Andrew Jackson’s exhibition Little Burgundy – Evolving Montreal is a foray into this south-western district of the city. Over a two-year period, the photographer documented important landmarks for the Black community and met people who grew up there, live there or still have ties to the area. The result is an exhibition featuring 61 photographs of the individuals and sites that bear witness to the urban and social transformations that have impacted Little Burgundy. Three hard-hitting yet touching short films capture local residents’ lived experiences.
The exhibition also features some twenty objects and images selected by Andrew Jackson from the Museum’s collection. These artefacts, juxtaposed with contemporary objects loaned by residents, create a dialogue between the past and the present.
Through this project, Andrew Jackson exposes the duality involved in designating a place or neighbourhood as a “Black space.” For Black people, it invokes a sense of security, freedom and belonging, while for non-Black persons it conveys a negative image.
“When city spaces, such as Little Burgundy, are designated as Black spaces, there are profound implications for Black occupants. This is especially true in North America, where historically, in non-Black minds at least, Black spaces have not existed as places of acceptance or celebration of difference. Rather, they have been linked to notions of failure – notions that become catalysts for urban renewal, gentrification and the ensuing erasure of Black communities.”
– Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson
Andrew Jackson is a British-Canadian photographer based in Montreal since 2019. His practice is developed at the intersection of photography and text and, most recently, focuses on notions of family, transnational migration, displacement, trauma and collective memory. He recently published the monograph From a Small Island, the first chapter of his ongoing series Across the Sea Is a Shore, a collection of works that explore the intergenerational legacies of migration from the Caribbean to the UK.
Andrew Jackson has a history of developing platforms that provide opportunities for traditionally excluded groups to engage with photography. In 2021 he created a public engagement project in collaboration with the DESTA Black Youth Network, located in Little Burgundy, which resulted in a group exhibition shown at the PHI Foundation. His works are held in public collections that include the United Kingdom’s Government Art Collection, the Permanent Collection of the New Art Gallery Walsall and the Autograph ABP and Light Work collections. His photographs have also appeared in such publications as the Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, the Financial Times and The New Statesman.
3 things to know
Black space: a pilgrimage site
As part of his research carried out for the Evolving Montreal photographic commission, Andrew Jackson investigates how Black spaces – both physical and discursive – are experienced by Black communities. He is especially interested in how these sites are created and maintained, whether tangibly or symbolically, and in historically occupied physical spaces.
His work highlights how these spaces continue to exist in collective memory and how attachment to them endures, long after they have been obliterated by urban renewal and new communities have moved in. As Andrew Jackson states: “This is so powerful that long after Black residents have left, involuntarily or otherwise, they continue to make the pilgrimage of return.”
Little Burgundy
Although the Black population today makes up only about 18% of the neighbourhood’s 11,000 inhabitants, Little Burgundy remains an important historical site for the community. As one of Quebec’s first Black neighbourhoods, it offers a unique perspective on the impact of urban renewal and gentrification on historic populations, as experienced in Montreal and throughout North America in the 20th century.
While certain important gathering places like the Union United Church – the oldest Black congregation in Canada – now find themselves outside the neighbourhood’s contemporary borders, they remain intimately linked to the history of the community that founded and animated them.
Evolving Montreal
Evolving Montreal is a series of commissions initiated by the McCord Stewart Museum to support documentary photography projects that capture the transformation of neighbourhoods from unique points of view. After Robert Walker and Joannie Lafrenière, who photographed Griffintown and Hochelaga-Maisonneuve respectively, the Museum has selected Andrew Jackson for the third installment of the series.
For his commission, Jackson chose to document the changes occurring in Little Burgundy, considered the cradle of Montreal’s Black anglophone community. Over a period of about two years, the photographer recorded some of the key sites and individuals that compose Little Burgundy’s Black community today. Jackson’s personal interpretation of the commission extends the purview of Evolving Montreal by exploring the notion of neighbourhood as a space that is at once physical and conceptual.
Acknowledgements
The Museum would like to thank its team and all those who contributed, directly and indirectly, to the presentation of this exhibition.
Curator
Zoë Tousignant, Curator, Photography
Project Management
Eve Martineau, Coordinator, Exhibitions
Graphic Design
David Martin
McCord Stewart Museum team
Cynthia Cooper, Head, Collections and Research, and Curator, Dress, Fashion and Textiles
Guislaine Lemay, Curator, Material Culture
François Vallée, Head, Exhibitions
Caroline Truchon, Senior Project Manager, Exhibitions
Mélissa Jacques, Supervisor, Technical Services, Exhibitions
Olivier LeBlanc-Roy, Technician, Exhibitions
Eugénie Bonneville, Technician, Exhibitions
Julien Pouliot, Technical Coordinator
Caterina Florio, Head, Conservation
Sonia Kata, Conservator
Karine Rousseau, Head, Collections Management
Geneviève Déziel, Cataloguing Coordinator, Collections Management
Camille Deshaies-Forget, Assistant, Collections Management
Ana Prasser, Archivist
Jean-Christophe Chenette, Senior Technician, Collections Management
Anne-Frédérique Beaulieu, Officer, Digital Outreach, Collections and Exhibitions
Roger Aziz, Photographer
Leïla Afriat, Officer, Community Relations, Education
Sabrina Lorier, Manager, Digital Engagement
Maïa Mendilaharzu, Officer, Marketing and Visitor Experience
Anne-Marie Demers, Graphic Designer
External team
Revision and translation
Hélène Joly
Judith Terry
Printing
Pro Seri
Video editing and creation
Tomi Grgicevic
Audiovisual installation
Éric Fauque
Lenders
Jason Fraser
Charlene Hunte
Andrew Jackson
Follow Andrew Jackson in Little Burgundy, and learn how the photographer explores the urban, social and cultural transformations of the neighbourhood.
Free | Round table
March 19
Occupying Space, Shaping Community
In collaboration with the 2025 Festival Art Souterrain on the theme of Habitat – presents “Occupying Space, Shaping Community,” a round table discussion tied to the exhibition by photographer Andrew Jackson.
Attend
Free | Talk
May 28
Conversation between the artist Andrew Jackson and Zoë Tousignant
This discussion, presented as part of the Little Burgundy – Evolving Montreal by Andrew Jackson exhibition, seeks to address the themes underlying the photographic documentation of the Little Burgundy neighbourhood, birthplace of the English-speaking Black community of Montreal.
Attend
Free | Conference
September 10
Speak Up, Raise Voices
The Museum is inviting the general public, the Little Burgundy community, and academia to take the floor at a conference-workshop that aims to decompartmentalize knowledge about the Black space concept, in the specific context of the Little Burgundy neighbourhood.
Participate
Blog | Behind-the-scenes access
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A neighbourhood where jazz enlivens the walls, murals convey history, and science inspires girls.
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Blog | Behind-the-scenes access
Capturing a City’s Transformation Through Photography
Learn how the Museum is supporting the local photographic community by documenting the city’s changing face.
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