The Works invites 'Dialogue' between public, artists

The Works Art & Design Festival has unveiled its theme for its 32nd annual event: Dialogue: the art of collaborative thought; interplaying, interacting and interconnecting to develop new ideas.

There will be more than 600 artists in 49 exhibits with more than 200 special events, performances and workshops from June 22 to July 4 at Sir Winston Churchill Square in downtown Edmonton.

Art exhibits and performance art are collaborations and include ImagiNation Miscellany which asks the question, What Have You Heard About Us? The result is a multi-disciplinary art installation shaped by story circles exploring stereotypes faced by Edmonton’s Indigenous and cultural minority communities.

Dialogue is the interplay of personal experience, the interaction of personal perspective, and the intersection of personal bias, collectively interconnecting existing perceptions to a new understanding of art and design.

Exhibits such as Nimiyosimacihon Ispihk by Lana Whiskeyjack, Inside Out by Kasie Campbell and Shield by Stacey Cann, each connect the artist with the audience in intriguing and personal ways.

Nimiyosimacihon Ispihk is paintings and audio clips from interviews with Indigenous women about beauty. Whiskeyjack’s paintings honour and reflect the brilliance, strength, and resilience of her relatives: powerful iskwewak reclaiming their beauty and sacredness every day.

For more information on these exhibits please visit hhttp://www.theworks.ab.ca/canada-150/