Intergenerational storytelling through fashion, textiles, and community artwork.
The Exchange was a community arts initiative running from March 2019 to 2020. The project connected older adults and youth from Indigenous and Newcomer communities in Hamilton through collaborative artmaking rooted in cultural identity, migration, and shared resilience.
By centring traditional sewing, printmaking, and storytelling practices, The Exchange created a space for cross-generational learning, cultural exchange, and the celebration of community heritage.
The project unfolded over four workshop rounds, each led by a different artist-facilitator and featuring new participants. Workshops focused on storytelling, textile arts, linocut printmaking, and sewing, with all facilitators and participants representing Racialized, Indigenous, or Newcomer communities.
Each piece of wearable art fused textile traditions with contemporary storytelling, incorporating elements like linocut prints to visualize personal and collective narratives.
Using fashion and textile art as a vehicle for storytelling, The Exchange demonstrated how senior adults can be active agents of culture, memory, and creativity. The project supported their wisdom and inclusion, while inspiring younger generations to honour the knowledge and traditions passed down to them.
In September 2019, participants from The Exchange took to the runway at Hamilton’s Supercrawl Fashion Pop-Up Show, showcasing their garments in a live public presentation. This event transformed their personal stories into a shared celebration.
Danielle Boissoneau is Anishnaabekwe from the shorelines of the Great Lakes. She is a writer, a seedkeeper and a community organizer that works towards embodying the values of her ancestors in real time. As a facilitator and consultant, Danielle teaches about the practice of decolonization and provides skills and tools for people to use when doing this important work. Danielle’s most important work is being a mother.
Suad Badri came to Canada as a refugee from Sudan in 2014. She holds a PhD in Geography of Energy, a Master of Science in Environmental Studies, and a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. As a newcomer to Canada, Suad is passionate about community development, and strives to empower immigrant and refugee women across the Hamilton community. In her role as a community advocate, Suad has helped to establish the Victoria Park Women’s group and worked with the SACHA (Sexual Assault Centre) facilitating the Sewing Circle. Suad is also the founder of e_ESL Culturally Based Project, which is an app-based project currently in development that extracts English-language from textbooks from other cultures.
Wilamina McGrimmond is a member of the Tla’azt’en Nation, and has resided in Hamilton for the past 34 years. She is a long-time teacher and community activist for Indigenous rights, including advocating for the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls. Wilamina is the organizer and drum teacher in Spirit Bear Drummers, an Indigenous women’s drumming and singing group that performs in and around the Hamilton area, including annual Labour Day parades and Women’s Day celebrations. She has also been leading an Indigenous drum-making workshop at the Hamilton Museum of Steam and Technology for the past twelve years. She has been teaching sewing to women’s groups, including immigrant women, in the city for years, and is currently a sewing teacher at the De dwa da dehs nyes Aboriginal Health Centre in Hamilton.
Michelle Thomas is a Seneca Bear Clan woman from Six Nations of the Grand River. She is passionate about creating opportunities for people to decolonize their minds. Michelle strives to create culturally appropriate training & facilitation by incorporating Haudenosaunee values into her work. This creates opportunities for education and positive dialogue. It is only through reclaiming your power, voice and purpose that you can make true change. This includes work within organizations, staff, and individuals. Personal and professional development includes the use of team-building, facilitation and interactive experiences, she creates opportunities for meaningful engagement within your circle. She carries a diverse background of education, sociology, business and healing & wellness. She has worked within the education, social, health, family violence prevention, addictions, and employment & training sectors.
Michelle’s unique combination of facilitation skills and training in healing and wellness allows her to be an asset to your organization’s retreat or self-care program. Michelle is a certified Reiki Master, spirit painter and traditional healer. A workshop or training can be provided, as well as individual healing sessions. Find more of her work online at michellethomas.ca.
Janet Marie Rogers is a Mohawk/Tuscarora writer from Six Nations. She was born in Vancouver British Columbia, grew up in Stoney Creek and Hamilton Ontario and is now back home living on Six Nations preparing to launch the press Ojistah Publishing. Janet works in the genres of poetry, spoken word performance poetry, video poetry, recorded poetry with music and script writing. Janet is a radio broadcaster, documentary producer and sound artist. Her literary titles include; Splitting the Heart, Ekstasis Editions 2007, Red Erotic, Ojistah Publishing 2010, Unearthed, Leaf Press 2011 and “Peace in Duress” Talonbooks 2014, Totem Poles and Railroad, ARP Books 2016, As Long As The Sun Shines 2018 with a Mohawk language edition of that title to be released in July 2019, Bookland Press. As Long As the Sun Shines also has an audio companion on Reverbnation. Her poetry CDs Firewater 2009, Got Your Back 2012 and 6 Directions 2013 all received nominations for Best Spoken Word Recording at the Canadian Aboriginal Music Awards, the Aboriginal Peoples Choice Music Awards and the Native American Music Awards. Janet produced and hosted Native Waves Radio on CFUVfm for 10 years and CBC Victoria radio one music column Tribal Clefs for 8 years. Her radio documentaries “Bring Your Drum” (50 years of indigenous protest music) and Resonating Reconciliation won Best Radio at the imagaineNATIVE Film and Media festival 2011 and 2013. Her six-part radio documentary NDNs on the Airwaves won two T.O. Webfest Awards 2017. Janet Rogers and Ahkwesase Mohawk poet Alex Jacobs make up the poetry collective Ikkwenyes which produced the poetry CD Got Your Back and won the Loft Literary Fellowship prize 2014. 2Ro Media is the media collective lead by Janet Rogers and Mohawk media artist Jackson Twobears.
Laura Reid Kooji is Anishinaabe, Ojibway from Nipissing First Nation, living in Hamilton, ON. Laura’s first book “No Rainbow” was published in October 2018 by Bayeux Arts They have media published articles about cultural appropriation and identity in print and online. Laura was the co-founder and editor of Bent Q Media, an online resource run by and for members of Hamilton Ontario’s LGBTQIA+ and Two Spirit communities. In addition to writing, Laura is a beadwork artist, community educator/activist and musician. Laura is passionate about Indigenous language revitalization and studies Anishnaabemowin (Ojibway) and Kanyen’kehà:ka (Mohawk) languages.
Ariel Bader-Shamai is a multidisciplinary artist and arts administrator based in Hamilton.
The Exchange was developed with support from the Canada Council for the Arts and the New Horizons for Seniors Program.
