This series is ongoing, but I’ve put some information about the completed artworks below.
The suitcase-artwork, “Iron Horse (After Monkman),” is displayed outside the Neilsen Park Creative Centre as part of Asian Heritage Month in 2025.
“In Aquil Virani’s current work-in-progress, Unpacking Ismaili Baggage, a portrait of a man in a suit is painted amidst a western landscape on the inside cover of a vintage suitcase. The portrait is in black and white, the background in colour. The worn leather invokes nostalgia, longing and displacement. A second work in the series depicts women marching in Tanzania, also in black and white, a sole woman in kaftan, Virani’s paternal grandmother, in colour in the foreground, a plane at altitude in the distance. The series depicts the mass migration of Ismaili Muslims from East Africa, headlined by Idi Amin’s 1972 presidential decree that nationalized the property of “Ugandan Asians” and forced tens of thousands to flee to largely commonwealth countries, including Canada. The series, commissioned on the 50th anniversary of the 1972 expulsion, touches on a number of themes that run through Virani’s work – documentary, portraiture and themes of belonging and displacement.” From Devyani Saltzman’s essay, “Aquil Virani celebrates the stories of everyday people.”
This artwork features a “White Paper,” put forth by the government of Pierre Trudeau, suggesting policies that aimed to dismantle the Indian Act (among other things). The document, reading “Indian Policy,” is held by a dark-skinned hand above a magazine featuring Uganda’s Idi Amin. In addition to pointing out the use of the word “Indian,” I’m also trying to draw a messy parallel between the two “indian policies” to ask: in what ways are these two struggles different? In what ways are they similar? Who is who in each instance?
This artwork presents the cover of an Ismaili cookbook, titled “A Spicy Touch,” inside the cover of a vintage suitcase. The piece is meant to raw explicit connections between food and identity, food and belonging, food and displacement. Food is necessary for human survival. Food production is intertwined with colonial realities. And I’m also questioning the sterilization of “food as culture;” in other words, do anti-immigrant advocates eat at Indian restaurants? What is the underlying message if multicultural festivals celebrate diverse food instead of other aspects of culture? Is food an apolitical meeting ground for diverse cultures or not?
The main image in this suitcase-artwork is based on a black-and-white photograph of the 1972 “Ugandan Asian expulsion” from the Library and Archives Collection (LAC). In this historic series of photographs, “Ugandan Asian” refugees are greeted and helped by Canadian “Manpower and Immigration” personnel in Longue-Pointe, Quebec. I’ve super-imposed a period-appropriate Kool-Aid logo on the bottle that is being pushed by the host Canadian official. And a translucent layer of crowdsourced images from Ismaili immigration stories add depth and contemporary relevance. I’m exploring the legacy of aid, and refuge, and gratitude. What happens when a nation state welcomes a family or community in need? Who is owed what? And what happens to the children of immigrating parents in terms of belonging, identity, and existential gratitude? Who is “drinking the kool-aid?” What is the “kool-aid?” And who is making it?
As the quote from Devyani Saltzman’s essay expresses above, this artwork features my grandmother at a gathering in Tanzania (where my dad was born) marching in support of Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere, the former Prime Minister of Tanganyika and the first President of Tanzania. Not only is this image the only photograph I have of my paternal grandmothers, but it’s also rich in details — political subtext, women in community, transportation and movement. Transportation is a crucial aspect of migration, central to the journey of my family. My paternal grandparents, with my grandma depicted here, came from India. My dad was born in Tanzania where the photo was taken. I was born in “Vancouver.”
This artwork shows an Ismaili man looking into a landscape pulled from a Kent Monkman painting (“Iron Horse”). I’m trying here to implicate immigrant or racialized communities in the indigenous-settler conversation. I’m implying here that many immigrants internalized the problematic views of terra nullius when settling in Canada, just like the early Europeans. I’m also suggesting that by living in Canada, these communities have also benefited from colonial injustices – whether directly responsible or not. It’s a kind of “visual citation” or quote in support of Kent Monkman’s work and overall arguments, but applied specifically to different communities. This artwork was shown at the Aga Khan Museum on a printed panel for the “50 Years of Migration” exhibition.