respectfulchild, Marcel Petit and Shellie Zhang: In Conversation
Watch respectfulchild, Marcel Petit and Shellie Zhang in an online conversation building on themes explored in respectfulchild’s exhibition 落叶归根 : falling leaves return to their roots. Hear about the history of Saskatoon’s Chinatown and the importance of remembering and honouring ancestors and our histories. This exhibition project was presented as part of the RBC Emerging Artist Series.
Recorded October 30, 2020
About the speakers
respectfulchild is an artist born, raised, and living as an uninvited guest on Treaty 6 Territory. Working in sound, performance, and interdisciplinary collaboration, they explore the quiet tensions and chaotic beauty of being a queer Chinese settler on the Prairies.
Marcel Petit is an independent producer, filmmaker, actor, photographer and playwright from Saskatoon. He has created several film/video works, from short dramatic pieces to feature documentaries. Recent theatre work includes Salt Baby, Reckoning and Blow Wind. He also runs the Core Neighbourhood Youth Co-op, a youth centre in Saskatoon.
Shellie Zhang is a multidisciplinary artist based in Tkaronto/Toronto, Canada. By uniting both past and present iconography with the techniques of mass communication, language and sign, Zhang’s work deconstructs notions of tradition, gender, the diaspora, and popular culture while calling attention to these subjects in the context and construction of a multicultural society. She is interested in exploring how integration, diversity and assimilation is implemented and negotiated, how this relates to lived experiences, how culture is learned, relearned and sustained, and how things are remembered and preserved