Artists in a Time of Nation-Building – Part One

Artists in a Time of Nation-Building: Part One

March 26, 2026

In early December 2025, a video of Prime Minister Mark Carney recorded for the Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts ceremony, which had occurred the previous night at the Mackenzie Art Gallery in Regina, popped up on my Instagram feed. Speaking directly to Canadian artists, Carney addressed their important role:

“At a time when the world has become more divided, your work as artists, as creators, as storytellers, is more valuable than ever. You tell Canada’s story, you help us understand each other better in all our complexity, diversity and audacity.”

Mark Carney has a well-documented—though not un-dubious—history as an art collector. In 2015, his purchase of works for his private collection was brokered by the CBC’s then Power and Politics host Evan Solomon. The sale was one of two later investigated by the CBC, which ultimately determined that “some of Solomon’s activities were inconsistent with the organization’s conflict of interest and ethics policy, as well as journalistic standards and practices.”¹ Solomon was fired because of the transactions, though notably his relationship with Carney has continued—Solomon now serves as Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Innovation appointed as part of Carney’s current cabinet.

Since taking office in March 2025, Carney has publicized his relationship to art more intentionally, generating news when he spoke in detail about artist Luke Parnell’s “A Brief History of Northwest Coast Design” in September for National Day for Truth and Reconciliation.² Parnell’s work was one of many that Carney had installed—either in his private residence or in offices on Parliament Hill—since becoming prime minister. Sourced from the National Gallery of Canada, Global Affairs Canada, and the Canada Council for the Arts’ Art Bank, artworks are regularly loaned to prime ministers and government officials, but I don’t recall hearing about it as much in the past—this focus on the arts from a leading political figure feels unique.

The prime minister’s centering of Canadian art made news again when he sat for an end of the year interview with the CBC’s Rosemary Barton, surrounded by an exhibition at the National Gallery of Canada. Locations for prime ministers’ year-end interviews often signal priorities the government wants to reflect back to the public. For example, in 2021, during the rise of the COVID-19 Omicron Variant, then-Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke with Barton in a mass vaccination clinic at the Olympic stadium in Montreal. Similarly, in 2022, after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, they spoke in a Ukrainian bakery in Toronto. Following Prime Minister Carney’s discussion with Barton, the National Gallery posted photos documenting him spending time with the exhibition alongside director and CEO Jean-François Bélisle.³

These nods to Canadian artists were (un)comfortably nestled around announcements of the government’s first federal budget—Canada Strong. Characterized as a response to a world that is “increasingly dangerous and divided,” plagued by “disruptions and uncertainty for Canadians,”⁴ this framing of the budget, coupled with the Prime Minister’s visible nods toward artists, felt important to pay attention to.

Screenshots from Mackenzie Art Gallery reel, posted on December 5, 2025.⁵

Though individual artists and organizations are funded at arm’s length in Canada, support is disseminated via the federal government’s purse, helping to maintain a viable industry of artistic practice that doesn’t always need to interact with the capital-driven art market. Arts and culture have a powerful impact on the economy—and injecting funds into the arts as an industry offers a lot in return. In 2024, arts and culture contributed over $131 billion to the economy ($65 billion directly, representing 2% of the economy), supported 1.1 million jobs distributed across the country, and generated around $17 billion in federal and provincial tax revenue. The arts have outpaced the growth of Canada’s economy over the past three years and supported thirteen jobs for every $1 million in output—many more than oil and gas, manufacturing, or agriculture.⁶

Despite the numbers indicating the strong economic impact the arts have in Canada, funding for the arts has not only been stagnant for years, but has continually been at risk of being cut. This past year, when Prime Minister Carney began to signal a coming austerity budget, the Canadian Arts Coalition launched their 2025 Campaign for Culture, calling on Canadians to ensure that all members of parliament support investment in arts and culture, and that no cuts be made to the Canada Council for the Arts or the Department of Canadian Heritage. Their letter-writing campaign saw over 52,000 letters submitted across the country, which they note was the “largest letter campaign for culture in recent memory.” By all accounts, the Coalition’s work paid off: while the significant investments they called for were nowhere near met, their additional call—for no cuts—was successful.⁷ They also note that the federal budget included a number of “new and renewed investments in many vital programs that serve artists and cultural organizations across Canada.”⁸ Most importantly, though, their campaign helped raise awareness around the significant impacts arts and culture make in the country. From Prime Minister Carney’s highlighting of the arts since the budget was announced, it would seem that the Coalition may have been heard.

