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welcome everyone my name is shauna mccabe and i’m the director of the art gallery of guelph and i’d like to welcome you all tonight

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um and thank you for joining us and thank you catherine blackburn for being with us tonight i’ll start by

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offering atlantic knowledgement on behalf of the art gallery of guelph where we are hosting this dialogue tonight

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this statement is crucial for art museums as land acknowledgements acknowledge and recognize the ongoing effects of

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colonialism that really underpin these institutions not only of museums utilize deeply colonial methods of

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representation but because of their authority um these narratives have been have often been

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accepted as truth in forming destructive policies that have negatively impacted indigenous peoples guelph ontario is

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situated on treaty land that is steeped in rich indigenous history and home to many first nations inuit of metis people

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today and as we gather here uh this evening we’d like to acknowledge that that guelph resides on the ancestral

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lands of the atawandran people and more recently the treaty lands and territory of the mississaugas of the

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credit we recognize the significance of the dish with one spoon covenant to this land and offer our respect to our

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anishinaabe and metis neighbors

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as we are gathered virtually here today connected and yet physically dispersed it’s also a good moment to reflect on

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the significance of place wherever we are and in doing so recognize how different traditional lands we reside in and move

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through and form our lives we acknowledge the our elders past present and emerging of these lands with

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gratitude and respect a couple of details um everyone has

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their microphones muted to avoid disruptions during the talk and if you do have questions please add them

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to the chat and we will address them towards the end and please feel free free to do that at

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any point and i’d like to acknowledge our guest tonight catherine blackburn

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catherine it was born in il al-aqua saskatchewan and which exists in close

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proximity to pachana saskatchewan a place that holds the key to much of her work

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she is a member of the english river first nation with dene and european roots and as well

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she grew up in choiceland a community in rural saskatchewan and today lives in terrace british columbia

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her work as you will see and as many of you already know embraces um two key inspirations family and

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culture and through these two lenses she’s able to address the complexities of memory

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history and cultural identity the other distinctive aspect of her work is her commitment to

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merging contemporary concepts with elements of traditional dna culture exploring the significance and history

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of certain materials and practices through their changing resonance in the context of colonialism

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and what we’ll talk about today is the development of her work from earlier to the new age warriors

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series which is uh which the gallery has had on view here since january as well as more recent work um and i

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guess actually i wanted to read something the other thing that um catherine is is an amazing writer and um

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very articulate about her work and i thought this was actually a passage that was part of um

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your tea and bannock um piece uh on on beadwork and uh just this one

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paragraph where you say with this liberation my work processes have become more freeing

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using traditional materials and techniques i’ve twisted the rules just enough to allow me to play

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my bead work is photo based incorporating transfers sometimes as a tool and others as a base for my design no

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matter the final outcome my goal remains constant the direct relationship of my european and dna heritage

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challenges me to create innovative work that encourages dialogue between traditional art forms and new

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interpretations of them these are the tools i use to create and with those in mind that i hold near

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and dear to my heart i am inspired to create messages of kinship and resiliency and i thought that

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it’s so articulate and i know um you know much of your work is also autobiographical so much more of your

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your biography will come out as we talk about your work um and that passage also really speaks

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strongly to this and powerfully to this first slide which is kind of a great starting point um

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because it it speaks to sort of your interest in textile in one

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sense but also about the body and maybe you want to start here sure uh thank you so much shawna

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for the the beautiful introduction and thanks for having me and um thank you everybody for joining and

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um yeah i guess we’ll just dive right into it um i thought this this body of work was

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a good place to start um this work is titled our mother’s

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tongue and uh there’s a few slides that i’ll show you of this work itself but

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um i thought it was a good a good focus in terms of bringing together

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my work in adornment referencing the body referencing

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language and through these threads speaking to cultural identity and these larger

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explorations within my practice and so yeah this quite literally brings brings

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those together in a sense for this work i used as you just mentioned in that little

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excerpt i use uh gel photo transfers in the creation of this particular body

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um and uh yeah i don’t know i don’t know how many are familiar with

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the process of it it’s quite simple but i’m just using acrylic gel medium and uh

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and layering over top of a photo rubbing the back of the photo off and so you’re left with this like

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gel gel skin to work with and from there i i mounted

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it on a piece of canvas and then i was able to work back into the work

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and so um yeah as i mentioned it this work is is bringing together all these different

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aspects of my practice this work was made in 2018

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and there are two there are two kind of smaller bodies i guess within

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this larger one so this is a framed work that you’re seeing here

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of which i beaded the den language back onto the tongue this this tongue in

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particular is my mother’s and in in the next slide

