Projects & Collaborations
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Miigwech Collective brings together three Indigenous women from various artistic and professional backgrounds. Through Miigwech Collective, Rosary Spence, Cotee Harper and Tamar Ilana present culturally grounded events, showcases and gatherings highlighting a matriarchal movement that promotes strong women in leadership roles. It is through this invaluable work that the Miigwech Collective honours their ancestors and the generations to come. As part of Luminato at Harbourfront’s programming, Miigwech Collective curates an exciting lineup of Indigenous music artists
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Rosary Spence is a co-curator, producer, and featured performing artist for FabCollab’s Indigenous Grooves, an Indigenous-led electronic pow wow and multidisciplinary performance series that celebrates Indigenous women and gender-diverse artists across music, dance, visual arts, and cultural expression. Alongside collaborators Cotee Harper and Tamar Ilana, Rosary helps shape the artistic vision, programming, artist curation, and community direction of the series, which has become a groundbreaking platform for contemporary Indigenous creativity on Turtle Island.
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Rosary Spence, a Cree singer from Fort Albany First Nation, has collaborated with the Canadian Arabic Orchestra (CAO) to bridge Indigenous and Arab musical traditions. She has performed at events with the CAO, including the Mississauga World Music Festival and concerts like "Origins," which focus on cultural fusion. Origins showcases the multicultural mosaic and heritage in Canada. It honours the arts and culture of our First Nations, as well as, conveys a strong message of unity and intercultural understanding at a time of rising xenophobia and Islamophobia. Furthermore, this concert sheds light on Canadian First Nations’ arts and culture, honours our indigenous people and history, and brings to the forefront the spirit of truth and reconciliation that is an important milestone in our country’s history; a milestone which will indelibly drive home that the democratic values of an inclusive society such as ours are shared by all Canadians. The concert material was prepared jointly by Hassan Tamim (HT) of the Canadian Arabic Orchestra and Choir (CAO), Wafa Al Zaghal (Canadian Arabic Orchestra President & CEO) and Rosary Spence.
https://canadianarabicorchestra.ca/ |
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A Toronto fashion incubator for Indigenous artists is partnering with Ikea to launch a collection of kitchen accessories that reflect traditional ideas about conserving resources and feasting. Indigenous fashion incubator partners with Ikea to create salvaged collection.
www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/programs/metromorning/indigenous-fashion-ikea-1.4146322 |
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The conversations and performances that comprised On Breathing and Braiding are a continuation and an expansion of an on-going collaborative process between Elwood Jimmy and Vanessa Andreotti, through their shared work with Musagetes. Throughout 2018, their collaboration involved several modes of relational engagement with Indigenous and non-Indigenous artists, scholars, and communities, including visits, gatherings, and consultations leading up to a number of questions relating to rigorous, ethical and respectful engagement with Indigenous senses and sensibilities (being, knowing, relationships, trauma, place, space, time, movement, rhythm). A key inquiry woven throughout this day asked how different sensibilities learn and work together in the holding of space for the possibility of collective breathing and braiding, of recalling exiled capacities and enlivening guidelines for this work with (self-)compassion, generosity, humility, flexibility, and rigour, without turning our back to (or burning out with) the complexities, difficulties and pain of the process of healing.
https://festival.artseverywhere.ca/presenter/rosary-spence/ |
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Like an Old Tale has drawn me into a world in which hundreds of people from all over the world retell an old story through sound, text, movement and image. How can music help or hinder our understanding of each other? Over the last year and a half we’ve worked together to create a musical world which makes room for different cultural traditions and skills. Jumblies Theatre Company, director Varrick Grimes, soloists Doug MacNaughton (baritone) and Neema Bickersteth (soprano), Rosary Spence (First Nations singer), Sharada Eswar (Carnatic singer), Toronto.
http://julietpalmer.ca/music/like-an-old-tale/ |
Dish Dances was made in collaboration with a team of artists, including choreographers Aria Evans, Animikiikwe Couchie and Lilia Leon, composer Melody McKiver’s re-interpretation of original music by Rosary Spence, with vocal performance by Amplified Opera. The film an Indigenous cast, including familiar faces from prior Talking Treaties creations working alongside students from the Centre for Indigenous Theatre.
https://jumbliestheatre.org/dish-dances/
https://jumbliestheatre.org/dish-dances/