February Updates with the Embassy Cultural House!

Happy Lunar New Year! □ The Embassy Cultural House welcomes the Year of the Wood Snake and the opportunity for revival, renewal and creativity.

View this email in your browser Lunar New Year in Taiwan. Photo credit: Venus Tsao Happy Lunar New Year! The Embassy Cultural House welcomes the Year of the Wood Snake and the opportunity for revival, renewal, creativity, and the shedding of bad energy.  The start of this year has yielded difficult news (Trump’s inauguration and deranged threats to Canada’s sovereignty) and welcome news (a temporary ceasefire in Gaza), but we are continuing our cultural work despite these turbulent circumstances. Our current focus is on the fourth issue of the Embassy Cultural House tabloid, our annual year-in-review with featured articles, news from the community, and a recipe! This issue will be launched at PS Guelph’s Rock / Paper / Scissors Book & Print Fair at the Art Gallery of Guelph on Sunday, February 23, 2025. We hope to see you there!  Left to right: Ron Benner, Stephanie Kelly, David Heap, and Sara Rans. 470 Days Too Late, Palestinian Solidarity Celebration, Victoria Park, London, ON, Sunday, January 19, 2025. Photo credit: Rahaf Abuzarifa Congratulations to Dr. Ira Kazi! On February 7, 2025, Dr. Iraboty Kazi succesfully defended her thesis, Beautiful People in Beautiful Places, Pastoral Landscapes as Heterotopias in Early Modern Art and Queer Cinema. Congratulations to Ira on her incredible doctoral lecture and the inspiring work that she has accomplished at Western University and abroad.  Omar El Akkad: In Conversation Omar El Akkad: In Conversation Hosted by Sarah Marie Tuesday, February 18, 2025, 7:30PM Online Zoom Webinar Join Words for a visit with award-winning novelist and journalist Omar El Akkad to talk about his new book, One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This, a powerful reckoning with what it means to live in a West that betrays its fundamental values. The host for the afternoon will be Sarah Marie, who organizes a live Instagram book series. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This is El Akkad’s nonfiction debut, his most raw and vulnerable work to date, a heartsick breakup letter with the West. It is a brilliant articulation of the same breakup we are watching all over the United States, in family rooms, on college campuses, on city streets; the consequences of this rupture are just beginning. This book is for all the people who want something better than what the West has served up. This is the book for our time.   For more information, please visit the Words website. To register for the event, please visit Eventbrite.  In Conversation: Curator Qanita Lilla and  Artists Jessica Karuhanga and Winsom Winsom In Conversation: Curator Qanita Lilla and Artists Jessica Karuhanga and Winsom Winsom Saturday, February 22, 2025, 2:00PM-3:00PM Museum London, 421 Ridout Street North, London, ON   Enjoy a conversation and Q&A with Ukutula: Our Timeless Journeys guest curator, Qanita Lilla, and artists Jessica Karuhanga and Winsom Winsom. Together, they discuss the exhibition, its development and their works featured in the exhibition.  Ukutula: Our Timeless Journeys centres on a display of sixteen extraordinarily diverse traditional West African masks. These masks, part of the Agnes’ Justin and Elisabeth Lang Collection, appear in chorus with the contemporary work of five Canadian artists from the African and Asian diasporas. A travelling exhibition developed by AGNES and hosted by Museum London, Ukutula runs from November 21, 2024, to May 11, 2025. This program is free, and all are welcome to attend. Donations upon admission are graciously accepted. Registration is required.   For more information, please visit Museum London website. To register for the event, please visit this link.  Launch of the fourth Embassy Cultural House tabloid at PS Guelph's Rock / Paper / Scissors Book & Print Fair! Launch of the Fourth Embassy Cultural House Annual Tabloid PS Guelph's Rock / Paper / Scissors: Book & Print Fair Sunday, February 23, 2025, 11AM-4PM Art Gallery of Guelph, 358 Gordon St, Guelph, ON Set to be launched at Rock / Paper / Scissors, the newest issue of the Embassy Cultural House tabloid will include feature articles by Sarah Kendzior and Dr. Qanita Lilla, an interview by Jessica Irene Joyce with Michelle Wilson and Mikaila Stevens, a recipe by Jamelie Hassan, and more!  PS Guelph’s annual Rock / Paper / Scissors: Book & Print Fair is back on Sunday, February 23, from 11 am to 4 pm at the Art Gallery of Guelph. The event is free! Rock / Paper / Scissors is devoted to small-scale publishing and the social life of the book. This year, local zinesters, printmakers, artists, poets, and publishers from across Ontario and further afield will join us for a print media lover’s dream.  ​ Rock / Paper / Scissors is co-presented by PS Guelph, Musagetes, and Art Gallery of Guelph. The Book & Print Fair event space is accessible by both a ramp and stairs leading to the front entrance, with stair and elevator access to the washrooms. Masks are encouraged, and some will be available at the door.    