Growing Family: Design & Desire in Mennonite Genealogy

About the exhibit

This exhibit was installed in the Mennonite Archives of Ontario gallery from May 2019 to May 2022. This page is the online version of the exhibit.

This is an exhibit from the collections of the Mennonite Archives of Ontario about family and the art of remembering.

Genealogists do not just uncover the past, they take active roles in shaping it. Designing a family tree may seem like a simple act, but this act requires choices and reflects deep desires for connection, identity and legitimacy.

Through paintings, photographs and original documents from the Mennonite Archives of Ontario, Growing Family takes the viewer through the ways in which Ontario Mennonites have used genealogy to remember the past, reconnect with the present, and hope for the future. These designs are at once uniquely personal and reflective of the universal longing for family.

What designs are we choosing and what desires are we expressing when we document our family pasts?

Exhibit Guide

This is a pdf of the printed self-guided tour.

Images are details from: Daniel and Marie (Suter) Steiner family tree, 1906; Johann "Hans" and Maria Janzen descendant chart, 1950s; Isaac S. Cressman family tree, 1960s.

Read More

"New Grebel Exhibit Features Artistic Mennonite Family Trees," Woolwich Observer, May 23, 2019.

Zach Fishman. "Tracing Lineage: The Art of Family Trees." Imprint, May 29. 2019.

Laureen Harder-Gissing. "'Hidden in that Little List': Genealogical Pursuits, Outcomes, and Representations in the Lives of Two Mennonite Women ." Mennonite Quarterly Review XCII (July 2018): 377-401.

Watch

Showing images from the exhibit, archivist Laureen Harder-Gissing discusses the ways our family trees reflect our designs and desires. (12 minutes)

Here is a longer version of the above talk, given as part of "The Anabaptist Story Lives On" webinar series in June 2020. (54 minutes)