SUM GALLERY

SHAPESHIFTERS — Curated by Carmen Levy-Milne | Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art, Kelowna

Sept 12 – Oct 25, 2025

For the first time ever, SUM gallery is expanding our activities to the Okanagan, thanks to a partnership with Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art in Kelowna! We’re proud to be a part of their Shapeshifters exhibition, curated by Carmen Levy-Milne.

In this exhibition, the collaborative artist trio Kendell Yan, Chris Reed, and Romi Kim will explore the intersections of queer monsters inspired by myths and stories from their unique cultures. A common thread woven through Chinese, Cree, and Korean folklore is the notion of shapeshifters, fictional beings that can transform themselves from one physical form into another. Including a series of lenticular printed photographs, an exploratory film, a performance, and a community centered workshop, the artists come to this project representing stories from their respective heritages while considering the intersections and compatibility between these folktales and their drag personas and gender identities.

Locals and visitors to Kelowna are welcome to the join the opening reception; 6 – 8pm on Friday September 12th. This special opening includes a live performance by Yan, Reed, and Kim; you don’t want to miss this! The opening is free and open to the public, with light snacks and refreshments provided.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Shapeshifters are a multidisciplinary QTIPOC artist collective based on the stolen lands of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səl̓ílwətaʔ (Tsleil-Waututh) nations. Romi Kim (they/them) , Chris Reed (they/them), and Kendell Yan (she/they) are close friends, drag performers and accomplices. Also known as SKIM (he/him), Continental Breakfast (they/them) and Maiden China (she/they).

Shapeshifters have been collaborating since 2022. Their artistic practice is rooted in collective care, cultural and community histories, kinship, and queer liberation. Shapeshifters have exhibited work at Sum gallery (2022), the Vancouver Queer Film Festival (2023), James Black Gallery (2023), and Queer Arts Festival (2023).

Carmen Levy-Milne (she/her) is a curator and cultural worker born and raised on the unceded land of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm people. As a diasporic Jewish settler, her practice is primarily concerned with the philosophy of tikkun olam (“the repair of the world”), where she sees her work in the arts sphere as responsible for uplifting reparative, decolonial, and critical artistic responses to our broader social, political, and cultural circumstances. She holds an MA in Critical & Curatorial Studies from UBC and a BA in Communication and Cultural Studies with a Minor in Religion and Cultures from Concordia University. Her work has been featured by the AHVA Gallery, the Burnaby Art Gallery, Centre A, Deer Lake Gallery, and the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery.

Presented in partnership with Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art, thanks to generous support from the Canada Arts Presentation Fund, administered by the Department of Canadian Heritage.

DARK WREATH — Babe Siegl | THIS Gallery

Sept 26 – Oct 5, 2025

We’re so happy to be a community partner for THIS Gallery‘s upcoming exhibition: a solo show by our very own Babe Siegl!

Babe Siegl’s Dark Wreath merges digital precision with the tactile richness of oil painting to explore the complexities of queer identity in a digital age. His surreal, vividly chromatic compositions shimmer with artificial reflections, gendered symbols, and dreamlike figures that reflect cycles of harm—shame, toxic masculinity, and internalized prejudice—caught in endless loops. Yet alongside melancholy lies humour and vitality: his characters, playful as toys or avatars, embody queerness as fluid, adaptive, and ever-becoming. Through this hybridity of medium and meaning, Siegl reveals the tension and resilience at the heart of contemporary queer experience.

Join us for the opening reception on Saturday, September 27, from 12 – 4pm at THIS Gallery (108 East Broadway, back alley entrance).

ABOUT BABE SIEGL

Benjamin/Babe Siegl (he/him) is a painter, animator, and occasional curator based in Vancouver. His work explores contemporary queer identity through the lenses of painting, drawing, animation, and digital media. Originally from Florida, Siegl holds a BFA from Florida State University (2011) and an MFA from Emily Carr University of Art + Design (2017). He is a long-term staff member of the Pride in Art Society, a Vancouver-based queer arts charity.

Emancipation Day — FREE Events at SUM Gallery

Gallery Exhibition | Drag & Burlesque Performances | Spoken Word Celebration

August 1st is Emancipation Day and we’re celebrating with a week of events at SUM gallery!

