Sonic storytelling and community empowerment: Black Diasporas Tkaronto-Toronto
Black Diasporas Tkaronto-Toronto at the Museum of Toronto documents and weaves a web of connection across the vast spectrum of Black life in the city.
How has Toronto been shaped by the Black diaspora? What relationships are significant to Black Canadians and their communities, and how are these relationships constructed? What defines home, and how does it intersect with cultural identity for Black Canadians? These are some of the questions that Black Diasporas Tkaronto-Toronto at the Museum of Toronto explores.
The exhibition spotlights the spectrum of Black life in Toronto, engaging visitors in an open montage of visual and sonic textures. It presents a cohesive ensemble of works, including interviews, films, maps, and historical timelines to document the rich histories of the Black Diaspora that have shaped contemporary Toronto. The exhibition foregrounds the everyday, speaking to the lives of ordinary people and celebrating daily moments that depict the multifaceted realities of Black life in Toronto.
I was deeply moved by the exhibition’s massive emphasis on the act of listening, foregrounding sound as both an artistic medium and a mode of engagement. Focusing on sonic storytelling was an incredibly fitting choice for such a powerful project, since audition inherently supports multiple experiences.
The exhibition’s striking setup seats visitors down with a television and headset, where the screens, rather than video footage, display transcriptions of the personal narratives being relayed aurally. The exhibit makes clever use of listening as a form of understanding—not just passive perception, but an active cultivation of our emotional responses. The various narratives and sound works are arranged spatially according to the themes and questions they explore, yet the openness of the exhibit reinforces the interconnectedness of these stories and experiences as not distinct or individual but rather intimately connected.
Beyond being informative, the exhibit is also deeply participatory, inviting visitors into the act of creation itself. One such way is through the act of mapping, offering interactive ways for visitors to engage. One map of Toronto invites participants to mark out locations of spaces, stores, and businesses important to Black Torontonians. Right underneath the map, visitors can also take cards and add to an emphasis list that presents the different ways in which the Black diaspora has made Toronto a unique place of existence. A world map allows Black-identifying visitors to mark where they were born, the places they have ties to, and the places they consider home—further expanding the exhibition’s scope as an evolving archive of the presence and belonging of Black life in the world.
At its core, the exhibit facilitates the creation of spaces that foster belonging and empower the Black community. Through sound, storytelling, mapping, and collaboration, it positions both art and community-building as not fixed or completed acts but as ongoing, participatory practices–ones that thrive through dialogue, engagement, and collective world-making. For non-Black visitors, the exhibition is an invitation—an opportunity to listen, witness, and engage. More than just an exhibit, Black Diasporas Tkaronto-Toronto is a must-visit experience that demands to be seen, heard, and felt. Experience it for yourself—on now until March 1, 2025.
