A Portrait of Black Montreal

When British documentary photographer Andrew Jackson moved to Montreal in 2017, he did what he always does in a new city: he googled, “Where are the Black spaces?” The first result was Little Burgundy, a historically Black neighbourhood in southwest Montreal. He set off to explore. As he strolled through the area’s Oscar-Peterson Park on a bright Sunday morning, he stumbled upon people playing basketball. “It was wonderful,” says Jackson. “But it’s funny. When you google ‘Where shouldn’t you go in Montreal?’ Little Burgundy pops up again.”

Once called St. Antoine, the neighbourhood was first settled in the late 19th century. As the railway industry boomed, many Black men found work as porters and dining car staff, so the area’s proximity to the Windsor and Bonaventure train stations made it a convenient place to put down roots. By the early 20th century, Little Burgundy was home to 90 per cent of Montreal’s Black population. It’s also the site of Union United Church, one of Canada’s oldest Black congregations. “It’s one of the first places Nelson Mandela visited after his emancipation,” says Jackson. “And where Malcolm X’s parents met.”

In the mid-1960s, Montreal began planning new developments in the area. City planners displaced more than 14,000 residents, most of them Black Canadians, and renamed St. Antoine “Little Burgundy.” By 1996, only two per cent of Montreal’s Black population remained there. The story of the neighbourhood’s past reminded Jackson of the cultural bulldozing that happened where he grew up in Dudley, a town in England’s West Midlands. There’s a street where six Black families lived, including his own. “One day, we got a letter from the city council saying that they’re building the Dudley Southern Bypass,” he says. “And coincidentally, it’s going through four of these six Black houses.”

What started as a casual visit to Little Burgundy soon became the focus of Jackson’s latest photo series, which runs until September 28 at Montreal’s McCord Stewart Museum. Jackson had already been documenting Union United Church, where he met the church’s archivist and leaders who ran its food bank. In 2023, a chance encounter during a Defund the Police meeting at a local park transformed his project. That’s where he met Jason Fraser, the neighbourhood’s unofficial ambassador. (He goes by the moniker “Mr. Burgz” and wears “Burgz” caps and T-shirts.) Through him, Jackson met more residents and was invited to family barbecues and Fraser’s 50th birthday celebration.

Tumultuous change is on the horizon for Little Burgundy once more. Historically, the neighbourhood has been home to the highest density of public housing in Quebec, and the structures now show signs of decay. Meanwhile, luxury condos rise steadily on its edges. “It’s near downtown, which makes it prime real estate,” says Jackson. But he believes the community of Little Burgundy will endure. “As long as Union United Church is here, there is hope for a sense of community,” he says. Every Tuesday, the church comes alive with volunteers packing and distributing food to those in need, while on Sundays, congregants and choir members sing hymns together. Below, Jackson shares the stories behind some of the exhibit’s most striking photographs.

Willie Rosario, Oscar-Peterson Park: “I met Willie one hot summer day last July while sitting on a bench at the local park,” says photographer Andrew Jackson. “He spoke proudly about how he and fellow Little Burgundy resident Jason Fraser had put on a barbecue for the community. He had a lot of pride about what they had achieved and wondered, somewhat wistfully, if they could do it again.”

Martin Luther King, Union United Church: “This MLK bust sits in an office above Union United Church. It looks like an artifact of a dream left unfulfilled; King’s desire for children to reach the mountaintop hasn’t quite made it to the present. Meanwhile, Obama’s presidential portrait reflects faintly in the glass. When he won in 2008, there was a wave of optimism, and a text circulated among Black communities: ‘Rosa sat, so that MLK could walk, so that Obama could run.’ These two pivotal figures are juxtaposed against each other.”

Michael P. Farkas, CEDA, Rue Delisle: “Michael is the director of Youth in Motion, an organization that’s been providing young people a safe space to hang out, play games and learn since the 1980s. They have a studio where teens can create music and use tech like audio devices and podcasting equipment. Michael is also the president of the Round Table on Black History Month in Montreal. He’s helped me a lot on this project, letting me use the Youth in Motion building as a base for my work in the community.”

Anyssa Ranetkins, Youth In Motion, Rue Saint-Martin: “People often talk about the Black community as if we’re a monolith. But Anyssa, a biracial woman who identifies as Black, disrupts that. She’s a community worker at the Tyndale St.-Georges Community Centre, which has been serving Little Burgundy residents since 1927. She pours her energy into creating opportunities for young people and women.”

Window #1 Rue des Seigneurs: “This is one of the homes in Little Burgundy. There’s a boarded-up window here. To an outsider, it could signify failure. But for the person who lives behind that window, it might hold the memories of a child’s 10th birthday, a family Christmas, a first kiss.”

Jason “Shamba” Fraser and daughter Jachelle Fraser: “Jason, known as ‘Shamba’ since childhood, has been instrumental in helping me with this project. He’s a big promoter of Little Burgundy. He also calls himself ‘Mr. Burgz’; here, he’s wearing a baseball cap with ‘Burgz’ written on it. Jason is a devoted family man. There’s a stereotypical notion that Black fathers are absent, but Jason is a constant, loving presence with his own family and children, just as his father and mother were to him.”

Jason’s hands, by 1965 St Jacques: “Every Tuesday, Jason leads a men’s group at the Tyndale St-Georges Community Centre, where participants play basketball and can talk about their feelings. He’s also Black Santa at Christmas and delivers gifts to the community. Here, his hands are marked by calluses—they tell a story of past struggles, but they also reflect resilience.”

Black bodies, Oscar-Peterson Park: “Here, two young men move across a park, but you don’t see their faces. The audience is left to imagine who they are and what they’re doing. People who have negative views of Little Burgundy might project racist tropes upon this image: that these men are lazy or criminals. But if you are a person who has lived in Black spaces, you might have a more benign perception. You might think they are merely young athletes running across a playing field, doing fitness training.”

Nancy Oliver-Mackenzie, Parc Vinet: “Nancy, originally from Nova Scotia, moved to Montreal in the 1960s. She’s a retired teacher and remains a keen photographer and historian. She’s in charge of the Union United Church’s photographic archive, which she has recently digitized and put on a website. She is instrumental in preserving many of the historical images of Little Burgundy used by researchers who have written about the neighbourhood.”

Ernest, opposite the bench on Rue Quesnel: “Ernest is new to Little Burgundy. He lives near Oscar-Peterson Park with his partner, a long-time resident of the neighbourhood. Behind him stands a 50- or 60-year-old tree, old enough to have been rooted in the area before the 1960s-era urban renewal programs displaced Black residents. It’s a juxtaposition of this new person to the area, against this tree of a bygone era.”

Stained glass window, Union United Church: “Community members often feel safe enough to be themselves in Black spaces. Here, the brilliant golden light inside the church alludes to that notion of safety.”

Charlene Hunte, Union United Church: “Charlene is a retired health-care worker who runs the food bank at Union United Church, which feeds between 80 and 100 people every week. She lives outside the community and leaves her home at around 6:30 a.m. every Tuesday to be at the church by 8 a.m., rain or shine. Two of Charlene’s four sons have died. One of them was murdered. Still, she chooses to be giving toward other people. I wanted to give her a sense of gravitas in this photo.”

This story appears in the March 2025 issue of Maclean’s. You can buy the issue here, subscribe to the magazine here or send a gift subscription here.