Should the Hudson's Bay Company be allowed to sell its Indigenous art?
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The Hudson Bay Company has made a controversial decision to sell off its collection of Indigenous art and artifacts as part of its liquidation efforts.
Today on Commotion, host Elamin Abdelmahmoud speaks with Indigenous Studies professor and Winnipeg Press columnist Niigaan James Sinclair about this decision and how it could impact Indigenous cultural preservation efforts.
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CBC
13 minutes ago
- CBC
Juliette Powell, a former MuchMusic host and first Black Miss Canada, dead at 54
Juliette Powell, a former MuchMusic host and the first Black woman to be crowned Miss Canada, has died at the age of 54. Powell, who was born in New York but moved to Montreal as a child with her French Canadian mother, died unexpectedly on June 3 after falling ill with acute bacterial meningitis, according to an obituary posted online. She became a VJ for MusiquePlus, the French-language counterpart to MuchMusic, in 1992 and hosted the channel's the weekly dance music show Bouge de là! while she was a business student at Montreal's McGill University. Powell then moved over to the English channel to host its popular Friday night dance music show Electric Circus from 1996 to 2000 and the Francophone music show French Kiss. She was an economics student at the University of Toronto during her time at MuchMusic. WATCH | Juliette Powell on MuchMusic's Electric Circus: Former colleagues remember Powell Her former MuchMusic colleagues remembered her on social media Tuesday after news of her death emerged. Former host Master T said he was "blessed" work with Powell. "Your bouncy positive energy will be missed. Rest easy, Juliette Powell! Gone too soon!" he wrote in a post on his Instagram story above a photo of Powell sitting on a control room desk with a smile on her face. "Rest in a peaceful celestial party," Sook-Yin Lee, another former VJ and former CBC Radio host, said in an Instagram story post. "Before I was a VJ, I was a fan. Watching MuchMusic as much as I could. Juliette was so cool, so French cool. I enjoyed her range of roles, especially on Electric Circus. Such sad news here," Jennifer Hollett, a former VJ and executive director of The Walrus, wrote on X. After MuchMusic, Powell started as a business reporter for Toronto news channel CP24 and also founded a media and consulting company that led her to produce feature interviews with a range of prominent people, including Nelson Mandela, Steven Spielberg and Janet Jackson. Powell broke ground in beauty pageant world Prior to her being a fixture on Canadian television, Powell broke ground in the beauty pageant world when she was crowned Miss Canada 1989, in October 1988, then represented Canada in the Miss Universe pageant the following May. Her obituary says she was "motivated by a desire to challenge racial biases in beauty pageants." At the time of her crowning, Powell said she was proud to be the first mixed race person to win the pageant. She said that she would "gladly serve as a role model for both white and Black Canadians" and that her win was "a great proof of multiculturalism in this country," according to an article by The Canadian Press published by the Montreal Gazette on Nov. 1, 1988. When she crowned her successor a year later, Powell said the best part of being Miss Canada was seeing how much she had "developed and gained" during her reign. WATCH | The moment Juliette Powell becomes first Black Miss Canada in 1989: A new career path Powell's interests in technology and ethics led her on a new career path after her time as a television host and reporter. She worked in advisory roles for the United Nations, World Bank and World Economic Forum. She studied at Columbia University and graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor of arts in sociology. She joined New York University's telecommunications faculty in 2021 and co-founded the New York-based consultancy firm Kleiner Powell International in 2024. She was a keynote speaker as well as a commentator, appearing on CBC News, NBC, BBC and other Canadian and U.S. networks, sharing her expertise on issues like privacy, cybersecurity and unconscious bias in technology. She had two books to her name: 2009's 33 Million People in the Room: How to Create, Influence, and Run a Successful Business Using Social Networking and The AI Dilemma: 7 Principles for Responsible Technology, which she co-authored in 2023. But beyond her career, her friendships were where she had "the most impact," her obituary reads. "Juliette had a magical way of drawing people in with her infectious enthusiasm, and her brilliant intelligence and gorgeous smile lit up every room she ever entered. Her loss is devastating and she will be deeply, painfully missed by so many."
