The Looms We Resemble accentuates the similarities and intersections between different cultures and histories. Over the span of one month, the artists in this exhibition gathered to learn more about weaving and sit with the patience it offers.
Curatorial Tour with Fatma Hendawy
Each artist manifested their very unique and intimate connections with their heritage, ancestors, and identity. Through this guided tour, we will delve deep into these connections and explore how each artist found solace in being together, weaving, telling stories, sharing time and space and producing new artworks that capture the essence of this togetherness.
The tour will end with an informal open discussion between the curator and attendees.
ABOUT FATMA HENDAWY
Fatma Hendawy is a curator based in Toronto. She graduated in 2020 from the MVS Curatorial program, University of Toronto. She participated in curatorial workshops and residencies including Tate Intensive 2017, ProHelvetia and ZKU/Berlin. She curated “Overt: Militarization as Ideology”, 2020 at the Art Museum, “Blind Ambition” by Hassan Khan film screening at Images Festival 2022, “Garden of Broken Shadows”, 2023 at Critical Distance Center for Curators, “Art Nest” 2023 at TOAF 62, and “As we move away from the sun”, 2024 Apexart international exhibition at Allan Gardens.
Currently she is working on independent curatorial research “Harvesting Roots, Cultivating Hope” funded by OAC to document conversations with immigrant artists from the SWANA and East Africa in Ontario.
Saturday, November 30, 2024
Time: 2 – 4 PM (ET)
Youngplace Hallway Galleries (180 Shaw Street, Third Floor, Toronto)
No Registration Required
Storytelling Circle with Sarah Abusarar
Storyteller, Sarah Abusarar will be accenting the exhibit by weaving Palestinian stories of long ago. The Palestinian traditional stories were told by women in the villages. It is a tradition that was passed down from generation to generation. Often the women would tell these stories while engaging in other folk art such as embroidery and weaving. Sometimes they would tell traditional stories and other times the women would share stories from their own lives as they wove. Sarah comes from one such family. She will be sharing stories that would have been told around the fire in her village Dura by her grandmothers and that she continues to tell in diaspora in order to preserve this ancient tradition.
ABOUT SARAH ABUSARAR
Sarah Abusarar comes from a long line of storytellers on her paternal side. She tells stories to both adults and children. Sarah has told stories both nationally and internationally at festivals in Canada, Italy, Croatia, Bosnia, Tunisia, Morocco and United Arab Emirates. Because Sarah grew up in several countries, she tells stories from all over the world with the focus on Palestinian and Croatian stories where her roots lie. Her favourite stories are ones that promote social change. Sarah has also used stories in a therapeutic way with children in refugee camps and refugee children in Toronto, as part of their therapy. She works at the Parent Child Mother Goose Program using traditional storytelling to encourage parent child bonding. Sarah belongs to a collective called “Musical Story Studio” where stories and music are combined. Sarah tells stories so that she may go deep inside of the tales and find herself in far away magical places that she remembers, from long, long ago.
Saturday, November 23, 2024
Time: 12 – 3 PM (ET)
WA OFFSITE Gallery, 180 Shaw St. Unit 302
Registration Required
Maximum Capacity: 14
COME HAVE TEA with HELEN KONG
Tea is beyond a beverage. In a tea gathering we engage in a mindful and meditative journey of making, drinking, appreciating, and reflecting with tea.
In this tea gathering, Helen will demonstrate a Chinese tea ritual and serve teas to the participants and attendees. This will serve as context to her piece “Tea by the Apricot Tree” made during the “Way of Weaving” course facilitated by Jana Ghalayini. The tea mat, woven and created into a carry case for a traveling tea set expresses the significance of tea gatherings as a circle of learning and healing through engagement. More information about the piece can be found at the exhibition “The Looms We Resemble”.
ABOUT HELEN KONG
Helen Kong is a second generation Chinese Canadian living and working in Tkaronto (Toronto). She studied her first ritualized tea while living in Japan. Chado (the Way of Tea) is a meditative life journey through tea and hospitality. It is the gateway into art, culture, and philosophy. After returning to Canada, she studied ceramics as a way to better understand tea vessels. She established Secret Teatime, a clay studio where people play with clay and sip tea. She has expanded from making tea wares for Japanese teas to also studying and making wares for her own heritage of Chinese tea.
Saturday, December 7, 2024
Time: 1 – 3 PM (ET)
Open to all – no registration required
Location: Hallway Galleries, Youngplace, Third floor, 180 Shaw St.
Free Entry