Conscious Cosmos

Date: Saturday, April 20, 2024 | 2 pm
Price: $40 Regular | $36 Friends | $30 Students and Seniors
Tickets include same-day Museum admission

Celebrate Earth Day with Shezad Dawood, the multidisciplinary artist behind the Aga Khan Museum’s current temporary exhibition, Night in the Garden of Love, and Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning, an interdisciplinary artist and Queen's National Scholar in Anishinaabe Language, Knowledge, and Culture (ALKC) in the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Studies at Queen's University.

Join Dawood as he invites us into his transformative world, rooted in a way of thinking that creatively and unexpectedly collapses traditional disciplinary boundaries while cracking open new ways of looking at the world around us. Dawood’s enduring focus on ecology and new technologies is refreshingly hopeful and future-focused while solidly grounded in our present moment. In his talk, he will speak about his philosophical interests and the research-driven and cross-disciplinary focus that underscores his uniquely collaborative and cross-cultural creative processes.

Following Dawood's presentation, he will be joined by Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning for a captivating conversation in which she offers her perspective, highlighting the connections between Dawood's interdisciplinary approach and Anishinabe philosophies of interconnectedness and stewardship of nature. They will explore how Dawood's work intersects with and contributes to broader conversations about sustainability, technology, and cultural exchange.

About Shezad Dawood

Shezad Dawood (b.1974) was born in London, where he lives and works. He studied at Central St Martin's, the Royal College of Art and Leeds Metropolitan University. Dawood is a Senior Research Fellow in Experimental Media at the University of Westminster.

As a multidisciplinary artist, Dawood interweaves stories, realities, and symbolism to create richly layered artworks spanning painting, textiles, sculpture, film and digital media. Fascinated by ecologies and architecture, his work takes a philosophical approach, asking questions and exploring alternative futures through what Dawood describes as 'world-building' and 'imagineering.' His practice is animated by research, working with multiple audiences and communities to delve into narrative, history and embodiment.

About Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning

Dolleen Tisawii’ashii Manning is an interdisciplinary artist and Queen's National Scholar in Anishinaabe Language, Knowledge, and Culture (ALKC) in the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Studies at Queen's University. Manning has expertise in Anishinaabe ontology, mnidoo interrelationality, phenomenology, and art. A member of Kettle and Stoney Point First Nation, her primary philosophical influence and source of creativity is her early childhood grounding in Anishinaabe onto-epistemology. She is Principal Investigator of Earthdiver: Land-Based Worlding (MITACS), and Co-Investigator on Pluriversal Worlding with Extended Reality. Manning co-directs the cross-institutional Peripheral Visions Co-Lab (York and Queen’s). She is an affiliate of the Revision Centre for Art and Social Justice, a Fellow of The International Institute for Critical Studies in Improvisation (IICSI), and a Member of Connected Minds: Neural and Machine Systems for a Healthy, Just Society.