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i’ve incorporated a photo of the other small body of work within this which was

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five pin cushions so i did five cushions and five frame works

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and i guess the the more intense story behind this work um

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is it refers to a story i had read or come had come across at one point

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in regards to residential schools and uh this being a form of punishment

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if indigenous children were to speak their their language in these schools

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uh sometimes their tongues were pierced with pins and so there’s a relationship here that

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i’m i’m diving into a familial connection my mom being

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a residential school survivor and the complex nature of language and

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language loss and there’s not a straightforward

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explanation or solution to why i don’t know my

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language why i can’t speak my language

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so i think i’m in this in this work i’m working through trauma i’m working

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through my own trauma i’m referencing family trauma

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and intergenerational trauma but i’m also considering the

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other side of this work which is about resilience and and beauty and indigenous beauty

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and adornment and all that that encompasses um and so as such i’ve

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i’ve beaded back into the framed four of the framed works with floral

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pattern and these aren’t any particular floral patterns but i am referencing

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floral motif found on on dene garmet traditional den a garment such as

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moccasins or or mitts of which my grandmother um used to make my late my late satsune

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and so yeah it’s it’s about loss and language and language loss but it’s

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just as much about beauty and resilience and power

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and sovereignty and all those complex

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themes surrounding such a a heavy heavy um occurrence you know

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um and i don’t know maybe it’s worth just mentioning too

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because i don’t know if it’s that apparent but you might have to view this work

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all in in the same place because to understand that the words

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found on my mother’s tongue and slide one are all found on the other four tongues in these

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framed works and that is contributes to the sense of dialogue my

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mom being able to teach us the language and us repeating it on our tongue so there’s

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this um yeah dialogue that i wanted to create that although

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um you know we we don’t know our language there’s there’s other ways of um

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celebrating celebrating ourselves and our identities so and the syllabics get picked up in

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in new age warriors as well yeah yeah and different different kinds of syllabics in that one as well this one

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was yeah specifically danny of course but yeah you’re right so

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um through this work i was really intrigued as i was making it of the direct

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correlation to the act of stitching um this labor of love um because adornment

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and beating is a labor of love that’s deeply rooted in community love for one another

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a mother’s love for her family and community because it was mainly females within

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indigenous communities that would feed and adorn but um that’s changed and and it’s

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much more inclusive of everybody now but i was really yeah i was really became a little bit

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obsessed with this idea of what i was doing i was i was taking this skin of this um this

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acrylic gel medium that literally felt like a skin and i was stitching through

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it and there was a permanency that was being described and it reminded me so much of indigenous tattooing and

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marking in this way and so um i come across a bunch of different photos but i

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included this one this one’s actually amy melbouff an artist i really look up to as well

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and this is uh her markings on her back and i believe she received these by dion cazes i could

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be wrong on that but um this technique found on her back on the right here is called skin

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stitching and and since since this

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since creating this slide long ago i actually have have received my own

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markings and so i was really drawn to the specific type of mark making which is taking a

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needle attaching a thread dipping the thread in ink and literally sewing below the skin

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surface and and that ink being dispersed um

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under the skin so it uh yeah i just became more and more

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i guess enthralled with this the the relationship to one another and uh

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did more research after afterwards so

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um i threw this slide in because i don’t know how many people know but i

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have a jewelry business as well it works in tandem with my

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practice in the sense that they’re they’re interestedly linked being

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beadwork being adornment i don’t separate them in a sense in my head

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however i do separate them in terms of how they function differently apart from each other when

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being a business more business oriented and so um

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it’s been really beautiful to to blur that line within within my

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practice um to to not separate them not have them categorized so much as i i

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used to to see that they have so many similarities right between my my visual practice and

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and my um the jewelry i make for business but it definitely was the start of my

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introduction to beadwork um i i’m trying to think back as to when i first like made anything

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with beads and i believe it was 2008 and so i i’ve grown up

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um surrounded by bees my whole life my grandmother’s and my late grandmother is a phenomenal

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beadwork artist um so i was always surrounded by beads and and beadwork and garment making

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and the process of hide tanning and but i had never actually learned

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from her i learned from a friend kirsten ryder from morley alberta and

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she taught me two thread applique the same the same technique my grandma

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would have used and from there i just started making little

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you know pairs of earrings and gifting them and whatnot and little did i know at the time that

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that that would lead me into a textile based practice that is

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predominantly you know beadwork feedwork-based so it’s kind of the beginnings of it

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however these two photos are not my first project so don’t feel frustrated if you’re just

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starting to to beat i like to i mean every biography of yours says you know