In the most recent budget, funding for the arts falls under the general category of Protecting Canadian Culture, Values, and Identity and, as reflected by this title, the return on investment for arts funding is considered to be more than just economic. For Carney’s government, the arts help to define and sustain national identity and culture—functions that have proven especially imperative over the past year in response to the trade war with the United States. The Canadian Chamber of Commerce report summarizing the economic benefits of the arts in 2024 notes: “75% of Canadians believe that attending arts and culture events positively impacts their sense of belonging in Canada.”

Art is a nation-building tool. This isn’t new, but it’s an important reality that I think artists need to be reflecting on—especially in this heightened time of Canadian exceptionalism, accelerated since the January 2025 re-election of US President Donald Trump. Art both shapes and mirrors the efforts of a nation to form its identity and values and has long been understood as a tool used by governments to help push forward certain cultural priorities. But I wonder about the role of artists within this “elbows up” climate in which Canadians are banding together around Canadian identity more than I, at least, have ever witnessed before. As an artist living in Alberta, where, in the midst of this Canadian exceptionalism, separatists in powerful positions are actively working to threaten national unity, I especially feel that this is a moment to deeply consider the notion of nation-building and how my role as an artist might be implemented within it. There are risks associated with artists’ voices being utilized to forward the political priorities of a government, especially one so urgently focused on shoring up its position as an extractive colonial nation. As the country rushes to extricate itself from American reliance, we are already hearing about pressure to fast-track natural resource extraction without required Indigenous consultation or environmental scrutiny.⁹ Artworks often challenge us to think deeply about our relationship to identity and colonialism, and when they become utilized by governments without necessary critique, the intentions of artists can be easily misappropriated.

It isn’t the first time that the relationship between Canadian arts and national unification has been scrutinized—we saw these discussions emerge in 2017 during Canada’s 150^th year, when the government invested significantly in the arts through the Canada Council for the Arts’ New Chapter program. Ultimately, Canada 150 lead to a lot of critique, resistance, and refusal to celebrate the nation’s colonialism,¹⁰ and it seems to me we have an opportunity to reflect and to consider similar responses again now. Though the parallels are clear, a lot has changed since 2017. With many in the arts experiencing backlash, cancellations, and firings as a form of retribution for their vocal recognition of the genocide happening in Palestine, the urgency of the moment feels palpable.¹¹

That same day in early December, when Carney’s speech for the Governor General’s awards was trending online, I was chatting with Deanna Bowen, herself a 2020 winner of the award. As friends for over 25 years who haven’t lived in the same city since 2009, we rarely have a chance to sit together and chat for hours as we did that day. Politics certainly came up at various points during our long conversation—it’s a subject we both care about deeply and don’t easily separate from our day-to-day lives. The arts in Canada is also something that we speak frequently about—our takes on it and frustrations with it. And while politics always seeps into our conversations about Canadian art, I don’t recall many moments when the two were so directly linked as on that day.

We spoke about how to reconcile the notion of artworks being used by the government as a part of the “elbows up” nation-building strategy. With a practice heavily informed by personal, cultural, and historical research, much of Deanna’s work retells familial stories of Black Americans migrating to Black settlements in Alberta (Amber Valley and Campsie) after fleeing the Jim Crow legislation of late 19^th century America. Exposing the formal restrictions her family, and other Black immigrants faced by the Canadian government, her work traces the legacies of the institutionalized anti-Black sentiments that continue to impact Canadian identity today. Together, we began to tease apart the concerns we share when artworks centering personal stories and histories and seeking to challenge dominant hegemonies are co-opted by the very audiences and governments the works aim to criticize. Since that day, I’ve been sitting with Deanna’s response to my concern over a Prime Minister using the arts as such a tool: “How,” she asked, is “this act of nation-building different from that of John A. Macdonald?”

Art is a powerful tool, and artists’ voices are critical ones that should be more audible to the public. But I wonder—at what cost? Deanna and I left our December conversation promising to spend more time thinking deeply together about the role of artists during this moment of Canadian nation-building and to find strategies for reconciling our concerns. That conversation will follow next month as a long-form conversation between Deanna and myself, pieced together from various discussions between December 2025 and February 2026.

Christina Battle is an artist, curator, and writer based in amiskwacîwâskahikan (Edmonton), within the Aspen Parkland: the transition zone where prairie and forest meet. Her practice focuses on thinking deeply about the concept of disaster: its complexity, and the intricacies entwined within it. She looks to disaster as a series of intersecting processes including social, environmental, cultural, political, and economic, which are implicated not only in how disaster is caused but also in how it manifests, is responded to, and overcome. Battle’s practice prioritizes collaboration, experimentation, and failure; she has exhibited internationally in festivals and galleries as both artist and curator. www.cbattle.com.

