Image: Water No Get Enemy 3017, Quentin Vercetty
Blackface, or the act of darkening one’s skin in an attempt to impersonate Black people, is an act that persists in Canada. In that they juxtapose racial expression with claims to racial transcendence, blackface acts are a manifestation of Canadian postracialism.
Arts Against Postracialism: Strengthening Resistance Against Contemporary Canadian Blackface (AARP) :
AARP is a project led by Dr. Philip Howard (Principal Investigator, McGill University, Department of Integrated Studies in Education) in collaboration with artist/curator Camille Turner (artistic lead). It challenges blackface and postracialism by supporting efforts to contest them. It also seeks to contribute to challenging blackface on Canadian campuses.
Blackface has been a recurring phenomenon in Canada, and in recent decades university campuses and other sites of schooling have been a key site at which they occur.
The AAPR project seeks to contribute to challenging blackface on Canadian campuses by:
building capacity for critique and spaces of healing for those negatively impacted by blackface;
creating intra- and inter-campus networks between student organizations interested in challenging blackface;
raising the level of critical dialogue about blackface on campuses
To meet these objectives, four identical 1-day events were organized around a keynote by Dr. Howard, and art installations and workshops were created for the project by four socially engaged Black artists. The events took place on four different university campuses:
October 23, 2017: AAPR @ McGill University, Montreal, QC
October 25, 2017: AAPR @ Queen's University, Kingston, ON
October 27, 2017: AAPR @ Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, ON
October 30, 2017: AAPR @ Ontario College of Arts and Design University, Toronto, ON
The AARP project was funded by Connection Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.
AARP ARTISTS (Photo by Garrett Elliott)