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you describe yourself as a contemporary beadwork artist and but it’s at the same time um

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you know your emphasis on tradition right and and you sort of the ancestral practices you’ve inherited

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are sort of part of that definition of contemporary beaver gardens right yeah you keep those things in tension

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throughout i think it’s also important too and i’ll probably speak to it more but

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the the power of dress and and the power of them of fashion and generally speaking

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and how it it’s transformative in a sense and so i also look at my my jewelry practice

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you know and in comparison to that as well or like in relationship to that and so

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i think it’s it’s more me unlearning how to um there’s this idea

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of compartmentalizing everything right and and more finding the veins and and how it’s all it all comes together within my work

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so this is just a reference photo um you

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know i speak about indigenous tattooing and marking it also included piercing jewelry adornment of the body

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and all these different ways and so it’s it very much is a historical expression

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throughout indigenous communities and so um at uh at the time of missionaries

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um the first catholic missionaries or not just catholic but missionaries in general um

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there was a banning of these practices um many different types of cultural

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practices including ceremony song dance art and tattooing and adornment

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um it was all part of it right so there’s a a definite um

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resurgence and uh resistance as well to the work that i do

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and and having that work be based in adornment is is a really special um

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place i think for me to center and focus that that power that’s found in and

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yeah in dress and in adornment in that sense

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um so this this is just a still from a performance piece that i had done

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this was in february i believe of 2019 so right right before covid this was my

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last bigger body of work that i that exhibited in

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um college gallery saskatoon university of saskatchewan i had done a residency show there and

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this was um really important for me at the time like i had mentioned

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previous i’d had been learning and researching more about indigenous mark making

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indigenous tattooing and had come had drawn the conclusion that

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my my den ancestors would have received many of these same

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markings my my family doesn’t have any facial tattoos or traditional markings

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that i know of um but i know that it has has roots in the dna

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in the dna community so it was um something that i i knew i had wanted to

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receive at some point but it was one of those things that i felt it would come to me at the right

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time instead of me you know trying to chase something and so there’s definitely been a resurgence in

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tattooing and indigenous mark making and so i was put in contact at one point

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point with a um a few artists but this is artist stacey

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fant beyond hope i’m pronouncing your name right stacy um and she is based in regina

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and so she and i had a couple sessions where she had done some some arc making on my shins and

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this one in particular was a marking on my face that i wanted to be part of my my solo exhibition

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for this residency and so this actually happens within within the gallery space and we invited

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people to to come join um to come watch and um

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yeah it was it was a powerful um process

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and and especially being in a settler colonial institution it really begged

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to for these i think it was a way of trying to create a

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dialogue or maybe just more of an awareness or just to question these institutions

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on the responsibilities that they that they hold in terms of

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reflecting indigenous voice indigenous body especially on indigenous lands and so it

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was it was important for me to have that happen in in a space like this

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um yeah

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these and these are old now um these are called this is a pair of

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mukluks i had made back in i have it written somewhere i believe it was 2012

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might have been 2013 but they were they’re called the ties

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that bind and at this at this time i was um

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like i mentioned earlier i was always surrounded by my grandmother’s work and and her incredible gift of garment

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making and she made mukluk similar to this this is kind of her style that i’ve mimicked

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and she mentored me through this project it was one of the first art grants i

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had received from the saskatchewan arts board and i knew i would i wanted to

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incorporate portraits um and strong women in my life

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and um so on the left so on the right the picture on the right on the left

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hand side is my mom’s portrait and on the right is my sister’s and on the backs of each i have

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so the picture on the left but the right side is the churchill river which is where my my community of

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pachanac is based right along the churchill river and on the left is prince edward island

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and that was a representation of the east coast where my sister is now

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based at the time she had a cabin there but it um yeah that that is a representation of

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her her home at the time but also um it speaks to a family history as well

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my dad being from eastern canada and my grandfather and grandmother on my

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dad’s side being born in halifax and

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it’s it’s interesting because when i i don’t know if when i was creating this

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piece if i really understood the the level of disconnect that i was also

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navigating in this work and that being that i didn’t have strong

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connections to either place the place that i was born i i didn’t grow up in patchnack

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and my dad’s side of the family were were provinces away and we rarely got to see them so i think i was really

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navigating this idea of like home and i i continued that navigation still

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to this day you know what is home to me um how do we define

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home for for ourselves but also homelands and and uh that being uh

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i don’t know like a i guess it’s a it’s a complex theme for

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me that i’m still i still consider in my in my practice um i think now it becomes more about

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community and where i feel at home with community and that that can be enough right so

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yeah it was uh definitely um a difficult project i mean

