Rooted within storytelling by families and communities, the politics of hair have been both intimately personal and profoundly social. Hair carries diverse cultural narratives that are usually shared through identity and gender. For example, the beauty one sees in loosely coiled curls, or a tight braid are both subjective, not only in the presentation but how hair is communicated to the world.

Associate Curator Suvi Bains says, “I encourage visitors to take care while viewing artworks in the Gallery—reflect on and listen to the histories and experiences with these artists as they reimagine relationships to hair and re-define beauty standards. un/tangling, un/covering, un/doing brings forth compelling storytelling that expresses connections intertwined with familial teachings and the artists’ own informed experiences.”

The exhibition shares stories embedded in the rituals attached to hair, for instance acts of resistance and sacred reverence. Artists from across Canada—including Audie Murray, Rebecca Bair, Wally Dion, Clare Yow, Sharon Norwood, Sarindar Dhaliwal, Karin Jones, Baljit Singh, Kiranjot Kaur, and Natasha Kianipour—offer reflections on how hair embodies the importance of culture. They celebrate and reveal their responses to an individual’s association with hair and its many manifestations.

Black Arts Centre is the community partner for this exhibition and will feature a reading nook for all ages titled New Growths.

The Winter Opening on February 9 will also celebrate the Gallery’s exhibits: Josh Hite: A Vista features a multimedia installation on the fabrication and display of theatrical backdrops; Art by Surrey Elementary Students is a biennial exhibition celebrating the achievements of students and teachers.

There will be two events in connection to un/tangling, un/covering, un/doing including: Film Screening with Black Arts Centre on Wednesday, February 21 from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.; Conversations and Film Screening: Roots of Love on Saturday, March 2 from 2 p.m. to 4 p.m.

About the Artists 

Rebecca (Becky) Bair is an interdisciplinary artist and educator based in Vancouver —the traditional and ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples. Her research aims to explore the possibilities of specific representation and of identity through non-figuration. Bair uses multimedia approaches and “Sun collaborations” to visualise her explorations of perspective shifting work; adapting and converging symbols and materials that are central to her cultural understanding of identity, namely of Blackness. Rebecca holds an MFA from Emily Carr University where she is currently a sessional professor, and she is the founder of Black Arts Centre in Surrey, the first Black artist run centre in BC.

Audie Murray is a visual artist who works with a multitude of mediums such as sculpture, media, beadwork, and drawing. Her practice is informed by the process of making and visiting to explore themes of contemporary culture, embodied experiences, and lived dualities. These modes of working assist with the recentring of our collective connection to bodies, ancestral knowledge systems, and relationality. Murray is Cree-Métis from the Lebret and Meadow Lake communities located on Treaty 4 & 6 territories and is currently based in Oskana kâ-asastêki (Regina, Saskatchewan).

Karin Jones is an interdisciplinary artist with a background in jewellery. She received a Diploma in Jewellery Art & Design from Vancouver Community College in 1993, before embarking on a 20-plus year career as a goldsmith and independent artisan. Since 2007, her work has moved away from traditional jewellery and into sculpture and contemporary art.  She received an MFA in Craft from NSCAD University (2018), where she began her most recent work dealing with the ways historical narratives shape our sense of identity. In 2022, she was long-listed for Canada’s prestigious Sobey Art Award. She is an instructor and former Department Head of Jewellery Art & Design at Vancouver Community College.

Sarindar Dhaliwal was born in Punjab, India and moved with her family to England at the age of four where she grew up in Southall, London. At age fifteen, she migrated again with her family to Canada. She received a BA in Fine Art at Falmouth University, Cornwall in England (1978), then moved back to Canada where she still lives. She gained a MA from York University in 2003 and a PhD in Fine Arts from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario. Her work is in collections including the Walter Philips Gallery, Canada Council Art Bank, and the Art Gallery of Ontario. Dhaliwal was the 2012 recipient of the Canada Council International Residency at Artspace, Sydney, Australia.

Baljit Singh, a self-taught photographer based in Mississauga, Canada, seamlessly weaves her Sikh-Punjabi heritage into a vibrant tapestry of work that transcends geographical boundaries. Her photography serves as a powerful storyteller, breaking taboos and exploring themes of nostalgia, immigration, and social issues within the community. Grounded in authentic documentation, Baljit’s approach invites viewers to witness the raw, natural and at times the re-imagined selves of her subjects, spanning a spectrum from glossy editorials to intimate documentaries. With global recognition from exhibitions and features in publications like Vogue, Elle, and FLARE, Baljit provides a captivating glimpse into the diverse narratives of the South Asian experience.

Wally (Walter) Dion is a Canadian artist of Saulteaux ancestry living and working in Upstate New York. Working in a number of media including painting, drawing and sculpture, Dion’s art is concerned with issues of identity and power.

Sharon Norwood is a Jamaican born, Canadian artist from Toronto, Canada. Her work spans several media to include painting and ceramic. Norwood received a BFA in Painting from the University of South Florida and an MFA in studio Art from Florida State University. Norwood has been awarded residences at Erie Arts & Culture, the McColl Center for the creative arts, the Hambidge center, the Virginia Center for the creative arts, the Vermont Studio Center, PILOTENKUECHE in Germany, Watershed Center for the ceramic arts in Maine, and ROKTOWA in Kingston, Jamaica. In 2019 Norwood became a Joan Mitchell foundation nominee. Norwood’s work is in private collections in Canada and abroad.

Clare Yow is a Chinese-Canadian visual artist working primarily in photography with documentary as its basis. Her practice is concerned with unpacking the politics of diasporic identity, community, place, and labour alongside her lived experiences as a first generation immigrant-settler and feminist mother of colour. Often drawing on ideas around embodiment, consumption, labour, and loss, Clare is concerned with the intersections of race, transnationality, and feminist culture with the materials of everyday life.

Natasha Kianipour, known as KIANI, is a self-taught literary artist, poet, and spoken word performer whose creative tapestry weaves together the vibrant threads of her Iranian, Indian, and Canadian heritage. Natasha’s artistic journey has encompassed an opening act for Rupi Kaur at Vancouver’s Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Her spoken-word performance, “Truth wanders through her hair,” shed light on the female-led uprising in Iran. Additionally, Natasha presented her poetry exhibit, “The Poet’s Baug” in collaboration as an Artist-in-residence with the 5X Festival at Surrey Art Gallery. Her spoken word performances have resonated with audiences through CBC radio, and the 2023 Canadian Individual Slam Poetry competition.

Kiranjot Kaur is a Vancouver-based artist who, among many artistic adventures, enjoys painting vibrant, exploratory pieces and drawing high-contrast and bold ink designs. Kiranjot is a self-taught artist who explores a multitude of techniques to serve inspiration and provide truthful, artful renderings to ideas, emotions and statements.