Organized by the Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery, in collaboration with the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal and UQAM, with the participation of Marly Fontaine, an Innu student in visual arts at UQAM.

On Saturday March 25, 2017, a reading marathon was held at the Ellen Gallery to reactivate an initiative launched in 2016 in collaboration with #ReadTheTRCReport and No Reading After the Internet as part of Reading Exercises, curated by Katrie Chagnon. In a first marathon at the Gallery in January 2016, a French version of the YouTube project #ReadTheTRCReport was launched and then continued on-line. We decided to revive this project on the occasion of the symposium Topographies of Mass Violence held on March 31 and April 1, 2017 at the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal (topographies-violence.org).

First carried out in English, the #ReadTheTRCReport project was inspired by the publication of an article by Chelsea Vowel, encouraging Canadians to read the Report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada. Her article is available here: apihtawikosisan.com/2015/06/reaction-to-the-trc-not-all-opinions-are-equal-or-valid

In response to this open call, Zoe Todd, Erica Violet Lee and Joseph Murdoch-Flowers initiated a video project, inviting individuals from across Canada and beyond to film themselves reading a section of the Executive Summary of the TRC Report, and upload their video to YouTube. The goal was to pay tribute to the survivors of the residential schools, to increase the accessibility of this report and to give it life to prevent it from being abandoned on a shelf like so many before. The English version of the #ReadTheTRCReport project was completed in September 2015. The playlist is available on YouTube: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxPr_RIsvg9JJWoiRx2kl2v24r_pu7JbR

The French version playlist, #LireleRapportdelaCVR , can be found on YouTube: youtube.com/playlist?list=PLaHyXeXhAoN1_rza0I1Y18mtgh6QYhLMn

The French version of the Report can be downloaded in pdf format from the website of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (see pdf document entitled “Honorer la vérité, réconcilier pour l’avenir”, which corresponds to the Executive Summary): nctr.ca/fr/reports.php

Thank you to the participants for helping to extend the reach of this important citizens’ initiative!