The Paper Trail to the 1923 Chinese Exclusion Act was conceived in 2020 by community curator and exhibition designer, Catherine B. Clement, to commemorate one hundred years of the passing of Canada’s Chinese Exclusion Act. The community-based project has two components: first, a national, year-long exhibition opening July 1st, 2023 in Vancouver’s Chinatown; secondly, a community archive of the Chinese Immigration (C.I.) certificates issued to implement the Chinese Immigration Act (1885-1947), within which the 1923 Exclusion Act was a significant amendment and dark turn.

Project values include paying tribute to those who lived through this period, preserving documentary evidence and oral history, educating new generations, and public telling of this collective story. The project prioritized community participation through the “crowdsourcing” of family histories and archival documents from across every province.

The methodology of community collection was adapted by Clement from her previous ten-year research project, Chinatown Through a Wide Lens: The Hidden Photographs of Yucho Chow, that was coming to a close. Many families who had contributed photos from their private family collections also had Chinese Immigration certificates in their custody. Original C.I. certificates were identified, borrowed, digitized, and returned to families, while helping members interpret the records. Family history was also collected as important context to understanding the records and remembering certificate subjects.

In 2020, the project team expanded its capacity for identifying and digitizing certificates through a volunteer scanning network with locations established in Victoria, Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal, Halifax, and St. John’s. In 2021, the team worked with Library and Archives Canada to have previously restricted Chinese Immigration records opened and made accessible, namely, C.I.44 forms related to the registration of all Chinese in Canada required by Section 18 of the Exclusion Act.

In 2022, the project pursued collection of oral history interviews and digital content creation in complement to concept development, design and outreach of the exhibition. The project will launch on Canada Day, July 1st, 2023 as an exhibition at the Chinese Canadian Museum of British Columbia based in Vancouver’s Chinatown.