Questions of Community: Artists, Audiences, Coalitions

Description

242 pages
Contains Photos, Illustrations, Bibliography
$25.00
ISBN 0-920159-74-5
DDC 700'.1'030971

Publisher

Year

1995

Contributor

Edited by Daina Augaitis et al
Reviewed by Christine Hughes

Christine Hughes is a policy analyst at the Ontario Native Affairs
Secretariat.

Review

This edited volume emerged from the community residency and symposium in
visual arts

held at the Banff Centre for the Arts in 1993. Approximately 15 artistic
projects, many collaborative in nature, are analyzed in the book by the
artists responsible. As noted in the introductory chapter, artists in
the 1990s have been faced with the central question of address and have
subsequently shifted from an artistic role to an activist role, often
moving the setting of their exhibitions outside the art gallery forum.
The book also examines the increasingly important role of mass media in
disseminating the artist’s message.

As part of the project’s 10-week residency, four groups of artists
were invited to the Banff Centre to design projects to return to various
communities. Individual chapters are devoted

to the subject matter of each of these artists’ projects: a pan-Arctic
Inuit women’s collective interested in strategies for community
involvement in social change; a group of artists producing public
service announcements on AIDS and HIV; artists exploring language and
culture in support of indigenous peoples in Canada; and
Japanese-Canadian ceramicists. The book also examines work developed in
other locales across Canada, particularly where artist collectives have
produced projects that span regions. Examples include a Manitoba group
that mentors women artists, a Calgary-based group of Native artists and
artists of color, First Nations activism in the arts, and a public
advertising campaign against homophobic violence.

With the concept of community at its core, the chapters in this book
cover a range of topics, including how one can belong to a community,
how alliances can create communities, the role of institutions,
audiences and means of communication, and how to communicate messages
most effectively. Questions of Community is a valuable contribution to
the ongoing dialogue concerning the definition and boundaries of
community and the role that artistic coalitions have played in the
women’s, environmental, and labor movements as well as with respect to
issues of race, sexual identity, and AIDS.

Citation

“Questions of Community: Artists, Audiences, Coalitions,” Canadian Book Review Annual Online, accessed November 10, 2024, https://cbra.library.utoronto.ca/items/show/5019.