Indigenous arts

See how the AFA cares for an exquisite new acquisition by Métis Cree visual artist, Sharon Rose Kootenay, and the different steps we take to document, catalogue and preserve her work for the benefit of all Albertans.

The artworks in the AFA Art Collection mean so much to the artists, to the staff that work with them, and to the many, many Albertans who have an opportunity to view them through exhibitions, art placement programs, or even online in our Virtual Museum.

Watch:

50th Anniversary of the AFA Art Collection

Established in 1972, the AFA Art Collection is a unique representation of the history, development and achievements of Alberta's visual arts community. Today, the AFA is proud to manage one of the strongest, most active provincial art collections in Canada.

On September 29, 2022, the AFA began celebration for the 50th Anniversary of the establishment of the AFA Art Collection. Learn more about how we are celebrating throughout 2022 and 2023.

We are proud to diligently care and work with each of our more than 9,000 artworks in Alberta's public art collection. This is the second episode of a five-part series about the AFA Art Collection.

• Watch episode 1 of the series, Building a Collection, on YouTube

Videos produced by Hidden Story Productions.

To celebrate 25 years of the AFA, we’re taking a look back at how we came to be, favourite milestones, and some of the amazing artists we’ve encountered along the way. 

By Sarah Pocklington, former Indigenous Arts Development Consultant

In March 2005, the AFA initiated a three-phase consultation process to explore and understand the needs of Indigenous artists and arts organizations in Alberta. The first phase, completed in June 2005, focused on visiting Indigenous communities across the province to determine the needs of the communities in relation to arts funding. The second phase in October 2005 focused on secondary research and included interviews with service providers working with Aboriginal communities. The third and final phase focused on consulting and interviewing Indigenous artists and arts organizations throughout Alberta. The draft recommendations for phase three were completed in April 2006.

From this exploration, we arrived at the following key focus areas:

Outreach – building relationships and creating an Indigenous Outreach Strategy;

Capacity Building – Access to training and development opportunities related to grant writing, marketing, planning and communications for Indigenous artists and organizations;

Advocate – “Spreading the word” about Indigenous arts;

Support – allocating funding for amateur and professional Indigenous artists and arts organizations;

Networking – creating and supporting networking opportunities for Indigenous artists, organizations and service providers;

Continued Dialogue – Encourage and support dialogue with Indigenous communities through consultation and research processes, listening circles, events and conferences.

The AFA hired an Indigenous Outreach Worker on an eight-month contract as a part of the 2006-2007 AFA Action Plan. The plan introduced a pilot grant program for arts organizations, along with workshops targeted specifically to Indigenous artists with the goal of increasing awareness of AFA programming and encouraging applications. In 2006-2007 the AFA provided $95,205 to Indigenous arts organizations with $50,000 support from the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development.

Today, the AFA has a full-time Indigenous Arts Development Consultant who oversees the Indigenous Arts Individual Project Grant Stream and coordinates the Alberta’s Future Leaders Program for First Nations and Metis communities across Alberta. In 2015-16 the AFA provided $143,056.98 in project funding for Indigenous project grants. (Indigenous artists can apply to any project grant funding opportunity; however this project grant program provides specific support to Inidgenous artists).

Recently, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada: Calls to Action included the recommendation of a renewed strategy to promote the arts as a fundamental aspect of reconciliation.

There has also been a demonstrated response on behalf of provincial arts organizations to engage with Indigenous communities in new and expanding ways. Major institutions like the Art Gallery of Alberta have initiated programming as part of their ongoing mandates to include Indigenous artists and their practices.

The City of Edmonton 2016 Arts and Culture Hall of Fame video

Indigenous artists are also receiving greater public recognition for their talents. Recently, Cold Lake’s Alex Janvier was inducted into the City of Edmonton’s 2016 Arts and Culture Hall of Fame. He also received an Honorary Degree, Doctor of Fine Arts from the Ontario College of Art and Design and will be featured in a 2017 solo retrospective at the National Gallery of Canada (which you can read more about in our next blog post!). In 2015 the AFA was pleased to announce the award of a public art commission to Cree artist Brenda Draney for the new Centre for Arts and Culture at MacEwan University, set to be unveiled in 2017 in Edmonton.

Meeting the needs of supporting Indigenous artists, arts organizations and communities is a high priority for the Alberta Foundation for the Arts, the Arts Branch and the Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

The Alberta Foundation for the Arts is pleased to be a funding partner in this collaboration with Stone-Olafson and other community leaders to develop a long-term research investigation and evaluate how current conditions will reshape Albertans’ attitudes and behaviours towards social and group activities, across a variety of sectors. The purpose of this work is to give leaders of community sports, recreation, arts and culture, professional sports, active living, heritage, tourism or hospitality sectors relevant facts about local audiences that they will need to bring life back to our communities.

The initiative is being funded by: 

• ActiveCITY Collective
• Alberta Foundation for the Arts 
• Angus Reid
• ATB
• Calgary Arts Development 
• Calgary Foundation
• Edmonton Arts Council
• Edmonton Community Foundation
• Rozsa Foundation
• Stone-Olafson
• Travel Alberta

​This research is being conducted in six waves over the course of the next year. This is a community resource that is FREE to access and results from the second wave of research are now available. The second wave of research builds on the baseline established in May and June by delving into attitudes on comfort, spending, the impact of media, and audience expectations.