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Footnotes:

1
CBC News, “Evan Solomon fired by CBC News in wake of alleged secret art deals,” CBC News, June 9, 2015.
2
Catherine Lévesque, “Mark Carney has borrowed 48 valuable artworks since taking office,” National Post, October 14, 2025.
3
National Gallery of Canada (@natgallerycan), “Prime Minister @MarkJCarney visited the Gallery for his end-of-year interview with @RosieBarton, Chief Political Correspondent at @CBCnews. 🎙️The interview took place in our exhibition Winter Count: Embracing the Cold, and our Director and CEO, Jean-François Bélisle, had the pleasure of giving him a short tour afterwards. Winter Count is a reflection on the profound influence of winter on various cultures and brings together Indigenous, Canadian settler and European perspectives on the subject. ❄️,” Instagram, December 30, 2025,https://www.instagram.com/p/DS6KJV4ABlW/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igsh=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==
4
“Prime Minister Carney outlines Budget 2025 measures to enable $1 trillion in total investments,” Prime Minister of Canada Press Release, November 7, 2025.
5
Mackenzie Art Gallery (@mackenzie.art.gallery), “At our opening reception last night, Prime Minister @markjcarney shared his congratulations to all of the recipients of the 2025 Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts. Thank you Mark Carney for recognizing the essential role of artists in our society, and the pivotal role that Saskatchewan continues to play in the Canadian identity. Thank you to everyone who joined us to celebrate eight artists who represent the strength of culture across this nation elevate our voice across Turtle Island and the broader world. These artists have made profound individual contributions, but also are representative of broader voices, of the artistic, cultural, and other communities that they are a part of. They help us challenge our presuppositions about our own stories and histories so that we can become a better collective, expanding our imagination and understanding, truly embodying the MacKenzie’s vision for a world where art heals and inspires across generations. Thank you and congratulations to Peter Pierobon, @Dainaugaitis, @ThaddeusHolownia, @BruceLaBruce, @KentMonkman, Clive Robertson, @sandrodri, and Jin-me Yoon. Thank you to the Governor General of Canada, the @Canada.Council for the Arts, and the @NatGalleryCan for hosting this important exhibition in Saskatchewan, the cradle of Canadian culture. #YQR #GGArts2025 #MacKenzieArtGallery #CanadaCouncilForTheArts #NationalGalleryCanada,” Instagram reel, December 5, 2025.”
6
“Arts and Culture Sector Contributes $131 Billion to Canada’s Economy,” Canadian Chamber of Commerce News Release, October 28, 2025.
7
The coalition was advocating “That the Government of Canada permanently allocate at least 1% of its overall spending towards arts, culture and heritage. To achieve this for the 2025-26 fiscal year, the Government should increase its allocations by $270 million, specifically: An increase of $140 million to the Canada Council for the Arts; and An increase of $130 million to the Department of Canadian Heritage.” “Arts Day on the Hill Advocacy Tool Kit,” Canadian Arts Coalition, 2025. The recent budget maintained funding from previous years: over three years, Canada Council for the Arts receives $6 million and Canadian Heritage $21 million. “Budget 2025, Chapter 3: Empowering Canadians, Investing in Canadian Creators and the Cultural Economy,” Government of Canada, November 4, 2025.
8
“CAC Welcomes Steps Forward in Budget 2025 ,” Canadian Arts Coalition Press Release, November 4, 2025. In a follow-up email sent to participants in their ‘Campaign for Culture’ letter writing campaign on Jan 26, 2026 they noted: “Not only did the Fall budget invest in cultural programs of Canadian Heritage (PCH), the Canada Council for the Arts (CCA) was not cut, and in fact, got an extremely modest budget increase.”
9
Karyn Pugliese, “Carney’s critical minerals push meets Indigenous realities as Canada races to rival China’s supply dominance,” APTN, October 30, 2025
10
Examples of resistance were documented by Canadian Art Magazine: Artists and Allies Resist #Canada150 Push on Social Media, January 17, 2017.
11
While there are a number of reports that could be easily cited here, I will focus on this excellent piece by Jason McBride about the 2023 ousting of Wanda Nanibush, the Art Gallery of Ontario’s then curator of Indigenous art: Jason McBride, “Why Did Canada’s Top Art Gallery Push Out a Visionary Curator?,” The Walrus, August 28, 2024.