Tania Willard
| Tania Willard | |
|---|---|
| Born |
1977 Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada |
| Nationality | Canadian Secwepemc |
| Known for | Curator painting, installation, drawing, painting, printmaking, kinetic art, video, film, social art, new media art, video art, internet art, |
| Website | http://www.taniawillard.ca |
Tania Willard (born 1977) is an indigenous curator and artist from the Secwepemc nation, which is in interior British Columbia, Canada. Willard was the co-curator for the art exhibition, Beat Nation: Art Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture, which toured in major galleries across Canada.
Biography
Tania Willard was born in 1977.[1] She grew up in Armstrong, British Columbia as well as back and forth to her father's Indian reserve. A formative moment in her life happened when she was 16 and selling fruit for her aunt at a powwow; while there she saw a group of kids doing breakdancing within the powwow.[1]
Aside from her artistic career, Willard is also a mother and grows organic garlic.[2]
Artistic career
Willard focuses on mixing traditional Indigenous arts practices with contemporary ideas.[3] She is an artist and graphic designer. She creates in oil and acrylic painting, printmaking, pen and ink drawing, watercolour, mixed media and collage.[2] One of her current projects is with an art collective she is a member of, The New BC Indian Art and Welfare Society. It is part of a project called BUSH Gallery that looks at how to create art spaces or possibilities that respond to Indigenous concepts of land.[2]
Beat Nation: Art Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture
Beat Nation started as an on-line project for grunt gallery, it features visual art, videos, music, and writing.[4] Beat Nation the Exhibition toured starting in Vancouver to Toronto, Kamloops, Montreal, Halifax and Saskatoon. Willard states that "it was a really important journey to take this exhibit to different places; the context of the exhibition is to present indigenous artists today who respond to both socio-political states of indigenous peoples and struggles, as well as use a mix of quite contemporary mediums and ancestral ideas."[2]
Beat Nation started with a very artist-run-centre[1] or approach—very immediate and somewhat more flexible.[1] The intention was never to create a large scale traveling exhibition.[1]
Major exhibitions
- Beat Nation: Art Hip Hop and Aboriginal Culture, traveling exhibition with the first show at the Vancouver Art Gallery, 2011
- CUSTOM MADE, Kamloops Art Gallery, 2015
- Unceded Territories: Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun, the Museum of Anthropology at UBC, 2016
References
- 1 2 3 4 5 Sandals, Leah (28 June 2013). "Q&A: Tania Willard on Life Beyond Beat Nation – Canadian Art". Canadian Art. Retrieved 14 June 2016.
- 1 2 3 4 Ryan, Ming (10 September 2014). "Project Space". projectspace.ca. Retrieved 14 June 2016.
- ↑ "Tania Willard". Mice Magazine.
- ↑ Hui, Stephen (17 July 2009). "Geek Speak: Tania Willard, curator of Beat Nation: Hip Hop as Indigenous Culture". Georgia Straight Vancouver's News & Entertainment Weekly. Retrieved 14 June 2016.