What is Emancipation Day, you ask? It’s the day in 1834 when the Slavery Abolition Act came into effect across the British Empire. We’re partnering with our friends at Hogan’s Alley to present a week of stirring art and riveting performance, all viewed through a uniquely queer Black lens.

August 1 | 7–9 PM
We’re kicking things off with a night of jaw-dropping performances featuring Mx. Bukuru, As*trix Banks, Velvet Ryder, Saint Solstice, Rainbow Glitz, Luna Buckster, and spins by DJ Grooveheart! Join us for a special reception featuring food by local Black-owned restaurants. This event is 18+.

August 1–8, open daily 12 – 6pm*
August 1st also sees the launch of our weeklong exhibition, featuring the interdisciplinary work of Valérie d. Walker and the SUM gallery debut of Uzo, a young fashion designer focussing on crochet couture! *Note: SUM gallery will be closed Monday, August 4th.

August 3 | 2 PM
Spoken word and poetry take centre-stage on Sunday afternoon as Addena Sumter-Freitag, April Sumter-Freitag, and Siobhan Barker present work that is at turns fearless, moving, and raunchy.

All of our events are FREE to attend but registration is recommended.

We’re located at #425, 268 Keefer St. See you there!

RSVP FOR FREE

Unsavoury Witness — Alejandro A. Barbosa

Apr 16 – Jun 6, 2025

Unsavoury Witness is a photo-based installation that includes laser-engraved photographs, photographic murals, intermedia, print media, and court transcripts from the Supreme Court of British Columbia on the 2001 murder of Aaron Webster in Stanley Park. This immersive exhibition foregrounds homophobia’s intimate connections with public spaces, institutionalised systems, societal responses, queer bodies, and desire.

Alejandro A. Barbosa combines photography and excerpt with placemaking to conceptualise pause as an agency of justice. By working from official documents and media archives surrounding a pivotal case in the history of homophobic violence in Canada, they complicate the certainties of queer pleasure and integrate the inconsistencies of justice when prejudice, silence, and risk intersect desire. Within the safety of SUM gallery, the exhibition is crafted as a diorama where artist and viewer intersect the public figure of the witness toward a queer ethics of memorialisation. Unsavoury Witness is Alejandro A. Barbosa’s debut solo presentation in Canada, their first with SUM gallery, and is curated by long-time mentor Patryk Stasieczek.

Unsavoury Witness is generously supported by The Parachute Fund and the Deux Mille Foundation. This exhibition is part of the 2025 Capture Photography Festival Selected Exhibition Program.

ABOUT ALEJANDRO A. BARBOSA

Alejandro A. Barbosa (they/he) is a 2SLGBTQIA+ latinx visual artist and curator born in Argentina who lives and works on the unceded, traditional and ancestral territories of the Coast Salish peoples—the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations. Alejandro’s practice focuses on lens-based media and investigates the flaws of representation, queer lived experience, and the politics of looking. Alejandro holds an MFA in visual art from the University of British Columbia, and a BFA in photography from Concordia University. They work as a Sessional Lecturer at the University of British Columbia and Non-regular Faculty at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Their work has been exhibited and collected in Canada, Argentina, Peru, and the United States.

ABOUT PATRYK STASIECZEK

Patryk Stasieczek is a Polish Canadian 2SLGBTQIA+ visual artist and curator currently working as an Assistant Professor of Photography at NSCAD University. Patryk’s practice explores photography as an embodied, interdisciplinary queering of image histories, actions, and materials. Their research is informed by their investment in pedagogy and delves into the emergent conditions of photography and the physical relationships images create as forms of experiential knowledge. Patryk’s work as an artist and curator has been featured in collaboration with the Pensacola Museum of Art (USA), Peripheral Review (CA), Centre Clark (CA), Libby Leshgold Gallery (CA), and the Magenta Foundation (CA).

