Mission

Artist-driven and audience-centred, CAG champions art and ideas that invite us to transcend the familiar, reimagine the possible, and explore new ways of understanding ourselves, one another and the worlds around us.

Values

Open: We believe we are at our best when we are in active dialogue. In everything we do, we strive to operate in open, attuned and accountable ways.

Responsive: We believe in responding meaningfully to the conditions of our times. We embrace new ideas, new approaches and an ongoing commitment to learning, change and growth.

Connective: We believe in the power of creative exchange and collective engagement. We aim to operate as a threshold, bridging artists and communities, people and ideas, the local and global.

Engaged: We believe that our work is most effective when grounded in an ever-evolving understanding of Vancouver and the ancestral and unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh and səlilwətaɬ nations on which it is situated. We anchor our work in a commitment to this city, its many histories and the current realities that shape it.

Equitable: We believe that our vision cannot be meaningfully realized without confronting white supremacy, colonialism, ableism, and other systems of privilege and oppression within our institution and the communities we operate in. We are committed to addressing these systems at all levels of our organization, including staffing, policy, programming, visitor experience, and partnerships.

Land

At the Contemporary Art Gallery, we carry out our work on the unceded and ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. As a predominantly settler-led organization, we acknowledge our responsibility to each of these nations, who have stewarded this land, water and air for thousands of years. We are committed to building sustained, reciprocal relationships with Indigenous communities and supporting the work of reconciliation and Indigenous sovereignty.