CTV News
31 minutes ago
- CTV News
‘It's a pivotal moment': Plan to modernize Pantages Playhouse unveiled
A design rendering image of the proposed exterior of the Pantages Theatre. (Number TEN Architectural Group) The group hoping to stage the Pantages Playhouse's next act has unveiled plans to transform the vaudeville-era theatre into a modernized concert hall. The Performing Arts Consortium (PAC) and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra (WSO) released its initial design plan Tuesday, which would reopen the 1,100-seat venue as the Pantages Theatre with a multi-million-dollar refresh. 'We've been on a long journey on this. It's a pivotal moment,' said Curt Vossen, a director with PAC and chair of the WSO. The plan is a culmination of months of work. A team of architects, theatre design and acoustic experts, digital and AV consultants, mechanical engineers and construction management specialists mapped out a design to update the century-old hall to house a modern-day symphony orchestra, as well as professional and community performing arts groups. Pantages Theatre A computer-generated image shows the design plan for the modernized Pantages Theatre. (Number TEN Architectural Group) The proposed design would add a deeper and wider stage, an orchestra pit, stage rigging, and modernized electrical and mechanical systems - all while preserving beloved historical elements of the century-old theatre. 'Transforming a vaudeville theatre into a first-class concert hall is not an easy challenge, but with the highly experienced team of consultants and a visionary client, I'm confident we will achieve that goal,' said Brent Bellamy with Number TEN Architectural Group, which led the design team. Pantages revamp comes with $55 million price tag Bockstael Construction costed the design, estimating it could come with a $55 million to $60 million price tag. PAC and WSO hope half will be paid for between all three levels of government, with the private sector making up the rest. Vossen said they have raised nearly $15 million so far. 'Once we secure $25 to $30 million in overall pledged support, including from government, we will greenlight the project and launch our major capital campaign.' Pantages Theatre The proposed design plan for the Pantages Theatre's lobby is shown in a digitally created image. (Number TEN Architectural Group) The city has already chipped in. It donated $837,500 in January for the renovation through its Downtown Arts Capital Fund. A spokesperson for Winnipeg Mayor Scott Gillingham told CTV News Winnipeg on Tuesday the city is facing significant budget pressures right now, so any major capital investments must be carefully considered alongside other priorities. 'But this is an exciting project for downtown and the local arts community, so the Mayor is willing to consider options for how the city can support it,' the spokesperson said. Pantages Playhouse The Pantages Playhouse in Winnipeg, Man. on June 10, 2025. (Jon Hendricks/CTV News Winnipeg) A backstage look at Pantages' century-plus history Pantages last dropped its curtain in 2018. The city, which has owned the venue since the 1940s, put out a call for proposals for the century-old theatre, which is designated as a national and provincial historical site. It was eventually sold to private buyers in 2019 for $530,000, but by 2022, the building was acquired by PAC. The non-profit was initially formed in the '90s to steward the theatre for community use on behalf of the city. Once it acquired Pantages, the organization assembled a group of benefactors who agreed to support a proof-of-concept for the redesign. WSO also signed a long-term agreement to be the managing tenant of the theatre. It was a familiar role, as the symphony previously managed community usage of the space during its final years of operation. Angela Birdsell Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra executive director Angela Birdsell speaks at a June 10, 2025 news conference in the Pantages Theatre lobby in Winnipeg, Man. (Jon Hendricks/CTV News Winnipeg) Once the new theatre opens, WSO has pledged to rehearse and perform many of its programs there. WSO executive director Angela Birdsell believes Pantages will offer the symphony street visibility to serve the community any time of day or night, while freeing up the Centennial Concert Hall, its current home, to offer a more diverse array of commercial shows. 'Like our five major cultural institutional partners, the time has come for the WSO to have its own home—a right-sized hall and acoustics for our traditional offerings and the many other creative projects we present,' she said. - With files from CTV's Jon Hendricks and Kayla Rosen
CTV News
an hour ago
- CTV News
New filmed in N.B. TV series premieres Thursday
The latest made in New Brunswick production will be hitting the television screens Thursday night. REVIVAL stars award winning Canadian actress, Melanie Scrofano, and is based on the graphic novel series of the same name. The series consists of ten hour-long episodes, all of which were filmed in southern New Brunswick. 'This has been a number of years leading up to this moment for us to have a TV series of this scale here in New Brunswick produced by our company,' says Greg Hemmings of Hemmings House Pictures. 'So, we're pretty thrilled.' Hemmings, who is also an executive producer of the show, says the series is a 'cult classic' and is based in a sleepy little town called Wausau, Wisconsin. Tensions and fear run high in the community when the recently deceased come back to life and return to town. Dana Cypress, played by Scrafano, stars as a police officer in the centre of the plot. She is tasked with solving a murder where both the living and revived are suspects. Fellow executive producer, Stephen Foster, who is also with Hemmings House Pictures, says Saint John works as a perfect backdrop for the setting. 'You just got to not point the cameras at the Bay of Fundy, that's the only trick,' Foster jokes. Southern New Brunswick viewers will likely recognized some locations with filming being done around uptown Saint John, and in neighbouring communities like Grand Bay-Westfield, Hampton, and Sussex, N.B. Filming for the series saw over 200 New Brunswickers find full-time work for the production and over 400 part-time workers, says Foster. There were also 51 people who experienced working in the industry for the first time during production. One of those was 9-year-old, Flora McInroy, from Saint John. McInroy plays the character named Jordan Borchardt. She is one of the youngest people to come back from the dead in town. She was one of over 100 girls to audition for the role in an open casting call, one she only found out about thanks to her mom being a hairstylist for production. She says being her first time acting, she never expected to get the part. 'I just can't believe it,' McInroy admits on the thought of starring in a TV series in her hometown. 'I'm very proud of myself for being able to do this, and I'm very thankful and grateful for just being able to do this, meeting other people, being able to share this experience and share the work that everyone has worked so hard on.' She, like Foster and Hemmings, hope REVIVAL is the first of many big productions to be filmed in the province in the months and years ahead. McInroy notes she may never have gotten the chance to act had it not been for the local production. 'These aren't just beer and pizza paying jobs,' points out Foster. 'These are union scale jobs. These are jobs that you can get a mortgage on and we're continuing to urge the government to continue to participate with us on this.' The show debuts Thursday at 11 p.m. Atlantic time on the CTV Sci-Fi Channel and is streaming the next day on Crave. A free community public screening of the first two episodes will be held in Saint John on Friday June 27. REVIVAL REVIVAL, a new TV series filmed in Saint John, N.B. premiers this Thursday. (CTV Atlantic/ Avery MacRae) For more New Brunswick news, visit our dedicated provincial page.