Findings and implications for Alberta organizations through Wave 2 results include:

• Support for the pace of re-opening grows but there are still lingering pockets of disagreement.
• Comfort levels are creating a new baseline of engagement.
• Increasing gaps are appearing between audience segments on the pandemic.
• As restrictions lift, Albertans are pulled by their social motivations and perceptions of safety outdoors.
• Engagement is (potentially) perishable.
• Staying connected will mean the development of innovative and hybrid experiences.
• In a crowded media space, audiences are still listening.
• Spending is obviously being impacted

The report makes the following recommendations for organizations:

• Comfort levels are not rebounding just because restrictions are lifting. Organizations need to temper expectations about reconnecting with audiences. You will not be reengaging them in the same you used to. It will take time and it will look different. Plan on it and prepare.
• Getting audiences comfortable enough to attend is vital. Some of this will rebound over time, and some will be addressed by government, but there are opportunities to build confidence in what you are doing to safeguard their health. Show the steps you are taking and the tools being employed to protect audiences. Building confidence with what you are doing will help increase comfort and, in turn, consideration.
• Audiences and markets are changing. There are new barriers to address and consider. Organizations will need to understand shifting mindsets of different target audiences in order to engage effectively. This could be a deep opportunity to engage for many organizations who can capitalize on their motivations and expectations.
• Find your voice. Audiences are listening closely for news around the pandemic and are eager for updates, information or promotions. They want to know when experiences will be available again and are receptive to traditional marketing messages again. In fact, they expect it.
• Adapting means developing new product and experiences to consume. Staying put or offering what you used to won’t necessarily work. Organizations that can move into hybrid offers (not simply digital alone or in-person alone) that still leverage intrinsic motivations will be well positioned to protect their revenue from competition.

Download the reports:

• Alberta Report
• Calgary Report
• Edmonton Report

You can subscribe to receive notifications when the new reports are available by visiting stone-olafson.com. 

This research is being conducted in six waves over the course of the next year. This is a community resource that is FREE to access and results from the fourth wave of research are now available. 

Findings for Alberta organizations from Wave 4 results include:

• Public perceptions reflect the low point of the pandemic at this time.
• Albertans are adapting to and following the rules.
• Change in habits during the pandemic appears to be additive, not alternative
• Contexts frame marketing in this environment - messages will need to be shifted, media strategies evaluated, and some types of voices changed.
• Engagement is on hold.
• Travel within the province is an option. 

What are the implications for Alberta organizations?

• When conditions permit, recognize you will be reconnecting with a weary population who are more anxious than before. Messages and offers will need to adjust to reflect this reality.
• As Albertans accept and get used to the restrictions, they expect others to follow them too. A large percentage of those surveyed indicate others not following protocols will dissuade them from attending events/participating in activities. The same applies for not seeing sufficient safeguards in place.
• As restrictions start to lift, Albertans are likely to start figuring out how to balance a new set of activities they enjoy with their usual activities they want to get back to. And for organizations, that means breaking through a larger competitive set to capture the attention of their audiences. For those that offer registered or directed experiences this may be an even bigger challenge now that people are also adding in more self-directed experiences.
• Organizations are likely going to need a multi-layered media strategy that can reach influencers who can help propel the message. To be clear, an influencer strategy doesn’t mean a pure social media strategy. It means a strategy of messages and media that are repeatable to others.
• Organizations have to be prepared to re-engage in stages. When current restrictions lift there will be some appetite to explore and potential opportunities to meet them online or outdoors. In a post-pandemic environment, audiences are very likely to get active again.
• Focusing on broad messages that reflect a drive to escape everyday stresses and deliver on social motivations will work well to help motivate intra-provincial travel. Reinforcing these main messages with reassurances about flexibility in booking and safety will also be helpful to finalize a decision.

Download the reports:

• Alberta Report
• Calgary Report 
• Edmonton Report

You can subscribe to receive notifications when the new reports are available by visiting stone-olafson.com. 

About the project

The Alberta Foundation for the Arts is pleased to be a funding partner in this collaboration with Stone-Olafson and other community leaders to develop a long-term research investigation and evaluate how current conditions will reshape Albertans’ attitudes and behaviours towards social and group activities, across a variety of sectors. The purpose of this work is to give leaders of community sports, recreation, arts and culture, professional sports, active living, heritage, tourism or hospitality sectors relevant facts about local audiences that they will need to bring life back to our communities.

The initiative is being funded by: 

• ActiveCITY Collective
• Alberta Foundation for the Arts 
• Angus Reid
• ATB
• Calgary Arts Development 
• Calgary Foundation
• Edmonton Arts Council
• Edmonton Community Foundation
• Rozsa Foundation
• Stone-Olafson
• Travel Alberta

The AFA is supporting a two-year research project conducted by Stone-Olafson on current engagement of arts audiences in Alberta. We are pleased to share the second set of results ("Wave 2").

This work was developed for the arts sector exclusively and is designed to provide specific, relevant, and reliable facts to support the leaders in the arts sector as they seek to understand their audiences and grow attendance.

Key topic areas for Wave 2 include:

• Exploring arts audiences' engagement and general perceptions
• Understanding audiences’ preferences for content, programming, and ticket purchasing
• Understanding opportunities for increasing support and engagement through fund development

Results

Watch the team from Stone-Olafson report on the findings from the first wave of research in the Spotlight on Arts Audiences project

Download the reports:

• Alberta
• Calgary Report
• Edmonton Report
• Regional Alberta

About the project

The AFA has partnered with the Rozsa Foundation, Calgary Arts Development, Calgary Foundation, Edmonton Arts Council, and Edmonton Community Foundation, to support the Spotlight on Arts Audiences research project. The work will survey arts-inclined audiences in Calgary, Edmonton, and across the province to provide data that is useful and timely for arts leaders and organizations three times per year over the next two years.