Public Art

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The City's Art in Kiosks program enhances everyday artistic encounters and conversations in public spaces.

The 2024 display features five illustrations of native plants with their Indigenous names created by Brianna Bear. The artworks are on display in kiosks along Douglas Street as part of the City's Winter Arts Festival (February 16-19) and will be available for viewing through the spring. 

The five illustrations showcased are part of a collaborative, language-learning colouring book by Indigenous artists Brianna Bear (Songhees Nation) and Jesse Campbell (Métis/Cree). 

The purpose of the colouring book was to create a new way to engage children and adults with Indigenous languages; namely, the Lekwungen language from the territory now known as Victoria, B.C. and the Michif language spoken by the Métis. These languages were selected by the creators of this project to help provide a small window into their heritage.   

The colouring book was created through the generous contributions of Open Space Arts Society (design by Kara Stanton and Paolino Caputo), the Tah’lum Indigenous Artist Collective and a City of Victoria Everyday Creativity Grant.
 

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Meet Ella Chay - Artist for the 2023-2024 Installation 

In June 2014, a new outdoor art gallery was established in Commercial Alley to add vitality to this historic area and corridor used by local businesses and pedestrians. Located between the 500 Block of Yates and Bastion Square, the outdoor gallery allows for four, 1.2-metre x 2.4-metre panels, showcasing a temporary art installation annually, providing a place for artistic and creative expression by local artists. 

Artist Ella Chay is the 11th artist to have their artwork displayed. 

“Through the Commercial Alley project, I was challenged to create work that interacts with the existing architecture, while also considering how the public uses the alley as a passageway between two points. 

The panels function as windows into an imaginary space behind the wall. In creating an engaging viewer experience, I aimed to create the feeling of movement through the imagined space that is simultaneous with the viewer’s physical movement through the alley. I am often inspired by dreams and the way memories and images are warped to build environments that are distorted and unfamiliar. My work also explores the idea of travel and aims to transport viewers into a new space. Inside these spaces, viewers are met with unconventional relationships between objects that reflect the irrational nature of dreams.” -Ella Chay  

Raised in Victoria, B.C., Ella Chay is a contemporary artist with a Bachelor of Fine Arts with Honours in Visual Arts and a minor in Film Studies (University of Victoria). Her current work focuses on world building and illusionary expansions of space, while challenging the boundaries of mediums by blending two-dimensional painted surfaces with three-dimensional sculptural forms. Chay is the recipient of the Takao Tanabe Undergraduate Award in Visual Arts (2021) and was nominated for the BMO 1st ART! Award (2022). Since graduating, she has participated in the Ministry of Casual Living’s Time and Space BIPOC Residency and held her first solo exhibition, The After Party. She is currently working out of Rockslide Studio, located in Victoria’s largest arts hub.

The artwork will be on display until the end of October 2024. 

To learn more about Ella Chay’s work, please see Ella Chay – Sweetpea Gallery

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Sacred is an Indigenous multimedia art display at City Hall that showcases a range of traditional and contemporary art forms created by eight emerging and established Indigenous artists.

Curated by Indigenous curator Rose Spahan with the assistance of Eli Hirtle, Sacred features artworks throughout City Hall in a variety of media, including indoor murals, an LED light painting, an outdoor projection, a short film, a poem, a series of photographs and a series of silk-screened prints. All artworks have been created by Indigenous artists living on Vancouver Island. 

The image above, River and Raven, was designed by Indigenous artist Dylan Thomas for the exhibit's grand opening poster.  

The Hands of Time consists of 12 bronze sculptures located around downtown Victoria. They were created to celebrate the City of Victoria's 150th anniversary of incorporation in 2012.

A three-stage, national juried public art competition was held to select the artist/artwork. 

Learn about artist Crystal Przybille and discover the artworks with The Hands of Time public art walking tour brochure [PDF/426KB].