Mirrors — Michael Morris and Dion Smith-Dokkie

Feb 6 – Apr 4, 2025

Mirrors presents a series of watercolour nudes created by Michael Morris during his Berlin residency in the 1980s. Unique in Morris’ predominantly abstract oeuvre, these paintings depict hustlers, artists, and friends, many of them posing in front of a mirror, so that their form could be captured from different angles. Some three dozen nudes, none of which have ever been exhibited publicly, are presented alongside six newly commissioned paintings — “reflections” on Morris’ work — by West Moberly First Nations artist Dion Smith-Dokkie. Curated by Rodney Sharman, Mirrors reflects on how the queer community’s relationship with AIDS has changed over the last forty years while highlighting the myriad issues that younger queer people continue to face today. Morris’ nudes, painted daily during the height of the AIDS crisis, create a body of overtly queer expression that is sensual, colourful, and safe, a private reflection of community at a time when queer people were very much villainized. By contrast, Smith-Dokkie’s works turn the viewer’s gaze upon himself: these nude self-portraits, situated in the bedroom or the bathhouse, are a sensuous, intimate, and vulnerable departure from the artist’s otherwise abstract body of work.

Join us for the opening reception on February 6, from 6 – 9pm, where both Smith-Dokkie and Sharman will be in attendance. SUM gallery is grateful for the time, guidance, and generosity of Michael Morris’ longtime partner, Rahmi Emin, as well as the support of the Parachute Foundation, the Audain Foundation, the Deux Mille Foundation, and the BC Arts Council.

ABOUT MICHAEL MORRIS

Michael Morris (1942–2022), a pioneering abstract painter and printmaker, made enduring contributions to film, photography, video, installation, and performance. Achieving international acclaim early, he helped shape Vancouver’s 1960s art scene and is celebrated for his collaborative practice and versatility as an artist, curator, and cultural leader. In 1970, Morris co-founded Image Bank with Vincent Trasov, a conceptual platform for mail art projects involving figures like Eric Metcalfe and General Idea. He later co-founded the Western Front Society, an artist-run centre for new art across disciplines. Morris passed away in Victoria, BC, on November 18, 2022, at age 80.

ABOUT DION SMITH-DOKKIE

Dion Smith-Dokkie (he/they) lives and works between northeast BC and Vancouver. A painter by trade, he is interested in topics like location and place, infrastructure, communication, and the body. This body of work marks a return to figuration and easel painting, in the wake of Michael Morris and in response to his watercolour nudes. Dion holds an MFA from the University of British Columbia. Recent shows include The Inaugural Lind Biennial at the Polygon Gallery, Land Breaths at the Art Gallery of Grande Prairie, and it hides in the light at The Bows in Calgary. Artistic philandering aside, Dion is a shy gay man and a member of West Moberly First Nations.

ABOUT RODNEY SHARMAN

Rodney Sharman, curator, is an internationally acclaimed composer, performer, educator, and arts advocate based on Musqueam territory in Vancouver. Currently the Victoria Symphony’s Composer-Mentor-in-Residence, he has held residencies with Early Music Vancouver, the Victoria Symphony, Vancouver Symphony, and the National Youth Orchestra of Canada. Dr. Sharman was President of the Canadian League of Composers (1993–98) and the Canadian Section of the International Society for Contemporary Music (1991–95), returning in 2016 to support Vancouver’s World New Music Days. He has served as President of the ISCM’s Canadian Section since 2019, continuing a career dedicated to championing contemporary music and fostering artistic collaboration.

Curatorial Cocktails

Curatorial Cocktails: Curator Talk with Rodney Sharman — Apr 4, 6 pm

On April 4 we bring our Mirrors exhibition to a close with Curatorial Cocktails featuring our exhibition curator, Rodney Sharman. Join us for an informal chat at the gallery, where Rodney will give his unique insights into the paintings of both Michael Morris and Dion Smith-Dokkie: how these particular works are unusual for both artists and how each responds to queer issues of their time.

To celebrate this event we’ll be serving specially curated cocktails, available by donation, made by our very own mixologist-in-residence, Tabitha McIntyre!

For the art collectors out there, this will also be an opportunity to purchase works by both Michael Morris and Dion Smith-Dokkie. For price lists and more information, please reach out directly to SUM gallery director Mark Takeshi McGregor: mark@queerartsfestival.com.

This artist talk is free to attend but registration is required as space is limited.

