August 8, 2022

Marissa Largo refocus the conversation inside and outside the gallery

Marissa Largo is creating space for emerging artists and change-making conversations about identity and equity with X Marks the Spot at Filipinx and the 2022 Ontario Galleries (GOG) award-winning exhibition Elusive Desires. 

Largo won the Best Exhibition Design and Installation at the 2022 Ontario Galleries (GOG) Awards for her exhibition at the Varley Art Gallery of Markham, Elusive Desires. The exhibition traces the intimacies and (be)longings of two queer Asian diasporic artists: Ness Lee (they/she) and Florence Yee (they/theirs), who seek to create a space where the often-obscured subjectivities and intimacies of queer Asian diaspora are brought to the fore.  

FilipiNEXT at York University

FilipiNEXT brought scholars, activists, and community members from all over Canada to York University to engage in creative discussions around Filipinx Studies emerging from Canadian contexts. Filipinx scholars from institutions across Canada make up the organizing committee, including AMPD Visual Arts and Art History professor Dr. Marissa Largo.

The weeklong series of workshops, events, and exhibitions explored the following questions: What tensions, aspirations, and lines of inquiry can emerge when we think critically about the history and future of Filipinx people in Canada? How will the past and present inform what is NEXT for Filipinx Studies in Canada?

The installation was sponsored by the Work Centre for Asian Research, York University School of Arts, Media Performance and Design (AMPD), AMPD Visual Arts and Art History Department, and Sensorium Centre for Research, Arts and Technology.

To learn more about FilipiNEXT and the artist involved, visit filipinext.ca.