Category: Media coverage

In the past few weeks I have been asked by various media outlets in Canada and Portugal to weigh in on the topic of statue toppling in what pertains to the monument to Gaspar Corte-Real outside the Confederation Building in St. John’s, Newfoundland. Here are the resulting newspaper articles, television and radio pieces:

Andrew Hawthorn, “How a controversial St. John’s statue was actually propaganda for a Portuguese dictatorship,” CBC.ca, June 14, 2020

Maria João Caetano, “Entre a aventura marítima e a pesca do bacalhau: esta é a história da estátua de Corte-Real,” Diário de Notícias, June 16, 2020

Interview for “Câmara dos Representantes,” RDP radio, June 29, 2020

Interview for “Focus Portuguese,” OMNI TV, July 13, 2020

The City Builders’ exhibit at the Columbus Centre, part of this year’s Myseum of Toronto Intersections festival, was launched on March 24 with a reception held in that Italian-Canadian community space. About 50 guests attended the event, which started out with a series of brief speeches from Emanuele Lepri (Villa Charities/ Columbus Centre), Jeremy Diamond (Myseum of Toronto), Jason Ottey (LIUNA Local 183), Gabriele Scardellato (Mariano A. Elia Chair in Italian Canadian Studies), and a presentation by the project manager Dr. Gilberto Fernandes. After the audience members toured the exhibit, they were able to ask questions directly to Dr. Fernandes and Marino Toppan – a retired construction worker, union organizer, and key interviewee in the City Builders documentary. Members of the press were also present, including CityNews and OMNI TV (Italian programming), which reported about the event in their evening news.

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Photos by Vincenzo Pietropaolo

The CBC (radio and online) also interviewed me for a story about the City Builders exhibit. You can read the article here. Unfortunately, the article attracted white supremacist and anti-immigration remarks in the comments section, which I addressed in Twitter thread, here.

Given the large public interest and turnout, we extended the length of the exhibit for an extra week. The end date is now April 7.