Gordon Sparks
Gordon Sparks is a world-class Indigenous mask carver, whose work was shown in 2024 and will be shown in 2025 at the prestigious and exclusive, Collect Art Fair in London, England. He has also shown his work in galleries across the Atlantic region in Canada, and will be presented in a one-man exhibition by Craft Ontario. His mask carving is integrated with his 30-year career as a skin artist, and he combines mask carving with reclaiming and sharing his cultural heritage through the design of skin-suits through tattooing. Further, he collaborates with dancers, drummers, and regalia designers to breathe life into a host of characters, stories, and ancestral teachings.
Despite increasing demand for his work in national and international contexts, Gordon remains committed to sharing his cultural teachings and artistic practice and to mentoring potential and emerging artists in local Indigenous communities near his home community of Pabineau First Nation in New Brunswick.
Awakening of the Masks Medicine
FRIDAY 10:30am - 12:00pm
Mi’gmaq artist Gordon Sparks, alongside Elders Donna Augustine (Thunderbird Turtle Woman) and Cyril Polchies (Wape'k Paqtism), will guide participants through the powerful story behind the creation of two traditional storytelling masks for the community of Elsipogtog. Born from a vision of healing and reconnection, the project began with the ceremonial harvesting of a tree from Virginia Park—a place marked by past loss, but chosen not to revisit pain, rather to rise from it.
With the guidance of Elders, the energy of student drum groups, and the hands of young learners, this initiative became a movement—rooted in humility, lifted by community, and shaped by traditional knowledge. The process honored the land, the medicines, and the stories that continue to teach us. These masks are more than carvings; they are teachers in themselves—carrying lessons of humility, the importance of traditional medicines, and the strength found in cultural identity.
Though the project addresses difficult truths, it does so in a good way—the right way—through ceremony, collaboration, and storytelling. What began in the school has since ignited a community-wide resurgence, inspiring new mask carvers and renewing commitments to ancestral ways of knowing. This keynote shares the journey of reclaiming teachings, honouring the past, and carving a future grounded in spirit, strength, and story