SUM AiR—January 2025

Jan 7 – 31, 2025

SUM-AiR is excited to announce January’s artist residency. Paige Bowman (@birdfingersss), Soren Dyck (@taliruq), Addison Finch (@zebrafiinches), Jamie Lauder (@mxlauder), Liam Murley (@liam.lovelock) and Dee Twentee (@dees20stitches) will be using this residency to create work for a group exhibition at the SUM Gallery in the fall of 2025. Each artist will be creating work in response to their individual relationship to gender as non-binary, gender non-conforming and trans artists.

Through this residency + subsequent exhibition the group aims to not only shed light on these important issues, but also to celebrate the diversity of gender identity within us all.

ñ (enye)—ilvs strauss

Nov 19 – 29, 2024

ñ (enye) is a multimedia bilingual installation / listening party by ilvs strauss (ilvs pronounced “elvis”). Visitors are asked to bring their ears for a guided journey through a labyrinth of intentional sound, audible and otherwise. Along the way, we’ll flip through the catalog of basic human needs and delve into an inquiry re: the advent of language, amongst other things. Ultimately, ñ (enye) raises the questions: What is it we hear? What is it we want to hear?

This exhibition also features strauss’ illustrated zine, “everything i heard over the course of my day all at once,” which was the original inspiration for her installation.

Join us at SUM gallery on Nov 19 for the opening reception of a new multimedia bilingual installation by ilvs strauss.

ABOUT ILVS STRAUSS

From a sociodemographic standpoint, I am a 45 year old educated, queer, mixed-race, white-passing, female bodied, Honduran-American artist. From a non-sociodemographic standpoint, I’m still those things, but manifest in 3D by the ethereal: experience, values, judgement, desire, need, love, motivation, inspiration, etc. The list goes on, but for now I’ll focus on the last three.

I love language and how it relates to the body.

I love surtitles, subtitles, and translation studies.

I love blurring the line between technician and performer.

I love the science and philosophy of sound – What is sound even? What are the effects of sound on our body, in our minds? How do our bodies/brains receive and interpret sound?

I’m motivated by considerations of accessibility – the show I am working on relies heavily on projected text, it is a lot to ask of an audience, to read for a sustained amount of time. How can I change the work to become accessible to those of different vision/hearing levels while maintaining the spirit and integrity of the piece?

The physics of sound inspires me. Sound is not a singular tiny object that travels along a wavy line from Point A to Point B. It is vibration – not a thing at all. Something (a voice, the slamming shut of a book, bird song) makes a molecule vibrate, which in turn makes the adjacent molecules vibrate, etc. A chain reaction radiating out in 3D. This has been a vital paradigm shift for me, a shift from thinking of singular entities on solo journeys to communities of entities vibrating in an iterative process.

I’m inspired to stop calling my ‘solo’ show a ‘solo’ show, for there is absolutely nothing I have done or will do that does not require the help/contribution/support/assistance of another.

Sacred Sacrilegious—Sujit Vaidya

Dec 3 – 13, 2024

SUM gallery brings 2024 to a close with Sacred Sacrilegious, a film by bharatanatyam-trained dancer and choreographer Sujit Vaidya, with videographer Robert Kingsbury and sound designer Parmela Attariwala.

Sacred Sacrilegious is a 40-minute film that explores the body as an offering to the five elements in accordance with Hindu philosophy (Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space). It is an abstraction of ideas that are placed through the body as moving landscapes. With his collaborators, Kingsbury and Attariwala, Vaidya has created virtual worlds for the body to inhabit an idea or a feeling through a series of visuals, each visual carrying something deeper within it. The viewer’s gaze is invited to stand on the edge of the visuals and make their own relationships with what’s being offered. “Sacred” and “Sacrilege” are offered as invitations to the viewer’s gaze.

On Dec. 3 at 7pm SUM gallery hosts a free public screening and Vancouver premiere of Sacred Sacrilegious, with Vaidya, Attariwala and Kingsbury in attendance, kicking off a ten-day mini-exhibition.

Film duration: 41 minutes

Note: Sacred Sacrilegious contains partial nudity.