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technically very difficult as well so i’m glad i had my grandmother’s um input and guidance and that in that um

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yeah way we also see these ideas that continue you know i think this this work we

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showed actually when i was directing the textile museum of canada and it’s they struck me then but i’ve

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noticed knowing and seeing your work since these ideas of of family

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and women and resilience and strength and then also the different forms that

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land and home can take that seems to recur you know from here from this point on

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yeah yeah definitely they capture sort of what continues to be your investigation

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and they’re wearable like you said they sort of come back this idea of the wearability work yeah

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yeah i’ve learned a lot technically too like i i learned pretty quickly after making

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this work i remember i beat it on um canvas or linen and

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when i brought it to my grandmother for the construction part she was like oh what are you doing never do that

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again so yeah i’ve come come a long way since then as well just technically

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speaking but um as you mentioned earlier in your

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introduction my work is is deeply personal at times but it is almost always focused on on my

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family history and my culture and so i thought it important to include

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a couple a couple pictures of uh this this would be on the right my first

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cousins my only my first cousins and i believe there’s quite a few of us missing

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so it’s a large family and we don’t get together very often and

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usually when we do it’s kind of unfortunate events there’s usually a death but within within it

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um we spend time together through the three four days of awake and it’s it’s a really beautiful time

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just to reconnect with everybody and so yeah it’s it’s kind of special even as

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as sad as the um occasion maybe but um yeah that’s the majority of them

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anyway um and then on the left is of my late satsune my grandmother that would have been on

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my wedding day

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so i thought i’d include a few paintings it’s really all i’ve ever done is a few

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paintings within my practice um it’s not to say i don’t love painting i really do

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um my my arts um practice really did start

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or my career i guess kind of started in painting um it was it was short-lived i i found i

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was gravitating towards beadwork um at this exact same time i was creating um

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some floral panels in beadwork to kind of accommodate this these paintings that i was working on at

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the time but these are two paintings from a body titled return

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and i’m i’m guessing a lot of people know the um the painter kehinde

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am i saying his right name right now can they wild wiley thank you wiley and his work is

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just phenomenal and i remember being so drawn to it at the time um the way that that he captures with

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the richness and color um design this way of monumentalizing

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uh the the person within the frame it’s just outstanding and so i was

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really inspired by the color palette of course the the use of floral and and floral motif

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within this body of work um and i don’t think i understood at the time exactly

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um what maybe these particular paintings were speaking to but i

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i clearly had taken these are photos and more of a snapshot type of photo

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um and i think i was really resisting that idea of um how

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often so often we’re portrayed as as people of the past you know we’re so used to like the

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edward curtis style of seeing our our families and communities and people and

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they’re they’re not colorful right they’re sepia toned or black and white and

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and it always is this referral to the past and i really wanted this work to speak to

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a vitality and a richness and a presence so i think that’s why i chose the colors

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i did as well and the types of photographs that i worked from were yeah these these snapshot images that i

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had had collected over the years so those are my references

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and then these two paintings um these were made in man i don’t have dates on any of my

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notes here i believe these are 2015. um and the painting on the left is

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titled my goodbye and the painting on the right is my grandmother on my dad’s side

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this is the sorry the title is mrs mary blackburn halifax explosion survivor 1915-2010

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and um this work was meant to be to include a third and you’ll you kind

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of can see the portraits that hang behind me in my

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goodbye there’s my grandfather on the left and my grandmother on the right and i never did finish the portrait of

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my grandfather um and i think in hindsight

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i think it’s because i didn’t have a connection to my grandfather at all um he passed and i was one and i never

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had any kind of relationship with them and so maybe there’s a reasoning behind that

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but it was just it ended up being just the two two paintings here um and

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yeah it’s um i think a way again that i was working through loss at this

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time i had lost my grandmother and like i spoke earlier this this

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disconnect from both sides of the family was really present at this time and especially after losing her and so um i

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think i i wanted to to dive into a process

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that being painting that was very time consuming and gave me and gave me time with this person as i

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was creating it right and it was this way of of trying to make up i think for

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for a lot of of loss but yeah she was a tiny woman she’d sink

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into that chair i remember when we go visit her she was so small

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so this work is um titled aboriginal classics and it’s an ongoing series for

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me i’ve created i don’t even know to date how many of these little tea bags

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but i’ve i’ve played with different styles of them i i started off similar to one the one on

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the left using seed beads and formulating these little floral or plant

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patterns on them with seed beads and some of my latest ones such as the one on the right

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that is one that includes porcupine quills and i wanted to include quills i’ve

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included quills in a few works of mine now but they predate

