History and interpretation: McCord Stewart Museum bridges past and future through cultural dialogue
In this photo essay from Montreal’s McCord Stewart Museum, we showcase art exhibits through the ages along with curator insights.
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Montreal’s McCord Stewart Museum has four outstanding ongoing exhibitions: Indigenous Voices of Today: Knowledge, Trauma, Resilience; Costume Balls: Dressing Up History, 1870-1927; Pounding the Pavement: Montreal Street Photography; and Little Burgundy – Evolving Montreal. See our coverage of earlier exhibitions at this award-winning museum here.
In the showcase on Indigenous art, the exhibits feature community members speaking out about their suffering as well as their dreams and plans for a better future. By helping initiate dialogue and foster understanding about the colonial experience, the exhibition offers opportunities for a meaningful connection.
This permanent exhibition was curated by Elisabeth Kaine, a former UNESCO Chair at Université du Québec à Chicoutimi. It is supported by the Québec Cultural Heritage Fund of the Ministry of Culture and Communications.
The exhibition on costumes captures the splendour of entertainment evenings where, for just one evening, guests transformed themselves into characters inspired by history or fantasy. On the one hand, many of these 19th century costumes capture the lighthearted side of life – but they also raise serious concerns about representations of Indigenous communities.
“The story told by these fancy dress balls is a sad and difficult one from an Indigenous perspective: appropriation, dispossession, exclusion, and oppression are common themes that emerge from this narrative,” according to Jonathan Lainey, Curator, Indigenous Cultures, and Cynthia Cooper, Head, Collections and Research and Curator, Dress, Fashion and Textiles, McCord Stewart Museum.
The exhibition on Montreal street photography features 30 groups of artworks captured by photographers who have documented the city’s social fabric. They reveal not just Montreal’s beauty but also its complexity, contradictions, diversity, and even comedy.
This exhibition was accompanied by a range of other community activities. For example, a workshop focused on helping family members create their own vision of Montreal using magnetic images and colouring pencils. A book was also published on the exhibited photographs and their back stories.
British-Canadian photographer Andrew Jackson showcased over 60 photographs on the urban and social transformations that have impacted the Little Burgundy neighbourhood. Residents also loaned contemporary objects, and this juxtaposition created a dialogue between the past and the present.
Through such a range of exhibitions, the museum shows that it is taking into account the changes in society, including the importance of recognising the consequences of colonialism. The museum also aims to amplify the voices of marginalised communities and actively contribute to environmental protection.
All these activities have won the museum a range of awards and acclaim. The McCord Stewart Museum is one of eight Montreal cultural institutions identified by the Conseil des arts de Montréal to make its resources, expertise, and networks accessible for the benefit of the artistic community.
“The museum fosters discussion and builds connections between communities by providing a safe space for all. It is in this spirit of inclusion and in a strong desire to contribute to making our society a fairer society that the Museum has also committed to continuing the decolonisation of its practices and to placing sustainable development at the heart of these,” museum president and CEO Anne Eschapasse explains.
Now what have you done today to pause in your busy schedule and harness your creative side for a better world?
(All photographs were taken by Madanmohan Rao on location at McCord Stewart Museum.)