Choreography/ Concept: Sujit Vaidya

Dancer: Sujit Vaidya

Videography and Editing: Robert Kingsbury

Sound Design: Parmela Attariwala

Outside Eye: Lee Su-Feh

Sacred Sacrilegious was made possible thanks to the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and Anandam Dance Theatre.

Sacred Sacrilegious runs at SUM gallery Dec. 3 – 13.

SUM gallery hours: Tuesday – Saturday, noon – 6pm.

ABOUT SUJIT VAIDYA

sujitvaidya.ca

My dance training is in a “traditional” dance form from India, called bharatanatyam. However, my way of engaging with the form is to situate my queerness within the rootedness of tradition and intergenerational knowledge. Some curiosities/ ideas I engage with around Body, Eroticism, Gaze, Queer shame, Queer intimacy and Stillness have been showing up in my work consistently. Slowing down movement and reclaiming/ re- aligning gaze around virtuosity through a non- Eurocentric lens interests me. I like to give the viewer the agency of meaning making. I’m not interested in putting across literal ideas. I like to sense and sculpt spaces for my audience’s imagination to inhabit. Rest, leisure, intimacy, stillness, gaze and erotic body are some themes I have explored in Sacred Sacrilegious.

“Traditional” bharatanatyam as practiced and performed today, is a practice of privileged able bodied persons from caste and class hierarchies. It caters to an Eurocentric gaze, with emphasis placed on physical virtuosity. My attempt in my works, including Sacred Sacrilegious, is to dismantle this gaze by using prolonged, sometimes uncomfortable silences to bring attention to the moment and invite ways of being present inside of it. – SV

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY—Rafael Zen + Khalil Alomar

Nov 7 – 16, 2024

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY is both a multimedia installation + sound performance. First, conceptually and fantastically – it is a conversation between an old tree + a cyber-bug through experimental electronic music, sound performance, hauntology, and eco-dreaming; then, materially, as an exploration of art fields that interest artists Rafael Zen and Khalil Alomar – multispecies collaboration (combining the sounds of humans + nature : birds > bugs > waves > wind), speculative environmental composition (by imagining a future when nature can only be accessed through screens and projections), and improvisational sound art (live performance of the speculative soundscape of an electro-forest).

The opening reception takes place on November 7, from 7 – 9pm, with Zen and Alomar performing live in the gallery. FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY runs at SUM gallery, Tuesday to Saturday from noon – 6pm, until November 16, 2024.

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ABOUT THE ARTISTS

RAFAEL ZEN /// The world is in convulsion, and so are we.* Rafael Zen is a queer and fiery Brazilian-Canadian multimedia artist and sound performer, currently living on the land of the Coast Salish peoples – Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam. There, he researches intersections between new media, performance, and environmental hauntology/speculative environmental composition/performance mediated with/through technology. In colonially-called Vancouver, he organizes Durations, an independent sound art and video art festival that offers an open stage for emerging artists exploring the fields of new media, sound, video art, and live performance. Academically, he holds a Master’s degree in Visual Arts – Contemporary Artistic Processes, where he researches anti-colonial and anti-capitalist poetic practices, and political counterattacks through contemporary art. Currently, he is researching New Media and Sound Art at Emily Carr University.

*Brazilian theorist Suely Rolnik (Spheres of Insurrection / 2017).

KHALIL ALOMAR /// Khalil Alomar is a queer Lebanese-Canadian artist whose creative practice primarily revolves around sound art, multimedia installation, and performance. He works through anti-colonial, anti-capitalist, and anti-establishment theory and practice. Currently, he is pursuing a degree in New Media and Sound Art at Emily Carr University. Alomar lives in the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Selíl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. His recent practice is centered on sound, video/paper collage, and photography as mediums that provide a platform for critiquing systemic aggressions and abuse.

FOREST / FLUX / FREQUENCY: Sound Performance
November 16, 2-4 pm

Join us at SUM gallery for the final day of our exhibition, FOREST / FLUX/ FREQUENCY by Khalil Alomar and Rafael Zen, for a special performance by the artists. This free, improvisational sound-based performance evokes an electro-forest in a future when nature can only be accessed through screens and projections

Saturday, November 16 at 2pm

SUM gallery (#425 – 268 Keefer St.)