A three-way collaboration between Concordia University, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre and Art History at Queen’s University, the third triennial CWAHI conference brings together over 60 scholars, curators, archivists and conservators, presenting new and creative ways to think about women’s contributions to Canadian cultural heritage through the lens of self-representation. The selected papers explore issues of subjectivity and identity, areas that have long been concerns for feminist art history and theory, and offer reconsiderations of the category of women’s self-representation through the wider frames of community, environment and experience. The papers pose important questions. How can we rethink the boundaries of portraiture and the self? How do objects reveal their creators? Can challenges to decentre the subject be productively united with understandings of the work of self-portraiture and autobiography?

Highlights of this year’s conference include a keynote address by Dr Beverly Lemire, an exhibition reception at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre, and tours of Queen’s University Archives and the Queen’s Art Conservation Program. Dr Lemire is the Henry Marshall Tory chair in the department of History and Classics, as well as the founding director of the Material Culture Institute, at the University of Alberta. Dr Lemire has published widely on British social and material culture from the 17^th through the 19^th century, and topics pertaining to dress and fashion, and gender and women’s history. She is the author of The Business of Everyday Life: Gender, Practice and Social Politics in England (2005) and Dress, Culture and Commerce: The English Clothing Trade before the Factory, 1660–1800 (1997), and the editor of The Force of Fashion in Politics and Society: Global Perspectives from Early Modern to Modern Times (2010).

The CWAHI conference honours the 40^th anniversary of the groundbreaking exhibition From Women’s Eyes: Women Painters in Canada, curated by Dorothy Farr and Natalie Luckyj at the Agnes Etherington Art Centre in 1975. CWAHI is an initiative based at Concordia University that connects resources and researchers from across the country to enhance scholarship on historical women artists in Canada. This national conference is held in concert with the exhibition The Artist Herself.

Fees:
Queen’s and Concordia Students are  admitted free of charge.
Agnes Members and Students from other Universities: $20
Early Bird Registration (until 15 March): $70
Full Registration (after 15 March): $100

Conference schedule: CWAHI Conference Program.pdf

Tours of Queen’s University Archives or the Department of Art Conservation:

Saturday, 9 May, 12–1 pm
Maximum tour capacity (for each tour): 25.  Please sign up for your tour on registration to secure a place. Tours will be 30-40 minutes in duration.

BOTH TOURS NOW FULL

Recommended Accommodation at a Special Rate:

Queen’s Residence (Leggett Hall)
(613) 533.3183
194 Stuart Street
Queen’s University
Kingston, ON K7L 5V2

Rate: $89.  When booking online at the above web address, the event number is 26471, and the event name is CWAHI Conference.

Notes: Two double bed rooms. Accessible. Parking not included. Breakfast not included. Free Internet access. Laundry facilities. Located on campus, five-minute walk away from conference location.

Four Points by Sheraton
(613) 545.4277
285 King Street East
Kingston, Ontario K7L 3B1

Rate: $125 To receive this special rate, bookings must be made on or before Wednesday 8 April 2015. Please mention that you are attending the Canadian Women Artists History Initiative conference.

Notes: Queen bed room with kitchenette. Accessible. Free parking. Breakfast not included. Free Internet access. Work out facilities. Laundry facilities. Located close to downtown Kingston, fifteen-minute walk away from conference location and Queen’s Campus.