The McCord Stewart Museum will present a new exhibition starting Sept. 13 until Jan 12. 2025.
“To All the Unnamed Women” was created by Michaëlle Sergile and it traces the origins of the first collective created by Black women in Quebec – the Coloured Women’s Club of Montreal (CWCM).
The CWCM was founded in 1902 by Black women to help migrant families find housing and access financial support.
According to a press release, Sergile’s exhibition explores the relationship between history and violence.
“To All the Unnamed Women doesn’t simply commemorate the past but offers a profound reflection on the creation of memories and the importance of identification. Through archives, I can say what I can’t always say,” said Sergile.
Sergile is an independent artist and curator who works with post-colonial archives dating from the 1950s to the modern day.
Her goal is to understand and rewrite the history of Black communities – more specifically women’s history, through weaving.
Sergile said weaving allows her to explore the links between gender and ethnicity.
“I think there’s something beautiful and powerful about thinking of all the people who have had these thoughts before you and being able to associate them with the period you’re living in,” she said.
The exhibition features seven original tapestries on Jacquard looms. Three of the tapestries display images from the museum’s photography collection and four of the tapestries showcase portraits of the CWCM members.
The McCord Stewart Museum’s Artist-in-Residence program allowed Sergile to deepen her knowledge of the CWCM and the women behind it.
“By celebrating both these nameless women and those who created the Coloured Women’s Club, the exhibition serves as a space for reflection, inviting the public to participate in reconstructing their stories,” explained Sergile.
The artist was able to explore the museum’s photography collection with images of Black women from 1870 to 1910. She discovered that despite their different social classes, most of the women remained anonymous, making it difficult to identify them today.
“When I started working with textiles, I realized there was a disconnect between the visual arts and craft, as if the two notions couldn’t coexist. I thought it fitted in very well with the way I conceptualized archives, because I was very interested in anything that’s put aside,” she explained.
Sergile’s work has been shown in many museums like the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, the Musée d’art de Joliette, the Fonderie Darling and the OFF, Biennale de Dakar, Senegal.
In 2023, she won the Visual Artist of the Year Award at Gala Dynastie and began a residency at the Fonderie Darling.
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