Meet the Artist

Leaf

Watson

aka. leaf jerlefia, Criticism and Curatorial Practice

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leaf jerlefia is a Jamaican-Canadian curator, poet and cultural critic, whose work explores notions of diaspora, home and belonging. She is the author of Hope & Hunger Handbound Books—a series of hand-bound artist books featuring poetry and prose inspired by feminism, diaspora and community. Her titles, In Transit and Black Is the Colour of My Hair have been sold at Xpace Cultural Centre, Aspace Gallery, Canzine Toronto and the Chester Newsstand. Her multiples, entitled Doctor’s Notes Against Intolerance (2016), were featured in This ArtWorks!, a web-series for CBC Arts in collaboration with Madeleine Co.In 2017, jerlefia participated in a 6-month long nomadic residency with British filmmaker, Isaac Julien, CBE, as part of OCADU’s Global Experience Project. She curated the resulting show, entitled Wandering Ground (2018), which opened for Toronto Art Crawl (2018)— and explored the diasporic experience in the colonial Motherland. She has curated 7 exhibitions, including It’s (Still) Privileged Art (2016) and Soul: Thrifted (2017).
OCAD University
Digital & Media Studies
Minor Completed, 2020
OCAD U - Faculty of Art
Criticism and Curatorial Practice
Major Completed, 2020

Creative Writing Curatorial Practice Cultural Studies Poetry Film & Media

2020, Emergence from Emergency
stackt market, Toronto, ON
2020, Black History Month Florence 2020: Obbligato
Florence, Italy
2018, Wandering Ground: Finding Paths (2018)
OCAD University
2017, This Art Works!: Episode 1 - Doctor's Notes Against Intolerance
CBC Arts
2016, Shantel Miller, The Side Profile Series
Xpace Cultural Centre, Toronto, ON
2020, Art Works Art School and Gallery Award Criticism and Curatorial Studies
OCAD University
2020, Black History Month Florence
OCADU: Career Launchers
2017, The Global Experience Project
OCAD University
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