Unsilenced Stories, National Exhibition Series
Unsilenced Stories is the Canadian Association for Health Humanities' national peer-reviewed exhibition and digital archive. Through annual juried exhibitions, public programming, and an open-access digital archive, the initiative recognizes contemporary artistic practice as a vital mode of knowledge production while creating opportunities for interdisciplinary dialogue across the health humanities.
Bringing together professional artists, researchers, healthcare practitioners, educators, students, and community members, Unsilenced Stories explores the many ways contemporary art contributes to our understanding of health, illness, disability, care, identity, memory, and lived experience. The project recognizes creative practice as a form of inquiry capable of generating new knowledge and expanding how health is understood, experienced, and represented.
Each year, artists from across Canada are invited to submit work through a national open call. Following peer review by a multidisciplinary jury, selected works are presented as part of the Canadian Association for Health Humanities' annual conference, Creating Space, where contemporary artistic practice and health humanities scholarship meet in conversation. The exhibition provides professional exhibition opportunities while fostering meaningful exchange across artistic, academic, clinical, and community contexts.
The Unsilenced Stories Digital Archive extends the impact of each exhibition and the reach of our peer-reviewed submissions beyond the conference by preserving artworks within an open-access platform. As the archive continues to grow, it serves as a national resource for research, teaching, public engagement, and future collaboration, documenting the evolving contributions of artists to health humanities discourse.
Together, the exhibition and archive form a sustained research-creation initiative that advances knowledge mobilization through contemporary art. By creating space for artistic perspectives alongside scholarly and clinical approaches, Unsilenced Stories broadens conversations about health and affirms the essential role artists play in shaping more expansive understandings of human wellbeing.
Partner with Us
Unsilenced Stories welcomes opportunities to collaborate with galleries, museums, artist-run centres, universities, healthcare organizations, community groups, and cultural institutions interested in advancing dialogue at the intersection of contemporary art and health humanities. We are always interested in developing new exhibition partnerships, touring opportunities, public programming, educational initiatives, and research collaborations. Organizations interested in partnering with the project are encouraged to contact the Project Director to discuss future opportunities.
Project Leadership
Founder and Director
Dr. Candace Couse
Assistant Professor, School of Creative Arts
University of the Fraser Valley
Dr. Candace Couse developed Unsilenced Stories as a national research-creation initiative for the Canadian Association for Health Humanities. She leads the project's curatorial vision, exhibition development, digital archive, research strategy, and knowledge mobilization activities in collaboration with CAHH and its national partners.