Pamela Edmonds
Pamela Edmonds is a Canadian visual and media arts curator focused on themes of decolonization and the politics of representation. She is considered an influential figure in the Black Canadian arts scene. Since 2019, Edmonds has been the senior curator of the McMaster Museum of Art. Career. Pamela Edmonds is a visual and media arts curator concerned with the politics of representation and influential in the Black Canadian arts scene. She is the senior curator of the McMaster Museum of Art, in Hamilton, Ontario. Originally from Montreal, Quebec, she earned both her BFA and MA in Art History  from Concordia University. Edmonds began her career in Halifax in 1998 with the exhibition "Skin: A Political Boundary," co-curated with Meril Rasmussen at Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. Since, Edmonds has remained a key player in the Black Canadian art scene. In 2019, she joined forces with other prominent Black Canadian curators Julie Crooks, Associate Curator of Photography at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Montreal based independent curator Dominique Fontaine and Gaëtane Verna, Director of The Power Plant Contemporary Art Gallery to organize the inaugural Black Curators Forum. After working many years in Toronto, Ontario at the  Thames Art Gallery of the Chatham Cultural Centre, Edmonds was promoted to senior curator at McMaster Museum of Art, becoming one of the few Black curators working in senior curatorial positions in Canadian museums and galleries. Her collaborative curatorial work has yielded some of the most important exhibitions of Black Canadian art in the 2000s. Working with the Sister Visions collective Edmonds organized "Through Our Eyes" at the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia in Halifax. She subsequently worked at A Space Gallery in Toronto, Ontario where she was the exhibitions coordinator, and in the Art Gallery of Peterborough where she  became the curator/director. In 2009, Edmonds co-founded Third Space Art Projects, a curatorial collective which she co-directs with Sally Frater. In 2014, Edmonds served as mentor in the Ontario Association of Art Galleries (OAAG). Her work continues to focus on decolonialism and Black Canadian art practices. Curated exhibitions. "New-Found-Lands," Eastern Edge Gallery, St. John’s, 2016 "Liminal: Lucie Chan & Jerome Havre" Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, Ontario, 2016 "Skin Deep: Reimaging the Portrait", Project Gallery, Toronto, 2015 "Confluence: Shifting Perspectives of the Caribbean", Artist in Transit, 2014 "Tracings: Recent Work by the W5Art Collective," Women’s  Arts Resource Centre Gallery, Toronto, 2014 "Bounty: Chikonzero Chazunguza," Gallery 101, Ottawa 2013 "Erika DeFreitas: Deaths/Births/Memorials", Centre 3 for Print and Media Arts, Hamilton, 2013 "Screening Alterity," Art Gallery of Peterborough, 2012 "28 Days: Reimagining Black History Month," Justina M. Barnicke Gallery/Georgia Scherman Projects, Toronto, 2012 Publications. Throughout her career, Edmonds has published texts about Black Canadian art histories. She has also served as editor for cultural publications, including MICE Magazine (Moving Image Culture Etc.) with Mark V. Campbell, and the Black cultural journal "Kola" (based in Montreal).