition catalogue will soon be available, and material for a museum education resource kit to be used in BC schools' social studies and arts curricula is also being developed.

This exhibition will coincide with the Society of Architectural Historians conference in April 2005. The delegates will be invited to tour modern movement architectural sites in the Victoria area, in addition to a two-day symposium.

Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery, University of Victoria

The CURA research project on women artists in Victoria, from the 1850s to the 1920s, will culminate in an exhibition that will attempt to answer questions such as: Why did women make art in colonial (1851-1871) and early post-colonial Victoria? How did they learn to make art? What sorts of art did they make? Who were they? Above all, what role did women's art activity play in Victoria's dramatic transformation during this period?

See Project: A Woman's Place...

This exhibition of photography is located on the ground floor of the Wasa Hotel in Fort Steele, BC. For more information about Fort Steele and the Wasa Hotel, go to the Fort Steele web site by clicking here.

See project: Joseph Frederick Spalding

Visions of the West Coast: Robert Aller and his Community celebrates the creative expression of artists working in the region of the Alberni Valley, as well as those encountered by Robert Aller during his career.

In 1995, Robert Aller donated twenty works of art, including four of his own pieces, to the Rollin Art Centre. This important collection of Canadian art was the first personal donation to the Centre, and marked the celebration of the Community Arts Council's thirty-year anniversary.

Robert Aller began his collection while he was enrolled as a student at the Vancouver School of Art in 1946. Many of the artists in his collection were personal friends or teachers, including George Clutesi, Fred Amess and Arthur Lismer. Since then, his collection has expanded to include the works of other leading artists from the Alberni region.

The exhibit is on display at the Alberni Valley Museum to March 12, 2005 and will be exhibited later in the year at the Maltwood Gallery of the University of Victoria. The Alberni Valley Museum is located in Echo Centre on Wallace Street in Port Alberni, and is open Monday to Saturday—10:00 am to 5:00 pm and on Thursdays to 8:00pm. Please call 723-2181 for more information

This exhibition will coincide with the Society of Architectural Historians conference in April 2005. The delegates will be invited to tour modern movement architectural sites in the Victoria area, in addition to a two-day symposium.

Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery, University of Victoria

The CURA research project on women artists in Victoria, from the 1850s to the 1920s, will culminate in an exhibition that will attempt to answer questions such as: Why did women make art in colonial (1851-1871) and early post-colonial Victoria? How did they learn to make art? What sorts of art did they make? Who were they? Above all, what role did women's art activity play in Victoria's dramatic transformation during this period?

See Project: A Woman's Place...

This exhibition of photography is located on the ground floor of the Wasa Hotel in Fort Steele, BC. For more information about Fort Steele and the Wasa Hotel, go to the Fort Steele web site by clicking here.

See project: Joseph Frederick Spalding

This exhibition will coincide with a Society of Architectural Historians conference in April 2005. The delegates will be invited to tour modern movement architectural sites in the Victoria area, in addition to a two-day symposium.

See project: Modern Movement Architecture in BC

World Tea Party Victoria at the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, June 25 - August 29, 2004

The exhibition is a collaboration between The World Tea Party Society, Vancouver and the University of Victoria CURA (Community University Reseach Alliance) program, funded by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. The teawares in the exhibit range from 10th century China through Japan to 18th century England and present day British Columbia.

Accompanying events at the Gallery will encompass even more of the world-wide ritual of tea, as will additional events and exhibits planned at other local sites.

See Project: World Tea Party

Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery

The Fraser Heritage Society's Liturgical Textiles exhibition will travel to the Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery at the University of Victoria in the fall of 2004.

See Project Liturgical Textiles of St. John Divine Church, Yale, BC

After a well-received showing at the Vancouver Art Gallery in the recent Drawing the World exhibition, the Inkameep Day School drawings will be featured in an exhibition entitled "Nk’mip Chronicles: Drawings from the Collection of the Osoyoos Museum," to be shown at the Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery, Feb. 23 – April 6, 2004.

