| If profound intractable problems exist in society, it follows that the professions needed to fix them have not yet been invented. Ian Wojtowicz (he/him) is a writer who builds stuff. His work applies techniques of connection, dissensus, modifiability, playfulness, editing, argument, dialogue, and repair. He has shown work in Hong Kong, Europe and throughout North America, and has published work in Wired Magazine, Atlantic Monthly, and on PBS and Discovery channels. Professionally, Wojtowicz has consulted for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the US National Coast Guard Museum, the Redwoods National and State Parks, and indigenous cultural projects at Nk'Mip and Wanuskewin. Wojtowicz holds a degree in Art, Culture and Technology from MIT’s School of Architecture and is the editor of a collected volume from MIT Press entitled Interrogative Design, on artist Krzysztof Wodiczko's influential design philosophy. He currently lives and works in Vancouver, Canada, on the territories of the Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh people. |
If We Sold This Church
This medium format black and white photograph documents a façade of Christchurch Cathedral in downtown Vancouver during its renovations in 2016. The Church invited the public to write reflections on the construction walls on the theme of reconciliation, ostensibly relating to the atrocities of the residential school system. I intervened with this projection.
The text of my projection calls to attention current infrastructure problems on Native reserves as possible areas of atonement by the Church, earnestly suggesting that reconcilliation involve both territorial sacrifice and constructive repair. The improbability of Church properties actually being sold to pay for reparations belies the mostly symbolic nature of the reconciliation process and the compounding of one crime with another.
In 2022, the Supreme Court forced the Catholic Church to sell a small fraction of its properties to pay reparations in a local court case. Neither the Catholic nor Anglican Churches, nor the Governments of Canada, the United Kingdom, nor the UK Monarchy have yet made full reparations for their abuses of indigenous children and families.