Each year the Victoria Arts Council recognizes International Women’s Day as a way of honouring the artistic matriarchs in our community, as well as recognize the continued marginalization of voices against misogyny.
In celebration of the 115th year of International Women’s Day, the VAC has brought together two dynamic installations in partnership with the Inter Cultural Association of Greater Victoria and the Salt Spring Island National Art Prize.
Exhibition dates: 1-29 March 2026
Community Reception: Sunday 1 March, 2PM-5PM
with opening remarks by Shelly D’Mello, CEO of ICA
Artist in Conversation with Isabel González Quiroz and Kegan McFadden, Sunday 15 March, 2PM
Artist talk with Anna Gustafson, Sunday 29 March, 3PM
Gallery location: VAC temporary venue
Address: The Bay Centre, 1150 Douglas Street (lower level, bottom of escalators; across from “Winners”)
Gallery hours: Tuesday – Sunday, 12noon to 5PM
Admission: by donation
VAC in partnership with ICA presents:
WEAVING CONVERSATIONS
Weaving Conversations is an installation by Isabel González Quiroz with work produced during a textile workshop with a 15 women weavers from around the world.
Weavings Conversation was aTextile Art Workshop that was carried out by artist Isabel González Quiroz at Inter Cultural Association of Greater Victoria from September to December 2025.
It consisted of 15 sessions of three hours each, with the participation of migrant and refugee women who are ICA users, invited to a gathering centered on learning textile art.
During these sessions, González Quiroz introduced various tapestry exercises that covered the initial stage of textile learning: textile language: weft and warp, and how by interlacing them to create a fabric.
This generosity in sharing was expressed mainly in the willingness to communicate. For each, English is a new language, and none were sufficiently fluent. With great creativity, the participants were able to have conversations, using textiles as a communicative link, fulfilling the main objective of this experience.
This presentation will include the nearly 60 weavings produced over the course of the workshop, as well as a display of tools used in their making, video clips of the processes, and more.
Isabel González Quiroz is a Chilean visual artist and psychologist based in Lekwungen Territories (Victoria, B.C.) Her recent work consists of various languages and techniques, focusing on oil painting (plein air of Canadian landscape), prints and textile arts. She dedicates herself to textile design and experimentation and to teaching loom weaving and pre-Columbian tapestry. Her work as an artist consists of a graphic exploration both in installations and in serigraphic, photographic, and textile procedures, whose forms of diffusion have been collective and individual exhibitions in the Juan Egenau Room of the University of Chile, the Museum of Contemporary Art MAC, BECH Gallery, among others.
Weaving Conversations workshop participants include: Patricia Ali Ndovola (Central African Republic), Irama Castellanos De Lopez (Venezuela), Helen Danayan (Iran), Fatemeh Mirzaei-Moorchehkhorti (Iran), Mary Thomson (South Sudan), Khadro Roble (Somalia), Zengyan Sun (China), Xiurong Liu (China), Aiping Zhang (China), Jieming Hu, (China), Lu Gao (China), Mehri Salehi (Iran), Ozra Shamsaldin (Iran), Sakineh Mahi (Iran), Lillian Li (China), Molly Misa (Philippines), Regeat Gebremariam (Eritrea)
VAC in partnership with SSNAP presents:
Anna Gustafson, Sample
Anna Gustafson was conceived in Guatemala to an Italian/ Guatemalan mother and Swedish father, born in Sweden and
raised in Vancouver, Canada. Gustafson’s long view has benefited from being nurtured in a multi-cultural family within an immigrant perspective.
An important premise of her work is that we best remember information and events through our senses and associated emotions. As Anna’s practice has a strong sensory component, her work encourages each viewer to develop their own emotional responses, and fully absorb the information presented.
An honours graduate of Vancouver School of Art – now Emily Carr, Anna has shown in public galleries since 1974.
Artist Statement:
In my practice I use common objects to explore the intersection between the natural world and technology. To initiate the move from indifference and denial to engaged and effective action I research history, science, and methods of learning and communication. With an emphasis on profligate waste and habitat destruction, my recent work involves enshrouding discarded small appliances and single use plastic containers in linen, just as we once prepared our dead for burial.
My artistic practice combines a spare aesthetic with a sincere use of materials and rigorous methodology to create narratives that resonate with the synergy between idea, material and technique. Edited to essential elements, I choose to work with a limited palette and a restricted vocabulary of natural materials and found objects.
This year we’re also pleased to present the of photograph project, Voices in Focus by Sirajum Munira at our community satellite, theDock Centre for Social Impact, to coincide with International Women’s Day. More on that project here: https://vicartscouncil.ca/2026/02/24/sirajum-munira-thedock/
The VAC recognizes the support of The Bay Centre | Victoria, the CRD Arts Services, the Province of British Columbia (BC Community Gaming and BC Arts Council), as well as our partnerships with Salt Spring National Art Prize and the Inter Cultural Association of Greater Victoria.