Associate professor in the Department of Studio Art has a solo exhibition, Scotiabank Photography Award: Dawit L. Petros, opening today at The Image Centre in Toronto.
At 7 p.m. on May 7, Professor Dawit L. Petros will give an artist talk in lecture room IMA-307 at The Image Centre.
This exhibition, curated by Gaëlle Morel, is on view in the main gallery from May 6 to Aug. 1, 2026.
This survey exhibition celebrates the career of Montreal-based multidisciplinary artist Dawit L. Petros, winner of the 2025 Scotiabank Photography Award. Spanning over 20 years, this presentation of more than 80 photographs, serigraphs, and books traces a long-standing inquiry into the legacy of colonial history across Africa, Europe, and North America. Rooted in rigorous scholarly research and extensive travel, Petros's practice is defined by his creative use of archival photographs, colour, and abstraction. The artist challenges photography’s documentary function while investigating migration, belonging, displacement, and the lingering effects of colonial memory.
Dawit L. Petros (Eritrean/Canadian, b. 1972) is a visual artist, researcher, and educator. He holds an MFA in visual art from the School of the Museum of Fine Arts/Tufts University, Boston. Recent exhibition venues include Remai Modern and the University of Saskatchewan’s College Art Galleries, Saskatoon (2025); the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago (2024); Oslo Kunstforening, Norway (2020); the 13th Biennial of Havana, Matanzas, Cuba (2019); and Addis Foto Fest, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (2018).
Petros has been awarded an Independent Study Fellowship at the Whitney Museum of American Art (2012) and an artist residency at the Studio Museum in Harlem (2008), both in New York City. A winner of the Duke and Duchess of York Prize from the Canada Council of the Arts (2021), he is an associate professor of studio art at Dartmouth College, New Hampshire. Petros is represented by Bradley Ertaskiran, Montreal, and Tiwani Contemporary, London, UK.
Gaëlle Morel (French/Canadian, b. 1976), PhD, has been the Curator, Exhibitions and Public Engagement at The Image Centre, Toronto Metropolitan University, since 2010. Based on extensive archival research, her most recent exhibitions include Lee Miller, A Photographer at Work, 1932–1945 (2024); Stories from the Picture Press: Black Star Publishing Co. & The Canadian Press (2023); and Mary Ellen Mark: Ward 81 (with accompanying catalogue, 2023). In 2009, Morel was the guest curator of the photography biennial Le Mois de la Photo à Montréal. She is currently an instructor in the Film + Photography Preservation and Collections Management graduate program at Toronto Metropolitan University.