Harnessing the power of research to learn and generate new insights, enabling the arts community to be strategic, focused and adaptive.

Research in Residence

An Arts Impact Project

Research in Residence

An Arts Impact Project

Three qualitative arts impact frameworks

About the initiative

The Research in Residence: Arts’ Civic Impact (RinR) research project brings together academics and the arts sector to develop and test qualitative frameworks that will greatly assist the arts sector in demonstrating its civic impact. It is guided by an Advisory Committee of the project’s partners, and is facilitated and documented by Robin Sokoloski at Mass Culture and Mary Elizabeth Luka at University of Toronto Scarborough. This national research model, including three qualitative impact frameworks, has been shared publicly.

The Researchers in Residence: Arts’ Civic Impact initiative is a collaboration between Mass Culture, the Canada Council for the Arts, the Culture Statistics Working Group (Federal-Provincial-Territorial Culture and Heritage Table), the Ontario Trillium Foundation, and Toronto Arts Foundation.

The initiative engaged researchers from each of the following institutions: McGill University, Emily Carr University’s Aboriginal Gathering Place, University of Winnipeg, Dalhousie University, and Carleton University.

The researchers and their specific arts’ civic impact area of focus were: Sydney Pickering, Indigenous Cultural Knowledge; Emma Bugg, Climate and Sustainability; Aaron Richmond, Health and Wellbeing; Shanice Bernicky, Diversity and Inclusion; Audree Espada and Missy LeBlanc, Diversity and Inclusion.

The Research in Residence project represents a whole new level of collaboration across the arts community, arts funders and academia to advance arts impact research in Canada.

Liz Forsberg • Lead, Partnership Investments, Ontario Trillium Foundation

Mass Culture is thrilled to bring together a diverse group of researchers, an advisory group and link with them arts organizations and festivals across Canada. Researchers will work closely with arts organizations to create in-depth analyses of civic impact of the arts, including issues of anti-racism, equity, Indigenous cultural knowledge, health and wellness, and climate change. This collaborative work will create a national research model that Mass Culture will share openly with the arts and cultural sector.

Clare Daitch • Co-Chair Operations Group, Mass Culture

The Canada Council for the Arts is pleased, through a great collaboration with other funders, to support the Research in Residence: Arts’ Civic Impact project, which is aligned with its Qualitative Impact Framework. This initiative will help the broader arts community explore the impact it has on their communities and society at large.

Gabriel Zamfir-Enache • Director, Research, Measurement and Data Analytics at Canada Council for the Arts

Resources

The Researchers

Watch introductory video now

Topic: Diversity and inclusion

Residency: Culture Days

Supervisor: Susana Vargas Cervantes

University: Carleton University

Shanice is proficient in English and French.

Topic: Climate and sustainability

Residency: CreativePEI

Supervisor: Tarah Wright

University: Dalhousie University

Watch introductory video now

Watch introductory video now

Topic: Diversity and inclusion

Residency: Winnipeg Art Gallery Qaumajuq

Supervisors: Serena Keshavjee and Julie Nagam

University: University of Winnipeg

Topic: Health and wellbeing

Residency:

Supervisor: David Theodore

University: McGill University

Aaron is proficient in English and French.

Watch introductory video now

Watch introductory video now

Topic: Indigenous Cultural Knowledge

Residency:

Supervisor: Connie Watts

University: Aboriginal Gathering Place, Emily Carr

Advisory

Robin Sokoloski, Co-facilitator, Mass Culture

M. E. Luka, Co-facilitator, University of Toronto Scarborough and Critical Digital Methods Institute

Jamie Gamble, Evaluator

Marke Ambard, Advisor, Canadian Heritage

Clare Daitch, Advisor, Mass Culture

Liz Forsberg, Advisor, Ontario Trillium Foundation

Nicole Frenette, Advisor, Canadian Heritage

Annie Grégoire-Gathier, Advisor, Canadian Heritage

Paula Ledaga, Advisor, Canadian Heritage

Daniela Navia, Advisor, Canada Council for the Arts

Shawn Newman, Advisor, Toronto Arts Foundation

Gabriel Zamfir-Enache, Advisor, Canada Council for the Arts

Participating Universities

Researcher Bios

Shanice Bernicky

Shanice Bernicky (she/her/elle) is a media maker and doctoral student at Carleton University’s School of Journalism & Communication. Bernicky is interested in the relationship between identity, belonging, and equity, diversity and inclusion practices in settler-colonial states. She completed a Master’s research-creation thesis in Media Studies at Concordia University, exploring themes of heritage and mixed-race identity from axis point of natural Black hair. As a freelance video editor, she has worked on a myriad of projects on rich topics such as Indigenous laws and practices outside the settler-Canadian legal framework, research for the vitality of English-Speaking communities within Québec, and environmental issues connecting the East and the West. At Carleton, her work investigates the link between Canadian policy and the creation of diverse and inclusive television.

Emma Bugg (she/her) is pursuing a Master of Environmental Studies at Dalhousie University. Through the Mass Culture Arts’ Civic Impact research project, Emma is exploring the intersections of art, climate change, and environmental sustainability by working in residence with an arts organization to develop an impact framework to better understand, amplify, and enhance the contributions of the arts towards addressing the climate crisis. Prior to beginning her studies at Dalhousie University, Emma worked at the Ottawa based non-profit Evidence for Democracy as the Communications and Campaigns Manager. She holds a Bachelor of Arts Honours from the University of Saskatchewan.

Audree Espada is currently a graduate student at the University of Winnipeg, where she is completing her Master of Arts in Cultural Studies (Curatorial Practices). Having grown up in a city like Los Angeles, Audree understands the value of proper representation of diverse communities in the arts and humanities. After obtaining a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology at the University of California – Santa Barbara, Audree worked as an archaeologist and museum professional in California, Colorado, and New Mexico. Audree draws upon her many years of field experience to highlight and uplift diverse voices in museum and gallery spaces.

Missy LeBlanc (Métis, nêhiyaw, and Polish) is a curator, researcher, and writer based in Mohkinstsis/Calgary where she is currently the Curatorial Resident at TRUCK Contemporary Art. In 2019, she was the winner of the Middlebrook Prize for Young Canadian Curators and a runner-up for the Canadian Art Writing Prize. LeBlanc holds a Bachelor of Arts from the University of Alberta, double majoring in the History of Art, Design, and Visual Culture and Sociology and a Diploma in Arts & Cultural Management from MacEwan University. In September 2021, LeBlanc will be starting graduate studies at the University of Winnipeg where she will be working towards obtaining a Master of Arts in Cultural Studies, Curatorial Practices.

Aaron Richmond is an interdisciplinary artist and PhD candidate in the History and Theory of Architecture program at McGill University. His doctoral project addresses the medicalization of Modern art and architecture within the French periodical L’Esprit nouveau (1920 to 1925). His doctoral work is supported by grants from the Fonds de Recherche du Québec and the Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship. His art critical writing has appeared in the Brooklyn Rail and e-flux.

Sydney Pickering

Sydney Frances Pickering is a member of Lil’wat nation. She is currently living and working on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Səl̓ílwətaʔ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. Her multi-disciplinary practice includes hide tanning, video, sound, beadwork and poetry. She uses her practice to tell her family’s story, speak about identity and what it is like navigating as an Indigenous person within a colonial society. Her work over the past few years is grounded by her continued connection to land-based material practices.

Land Acknowledgment

Mass Culture honours and acknowledges the territories upon which our offices reside, the traditional land of the Huron-Wendat, the nations of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, the Métis, and the Anishinabek, including the Mississaugas of the New Credit Nation. We recognize and respect all recorded and unrecorded Nations who cared for this land of Tkaronto, meaning “Where the Trees Meet the Water.” We honour the Dish With One Spoon treaty and our responsibility to peaceably share and care for the resources around the Great Lakes. Mass Culture is grateful for the opportunity to nurture the world of the arts and connect cultures and communities across this land, which is the home to many Indigenous peoples from across Turtle Island. We hope to breathe life into our obligations to those communities and treaties. If you’re not sure of the history of the land on which you live and work, you can check out whose.land/en/ and native-land.ca/.

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