Family+ is a partnership between the Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild and Government House.
You may view the exhibit between March 29 and June 22, 2025 in the Queen Elizabeth II Gallery at Government House, 4607 Dewdney Ave, Regina, SK. Please note, Government House is closed on Mondays until Victoria Day, May 19, 2025.
Viewers are invited to share their reflections of the exhibit here: https://forms.gle/3pLx6WQJ36k2qpa47
Exhibition Statement:
In celebration of National Poetry Month in April, designated by the League of Canadian Poets and in coordination with National Poetry Month’s theme of “Family”, Family+ is a group exhibition exploring the rich dynamics of the families in our lives.
Family is composed of various bonds. As The League of Canadian Poets state, family is, “Parents, pets, friendships, soulmates, siblings, plants, and beyond.” They ask our poetry to “celebrate, cherish, mourn, critique, and explore the myriad bonds that family forms in our lives.” And Family+ does just that. Our chosen artists Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye (Saskatchewan Poet Laureate), Dash Reimer (Saskatchewan Youth Poet Laureate), Amber Goodwyn, Beverley Brenna, Bruce Rice, Chelsea Coupal, Courtney Bates-Hardy, Josiah Nelson, Medrie Purdham, and Nicole Mae explore the rich textures of “family” in their poems. Found family is a strong recurring theme in this exhibition, as the poets consider what the joys and the implications found family means for them in their lives. Family+ meditates on blood relations, growing families, an evolution of self with/out relatives, becoming kin, familial separations—by travel or respectful boundaries— grief, and/or withdrawing from toxic structures; these poems consider ancestral knowledge and connections, relate to the natural world as an ancestor, view neighbourhoods as lineage, grapple with religious community bonds, and even view solid structures as relatives.
When we think of family, often the traditional conception of biological family comes up, but these poets wrestle with the notions of the traditional and instead illuminate the joys of all kinds of family that is meant to be celebrated, questioned, mourned, cherished. Ancestors permeate the exhibition as ghosts, shadows in the sunlight, that carry us forward. These poems ask us to consider the weight we give to traditional families and encourage us to allow the same weight to our found families, to our friends, animals, and beyond.
Family+ is an expanded understanding of what family can be and allows us to reflect on our own family structures, our roles, and community responsibilities.
Exhibiting poets:
“-matoes and prayers”
Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye (she/her), Saskatchewan Poet Laureate, is an African-Canadian Interdisciplinary Poet, Public Speaker, Chorus-Poem Playwright, and Thespian residing in Saskatoon Saskatchewan. Author of Earth Skin, Equanimity in Sonder, Equanimity in Conversation and The Taste of Sonder. Recipient of the RBC SaskArts Emerging Artist Award and the Platinum Jubilee Queen's Medal. The past 2020-2021 Saskatchewan Youth Poet Laurate and 2022 READSaskatoon Poet Laureate, currently working as Poet-in-Residence with the Remai Modern Gallery, City of Saskatoon, and Persephone Theatre. And Co-organzing Write Out Loud, a Youth Poetry Collective. Other playwrighting credits include Maddeness with Rocks with Obsidian Theatre and CBCGem, Painted Elephant with Black Theatre Workshop AMP, I Am Who I Am with SUMTheatre's First Monday, But First Let Me Breathe with Theatre on the Beat. Organically from Yorubaland Nigeria, Peace explores the intersectionality of the artist community from an explorer's perspective, dipping her honey-stained fingers into poetry, dance, performance art, critical research, and the theatre world.
“Wild Violets”
Courtney Bates-Hardy is the author of Anatomical Venus (Radiant Press, 2024), House of Mystery (2016), and a chapbook, Sea Foam (JackPine Press, 2013). She is the co-editor of apart: a year of pandemic poetry and prose (Saskatchewan Writers’ Guild, 2021). Her poems have appeared in Event, Vallum, PRISM, and The ex-Puritan, among others. Her poetry has been featured in The Best Canadian Poetry and nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She is queer and disabled, and one-quarter of a writing group called The Pain Poets.