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beads and and that trade the trading of beads so prior to to beads um being an item

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of trade anyone within the porcupine belt would have utilized or could have

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utilized quills as a form of adornment

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saying that it is a very time consuming process especially if you’re doing you know

32:38

natural natural plant dyes to get those colors within quills it’s very intricate work and there’s

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dozens of different ways that you can create with quills so this was just one of the ways

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and i basically used them as beads where i would cut cut them into

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whatever size i needed and then i’m applying them through the hollow

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of the the quill itself to tack it down so

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a very similar process to the one on the left it just has a very different aesthetic

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i’ve since done some of these little tea bags with tufting hair animal hair tufting so

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caribou hair specifically um and so i’m yeah i’m

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i’m not sick of them yet they bring me joy but i’ve done enough of them now um

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so i’m kind of giving them a little bit of a break but um the reason i had titled this work

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aboriginal classics was a reference to this uh generalizing

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this generalizing of indigenous people under this you know large umbrella um

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and not defining us as these unique sovereign very diverse nations and i think just

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being really frustrated with it um and so i kind of taken that idea along with

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these this idea of commodity commodification of a product and also happening

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at this time and continues to happen um in so many different ways is this

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commodifying culture one example being dream catchers of course another being

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sage bundles you know whatever is the next cool trend that makes a quick buck

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people are not hesitant to to commodify culture in that way and so

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it really kind of is this play on that idea that um you know these are these little tea

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bags these little vessels hold these medicines that i’ve picked from the land that i’ve made offerings

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back to the land and so they become these um not not so

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much sacred but they become these medicine bundles in a sense and the idea that it’s in

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this tea vessel form um ready to be consumed

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so this this idea of consuming culture in that in that way um

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what’s that how many are there now i want to say there are 20 or more um

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i’m there might be more i know i have a list that i’m inventorying them all now

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um but yes some have been purchased or acquired by other galleries

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and others are in private collections but i never i never thought that this this work

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would be a continuous body of work for me at the time that i created my first six and um it they’ve also been a really

35:50

nice way to make my work accessible in a sense that they’re not um you know

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they they’re not at a high price point like other other works um so yeah more accessible for the

36:03

average buyer we have rat root in our collection here yeah yeah and um so do all of the plants

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actually refer to northern saskatchewan that’s that’s where it started

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yeah that’s where it started um and i was very careful

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with acquiring that knowledge too um there are some medicines that are sacred and they’re

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not meant to be revealed and um you know passed along in that way

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and there are certain medicine men and women in these communities that hold this this

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knowledge and so um it was very important for me obviously to not just

36:48

respect and not um you know tread that line so it was i went to my mother for the

36:55

majority of what could be used um in this collection as well as my grandmother at certain points in time so

37:02

um it did expand this collection has expanded to include some bc plants now so where i’m based

37:11

there’s actually a trail that i’m quite familiar with and they have these little posts beside the plants

37:17

themselves on the trail and it explains the traditional indigenous medicine uses of

37:23

each plant and so that kind of became like a second phase of that or an extension of medicines for

37:32

me utilizing some bc plants but yeah it’s um like i said i

37:39

maybe i’ll just end up running out of plants i don’t know maybe that’ll be the end of the series but

37:48

oh and i should maybe mention two sorry those those works um also utilize birch bark

37:54

for the tags themselves and sinew that was gifted to me from my

38:00

grandmother um i’ve since run out of that sinew so i’ve had to to find other but the the sinew is on

38:07

the little um string that holds the tag

38:14

um this is just a reference photo um before the next the next slide and it

38:22

um i just wanted it in reference to porcupine quill work and and the multitude of ways that you can

38:28

stitch or utilize quills and the image on the left

38:33

utilizes i believe it’s called straight stitch as well as zigzag stitch and the image on the right

38:41

is zigzag stitch and i believe rope stitch there are dozens of stitches

38:48

for quill work and quill work would have been a a medium that my family would have

38:56

utilized as well so that’s why i’d gain interest in quills quills themselves

39:01

my grandmother believes that she wants my late grandmother believes that she

39:06

once quilled but it would have been so long ago for her that she actually

39:11

couldn’t recall so i at the point at the at this point in

39:18

time when i was doing this kind of research for this next project

39:23

i was trying to get in contact with someone that’s still a practice quilt work within my

39:29

community and the only elder that was around at the time was 102

39:36

years old and so by the time i got my together this person had passed

39:44

on and so i had taught myself i basically taught myself from a book

39:52

how to how to quill now i only learned one stitch

39:59

so i can’t say i’m a master quilt worker at all um but i learned the zigzag

40:07

stitch it was the only stitch i did not fail completely at and um and i created this piece uh

