Professor Althea Thauberger is an artist, filmmaker and educator known for place-based experimental documentary projects that emerge from collaborative research and production processes. Her work—spanning photography, film, video, and performance—explores relationships between community stories and geopolitical histories. She was born in Saskatoon, and is of settler Scandinavian and Black Sea German descent.

Prof. Thauberger’s recent exhibitions include the Kaunas Biennial (2021); Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver (2020); The Toronto Biennial of Art (2019), The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (2019); The National Gallery of Canada (2019); La musée d’art contemporain de Montréal (2017), and the inaugural Karachi Biennale 2017.

Prof. Thauberger’s work has been the subject of numerous articles and reviews published by journals including Art Forum, Canadian Art, Tema Celeste, Flash Art, European Photography, Artnet Magazine, Frieze, the Guardian, C Magazine International, 4A Centre for Contemporary Asian Art, The Mainlander, and Flash Art. Her work has been the subject of monographs published by The Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver; The Liverpool Biennale; Künstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin; Artspeak, Vancouver; and Musagetes, Guelph.

Photo credit: Zinnia Naqvi

Research Area: Photographic history and theory; documentary studies; collaborative/collective community research and production; place-based contemporary art, settler colonial studies, and archival studies.

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Art History, Visual Art & Theory
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Heather Joan Tam is an interdisciplinary artist, and a researcher for documentary films on history in British Columbia and Canada, including All Our Father’s Relations (dir. Alejandro Yoshizawa, 2016), the story of the Grant siblings who journey to rediscover their father’s roots in China and understand his relationship with their Musqueam mother, and Incorrigible: The Story of Velma Demerson (dir. Karin Lee, 2022), based on Demerson’s memoir about her illegal incarceration, while pregnant in 1939 under Ontario’s Female Refuges Act for living with her Chinese fiancé as a white woman, and her lifelong quest for justice. Heather was Curator at the Bowen Island Museum & Archives from 2007 to 2013.

Research Area: Public History, Creative Writing

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Stanley provides logistical, financial, event, and administrative support for the Public Humanities Hub’s various programs and outreach. He has a UBC Master of Arts in History (2021) with a keen interest in public history, community stories, and museum work. His MA thesis primarily used oral history interviews to examine the 1969 riots in Kuala Lumpur. Stanley is engaged with his local community through badminton, freelance translation work, occasional piano performances, and volunteering for various non-profit initiatives.

Research Area: Asian Canadian history, modern history of Southeast Asia, public scholarship, community engagement, museum studies, oral history

Communications, Finance

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