Faculty of Arts and Sciences

Dawit L. Petros understood the power of photographs while still a child. As a refugee moving through East Africa and then migrating to Canada, he watched his family and community scatter across borders. The images they exchanged became lifelines.

“I understood very early on the significance of photography, both as a mechanism by which you express your identity and also as a way to establish your relationship with people who may not share the same geographical space as you,” says Petros, who joined the Department of Studio Art as an associate professor in the fall.

Decades later, that insight has crystallized into From the Edge of the Horizon, a two-part solo exhibition in his adopted hometown of Saskatoon, Canada—a homecoming that lets Petros show the people who helped his family what their generosity created.

The exhibition, presented at the University of Saskatchewan’s College Art Galleries and the Remai Modern museum, probes the themes that have shaped Petros’ life: migration, diaspora, colonialism, and the power of community. The works challenge viewers to question their assumptions about borders and boundaries while prompting them to reflect on their own place in the world.

The exhibition represents one milestone in a significant year for Petros. His work was also featured in last summer’ s Liverpool Biennial, the UK’s largest contemporary visual arts festival, and at Toronto’s Gallery TPW in the fall.

The power of images

In the early 1980s, Petros’ family received life-changing news: as part of Canada’s refugee program, they were being sponsored by a group of private citizens to move to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and begin a new life. This monumental move, made possible by the generosity of strangers, crystallized for Petros the power of connection and community.

“I am where I am because of so many people,” he says.

The countries his family had fled—Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya—each carried complicated histories with European colonialism. Combined with his family’s displacement and continued migration, these experiences made a deep impact on Petros. He became drawn to visual images, especially photography, as a way to understand and sustain relationships with his dispersed family and community members.

At the University of Saskatchewan, Petros studied history, focusing specifically on the Cold War in an effort to understand its dimensions in Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Northeast Africa.

“I wanted to see how those broader geopolitics unfolded and impacted my community and nation,” he says.

Photography remained a hobby. His parents, having left difficult and volatile conditions in Africa, wanted him and his brothers to have stable careers.

“It was paramount for our parents that we establish a relationship to education that would provide us with a different form of stability,” he says. “So art was always something that I did as a passion.”

That passion eventually became a driving force. Petros pursued his BFA from Concordia University in Montreal, followed by his MFA at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. He has since developed a practice that draws on archives and spans multiple media.

“I do a lot of work with archives,” he says, noting that he thinks of himself as an installation artist. The common thread is “a migratory impulse that shapes my life and understanding.”

This impulse is on full display in Spectre (La Teleferica), 2020, a centerpiece of From the Edge of the Horizon. The black, reflective, four-panel work depicts an African mountain range with white, ghostlike gondolas transposed on top, alluding to the Italian colonialist presence in the region and to the phantom of modernity—calling to mind the “Sky Ride” gondola exhibited at the 1934 World’s Fair in Chicago.

“That piece has this really powerful way of drawing in questions of aesthetics, infrastructure, modernity, colonialism, migration, and this triangulation of Europe, East Africa, and North America that many of us just don’t think about,” Petros says.

“The other thing the piece does, which is really important for me, is offer a reflective space, both literally and figuratively, for the viewer, who is physically transposed onto these geographies and into these questions when looking at the piece. As an artist, you’re trying to find more nuanced, complex ways of addressing these questions that haunt you. I’m satisfied with this work, not just because of how it raises these important questions but also because it finds a sophisticated material language through which these questions create an opening for audiences to engage.”

Full circle

From the Edge of the Horizon has offered Petros the unique opportunity to bring his work home to his family and community, and to show those who believed in him that their investment has paid off.

“My primary audience for this exhibition is my father and my mother,” he says. “I wanted my parents to understand what it is that I do, and I wanted them to see what these journeys have manifested into.”

That extends to his broader Saskatoon community as well. When members of the original families who sponsored his refugee resettlement came to the exhibition, Petros experienced an “incredibly emotional moment.” “It was an opportunity to recognize that their act of generosity had yielded this unexpected occurrence,” he says. “It was deeply, deeply gratifying.”

Petros hopes his work inspires his loved ones and greater community to understand their own histories. “I want them to have a mirror turned on them so that they understand the power and significance of these questions,” he says.

At Dartmouth, Petros says he is eager to work with diverse students and collaborate with colleagues across disciplines.

“I wanted to teach students who were invested in a liberal arts education similar to my own—students who may not aspire to be professional artists but understand the art ecosystem is vast and they can participate in various ways,” he says. “I cannot tell you how happy I am to be at Dartmouth.”

Serving as the unofficial head of photography within the department, Petros plans to teach each existing photography course three times to understand the curriculum and the program’s history before making modifications. He envisions introducing two new courses: one on photographic and archival research methodologies, and a seminar on the aesthetics of migration.

As he reflects on his past and looks to the future, Petros remains grounded in gratitude. “I recognize the improbability of my being where I am,” he says. “I’m deeply grateful.”