40:14

that i titled self-portrait and uh yeah it’s the zigzag stitch it’s done

40:20

on moosehide i harvested um the quills myself for

40:25

this project and i hand dyed them but i didn’t not natural dyes i used

40:32

fabric dyes for these and yes it was quite

40:38

the process it tests patience it is a incredible um

40:44

labor of love for anyone that that uses quills they they understand um exactly what i’m

40:51

talking about it it’s time consuming you have to be yeah it’s

40:58

it’s quite the process so i thought i would take on what i thought was a small project at

41:04

the time which i think this measures 12 by 13 inches approximately which is a very

41:12

very large piece to quill so i was kind of happy when it was done

41:19

i was rushing to to get this piece done for exhibition and i really haven’t touched um

41:26

quills in this sense in this zigzag stitch technique since i got my fill but

41:34

um with this work i think i was really playing with this idea of

41:39

melding this traditional form of making with a portrait style that i had layered

41:47

in photoshop and the reason i had done it that way was to really contrast those colors

41:54

because with quill work you’re basically working in rows or in lines and so there’s not a whole lot of shape

42:01

or rendering that you can do within smaller areas hence why i

42:07

expanded it to the size i did and yeah really blocked in those colors

42:19

so this is a work that i created um so that’s me on the right hand side

42:25

with my piece and that’s my my grandmother christine on the left hand side and in the corner

42:33

of her photo um there’s also another little photo included of her and that would have been

42:38

when she was a much younger and she’s working on a hide in that picture so for those that

42:46

aren’t familiar this is a traditional technique when used when prepping a hide

42:54

before you you use the hide for for garment making or whatever you’re going to use

43:00

the hide for um it’s a extremely like it’s the process is incredible from

43:08

you know harvesting the animal to to skinning to fleshing

43:15

and then to smoking after this process it’s again a massive labor of love and

43:22

kudos to all of those those people out there doing it and there’s um you know there’s also

43:29

been a resurgence in in this as well and it’s not that it ever had ever died but there are a lot of

43:35

young young men and women doing this um doing this now and it’s

43:40

it’s extraordinary so i used to just watch my grandmother um she was just a perfectionist at

43:47

everything she did but i wanted to include that that photo there just in reference to how i’ve

43:54

framed my piece on the right and that that um yeah has a historical

44:01

meaning or traditional meaning for me just in how i framed that that work and the

44:09

excerpt that you read from at the beginning i had just included

44:14

you can find you can find the process that i talk about making this work through tnbank.com and

44:22

it kind of just reveals maybe a little bit of um the pro yeah the the behind the

44:28

scenes process for me and uh the the writing i did to accommodate

44:33

and reflect on on this work after it was finished

44:40

and i think i yeah here’s a close-up of it um so it’s titled but there’s no scar

44:48

uh question mark on that um it’s a piece from 2018 and um i

44:57

similar to the the first slide i presented our mother’s tongue this work again is

45:04

is uh me processing trauma and pain um this is a bruise

45:11

that i’ve replicated uh using beads and not everyone sees the bruise right

45:17

away which i find um really interesting people see many different things in this piece

45:22

especially if it’s at a distance or depends on how close you’re standing to the work but

45:28

um yeah i was really working through pain my own pain my own family trauma

45:36

historical trauma to to an extent speaking to collective trauma but but

45:42

watching my step in that my work or some bodies of work that i

45:48

create are really on this um there’s a fine line between

45:55

what is mine to share what is what is um mine to offer in terms of the

46:02

viewer consuming um so it always comes back to asking myself

46:07

those questions and in these heavier bodies of work um and i usually navigate it through

46:15

um through personal of a personal story or personal um experience and

46:22

some of them takes a while this one this one definitely took a while for me to explore this idea

46:29

before i dove into it um but yeah i used beads to create this

46:35

bruise it’s applied to deer skin and it’s stretched on these

46:43

poles so like i said that traditional way of framing a piece um

46:50

yeah i don’t know if maybe you have any questions about that piece specifically shauna but if you do you feel free

46:57

yeah i decided i remember you said once it was clicked you you knew you wanted to create

47:02

another one you meant you felt a lot as soon as it was collected right you created another one

47:09

yeah yeah kind of yeah phase two i guess of the work it i think it was one of those works

47:16

too that i wasn’t quite i mean every any artist is happy when

47:23

they sell their work of course and when they know what’s going it has a it will be stewarded in the

47:29

right way and then it’ll have a good home but it was one of those pieces and maybe i hadn’t

