Research Assistant 2022 - To Change We Must Reflect

Students in universities have always pushed boundaries and confronted authority. This is what is special about a new generation entering an institution; they bring a fresh perspective and are willing to fight to revolutionize. 

In the early 2000’s there seemed to have been a lot of this drive as student initiatives and student publications were confronting and examining the institution as well as whiteness in general. While looking through the archives I came across Some Magazine a student publication from 2004, which was the precursor name of Woo Publications. This Issue was titled “Rich White People” and spoke on race and whiteness as well as ‘affirmative action’.

The magazine contained institutional critique of Canadian university as a ‘business’ - it was calling for a new agenda: ANTI CAPITALIST - ANTI IMPERIAL - ANTI WESTERN - ANTI PRISON - all similar ideologies we are currently seeing as students ask for tuition decrease, to eat the rich, and prison abolition. As well as a view of anti-white cube deconstructing gallery criteria. The biggest shock factor was the satire used to critique whiteness. In the magazine you can see stereotypical photographs of middle/upper class white people alongside a comical caption. 9/11 is also mentioned in the magazine as an interview was included with a photographer in which a conversation of whether 9/11 had affected their practice due to racial tension and white superiority. The magazine ends with a comical critique of Martha Stewart and the Pope, the epitomes of whiteness in society at the time. These students were not just openly talking about anti-racism but about whiteness which even now is usually not centred in conversations of racism.  

When I found the issue of SOME Magazine pictured above, I had so many questions. What was occurring in 2004 when these conversations were being publicly spoken about and published within the institution? Was there a response from the university, and if so, was it received negatively or was it supported? I was trying to answer these questions by reflecting back on history and the large increase of immigration in Canada in the early 2000’s alongside the events of 9/11.  

This magazine publication seemed to function in parallel to issues that are being addressed nowadays within the institution. It caught my attention so much that I reached out to the magazine’s art director David Cuesta. We ended up having a zoom conversation as he is now an artist working and living in the UK. David had a lot of insights into the art world and many stories of being a student at Emily Carr as well as his time being an art director for the school magazine.  

Our conversation began with us diving into his background. David’s parents are Colombian but he grew up as a first generation immigrant between Calgary, Vancouver, and London, England. His mom, who is a fine artist, introduced him to the art world at a young age and this led him to  pursue his art education at Emily Carr University. David is now working and residing in London, England.

David studied graphic design during his time at Emily Carr University in 2001 and then went on to develop his own practice, first working for agencies and later creating his own agency. He explained his design practice as mostly commercial with some experimental design projects. He has also maintained a critical art practice outside of his design work.

David shared with me the complexities he faced being a practicing artist in the art world during the rise of the Internet. He noted the difficulties surrounding originality and authenticity in a time of increased accessibility of information. He referenced the dematerialization of the 1960s and 70s and the difficulty he faces creating things that are contemporary, due to the democratization of content. He questioned the use of the internet, commenting on how it has caused fine art to lose its value in a way. David sees this as creating an art world that is at the same time much more institutionalized while also seeing that the internet has created this space where anybody can be an artist. He then carried this thought into sharing with me how this expansion of the internet also allowed for more globalization, which meant the empowering of minorities.

David then recalled his experience at a residency where he was one of 8 artists. Upon reflection, he sees that it seemed to be a curation of minority artists with him reflected as the “token” Latinx artist. This experience brought into question how he felt about affirmative action and he recognized this as a big shift in the art world. He sees these changes as appearing in step with changes of structures and accessibility through technology.

As we touched on his experience at Emily Carr and its structure, I learned it really has not changed much in the last 20 years. David told me “it’s more about rewriting the system, not just trying to change it, because you can’t work for a system that wasn’t written for the majority of people.” According to David, he felt as though there was a lack of engaging or challenging ideas at that time. This made it too risky to engage in the classroom with ideas such as institutional racism. As David said:

“I don’t feel the status quo in most academic organizations are interested in pushing radical creative or political ideas. I think they are more interested, getting in more paying students and developing courses that tailor to people that want to build the next facebook.”

The student magazine, however, created a space for David to push forward contemporary ideas whether they were political or not. David, along with Robin Cameron, editor and collaborator, created an open environment where students could drop off their work to be featured in the magazine. At the time, David was also interested in having a more conceptual direction for each issue.

We then dived into a discussion of the magazine shown above. David explained to me they were living in a post 9/11 world and a very tense political climate during which George W. Bush was invading Iraq. During this time, he recalled it not being safe to be a person of colour anywhere due to the ostracization of Muslims in relation to the terrorist attacks. Slowly, the internet was becoming popular and magazines such as Vice Magazine were transforming their work into more conceptual, socio-political work causing others to follow. As David says, they carried these inspirations into SOME magazine by thinking “how shocking can we be?” The institution at this time resisted the challenges that the magazine wanted to bring forward, a culture of conformity was present and still exists at the university today. I asked David how the feedback was after publishing something so radical for its time. Surprisingly, he told me there wasn’t much response at all because he felt as though people didn’t really understand what he was saying, “most people thought it was just a joke”.

Some Magazine, 2002, issue 4, p. 19, featuring Fountain: after 9/11 by Babak Golkar
[scan from archives, click to view full-size online]

Looking through the magazine, it is clear how ahead of its time it was as it dove into socio-political issues that are at the forefront today. I wonder how this magazine would be received today knowing how relevant it is to current issues, especially considering  the lack of acknowledgement of the importance of these issues at the University that continues to this day.  I think these ideas that  challenge institutions are essential to education, as it encourages young minds to push forward new concepts that allow for our societies to grow and progress. Making people uncomfortable through expression is not necessarily a bad thing because it allows for the questioning of norms that cause harm, such as the continued colonial violence that these institutions hold. As David and his colleagues thought, “how shocking can we be?” This is the mindset we need to uphold in order to bring change as society continuously evolves.