See project: Inkameep Day School Art Collection

Dr. Andrea Walsh will present a University of Victoria Centre of Religion and Society Fellowship talk on March 3, 2004, from 4-6 p.m., at the University's Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery. Her paper will discuss several of the pieces on display in the gallery's Inkameep exhibit.

See project: Inkameep Day School Art Collection

McPherson Library Gallery, University of Victoria

Sveva Caetani’s series of surrealistic watercolour paintings titled Recapitulation began as a tribute to her father who died when she was only 17 years old. These paintings, executed with powerful, sharply defined watercolours, explore a stylistic range that includes cubism, futurism, and surrealism. The exhibition included works from the collections of the Vernon Art Gallery and the Alberta Art Foundation.

See Project: Caetani Family Project.

Greater Vernon Museum & Archives
Aug. 28, 2003 - Dec. 20, 2003

Vernon Art Gallery
Aug. 28, 2003 - Nov. 8, 2003

A co-production between the Vernon Museum and the Vernon Art Gallery, "Caetani: Visions of Rebirth" included an exhibition on the Caetani family at the Museum and an exhibit featuring a selection of Sveva Caetani's work at the Gallery. The Gallery exhibition, Sveva Caetani: Selected Drawings and Paintings of Recapitulation, moved to the McPherson Library Gallery at the University of Victoria from Nov. 19, 2003 – Jan. 15, 2004.

See Project: Caetani Family Project.

St. John the Divine Church, Yale, BC

The Fraser Heritage Society's Liturgical Textiles exhibition showed at St. John the Divine Church Historic Site throughout the summer of 2003.

See Project Liturgical Textiles of St. John Divine Church, Yale, BC

Vancouver Museum
Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery

China and Beyond was an educational exhibit featuring art objects from the Vancouver Museum, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, the Maltwood Art Museum and Gallery and private collections throughout British Columbia. The exhibit demonstrated how many features of Chinese culture familiar today have their origin in earlier periods.

See Project China and Beyond: The Legacy of a Culture

Vancouver Art Gallery

Thirty-six Inkameep drawings were included in a Vancouver Art Gallery exhibition: Drawing the World, June 28-Sept. 21, 2003. View the original press release from the VAG. (note: link is to a PDF file)

See Project Inkameep Day School Art Collection

Liu Centre for the Study of Global Issues
University of British Columbia

See Projects: Industry Narratives and Japanese Canadian Photographers.

Trinity Western University
Langley, BC

See Project: Liturgical Textiles of St. John the Divine Church, Yale, BC.

Langley Centennial Museum
9135 King St., Fort Langley, BC

See Project: Legh Kilpin Art Collection.

Ottawa, ON

See Project: Inkameep Day School Art Collection.

White Rock Museum & Archives, White Rock, BC

See Project: First Nations Basketry Collection.

Emily Carr House, Victoria, BC

See Project: A Woman's Place: Art and the Role of Women in the Cultural Formation of Victoria, BC, 1850s-1920s.

Senate Chambers
University of Victoria

See Project: China and Beyond: The Legacy of a Culture.

Fernie and District Historical Society, Fernie, BC

See Project: Joseph Frederick Spalding.

Gulf of Georgia Cannery National Historic Site, Richmond, BC

See Project: Industry Narratives.

Sointula, BC

See Project: Finnish/Canadian Community History.

Humanities Centre
University of Victoria

See Projects: Hallmark Society Streetscapes Project, Inkameep Day School Art Collection and Japanese Canadian Photographers.

Senate Chambers
University of Victoria

Discussion forum for CURA project directors and community partners about the collaborative research process.

University of Victoria, Royal British Columbia Museum and BC Provincial Archives

Training seminar for First Nations cultural researchers on issues concerning First Nations cultural property.

A CURA training workshop for participating UVic student researchers, facilitated by Jennifer Iredale, Curator, Coastal Okanagan Region, BC Heritage Branch.