Kuumba Artist Feature: Sandra Whiting
Harbourfront Centre’s Kuumba festival is spotlighting a different Black artist each day of February. Today we’re sharing the story of Sandra Whiting.
A staunch community volunteer and storyteller, Sandra Whiting helped make Harbourfront Centre what it is today. She started working there in the 1980s on a part-time contract to help put together a cultural festival. “I don’t have a hell of a lot of experience but I knew it sounded exciting,” she says. They kept her on from project to project, until, after three years, the CEO asked, “Why isn’t she full-time?” She turned down a full-time position, lacking confidence that Harbourfront Centre knew how to integrate diverse communities into its programming. “It was all so divided. People would come for one day, then disappear,” she says, noting how early approaches to multiculturalism tended to be highly compartmentalized. The CEO asked her for a proposal, so she made one. They hired her.
When Sandra started, her mission was clear: make multicultural programming work. She gives Harbourfront Centre credit, though. At the time, it was the only major organization that was actually exploring multiculturalism. Its flaws were reflective of its pioneering status — when you’re the first to do something, you’re the first to make mistakes. Sandra wanted to create programs that could integrate the many cultures of Canada. Her attitude was, “We can’t just invite you to just one thing. You’re a Canadian. We need to invite you to everything.” She notes that for many of the diverse communities she wanted to engage, many had never been to the waterfront. She wanted to tell them, “Not only are you welcome here, we invite you.”
This was decades ago, when people were less sensitive to social justice, so things weren’t always easy. Sandra was one of three Black people working at Harbourfront Centre. As one of the first cultural programmers of colour in all of Canada, she pointed out something important: “They’re putting on things talking about us, but without us at the table.” This was new to people and they were nervous. When Sandra put together some sensitivity training, a co-worker from the publicity department came up to her, asking, “What do I say to the Indian community? What do I say?” Sandra responded, “First you say hello.”
Once she set the foundations for change, she created Kuumba, Harbourfront Centre’s first Black History Month festival. It was 1995. She was given $3,500 ($5,600 in 2021 dollars) to put on four weeks of programming. That kind of money doesn’t go very far, but she ran with out, going out to racialized communities to secure new sponsorships. This was new. Everyone had assumed that racialized communities had no money, that it was pointless to reach out to them. There was an evident hunger for Sandra’s vision. She put on a program exploring the politics of hair. A thousand people came out, and overflowing audiences had to be put in hallways and extra rooms. When she was done the first year, everyone expected that to be the end of it. She said no to that. “It’s like Christmas — it has to happen every year,” she says.
Much has changed since then. Culturally inclusive programming is now a staple of the arts, rather than an outlier, though its evolution has brought on new problems. “There are lots of discussions in our society today about Black History Month. There are those who want to get rid of it and move on, because it puts them in a box.” Sandra argues that Black History Month celebrations (or Black Futures Month — whichever term one prefers) are still essential, and that inclusivity isn’t a zero-sum game. “Does that mean throughout the rest year that no people of colour are seen in those spaces? Hell no. We must be there all the time, but Black History Month is a spotlight. You can’t argue with a spotlight. Let us keep it.”
Sandra Whiting worked at Harbourfront Centre from 1988–2011, where, as a Community Arts Programmer, she reformed the organization’s inclusivity practices and launched the Kuumba festival. You can follow her life on her Instagram (@whiting.sandra).