Thank you to David for taking this time to sit with me and share so much, it was a pleasure to connect with him.

Looking through the archives I was hoping to find documentation of community efforts of BIPOC students, specifically the Black Student Union that was created by Hope Akello and continued by Berlynn Beam during their time at the institution. Unfortunately, there are no archival records of this group but I had the chance to connect with Hope Akello who shared with me their experience and story in addition to their current art practice and teaching practice at the university. In this intimate conversation, Hope shared with me the disappointments and lack of support from the institution in their attempt to bring together Black students as a community.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Hope Akello through a zoom call on February 4, 2022. In my conversation with Hope, I learned about their impactful current community-teaching practice, which they have been shaping after their time as a student at Emily Carr University. In addition, we discussed their experience at the institution as a student,  and their work as a founder of the first and only Black Student Union at the university.

Through our conversation, I learned that Hope is a designer, educator, community practitioner, and all around passionate kind-hearted person. This is demonstrated through their practice and I‘m grateful I got to connect with them in deep and intimate conversation.

Hope has been teaching at Emily Carr University for about three years now and is currently teaching a core studio course. Although teaching at Emily Carr takes up most of their time and energy, they have expanded their practice into teaching at the New Media Gallery, located in New Westminster BC. Here, they give workshops to youth which are completely open to the public at a small fee. This side of their practice fuels their passion for creating workshops that are accessible to folks who would often not be able to exist in usual art spaces due to exclusivity and financial barriers.

A question they posed in reference to their practice is:

“How do we offer these same opportunities to individuals who don’t normally access this gallery or traditional galleries or after school programming?”

Hope elaborated on this by detailing their initiatives working with the directors in the gallery to offer workshops in a variety of different spaces. Hope shared with me the incredible ideas they have proposed in order to assert this accessibility, for example, connecting with the Burnaby Youth Custody Services Centre, putting forward the proposal that this detention Centre could function as a space for workshops with youth. Hope is working to find a  way to connect youth through expression and education to the principles of anti-racism and important activist initiatives and core issues, such as Black Lives Matters and the rates of incarceration of  and discrimination against Indigenous people. They expressed to me the difficulties of navigating these topics with young kids in these workshops and how a lot of Hope’s energy is spent posing the question “how do I have these conversations?”

We then discussed the Black Student Union and its founding at Emily Carr University. Hope’s experience as a student at the institution was difficult as there was a lack of community for Black students. They recall just transferring from Winnipeg in their second year and going to club day during  the first week of university in which they searched to see if a  Black student group was already in existence. To their disappointment there wasn’t. They found Korean, Persian, Chinese student groups, and noticed the Aboriginal Gathering Place, but nothing for Black students. They saw glimpses of other Black students throughout the campus and it motivated them to bring them together. In addition to wanting to build community they felt it was a bigger issue, extending to a lack of visibility and connection in the city as a whole. Their intention was to build community and union with the Black students. When they went to the Student’s Union Office to begin this group, they were met with resistance right off the bat. Hope communicated to staff their desire to start a Black Student Union in hopes of being handed the paperwork, but was met with questioning of the language they were using and suggestions of using ‘people of colour’ rather than Black. This was an example of being policed on language by non-black folks. Hope expressed to me the hurtful impact that was caused by these words because of the lack of acknowledgement that Black students are deserving of their own club or group. It was a memory for Hope that still stands out due to the negative and invalidating impact it had when they were striving to build community among other Black students.

When Hope began to host the BSU meetings, the turnout was not what they expected. Unfortunately, people did not show up. Hope wonders if it might be due to their own shyness and being a transfer student. Former students Berlynn and Chase carried on the BSU after Hope, and, with their outgoing nature, were able to build a community. Hope’s understanding is that this morphed into Black Arts Vancouver, a non-profit they founded post graduation. In hearing Hope’s side of the story, it is evident that the lack of support from the university really contributed to its failure to nurture a space and a voice for the Black community. This lack of support carries on today at Emily Carr University.

In conclusion I wanted to include an anecdote which Hope thoughtfully shared with me. I feel this captures their feeling of being a Black designer navigating a white-dominated art world. I hope other Black students feel seen and recognized in Hope’s words and for non-black folk, that it forces them to question the systems we function in and be curious of how a more equitable and accessible future could be built.

“I was talking to another faculty member who wanted to do something for International Women's Day. She wanted to create these little stickers and put them around the campus that had blurbs, like maybe a photo or an image of a historical woman with facts about that person. And I wanted to do something similar, but for Black History Month, and specifically focusing on Black designers. And when we were talking, I was just remembering as a student, as a young designer, I just felt like there weren't, I didn't know about Black designers. And yeah, I just didn't feel like I had a history or I didn't really feel reflected in my studies.

I did two years of university in Toronto, and I remember just learning art history and design history, and everything was in black and white. And there were largely no people of colour that were mentioned. And then when there were people of colour mentioned, it was almost never a Black person. And so I just remember being a young person and initially being so eager and hopeful to study design and be creative. But then getting into the studies and just feeling so small and invisible and like, I have no history. It's hard to exist in the world as it is, and then trying to exist and do work creatively, it's just again, like I just felt invisible.”

Thank you to Hope for their wonderful words and the energy they brought to the conversation. I look forward to seeing how they continue their impactful work.