A new art exhibit that follows stories from Black women such as Sylvia Stark, who was born enslaved in Missouri, is opening on Sunday at the Royal BC Museum. Hope Meets Action: Echoes Through the Black Continuum is being presented by the BC Black History Awareness Society (BCBHAS) in partnership with the museum and runs until March 1 of next year.
BCBHAS president Silvia Mangue Alene says that just because you’re a Black person doesn’t mean you know all the history; you have to become curious of your own culture as well as of other people’s cultures to be able to learn about them, she says. For her, that curiosity was brought on by the desire to understand why discrimination and racism exists.
“I was trying to understand… Still, I don’t understand it, because to me it doesn’t have any logic, but I wanted to see where people are coming from when they have these feelings towards Jewish or towards Blacks, or towards anyone that is different to them,” says Alene. “I studied, and I learned about Black history, I learned about myself… Still, I don’t understand why discrimination exists. I understand it in the sense, like, it’s a social construct, and it’s very well constructed, and it serves people, and it doesn’t serve others, and that is just the human nature. Discrimination is power. It’s justifying why to treat people a certain way, and looking for reasons to continue treating them that way.”
Alene says that this is the first time that a BC museum has had an exhibit fully organized by the Black community.
“We will expand and grow this legacy through resilience, hard work, creativity, and leadership, always, always with a humbling acknowledgement that we are not Indigenous of these lands,” says Alene.
Alene says that it’s always nice to know that people were here before you, and that they did great things.
“That gives you encouragement,” she says. “That gives you a sense of belonging, as well.”
Alene, who grew up in Spain, says that learning how to not let racism—personal and systemic—get to you is a long process.
“In the places you eat, in the places you work, in the places you study, and that’s another fight… An external fight,” she says. “So my external fight is through learning, through teaching, through presiding organizations like [BCBHAS], through working with important projects like this one, through helping youth and other Blacks make wonderful projects. That is my external fight against racism, and discrimination, and systemic racism.”
But Alene admits that it’s not always an easy fight. Sometimes you have to be “a bridge that people stand on to be able to get to the fight, to be able to get to their goals,” she says.
“This exhibit [is] a bridge within the community, and to build relationships with all the beautiful cultures that are part of BC,” she says.
But the exhibit also has what Alene calls a “precedent bridge.” In February of this year, museum CEO Jack Lohman resigned amidst accusations of racism and bullying at the museum, and Indigenous collections curator Troy Sebastian also left, calling the museum a “bastion of white supremacy” on Twitter. In June, the museum apologized after an investigation by the BC Public Service Agency confirmed that there had been instances of discrimination at the museum.
“For the first time, it’s part of the true accusations that the museum had of systemic racism,” says Alene. “This exhibit is a living thing to show people in the community that the museum is willing to change, and the museum wants to change their ways.”
Hope Meets Action: Echoes Through the Black Continuum
Until Tuesday, March 1, 2022
Royal BC Museum
royalbcmuseum.bc.ca