Driving from Vancouver to the Museum of Surrey you get a sense of being in-between. The landscape changes from dense city to farmland as you drive over a bridge, through a tunnel, and under a river. At the museum, layers of belonging, displacement, diaspora, the land, and identity greet you. A schoolhouse, a cabin, a town hall from another time. A textile dye garden alongside these layers of history tells you that this is a place that continues to consider ways of bringing the spaces between land, people, and cloth together.
The dye garden outside the museum.
On the day I visited, there was an exhibit of mythical creatures—unicorns, dragons, and mermaids—and a historical collection of cars, clothing, and items that belonged to the settlers and Indigenous peoples of this place. In the Indigenous Hall, nestled within these conversations between now and then, real and imaginary, sits the Weaving Cultural Identities exhibition. Commissioned by the Vancouver Biennale and created through a collaboration between designers and artists, this collection of prayer rugs considers the many ways that cloth can tell stories and create connection.
All photos by Amanda Wood unless otherwise noted.
