Speaker Series – Art Education, For Life: Fashion, Cultural Memory, and Design as Living Practice in conversation with Rebecca Baker-Grenier

May 2, 2026 | 1 pm – 2:30pm

Join designer Rebecca Baker-Grenier in conversation for an evening exploring fashion as a form of cultural knowledge, creative inheritance, and contemporary expression. Grounded in regalia-making, material practice, and intergenerational learning, this talk considers how design can carry identity, memory, and responsibility forward. Through a discussion of process, visibility, and the evolving language of Indigenous fashion, the conversation asks what art education makes possible over the course of a life.

Rebecca Baker-Grenier is of Kwakiuł, Dzawada’enuwx, and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh ancestry. She is a multidisciplinary artist with a BA from the University of British Columbia with a Major in the Indigenous Studies Program. Rebecca began fashion design in 2021 and is apprenticing under established Indigenous designer and artist, Himikalas Pam Baker. She completed the Indigenous Couture Residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity, 2022.

Rebecca debuted her first full collection at New York Fashion Week, September 2022, followed by Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week. She has presented her collection at SWAIA Santa Fe Indian Market fashion show, August 2023, Vancouver Fashion Week, 2023, Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week 2023/ 24, and Indigenous Fashion Arts, Toronto 2024. She was the recipient of the 2021 YVR Emerging Artist award for her fashion design. Her dress, ‘Wazulis’ was on display at the YVR Vancouver Airport, 2022 and was part of an exhibit at the Museum of Vancouver, 2023. Her cedar and ermine cape was on display at the Bill Reid Gallery, 2023-24 and her vest and skirt ‘Held by Generations’ is at the Museum for Natural History, New York 2024-25. She was featured in the October 2024 issue of Elle Canada. Her work has also been featured in Vogue and worn on red carpets.

There is an intimate ancestral connection with the art that Rebecca creates, representing her lineage as an Indigenous woman. Rebecca has been creating her personal and families’ sewn and beaded pow-wow regalia since the age of eleven. She is the regalia designer for the Dancers of Damelahamid’s productions (2016 – present) with her works dancing on national and international stages.

Speaker Series – Artistic Approaches in Dialogue with Jack Shadbolt: Alex Gibson, Chantal Gibson, moderated by curatorial fellow Andrea Valentine-Lewis

June 6, 2026 | 1pm – 2:30pm

Join us for a compelling conversation that brings contemporary artistic voices into dialogue with the legacy of Jack Shadbolt. Artistic Approaches in Dialogue with Jack Shadbolt centres on the creative processes and research practices of two artists featured in One Hundred Artists Deep: Alex Gibson and Chantal Gibson (no relation). Both artists undertook deep engagement with selected works by Shadbolt from the Artists for Kids Collection, drawing from their distinct histories, identities, and artistic practices.

Through their sculptural responses, Alex and Chantal offer expanded perspectives on Shadbolt’s work and its resonance in 2026. Moderated by Curatorial Fellow Andrea Valentine-Lewis, this talk invites audiences to consider how contemporary art responds to artistic legacy not as something fixed, but as material to be questioned, reshaped, and revalued in the present.