47:34

fully um quite worked through everything i needed to work through and

47:40

then i felt like okay well now i you know i’m saying goodbye to this piece and i don’t feel

47:45

quite ready so i did i did know i wanted to include it in a phase two in some way and um that’s that ended

47:53

up being what was what happened next but yeah it’s um it’s a a dark you know it speaks to a

48:01

historical colonial past this work most definitely it speaks to intergenerational trauma

48:07

um but again the the flip side of that is that to not get to not get caught in

48:14

that trauma um to work past it to work through it and and for me that’s that’s through my art

48:21

right but it’s also through these um indigenous ways of understanding and these

48:27

indigenous knowledges that that aid in that process and so

48:32

um yeah i don’t it’s a hard navigation at times and this was one of those

48:37

those pieces that well it strikes me too that you’re using the same sort of

48:42

materials the seed beads that are you know the same colors the same kind of um

48:48

materials you’re using for floral patterns for example so to cut your there’s this element of

48:53

beauty right that’s yeah yeah for the beads themselves and so when you put them in this way

48:58

and also to kind of i i know that you’ve you you photographed it outside here which gives it this sort of

49:06

the natural context also kind of adds to the the beauty of it right so um

49:13

yeah it’s interesting and then when you did the second phase it’s a garment right

49:18

yeah yeah something to wear it is interesting yeah actually i

49:24

actually made those notes yesterday [Music]

49:29

there’s some threads here again yeah definitely i’m glad you said that too because um

49:36

other people see um possibility within this and i think it’s

49:44

it’s when you’re close close up to the work too which i know not everyone has had the chance to experience with

49:49

with certain works but this was purchased by the national gallery of canada and it was actually

49:55

in exhibition in the aberdochmane exhibition um in 20 i’m blanking already on when

50:02

that was 2018 fall of 2018 and so i actually got to revisit this work

50:08

in in that gallery and um it was it was really a beautiful moment

50:16

too just to see others um others looking at it the perspectives

50:22

and and how people would get lost i think in in the the beads themselves like you said there’s this

50:29

there’s a beauty to it you know the summer’s shimmering others are matte and there’s this like play of um

50:35

of design within it itself i’ve heard others mention uh fingerprints when they’re close up to

50:42

it it resembling a fingerprint which i thought was really interesting and of course plays back into this these

50:48

themes of identity um but yeah i think it’s also really

50:53

important to speak to that beauty and that strength and that resilience and

51:00

and working past that trauma like i said and so at the time i at the second phase i took

51:07

it off the stretcher of which it was framed before sending it off to the gallery and

51:14

i i got my my friend to neil campbell i collaborate with her quite often and

51:22

she’s also a cousin of mine shout out to tania and she’s an amazing photographer and i

51:28

told her what i wanted to do with this piece and and she shot the photo on the right for me so

51:34

it’s me in that photo with the the piece itself draped on my back and

51:40

like you said it becomes a garment it becomes a garment which is really interesting now as i

51:48

as my practice is um really full circling back to some of

51:54

those first the mukluk piece for example right it’s it’s a becoming about wearable work

52:01

again um and garment wear and and fashion to an extent

52:06

and and beauty and all of those things so um yeah i wanted to wear the work

52:12

and i i got my hair braided for the occasion and those are extensions sorry to burst

52:20

and it was bubbled i thought that was my real hair but i wanted to indicate

52:26

um in in some way that my my indigenous identity and

52:33

i thought the braids were a nice way to do that and so they draped down over over the piece themselves but um

52:41

it can also speak because i haven’t shown my face it becomes anonymous in

52:47

that sense but it’s it’s also maybe more relatable

52:54

or maybe speaks to a collective experience with me not you know

53:01

identifying myself in the photo but yeah there’s um

53:08

a beautiful piece i don’t know if i have time to read it or not but when i was making this work

53:16

or actually it was after i’d made this work i didn’t really know how to speak about

53:22

it at first it it was very heavy for me and years later i came across

53:29

the work of quill christy peters who i’m not sure if you’re familiar with but she’s just an exquisite writer and and

53:37

painter and artist and and person and i found um a small excerpt from one of her her works um

53:45

that she titles decolonial love letters to our body and um if you don’t mind i’ll just read

53:52

it and i thought it was a nice relationship to this piece for me

53:58

the anger builds up in you and i from time to time they talk about reconciliation but

54:04

foreclose any spaces that allow us to feel whole after the residential schools a

54:10

generation was created that invented new ways to accept and process broken love even as small children we

54:17

recognize genocidal intent carefully charting our realities in alignment with this colonial project

