All Power to the People: MMFA's Revolution exhibit celebrates the radical 1960s

To say the late 1960s altered how we see and think about the world is something of an understatement, as a new exhibit at the MontrealMuseum of Fine Arts makes graphically clear.

Movements led by predominantly young activists for peace, black civil rights, women's rights, gay rightsand environmental rights turned people power into a political forcefor equality,freedom and justice.

It was a period of radical, transformative thought that exploded our understanding of what is right, what is possible and what counts as art.

The dynamism and profound cultural impact of that brief, creative period is the focus of the MMFA'sRevolution,which runs untilOct. 9th.

Originally curated by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London, the 700-piece, multimedia exhibit explores the interplay between music, fashion, photography, film, art, design and literature alongside the social upheavalof the years spanning 1966 to 1970.

While it maintains much of its original focus, the MMFA has tailoredRevolutionto include some Quebec content focusing on Expo 67 and the early sovereignty movement, all with a nod to made-in-Quebec music from the period.

Music is central to Revolution, just as it was to the period it examines. Visitors are provided with headsets that play period songsrelated the exhibit's six "immersive environments" the Counterculture, Swinging London, Dissent, Festivals, Consumptionand Communes, the Environment and Computing.

The Beatles, of course, are front and centre, as they were inthe consciousness of the time, andJohn Lennon loomslargest of all.

The exhibit draws its name and inspiration from the title of Lennon'sprovocative 1968 song that expressed hismounting ambivalence with how the social revolution was unfolding, namely its escalating use of violence.

While celebrating the link between creativity and social change, Revolutionis also a reminder that progress is not a given, but something you have to fight to achieve.

The exhibit's British curators, Victoria Broackes and Geoffrey Marsh, said the parallels between the dramatic events of the late 1960s and the present moment are impossible to miss, and worth reflecting on.

"With momentous political upheaval across the West, it is a perfect time to consider how the finished and unfinished revolutions of the Sixties have changed how we live today and affected the way we think about tomorrow," they wrote in an introduction to the exhibit.

Revolution is on at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts until Oct. 9, 2017. The MMFA is open both June 24th and July 1st.