For more information, please visit Akimbo.  Clissold Lecture featuring Nahlah Ayed Clissold Lecture featuring Nahlah Ayed Thursday, February 27, 2025, 5PM-6PM Western University, University College, Conron Hall or Zoom Register Now The Faculty of Information and Media Studies is pleased to invite you to the Clissold Lecture featuring guest speaker Nahlah Ayed, host of CBC's IDEAS. Ayed will explore the challenges facing international journalism today in her talk, "It Takes a Village: Covering the World in the Post-Truth Age."   As long-standing models of journalism became outdated and discarded, the foreign correspondent has become an easy target. Nahlah Ayed speaks in defence of a reinvented version and the enduring necessity of international coverage in the post-truth age. This event is open to the public, and all are welcome to attend. A livestream will be available.   For more information about the lecture, please visit the Western Alumni website.  Palestine and International Law with Michael Lynk Palestine and International Law: Developments at the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice Friday, February 28, 2025 at 1:30PM Western University, Social Science Center 1004, 1151 Richmond St. London, ON For more information about the presentation, please contact this email.  Protect Canadian Cultural Sovereignty: Recommendations for the Government of Ontario The Provincial Arts Service Organizations of Ontario represent and support creative workers, artists, and organizations engaged in all artistic disciplines that create and disseminate the arts in Ontario. These organizations work together to strengthen the arts and culture environment to benefit the millions of Ontarians, Canadians, and visitors from around the world who experience the arts across the province.    In 2022, Ontario had a large cultural trade deficit of $1.3 billion, one of the largest provincial cultural trade deficits in Canada.  Beyond the sector’s economic impact, the arts are central to fostering social and cultural cohesion. They bolster a sense of belonging, and they facilitate community connection and engagement. In response to potential tariffs placed on Canadian exports, and to resist the American cultural imperialism that has grown with the digital age, it’s critical that the Government of Ontario address the situation with the urgency it demands, and protect the future of Canadian cultural sovereignty.     For more information, please visit CARFAC Ontario's website. Congratulations to Sharmistha Kar on her Canadian Citizenship! We are happy to share the news that artist Sharmistha Kar, a contributor to the Embassy Cultural House and GardenShip and State, has officially become a Canadian citizen! Congratulations Sharmistha! Left: Sharmistha becomes a Canadian citizen! Right: Sharmistha and Anindita Chakraborty celebrate the occasion of Sharmistha's Canadian citizenship. Montreal, QC, November 19, 2024.  From Sharmistha: "I am very happy when I think of the journey until here, and our future with you all in this country. However, it is a feeling that I never felt before and may not feel again! Just bless us so that we can move ahead!”  What on Earth is Asian Canadian? at the University of Toronto  What on Earth is Asian Canadian? Interdisciplinary Space Asiancy Symposium Friday, February 28, 2025, 9AM-5PM University College, 15 King's College Circle, Toronto, ON   For more information, and to reserve a spot, please visit Eventbrite.  Relevant and Related Links From Democracy Now!: "American Historical Assoc. Votes Overwhelmingly to Support Resolution to Oppose Scholasticide in Gaza" From The Globe and Mail: "Biden was a failure, Trump is a catastrophe" by Omar El Akkad From Independent Jewish Voices: Report: Under the Guise of Charity - Canadian Funding for War Crimes in Occupied Palestine From Globalisation, Societies, and Education: "Academia in a time of genocide: scholasticidal tendencies and continuities" by Basma Hair and Mezna Qato TRIPLE BURNER FLOWER FIELD by SF Ho: 15 January - March 8, 2025 at Oxygen Art Centre, Nelson, B.C.  From Monthly Review (Volume 75, Issue 7, December 24): Notes from the Editors  From the National Gallery of Canada: Jeff Thomas: Origin by Rachelle Dickenson Visit the ECH Website Embassy Cultural House is located on the traditional lands of the Anishinaabek, Haudenosaunee, Lūnaapéewak, and Chonnonton peoples, at the forks of Deshkan Ziibi (Antler River), an area subject to the Dish with One Spoon Covenant Wampum and other treaties, colonized as London, Ontario. The ECH strives to create meaningful relationships between the Indigenous Peoples of Turtle Island and our contributors. The ECH honours the stewardship of the many Indigenous peoples who have resided on these lands since time immemorial. Copyright © 2025 Embassy Cultural House. All rights reserved. Our mailing address: 514 Pall Mall Street, London, ON, N5Y 2Z6, Canada Want to change how you receive these emails? You can update your preferences or unsubscribe from this list.