Komagata Maru exhibit recalls ship that was turned away

Good community-led initiative:

This year, the 100th anniversary of the episode, Mr. Girn is helping to tell the story, which has become a passion for him.

He is overseeing the project Komagata Maru 1914-2014, a collaboration among eight institutions across the Lower Mainland to hold exhibitions and events. At the Surrey Art Gallery, Ruptures in Arrival: Art in the Wake of the Komagata Maru examines contemporary art dealing with the event – and more recent histories of mass migration from Asia to Canada’s West Coast.

The Komagata Maru sailed to Vancouver in 1914, arriving in May. It had 376 passengers on board from Punjab, India – most of them Sikhs. They were British subjects, as were the Canadians they were hoping to join on this side of the Pacific. But Canada allowed only 24 to land. The rest, after two desperate months in Vancouver’s harbour, were forced to return to India. By the time they got there, the First World War had begun and they were seen as potentially seditious. Some were shot and many were imprisoned.

A great deal has been written about the incident, but Surrey Art Gallery curator Jordan Strom says finding visual art about it was challenging.

Komagata Maru exhibit recalls ship that was turned away – The Globe and Mail.