Tania Willard's 'Photolithics' at The Polygon Gallery explores photography through light and stone

Tania Willard's exhibition 'Photolithics' runs from March 7 to May 24, 2026 at The Polygon Gallery in North Vancouver, marking her largest solo show to date. This decade-long survey features new and existing works that reimagine photography through printing and presentation techniques, with the gallery space transformed into a 'lens'. Willard, who won the Sobey Art Award in November 2025, examines photography's historical role in colonialism, particularly regarding Indigenous Peoples in British Columbia. Co-curated by Audain Chief Curator Monika Szewczyk and Assistant Curator Serena Steel, the show includes works like 'Safelight' (2025), where windows are treated with patterns based on Salish basketry to cast protective light. A reconfigured installation of 'Only Available Light' (2016) places quartz crystals in front of Harlan I. Smith's 1928 film 'The Shuswap Indians of British Columbia' inside a purpose-built c7ískten̓ (kekuli). 'Vestige' (2022) reprints a postcard image of a Secwépemc woman on garnet sandpaper, addressing exploitation and injustice. Willard's essay 'Witnessing the Persistence of Light' from a 2016 exhibition at The Presentation House Gallery informs the exhibition, exploring photography as a medium dating back millennia.