NDN Giver - Bill Reid Gallery

On view from September 27, 2025 – February 22, 2026 

Opening Celebration: September 27th, from 12–3 PM. Free Admission.

This exhibition marks the solo curatorial debut of BRG’s Assistant Curator, Amelia Rea (Haida).

NDN Giver explores the layered meanings within both everyday and extraordinary gifts that circulate through the potlatch. Blankets, coppers, canoes, prints, mugs, trade beads and devil’s club strung into necklaces all become carriers of law, memory, and relation to one another.

The title NDN Giver reclaims a phrase rooted in colonialism that mocked Indigenous generosity. In reality, the practice of giving upheld in the potlatch reflects the complexity of responsibilities in Indigenous governance and exchange. To give is to strengthen ties, and to receive is to take on the responsibility of carrying them forward.

This exhibition is not about objects alone, but about the stories they carry and the obligations they enact. Whether a humble mug or a crest-bearing treasure, they act as a living archive of law, love, accountability, and kinship.

“What’s in a mug? Or more specifically, what’s in a potlatch mug? 

During lunch at my aunty and uncle’s house, I paused in front of a kitchen cabinet overflowing with mugs gifted at potlatches. It became clear that these mugs are more than vessels for coffee or tea. Each one is filled to the brim with family history, clan business, names bestowed, marriages celebrated, alliances formed, and truths spoken. To accept a gift at a potlatch is to accept responsibility to carry forward what transpired and to affirm agreement with the events that took place. And in truth, it is less a gift in the Western sense and more a form of payment, a recognition of the witness, and an obligation to remember, uphold, and retell the histories that were set into motion.” – Amelia Rea