About Emma
Emma Hassencahl-Perley is a Wolastoqey visual artist, arts writer, educator and curator from Neqotkuk (Tobique First Nation) in New Brunswick. She grew up in her community before attending Mount Allison University, where she earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 2017. In 2022, she completed a Masters of Art in Art History from Concordia University.
Emma maintains a visual art practice, focusing on painting, beadwork, and digital illustration. She has completed several mural projects in New Brunswick and Maine.
Emma's artwork reflects her identity as an ehpit (woman) and a Wolastoqiyik citizen of the Wabanaki Confederacy. Her artistic themes explore water, the cosmos, Wabanaki feminisms, and the Wabanaki double-curve motif, symbolizing life cycles and relationships, including nationhood and community. These motifs serve as both a cultural and aesthetic foundation in Emma's practice, connecting ancestral Wabanaki material culture with contemporary digital storytelling techniques.
In 2023, she was one of four artists MawiArt and Hockey Canada selected to paint hockey sticks gifted to players in the IIHF World Junior Championship held in Halifax and Moncton. Emma has exhibited nationally and internationally at venues such as the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Portland Museum of Art, the Abbe Museum, SOFA in Chicago, and La Biennale d'art contemporain autochtone (BACA).
In addition to her art practice, Emma teaches Indigenous Art History in the Wabanaki Visual Art Program at the New Brunswick College of Craft and Design.
Emma is also the Curator of Indigenous Art at the Beaverbrook Art Gallery. In 2018, she was hired as one of three emerging curators to curate a celebratory exhibition titled Everything is Gonna Be Fine for the 50th Anniversary of the New Brunswick Art Bank. She has curated and co-curated numerous exhibitions, including Carl Beam: one who is brave-hearted (2019), aulajijakka (things I remember) (2020), ehpituwikuwam (2022), and Wabanaki Modern (2022), BACA: Creation Stories (2023), and Epekwitk Quill Sisters: Etleoogoeiog (Talking Together) (2024).
Recent Murals and Projects
tobique day care
kehkimane knicannuk weci-woli-acehtuhtit skitkomiq (let us teach our children to change the world) (2024)
Ulnooweg X jedi x masdtercard foundation
Birds of a Feather, 2024
Beyond Behaviour X Fredericton public library
mawiyamok (a gathering), (2024)
SAINT JOHN CITY HALL COMMISSION
Menahqesk (where the sea takes the land), (2024)
Wolastoqey Tribal Council
"Wolastoqewiyik Nilun (We Are the Wolastoqey Peoples of the Beautiful, Bountiful River)", (2024)
Maritime college of forest technology
Abundance, (2023)
Portland museum of art (me)
Wesuwe-tpelomosu (Self-determination), (2023)
Fredericton high school
Possesomuwihke (there are many stars in the sky), (2023)
Mudwas Park, Tobique First Nation
Tobique Powwow, (2023)
Southern Victoria High School
kcicihtomuwakon (knowledge), (2023)
MAHSOS SCHOOL, TOBIQUE FIRST NATION
kakskimuhkahs (iris), (2023)
University of Moncton, Edmundston campus
Regenerative Love, (2022)
Portland Museum of Art
skitpeq (on the surface of water), (2022)
MAWIW INC., Fredericton office
FLOURISH, (2020)
Perth - Andover Middle School
Nit Leyic, 2022
Tobique Youth Center
psqahsuwe (it blooms), 2020
CITY OF FREDERICTON
Wici Kseltomomuwakon (With Love), 2019
Research Projects
Wabanaki Modern
Winner, Canadian Museums Association Award for Outstanding Achievement (Research) and APMA Best Atlantic Published Book AwardLonglisted, First Nation Communities READ AwardThe story of an overlooked group of cultural visionaries
The “Micmac Indian Craftsmen” of Elsipogtog (then known as Big Cove) rose to national prominence in the early 1960s. At their peak, they were featured in print media from coast to coast, their work was included in books and exhibitions — including at Expo 67 — and their designs were featured on prints, silkscreened notecards, jewelry, tapestries, and even English porcelain.
Early Days: Indigenous Art from the McMichael
A landmark publication bringing together more than seventy voices illuminating the rich array of Indigenous art held by the McMichael Canadian Art Collection.
Under the editorial direction of Anishinaabe artist and scholar Bonnie Devine, Early Days gathers the insights of myriad Indigenous cultural stakeholders, informing us on everything from goose hunting techniques, to the history of Northwest Coast mask making, to the emergence of the Woodland style of painting and printmaking, to the challenges of art making in the Arctic, to the latest developments in contemporary art by Indigenous peoples from across Turtle Island.