10/02/2026
So excited to have Dr. Cathy Mattes give a talk at the Sutherland Gallery on Brandon University campus on Tuesday, October 6 at 1:40, free and open to the public!
Cathy Mattes is a Michif curator (MMF citizen, Westman Local-Southwest Region), writer, and art history professor based in Sprucewoods, Manitoba, Canada. Her curation, research and writing centers on dialogic and Indigenous knowledge-centered curatorial practice as strategies for care. Curatorial projects include Kwaata-nihtaawakihk (Co-curator Sherry Farrell Racette, Winnipeg Art Gallery, March 2022), and Radical Stitch (Co-curators Sherry Farrell Racette and Michelle Lavallee, touring exhibition with Mackenzie Art Gallery, 2022-2025).
She has a PhD in Indigenous Studies from the University of Manitoba and teaches at the University of Winnipeg in the History of Art and Curatorial Studies programs. Mattes has contributed writing to various publications, including Bead Talk: Knowledge and Aesthetics from the Flatlands (University of Manitoba Press, 2023), Radicalizing Care – Feminist and Q***r Activism in Curating (Sternberg Press, 2021), and A Routledge Companion to Indigenous Art Histories in Canada (Routledge, 2022).
Mattes has been beading since she was 20 years old, when she was first taught by her auntie Jean Baron Ward. Since then, she has taught beading and moccasin-making in workshops, university courses, and around her kitchen table with family and friends.
