Poet in Residence | Jillian Christmas
Image: Jillian Christmas, Photo: K. Ho
In November 2023, acclaimed poet and multidisciplinary artist Jillian Christmas was appointed as the Vancouver Art Gallery’s inaugural Poet in Residence. In her new role, Christmas has been working alongside the Department of Public Engagement & Learning to enrich the Gallery’s public programming and offer a new lens through which to discover the exhibitions.
As a queer, Afro-Caribbean Canadian, Christmas’ work considers themes of family, heritage and identity. Her residency, aptly named Toward Delight, represents a thoughtful and immersive public engagement initiative designed to enhance the works on view in the Gallery. Christmas’ work will hold space for community reflection, conversation and collaborative daydreaming. Through this residency, she seeks to ignite a sense of wonder, inspire creativity and celebrate the power of art to unite and uplift those who come to visit.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Jillian Christmas is a queer, Afro-Caribbean writer, educator, curator and consultant. She is the first-ever Poet in Residence at the Vancouver Art Gallery. Christmas has previously served as the spoken word curator of the Vancouver Writers Fest and Artistic Director of Vancouver’s Verses Festival of Words. Among her notable achievements, Christmas made history as the first Canadian to reach the finals of the World Poetry Slam in 2015, performing her slam poem Black Feminist, and, in 2021, she was the recipient of the League of Canadian Poets’ Sheri-D Wilson Golden Beret Award for spoken word poetry and the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ Canadian writers. Christmas has also represented both Toronto and Vancouver at 11 national poetry events. Her debut collection, The Gospel of the Breaking, was published in 2020. Christmas lives on the unceded territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh and Musqueam people (Vancouver).