Anique Jordan facts for kids

Anique Jordan is a Canadian artist who works in many different ways. She uses photography, sculpture, and performance art. Her art often looks at history in new ways. She wants to show how the past can help us imagine the future. Anique Jordan's work often explores Black history in Canada. She also looks at working-class communities and the connection between Black and Indigenous peoples. Her art highlights the important work Black people have done to fight racism.

About Anique Jordan

Anique Jordan's family came to Canada from Trinidad. She was born in Toronto and grew up in Scarborough. She studied at York University in Toronto. She earned a Bachelor's degree in International Development in 2011. Later, she completed a Master's degree in Environmental Studies in 2015. She also earned diplomas in Latin American and Caribbean Studies and Business and the Environment.

How Anique Jordan Became an Artist

In 2012, Anique Jordan received old family records from a cousin. These records told stories about her family's roots in the Caribbean. She used these stories for her Master's thesis in 2015. The thesis was called Possessed: A Genealogy of Black Women, Hauntology and Art as Survival. She is now writing a book with the same title. Her thesis shared the history of a group of Black Loyalists. These were freed people of colour in Trinidad and Tobago. Anique Jordan learned from a young age how to collect and keep important documents.

Anique Jordan did not go to art school. She started making photographic art by asking a big question. She wondered, "How did Black people survive transatlantic slavery?" She felt that TV shows often showed slavery as a joke or as very violent. To talk about history, she realized she needed to be like an archivist. She also found inspiration in carnival celebrations. These events allow for creativity and unexpected things to happen. She wants her art to come from and give back to the communities that inspire her.

Notable Art Projects and Exhibitions

In 2015, Anique Jordan was one of ten Black artists invited to show their work. This was for a Jean-Michel Basquiat art show at the Art Gallery of Ontario. For this show, she created art featuring her mother and older aunts. They wore uniforms from the War of 1812.

In 2016, she made art for a Lawren Harris show called Idea of the North. This show was also at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Anique Jordan's work focused on the Black communities in the Ward area of Toronto. Lawren Harris painted in this area in the early 1900s. Anique Jordan discovered a historic Black church and two homes owned by a Black family there. To avoid bounty hunters, the name of this church was changed. It went from the African Methodist Episcopal church to the British Methodist Episcopal Church. Anique Jordan's art for this project had two parts. One showed a woman at a crossroads. The other was a photograph of a church gathering. She also put on a performance about the topic. Her work was praised for offering a different view of history.

In 2017, Anique Jordan joined a discussion panel. This was for a show called Position as Required at the Art Gallery of Windsor. She also created a performance called Scream Café. This was for a show at McGill University in Montreal. In Scream Café, people could scream out loud or silently.

In 2020, she organized an exhibition called Three-Thirty. This was for the Contact Photography Festival in Toronto. The show looked at important cultural places in Scarborough’s Malvern neighborhood. It explored ideas about power, land, and community. She named it Three-Thirty because many kids in Scarborough rely on after-school programs.

In the summer of 2020, Anique Jordan created a large art piece. It was inspired by social media posts after the murder of George Floyd. The artwork was 21-foot (6.4 m) long and called We Have Done Enough. It was for the Nia Centre for the Arts. This piece asked viewers to think about how much Black people have worked to explain and fight racism.

Other Roles and Collections

Anique Jordan has also worked as a curator. She was part of the curatorial team at the Art Gallery of Ontario. She helped organize Every. Now. Then: Reframing Nationhood. She was also the Executive Director of Whippersnapper Gallery in Toronto.

She has been an artist-in-residence at the University of West Indies (Trinidad and Tobago) and Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto. Anique Jordan is a member of the Black Wimmin Artists (BWA) collective. She founded this group in 2016. It is a network for Black women artists across Canada.

Some of Anique Jordan's art is in museum collections. Her 2015 photo Sixth Company Battalion – The Aunties (1/3) is at the Art Gallery of Guelph. Her work Mas’ at 94 Chestnut is at the Art Gallery of Ontario.

In 2024, Anique Jordan had a solo exhibition called Underbelly. It was at Patel Brown Gallery in Toronto.