New Westminster Museum Shifting Course

The New Westminster Museum is shifting course in a significant way. For many years, the story of the city's colonial history has occupied most of the museum. But times, they are a changing.

Recently, they introduced a museum-wide Indigenous exhibit called 'Downstream where the Waters Mix'. It heralds the beginning of a move to more inclusive stories of the city's past, according to Michele Taylor, Museum Curator.

The Indigenous exhibit was two years in the making, and a lot of the discussion was related to creating trust. The Indigenous Exhibit curator Nadine Spence was somewhat concerned that the exhibit, which features work from First Nations artists from all across BC, would be relegated to the back of the museum and that didn't sit right with her.

So it was decided that the exhibit would be spread throughout the museum with the anomalous backdrop featuring the British settler arrival and history.

While this is the first big step in a different direction for the Museum as explained by Michele Taylor, they are gradually making changes to other exhibits with the aim of telling stories of the diverse groups of people who live here or those groups that have been pushed out of the area.

They have recently put on an exhibit about housing issues in New Westminster that took an inclusive look at the issues. They also have a small exhibit about a person of Chinese origin, who had to pay the head tax to live in Canada - he made New Westminster his home.

Susan Millar

LJi Journalist