Heidi McKenzie | Reclaimed: Indo-Caribbean HerStories

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Heidi McKenzie, “Crescent Moon,” 2025

stoneware, coil built, acrylic, silica, steel stand, 17" x 18" x 6 1/2" (courtesy of the artist) (Photo: Dale Roddick)

Reclaimed: Indo-Caribbean HerStories is a mixed-media ceramic exhibition by Toronto-based artist Heidi McKenzie that illuminates the power, courage and strength of Indo-Caribbean women, past and present. Through a feminist lens, the exhibition narrates the little-known histories of Indo-indentureship in the mid-19th and early 20th centuries. Using photographic portraiture on ceramics, both archival and contemporary, the work draws in the visual narrative of the women’s indo-indentured jewelry as symbolic of strength, courage and resistance. It is an act of reclamation and decolonization.

There are three main components to the exhibition: a wall-mounted set of contemporary portraits on porcelain, lit from behind, depicting contemporary Indo-Caribbean women holding a matrilineal ancestral photograph; a two-sided collage of “Coolie Belles” photographs and ephemera on porcelain in window frames, inspired by early 20th century postcards; and a series of abstract figurative sculptures that respond to the photographic work.

The exhibition is open weekdays from 12:00 - 4:00 pm from February 27 to April 25, 2025. Closed April 18.