School Bookings are available October 3 to December 16, 2022
Exhibition on view, Alicia Henry: Witnessing

Alicia Henry’s mixed media installations evoke narratives of community, humanity, and connectedness. Henry combines wood, paper, acrylic, canvas, thread, dye, cardboard, leather, and cotton in figurative works that explore ideas of collective identity. Fascinated by the human form, Henry’s figures allow us to address and redefine our understanding of the body—our own and those of our neighbours, family, and community—and consider how bodies hold and communicate memories and history.  

This season’s school programs connect to Arts Education Big Ideas across grades K through 8, exploring how art can be a way to connect with and understand our community and our role within it.

If you have specific curricular connections that you would like us to address, please reach out to discuss how we can create something to suit.

Our interactive tours are adapted for each group to allow for age-appropriate engagement with students of all grades. In all cases, we employ a student-centered approach that encourages your students to find their voice and share with us what they see, feel, and wonder about the artwork on display.

Each tour is approximately 45 minutes in duration, depending on the engagement of the class, and includes in-gallery drawing activities and discussion.

In order to allow time for deep and meaningful engagement, we select only a few individual artworks to discuss in each tour. Please let us know if you would prefer a full guided tour.

CONSTRUCTED COMMUNITIES // SUITABLE FOR ALL GRADES
COLLABORATION // DRAWING // STORYTELLING

Students will work collaboratively to design and build an imagined community in our studios using paper, cardboard, and a selection of drawing materials. Working together, the students will imagine their community: where is it? what does it look like? who lives there? what activities happen in this place? how would they navigate these spaces? Each student will then work individually to create their contribution to the community using a variety of drawing materials on a cardboard or paper tile. Once completed, the students will assemble the tiles in our studios, telling the story of their piece in the whole.

LAYERS OF MEANING: FABRIC SELF-PORTRAITS // GRADES 4 +
TEXTILES// DRAWING // MIXED MEDIA

In the Gallery, students will be guided through close observations of Alicia Henry’s mixed media figures through drawing and conversation. These sketches and reflections will then inspire their own work in our studios where they will create a self-portrait using fabric, thread, and a variety of drawing materials.