Believe It Or Not, 2020-2021

Exhibit A (The Curious Case of Quong Wing v. R)
Witness Number 1 (The Exchange Café in Moose Jaw)
Exhibit B (Wing Lee Laundry and the Saskatoon Chinese Laundry Petition)
Exhibit C (Chinatowns Coming and Going)
Exhibit D (The Chinatown Gate That Could Have Been)
Witness Number 2 (The Golden Era of the Golden Dragon Restaurant)

Archival Inkjet print
18 x 24'

Believe it or Not consists of six photographic images alongside archival materials from the Saskatoon City Archives, Saskatchewan Provincial Archives, and Saskatoon Local History Library. The series developed out of a 2019 residency at AKA Artist-Run in Treaty 6/Saskatoon asks whom the distance of fiction comforts and the power of local history. Historical geographer Brian S. Osborne notes that increasingly, our understandings of "heritage" are influenced and discussed in the context of constructed mythologies, popular entertainment, tourism, and economic development. This series is a reflection on the stories, visuals and sites of historical reenactments and their resulting effectiveness, intended audience and role in disseminating historical narratives.

Believe it or Not is presented in a style that ties visual references from historical reenactment museums and examples of edutainment of Chinese-Canadian experiences in Saskatchewan. The title of the series is adapted from the infamous and hyperbolic Ripley’s Believe it or Not museums. Stories and archival materials include focuses on the Quong Wing v Rex Supreme Court case, the Moose Jaw Exchange Café, a laundry tax petition in Saskatoon, a proposed Chinatown gate in Saskatoon, Saskatoon’s first Chinatown, and the Golden Dragon Café.

Referencing the murder mystery game Clue, each image serves to recreate and piece together the aforementioned stories. Objects and props stand in as witnesses, evidence, or the setting of these stories. A gavel is presented as the weapon that deemed Quong Wing’s race outweighed his citizenship; a lantern resembling those hung in the Exchange Café is depicted as an observer of the space; and an unveiled model toy depicts a lingering suspension as a city’s Chinatown awaits recognition in the form of a public landmark

Believe it or Not is a case study on the politics of believability for stories outside of the dominant, nostalgized, and romanticized settler imagination. The series demonstrates the limitations of research-based art in the current age of fake news and how legacies of colonial narratives have been longstanding contributors to prevailing misconceptions of truth.

Installation photos by Derek Sandbeck. Believe it or Not, AKA Artist-Run, 2021 and Toni Hafkenscheid, Nostalgia Interrupted, Doris McCarthy Gallery, 2022.

This project was made possible with the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.