Writing to Resist

Jamelie Hassan is an artist, curator, writer and activist based in London, Ontario. Her work was featured in Light: A Visionary Perspective, an international group exhibition celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Aga Khan Museum, Toronto. Her works are included in major public collections and she is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Governor General's Award in Visual Media Arts in 2001. She received an honorary degree from OCAD University, Toronto in 2018 and in 2023 an honorary degree from Western University, London in 2023. She is co-editor with Ron Benner of the anthology “An Alternative Cultural History of London, Ontario: Art & Activism” published by the Embassy Cultural House, London, Ontario, 2024. Jamelie Hassan and Ron Benner are also the co-founders of the Embassy Cultural House, a not-for-profit artist collective based in London, Ontario.

Ron Benner is an artist, writer, curator and activist based in London, Ontario. His long-standing practice investigates the history and political economics of food cultures. Finding himself ethically opposed to bioengineering, he began to travel and research the politics of plants and food. His works take the form of garden installations, mixed-media photographic installations, and watercolours. He is co-editor with Jamelie Hassan of the anthology “An Alternative Cultural History of London, Ontario: Art & Activism” published by the Embassy Cultural House, London, Ontario, 2024. JamelieHassan and Ron Benner are also the co-founders of the Embassy Cultural House, a not-for-profit artist collective. This year his photographic/garden installation As the Crow Flies at Museum London celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2025 and he gave summer tours to the community where he hosted his annual maiz barbacoa/corn roast event. 

Laura Moseley is Curator of the Women’s Art Collection at the University of Cambridge and Founder of Common Threads Press. She holds a BA in History of Art from the University of York, where she received the dissertation prize for her thesis Indigenous and Modern Textiles: Ancient America in the Work of Anni Albers and Cecilia Vicuña. She also holds an MA in History of Art from University College London, where she again received the dissertation prize for A Diary of Touch: Rhetorics of Queer Identity in Contemporary Quilting Practices.

Common Threads Press was founded in 2019, originally under the name Made by Women, following Moseley’s undergraduate studies. The project was established in response to a desire to broaden access to art history and publishing, making space for contributors from a wider range of disciplines, backgrounds, and financial circumstances. Early formative experiences included producing zines as a teenager and serving as President of the University of York Feminist Society. The project’s first funding came through the Santander Student Business Competition at the University of York, which Laura won in 2019. Moseley has worked with institutions including the Pitt Rivers Museum, Latitude Festival and the Royal School of Needlework on projects relating to social art histories, activist materials, and political textiles.

Haruko Okano is an interdisciplinary artist living in Vancouver. Originally from Toronto, she moved to British Columbia in 1978. She is well known for her work in integrating the different components of her artistic process, her personal interests in the environment and whole systems integration. She is an avid organic gardener on approximately a quarter acre of land in Vancouver’s eastside.

Lois Klassen is an artist, writer, and artist book publisher based in Vancouver (Coast Salish territory). Her publishing moniker, Light Factory Publications, has produced the projects Reading the Migration Library and Practices of Everyday Ethics. Known for long-range projects that invite and engage participants in collective actions, Klassen’s projects deliberately face ethical demand by way of social, aesthetic and material methods. Her writing focuses on ethics and participatory art practices. She was a Fulbright Fellow at University of Texas in El Paso and a postdoctoral fellow at SFU's Critical Media Art Studio (School of Interactive Art and Technology, Surrey). Klassen is a research grant facilitator and research ethics advisor at Emily Carr University of Art + Design.