Both shows were held at the Gladstone Hotel, 1214 Queen Street West.

Show 1: Travis Shilling, March 2011 

How to Drown a Fish 

Travis Shilling is a paint chronicler. He captures the hidden in the visible – after-effects and fall-outs from events real and imagined. Travis’ series, How to drown a fish, marks out territories of disaster and survival. Asking how one drowns a fish is asking the impossible because human and animal alike adapt to inner and outer hardship. Still, people try to drown a fish every day, through damaging the environment or self-destruction. Travis’ work reflects a rich imagination and exceptional skill. These paintings juxtapose civilization and the animal world in a narrative dreamscape.

Travis was born in Rama, Ontario. He is the second of two artist sons of acclaimed Aboriginal artist Arthur Shilling. Travis has exhibited in Canada, Europe and the U.S. He travels between studios in Rama and Toronto.

Also a filmmaker and playwright, Travis’ short film, Bear Tung, featuring Gary Farmer, is a selection in the Alaska Native Heritage Center Indigenous World Film Festival and the 2011 National Museum of American Indian Film and Video Festival. Bear Tung was shown at both the New York Film Festival and the Santa Fe Independent Film Festival in 2010. 

http://www.travisshilling.com/ 

Show 2: Curated by Crystal Migwans, April 2011

N-nsidiswaamdis: I Recognize Myself curated by Crystal Migwans 

Organized and circulated by the Ojibwe Cultural Foundation

"This exhibition brings together the work of self-portraiture by artists from across the Anishinaabeg Nation. The works describe how Anishinaabe identity is forged, guarded and carried on by our Nation 's artists, and they demonstrate how the self-portrait in this context can become a potent statement of resilience; a reclaiming of agency of representation.

The title of this show is "N-nisidwaamdis:I Recognize Myself," a title which implies that there is a "someone"
for whom this moment of recognition happens. In its [original] venue here in the gallery of the Ojibwe Cultural Foundation, on M'Chigeeng First Nations on Manitoulin Island, this exhbibition is addressed firstly to the eyes of our Anishinaabeg community here on Manitoulin. It is their viewership that the greatest part of the exhibition occurs. For from that perspective, we gaze upon the artworks before us, and the artists of the wider Anishinaabeg Nation gaze back. And we recognize ourselves."

- Crystal Migwans. Curator, from the catalogue "N-nisidwaamdis: I Recognize Myself"

 http://www.ojibweculture.ca/ 

http://www.andpva.com/events/2011/04/04/n-nsidiswaamdis-i-recognize-myself-curated-crystal-migwans.html  

Show 3: Nicholas Galanin 

http://galan.in/