Carol was the CFFM: she helped establish the organization from its very inception and then served as a member of our board for twenty years. She had the drive, the vision and the network of connections to lead the CFFM to the fulfillment of its mission. As an unpaid, devoted volunteer for the Art Gallery of Ontario and then for the CFFM, Carol raised the visibility of all museum volunteers and in so doing won an award for her contributions to Canadian museums and to the Canadian Museum Association (CMA). Carol also believed in the international collaboration of museum volunteers and represented Canadian volunteers on numerous occasions in the World Federation of Friends of Museums.
In honour of a vibrant and generous life devoted to Canada's museums and their volunteers, Carol's friends, family and colleagues founded the Carol Sprachman Memorial Fund specifically to sponsor an annual lecture by leading Canadian voices of culture.
2018 LECTURE: Inuk scholar and curator Dr. Heather Igloliorte discussed exciting developments taking place in the Inuit art world, in terms of her own contributions and the work of national and international artists, curators and institutions. Dr. Igloliorte explored both daring innovations in artistic practices and sustained continuities with Inuit art’s celebrated past. She also examined works produced in Canada today within the context of contemporary circumpolar art and global Indigenous art.
Heather Igloliorte (Inuk, Nunatsiavut) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Art History at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, where she holds a Research Chair in Indigenous Art History and Community Engagement. She has published extensively on Inuit and other Indigenous arts and maintains an active curatorial practice. In 2016, she curated the permanent collection of Inuit art at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Ilippunga, and launched the nationally touring exhibition SakKijajuk: Art and Craft from Nunatsiavut, first installed at The Rooms Provincial Museum (2016-2017). Her recent projects include co-curating the contemporary circumpolar art exhibition Among All These Tundras (Leonard & Bina Ellen Art Gallery) and Alootook Ipellie: Walking Both Sides of an Invisible Border (Carleton University Art Gallery). She was currently Guest Curator for the Winnipeg Art Gallery’s Inuit Art Centre, which opened in 2020.
A collaboration between the Canadian Federation of Friends of Museums (CFFM) and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA).