“Travels With My Mother”
Beverley Brenna is a visual artist, freelance writer and editor. In the past year she has had three solo exhibitions in public galleries across Saskatchewan, and numerous group shows in the province. She is the author of 16 books, earning a Printz Honor, a Dolly Gray Award, and a Stuchner Award for humour. Her work has also been shortlisted for a Governor General’s Literary Award and included on CBC’s list of Young Adult Books That Make You Proud To Be Canadian. Individual poems have been published in anthologies and magazines including: Contemporary Verse II, Dandelion, Grain, Harvest, The Prairie Journal, Transition, Trout, Western People, and Zygote. Bev is a professor emerita from the University of Saskatchewan.
“How Do We Know What We'll Hold In Our Arms And What Will Be Our Ghosts”
Chelsea Coupal is the author of the poetry collection, Sedley (Coteau, 2018), and the chapbook, The Slow Reveal (Anstruther, 2022). Sedley was selected for an Indigo Exclusive edition and shortlisted for three Saskatchewan Book Awards. Her work has won the City of Regina Writing Award; been nominated for the Pushcart Prize; and appeared in more than a dozen Canadian publications, including Arc, EVENT, the Literary Review of Canada, The Malahat Review and Best Canadian Poetry.
“Switchback”
Amber Goodwyn is an interdisciplinary artist and an award-winning musician. Her poems have recently appeared in Arc Poetry Magazine, Briarpatch Magazine, and BAD DOG Mag. For her music project, Natural Sympathies, Amber works in concept album cycles with expansions into performance art and other disciplines. Amber’s films and videos have screened at several festivals. Amber has lived in Montreal, Nassau, and is currently based in oskana ka-asastēki (Regina, Saskatchewan), Treaty 4 territory. Amber is working on a chapbook manuscript and a new album with her band Natural Sympathies.
“And Cried, And Cried”
Nicole Mae (they/she) is an interdisciplinary artist from Treaty Four, Canada. Their poetry, films, and art works reflect themes of nostalgia, longing, prairie queerness, Hungarian diaspora, ill body, shame, and romantic love. Currently, Nicole has two poetry books--Youth and Screaming Sweet Nothings--and are in the works of releasing a third. They also teach poetry on Skillshare, host various writing workshops with licensed organizations, and work as a book publicist under River Street Writing. Their award-winning poetry films BRUTE (made possible by EMERGENT: (multi)media screening & showcase, sponsored by SK Arts, Canada Council for the Arts, Saskatchewan Filmpool Co., and Neutral Ground Artist Run Centre) and What My Chest Says About Me are currently in gallery rotation.
“Prayer”
Josiah Nelson holds an MFA from the University of Saskatchewan, where he teaches creative writing. His poetry has appeared in CV2, Grain, Queen's Quarterly, QWERTY, and South Dakota Review. He lives in Saskatoon.
“Are you still happy with your home?”
Medrie Purdham (she/her) lives in Treaty 4 and teaches in the English department of the University of Regina. Her book, Little Housewolf (Véhicule, 2021) won a Saskatchewan Book Award and was longlisted for The Gerald Lampert Memorial Award and the Fred Cogswell Award. She has been a finalist for the Vallum Chapbook Award and for the CBC Poetry Prize and has been three times anthologized in Best Canadian Poetry. Most recently, she had two poems selected as finalists for the Montreal International Poetry Prize.
“A House of Coiled Rope”
Dash Reimer is an artist and educator based out of Treaty 6 territory in Saskatoon. He works within the worlds of poetry and hip hop and has a decade of experience performing on stages across Turtle Island, North Africa, South Africa and Turkey. He is passionate about community care, grassroots neighborhood movements and baking his friends tasty treats. Dash has been an avid collaborator in playwriting, chapbook making, jazz combos, improv troupes, rap crews and everything in between. Dash is the current Youth Poet Laureate of Saskatchewan.
“Mira Flying Home”
Bruce Rice is a previous Saskatchewan Poet Laureate, an essayist, and editor. He has been called “a master of light.” His most recent poetry collection is The Vivian Poems from Radiant Press 2020, on the life and work of street photographer Vivian Maier. His new creative nonfiction collection, Standstill: A Hopewell Earthworks Daybook and other Essays was published by Long Road Press (an imprint of Radiant Press) in 2024. While his writing lives in world, he also says, “I became a better poet when I surrendered to beauty.” Bruce lives in Regina on Treaty 4 territory and the homeland of the Métis.
Contact Details
Contact Name: Cat Abenstein, Program Manager
Contact Email: swgevents@skwriter.com
Contact Phone: 306-791-7746
Funding provided by:
In proud partnership with:
