Aanikoobijiganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium 2025

October 15 – 18, 2025

SOLD OUT – JOIN THE WAITLIST

BOOK YOUR STAY AT THE DELTA

Participants of Aanikoobijiganag can enjoy a preferred booking rate at the Delta Hotels by Marriott. Please contact the Gallery for assistance or for more information.

About

The Thunder Bay Art Gallery presents the second Aanikoobijiganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium in Northern Ontario.  Join us for a vibrant 4-day gathering of beadwork experts and enthusiasts from Wednesday, October 15 to Saturday, October 18, 2025, in Thunder Bay, Ontario.  

Aaanikoobijiganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium is a 4-day gathering for beaders to learn and connect with the largest network of beaders in the North. This year showcases local, regional, and international artists and workshop leaders working across a range of traditional and contemporary materials alongside innovators, curators, and beadwork researchers who will share their diverse knowledge, experience, and teachings with participants. This award-winning event celebrates the joy of beading.  The word Aanikoobijiganag speaks of creating new links and connections in Anishnaabemowin.   

The Thunder Bay Beading Symposium is an opportunity to make genuine connections with fellow beaders and grow your community.   Aanikoobijiganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium is organized by the Thunder Bay Art Gallery, with the collaboration and guidance of a Co-Director Committee led by Jean Marshall, Leanna Marshall and Melissa Twance.  

Building on the success of 2024’s inaugural event, this gathering is designed for you to have fun, learn new skills, level up knowledge and techniques, and relax while connecting with professional beaders, artists, curators, and other makers. This event highlights the rich talent of beading and craft practices in our region and across Turtle Island. All workshops are Indigenous-led, and everyone is welcome to register. All skill levels are welcome.  

 Tickets are sold separately. One person per ticket. Tickets are limited and sold on a first-come, first-served basis.   

Download Program

FREE PUBLIC PROGRAMMING 

Wednesday 15, October

6:00 – 9:00 pm | Keynote | The Chanterelle Ballroom

Joe Big Mountain

Thursday 16, October 

6:00 – 9:00 pm | Public Reception and Artist Talk | Thunder Bay Art Gallery

Justine Gustafson: Agawaatebiigisin (it is reflected in the water) and Jean Marshall: Gakina Gegoon

Friday 17, October
1:00 – 4:00 pm | Drop–In Community Sewing Circle | Baggage Arts Building

1:00 – 4:00 pm | Thunder Bay Museum and Thunder Bay Art Gallery Collections Showcase| Baggage Arts Building

6:00 – 9:00 pm | Aanikoobijanag Beading Symposium Indigenous Artisan’s Market | Goods & Co.

7:00 pm | Public Reception | Aanikoobidoon II | Co.Lab Gallery | Goods & Co.
Curated by Melissa Twance and Shelby Gagnon

What’s included with your ticket:  

• All-inclusive access to the 4-day symposium.  

• Exclusive organic tote/swag bag including a selection of local goods.  

• Three 3-hour exclusive workshops. Two of these workshops are designed for all participants, plus one additional workshop of your choice (also included in ticket price). Preferences for the additional workshop will be considered. Please note that the workshops are capped in size to focus on hands-on learning. Workshop leaders are experienced and renowned beaders, artists, and crafters from our region and beyond.  

• All workshop materials are included. Workshops will include material supplies, such as beads, quills, natural pigments, moose bone, and more. You are encouraged to bring your own beading and crafting projects or supplies to work on throughout the symposium, but it is not required.  

• Lunch is provided (fixed menu with veggie/meat/gluten-free options).  

• Bus shuttle to select events.  

• Hotel discount code at The Delta Hotel by Marriott on Thunder Bay’s waterfront.  

• Access to premiere programming including: keynote, artist panels, artist talks, art openings, curator conversations, beading circles, an Indigenous Craft Market, and more!  

A waitlist will be made available.

Beading Symposium Micro Bursaries 

At the Gallery we are committed to equitable compensation for workshop leaders, which we strive to balance against accessibility for anyone interested in participating. In finding that balance the Thunder Bay Art Gallery understands that fees can be a barrier for some individuals to participate in major events. To alleviate this issue, the Gallery has gathered funds to award a small bursary for financial support. The bursaries will be awarded on a case-by-case basis at the discretion of the Gallery. 

Please email symposium@theag.ca  for more information. 

Beading is Belonging. 

Thunder Bay serves as a regional epicentre for beading. Northern Ontario boasts a vibrant community of beadworkers and artists engaged in land-based practices. The history of beadwork in this area features timeless motifs of Anishinaabe and Ojibway floral designs, with many skilled Anishinaabe and Métis bead artists from nearby First Nation communities, including Fort William First Nation and fly-in reserves. This is an exciting period for contemporary Indigenous beadwork, and we are here to support it. 

Our 4-day programming is grounded in hands-on workshops, keynote, artist panels, artist talks, curatorial conversations, opening receptions, drop-ins, demos, and beading circles to grow public interest and understanding of Northern Ontario artists, traditional craft practices, and Indigenous lifeways. 

The Thunder Bay Art Gallery acknowledges that we are located on the territory of the Anishinaabe peoples of Northwestern Ontario. We work and live on the lands of the Fort William First Nation, who are signatory to the Robinson-Superior Treaty of 1850. 

MEET THE 2025 Aanikoobijiganag Co-Director Committee

Jean Marshall is of Ahnishnaabe/English descent, born and raised in Thunder Bay. She is a band member of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, also known as Big Trout Lake, Treaty 9. She currently lives along the shore of Lake Superior. In 2018 she attended the Dene Nahjo Urban Hide Tanning Residency at the Banff Centre. She is now dedicated to leading and supporting hide tanning projects in her community. In 2024, she partnered with the Thunder Bay Art Gallery to organize  Aanikoobijganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium, the first-ever beading symposium in Thunder Bay. 

Leanna Marshall MSW, RSW, PCAT, is a social worker who works with Indigenous communities, particularly around healing from intergenerational trauma, loss, and self-esteem. Leanna is proud to be a graduate from the inaugural 2023 Indigenized Art Therapy Program from the WHEAT Institute in Winnipeg. She is a band member of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nation located in Treaty 9 in Northern Ontario. Leanna was born and raised in Thunder Bay. 

Melissa Twance, PhD, is a beadwork artist from Netmizaagamig Nishinaabeg. Her beadwork designs pay homage to Northwestern Ontario and traditional Anishinaabe iconography with infusions of contemporary and pop culture aesthetics. Melissa holds a PhD in Education, with her research embedded in Anishinaabe bead, quill, and hide work. She is a past Lecturer in the Faculty of Education at the University of Winnipeg and is currently the Canada Research Chair at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, ON. 

Kaaren Dannenmann is NamekisipiiwAnishinaapeKwe, a woman from Trout Lake, Ontario. She is a mother and grandmother. Her life is intrinsically connected to her homeland, her family and her community. She is a trapper and a trapper instructor. She is a community programmer for land-based training and activities and works hard to keep traditional culture and knowledge alive in the next generations, with language classes, trips to the trapline, games, ceremonies and special events and gatherings.  She is committed to peace and justice and is part of several international efforts that support Indigenous peoples’ struggle for recognition of rights to land, language, culture and economies. She is based in Treaty 3 territory in Northern Ontario. 

Shannon Gustafson (Kiiwednong Kwe) is a registered member of Whitesand First Nation, Ontario. She was raised on the Serpent River First Nation, Ontario, and now resides in the city of Thunder Bay. Her artistic and creative nature stems from her childhood and is inspired by powwow culture.  Shannon honours her gifts every day by working as a full-time artist with support from her family, who are also artists. Her work was showcased in the internationally touring exhibition Piitwewetam: Making is Medicine (2021–2024), presented by the Thunder Bay Art Gallery and co-curated by Jean and Leanna Marshall, a commemorative exhibition honouring their late son and brother, Jessie Gustafson. She has received numerous Ontario Arts Council grants, including the 2017 Hnatyshyn Foundation Reveal Indigenous Artist award. 

Justine Gustafson is an Anishinaabe kwe from Whitesand First Nation, ON, based in Thunder Bay. Justine is an emerging Indigenous artist who works full-time as a beader, recognized for her creative talent by peers, curators, fashion designers, and master bead workers. She comes from a family of artists, the Gustafsons, whose work was showcased in the internationally touring exhibition Piitwewetam: Making is Medicine (2021–2024), presented by the Thunder Bay Art Gallery and co-curated by Jean and Leanna Marshall, a commemorative exhibition honouring their late son and brother, Jessie Gustafson. Agawaatebiigisin (it is reflected in the water) (2025), presented at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery, is her first solo exhibition.   

Anong Migwans Beam is an artist, mother, and paint maker who lives and works in her home community of M’Chigeeng First Nation. Raised by artist parents Ann and Carl Beam, she was homeschooled and apprenticed with her father in his ceramic, pigment, clay gathering, and his painting/photography studio. She studied at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, the Ontario College of Art and Design, and the Institute of American Indian Art. She is formerly known as the Executive Director/Curator of the Ojibway Cultural Foundation and founder of Gimaa Radio 8.9 CHYF. In 2018, Beam founded Beam Paints, a family-owned company that creates plastic-free paints and watercolours inspired by her culture and pigment gathering of her youth. With our Indigenous paint tradition, Beam Paints celebrates the colours of the wide world with the intimacy of the northern forest.

Bev Koski is an Anishinaabekwe (Ojibway) beadweaving visual artist who lives in Vancouver, BC. She graduated from the Ontario College of Art and has a BFA from York University. Her work has been exhibited at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto, the Kamloops Art Gallery, the Carleton Art Gallery, the Thunder Bay Art Gallery, Gallery 44, the Richmond Art Gallery, the Art Gallery of Victoria, the Oakville Galleries, and Documenta 15 in Kassel, Germany. Her artwork is in the collections of the Carleton Art Gallery, Ottawa, Thunder Bay Art Gallery, Museum of History, Hull, Quebec, Centre national des arts plastiques, Paris, France, The Textile Museum of Canada, Toronto and private collections.  

Vanessa Dion Fletcher is a Lunáapew and Potawatomi neurodiverse artist. Her family is from Eelūnaapèewii Lahkèewiitt (displaced from Lenapawking) and European settlers. Reflecting on an Indigenous and gendered body with a neurodiverse mind, Dion Fletcher looks for knowledge in materials and techniques. Since 2017, Dion Fletcher has used porcupine quills as a primary medium, creating two-dimensional quillwork pieces and expanding the medium through photography, sculpture and performance. Dion Fletcher teaches community workshops in quillwork, beading, and creative writing. She is a faculty member at OCAD University in Indigenous Visual Culture.  

Marcy Friesen is a Bill C-34 member of the Cumberland House Cree Nation. Swampy Cree and Welsh are her ancestry. She comes from a long line of traditional master beaders and talented creative family members. She resides on Treaty 6 land on a farm with her family near Carrot River, SK, where she creates fur mitts, hats and more under the name Trapline Creations. After visiting a contemporary art gallery in 2019, she expanded her practice, creating works that exist outside the traditional spectrum of beauty and utility. Her work has been included in the Contemporary Native Art Biennial (BACA) in Montreal, the Whyte Museum in Banff, the Remai Modern in Saskatoon, and the Mackenzie Art Gallery in Regina. In June 2021, Friesen had her first solo exhibition at Fazakas Gallery in Vancouver, BC.

Joe Big Mountain comes from the Mohawk, Cree & Comanche Nations. He grew up participating in Powwows and educational performances – by doing so, he was encouraged by his family to start crafting at a young age and took to quilling. He uses traditional and contemporary techniques to enhance his craft to make each piece unique to his own. He hopes to continue this art and keep traditions alive by teaching his children to carry on a legacy of their own. Big Mountain takes great pride in his artwork, creating heirloom pieces under the name Ironhorse Quillwork to be passed on for generations.  

Jean Marshall is of Anishinaabe/English descent, born and raised in Thunder Bay. She is a band member of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug, also known as Big Trout Lake, Treaty 9. She currently lives along the shore of Lake Superior. In 2018, she attended the Dene Nahjo Urban Hide Tanning Residency at the Banff Centre. She is now dedicated to leading and supporting hide tanning projects in her community. In 2024, she partnered with the Thunder Bay Art Gallery to organize Aanikoobijganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium, the first-ever beading symposium in Thunder Bay. 

Leanna Marshall MSW, RSW, PCAT is a social worker who works with Indigenous communities, particularly around healing from intergenerational trauma, loss, and self-esteem. Leanna is proud to be a graduate from the inaugural 2023 Indigenized Art Therapy Program from the WHEAT Institute in Winnipeg. She is a band member of Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug First Nation located in Treaty 9 in Northern Ontario. Leanna was born and raised in Thunder Bay. 

Melissa Twance, PhD, is a beadwork artist from Netmizaagamig Nishinaabeg. Her beadwork designs pay homage to Northwestern Ontario and traditional Anishinaabe iconography with infusions of contemporary and pop culture aesthetics. Melissa holds a PhD in Education, with her research embedded in Anishinaabe bead, quill, and hide work. She is a past Lecturer in the Faculty of Education at the University of Winnipeg and is currently the Canada Research Chair at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, ON. 

Dr. Jordyn Hrenyk is a Michif (Métis Nation Saskatchewan) scholar and Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the University of Toronto. Her research is at the intersections of Indigenous art and entrepreneurship. Jordyn is also a beader, and during her PhD research, she worked with Indigenous beadworkers to understand the beadwork market across Turtle Island today. Jordyn was born in her home territory in Treaty 6, but now lives in Tkaranto, on the territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit, Anishinaabeg, Chippewa, Haudenosaunee and Wendat Peoples.

Judy Anderson is Nêhiyaw from Gordon First Nation, Treaty 4, Saskatchewan. Her practice involves beadwork, installation, three-dimensional pieces, painting, and collaborative projects; her work focuses on spirituality, family, colonization, decolonization, and Nêhiyaw ways of knowing and being. Her current work is created to honour people in her life and Nêhiyaw intellectualizations of the world. She is a professor of Canadian Indigenous Studio Art in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Calgary. 

Lisa Myers is an independent curator, artist and an Associate Professor in the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change at York University. She is the York University Research Chair in Indigenous Art and Curatorial Practice and has curated exhibitions in public galleries and artist-run centres across Canada. Lisa is a member of Chimnissing, Beausoleil First Nation. 

2025 Workshops

Bev Koski – How to Bead Over Anything 

Learn how to bead over anything. Bev Koski has packed a suitcase full of eraser figures and will teach you how to bead over them. This is an introduction to a beadweaving technique and explores different stitches that Bev uses in her work, including how to increase, decrease and how to add new thread. Participants will learn how to bead over small figures to bring home from Aanikoobijiganag.  

Kaaren Dannemann – Gifts from our Relation the Moose 

In Gifts from Our Relation the Moose, Kaaren Dannemann begins with Medicine Wheel Teachings and examples of reciprocal caretaking in our everyday lives. Participants will make a pendant from the bone of a moose. This beautiful piece of jewelry will act as a reminder of respecting Mama Akii, the Land, and All Our Relations. 

Shannon Gustafson (Large group workshop) – Beading is the Medicine  

This 2-hour group workshop is designed as a gentle start to the symposium. Beading together as a large group, participants can connect, relax, and get beading! Led by Shannon Gustafson, participants learn basic edge-beading techniques by constructing an embroidered medicine pouch. 

Additional Workshops (included in ticket price).  

An additional workshop of your choice, selectable at checkout.

Anong Beam – Tisgeh’dah! Let’s put colour on it!: Watercolor for Designers 

Anong Beam will show you how to design signature, vibrant, and unexpected colourways.   Using natural watercolour paints and pigments and creatively combining colour in your beadwork designs. She teaches basic watercolour techniques and expands into different ways artists and beaders can experiment with colour before committing to designs in beads or other media. This workshop is all about colour! 

Marcy Friesen – Smoke Break  

Marcy Friesen wants you to join her for a breath of fresh air. She welcomes all smokers and non-smokers to join her and learn how to create a peyote-stitched beaded cigarette. Since losing her Dad, Marcy has been contemplating her life and looks at cigarettes as a symbolic part of her journey. Participants create a beaded cigarette ready to take home. 

Vanessa Dion Fletcher – Introduction to Quillwork 

Grounded in Lunáapew quillwork and language, Vanessa Dion Fletcher highlights the diverse material and design possibilities of the porcupine quill. This is an introduction to the basic tools and methods for harvesting, sorting, and dyeing quills. Participants learn one or more of the fundamental stitching techniques, including zigzag, straight, and single-quill line stitches.  

Aanikoobijiganag: Thunder Bay Beading Symposium logo based on original beadwork by Cheryl Chapman. Images by: Chondon Photography