TORONTO, February 15, 2002 -- Acclaimed artist and educator Jane Ash Poitras will be the featured speaker in York University’s visual arts lecture series, Inuit and First Nations Cultures: Contemporary Perspectives, on February 21.

Central to Poitras’ work is the exploration of issues of acculturation, the impact of colonialism past and present, and the political and spiritual strength of the indigenous peoples of the Americas.

Over the past decade, Poitras has exhibited in numerous solo and group exhibitions in galleries and museums in North America and around the world. Her work is found in many private, corporate and public collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, Canadian Museum of Civilization, Art Gallery of Ontario, Vancouver Art Gallery, McMichael Canadian Art Collection and the Brooklyn Museum and Columbia University, New York. She is much in demand as a public lecturer, and has been the subject of several television and film documentaries. Born in the First Nations community of Fort Chipewyan, Alberta, she currently lives and works in Alberta.

Poitras’ talk will take place Thurs. Feb. 21 at 4 p.m. in Room 312, Joan & Martin Goldfarb Centre for Fine Arts at York University, 4700 Keele Street. Admission is free.

Inuit and First Nations Cultures: Contemporary Perspectives, a series of public lectures by leading Inuit and First Nations artists, critics, teachers and curators, runs through April in the Department of Visual Arts. For more information, call 416-736-5187.

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For further information, please contact:

Nathalie-Roze Fischer	Brigitte Kleer
Communications	Manager, Public Relations
Faculty of Fine Arts	Faculty of Fine Arts
York University	York University
416-736-2100, ext. 20421	416-736-2100, ext. 77143
nfischer@yorku.ca	bkleer@yorku.ca