54:25

shape-shifting and dancing around our parents broken bodies so that they could feel a little more

54:30

loved a little more whole even if that meant sacrificing parts of ourselves

54:36

that needed that love reflected back to us us and ashnave always inventing

54:43

technologies to resist us intelligent power beyond their

54:48

wildest dreams they didn’t realize that even children are ancestors

54:53

and homelands and spirits and dreams that we always have the ability to call

54:59

on the knowledge we have stored away in our flesh since time immemorial

55:05

so i thought it was a nice um relationship and a nice way of

55:12

um kind of closing or understanding that work for me

55:20

but yeah i i think she’s just a brilliant writer and an artist so i hope she doesn’t mind me

55:28

sharing that thank you for sharing it

55:34

okay so new age warriors holy smokes um yeah this is a large body

55:43

of work um as you can see i just did a little kind of like split

55:48

split screen scenario here on this slide um you can see the the relationship i have

55:54

to to the color color palette um in in terms of the

55:59

regalia shown at the top and and my work at the bottom and at this point in time on this slide

56:06

the photo at the bottom only includes six of the the pieces i believe there

56:13

was a total oh my gosh i always blank on this there might be nine but for

56:21

the runway event i had split this work into 12 and so there was quite a few more pieces

56:29

that came after this initial image here that you see

56:34

but um yeah this this body of work is new age warriors this is what’s

56:39

currently what you’re currently hosting at your gallery of course and um this work i guess um

56:47

time wise i’ll speak a little bit to that and you’ll see the process but it it was a two year

56:53

two year in the making um work for me and it was very challenging at times but

57:00

at the time that i i knew i wanted to do this i was really focused on on representation

57:08

um also really wanted to include this sense of

57:14

diversity of innovation within the work and so

57:20

it had formulated itself into these wearable works and that wasn’t

57:27

intentionally i didn’t know if that was going you know going to happen with the work itself it’s such a

57:34

i’ll kind of leave some of it to talk about but i didn’t know at that time that this would become

57:41

a wearable work for the runway so it’s really interesting to see this um this work do that and and again come

57:47

full circle back into a practice that speaks to um adornment of the body for me so yeah

57:54

this is the beginnings of it um i thought i can’t not uh mention my

58:01

grandmother and her inspiration in this body of work as i mentioned so many times already through this slide

58:07

my grandma’s just an incredible woman and she made her own garment she tanned her own hides

58:13

and she was always working away at her table and she’s really the epitome of strength for me

58:19

and uh and and where i i focus a lot of my my work is from the brilliance

58:26

um in in culture and den a culture and innovation and garment making and so

58:33

um really important for me to include my grandmother here

58:40

now i’m just going to check my notes here so for these works um

58:48

so for this body of work i should say i created both garment wear in terms of bodice pieces

58:55

that could actually be worn on the body um and then the medallions

59:01

and the medallions come in in different forms some of them are worn around the neck others i call them medallions but

59:07

they’re they’re in the form of head pieces so here you see kind of a combination of the work and

59:16

also for the medallion portions i’ve included glass seed beads as well so the majority

59:24

of the garments are made using perler beads um for those that aren’t familiar they’re

59:30

these little plastic beads that are a kid’s craft and you you melt them

59:36

together using an iron and that’s how they kind of fuse and bond to to each other

59:41

so um when i initially had plans for this body of work i

59:50

it was overwhelming of course and i thought how on earth would i ever create these these

59:56

art pieces or these armor pieces using glass beads i simply don’t have

1:00:02

that kind of time that would take me years and so that’s when i

1:00:08

came across this idea of perler beads and so i traded in the glass beads for

1:00:13

these plastic beads and in a way i went navigating

1:00:18

um through two years of a labor-intensive um

1:00:25

but really rewarding body of work for me um yeah there was a lot of calculation in

1:00:31

the in the forming of this work but just to introduce this slide particularly this is

1:00:39

allison whitman on the left also known as miss chief of change as i refer to

1:00:44

her she is the community resource coordinator for file hills coppell tribal council part

1:00:52

of the health services youth leadership team she is dakota cree and soto from

1:00:57

calluses first nation and her piece um incorporates ideas of

1:01:03

this beaded dance crown and also ideas of an inuit snow visor and i

1:01:11

wanted to take those two ideas and mesh them together and this is the result of that i’ve also

1:01:17

included horse hair for the tassels that hang from the headpiece itself

1:01:23

and on the right we have jill george also known as the front runner fighter

1:01:28

she is a member of the english river first nation she is also my cousin jill is a student

1:01:34

in the masters of physical therapy as well as a coach sorry co-coach in the brainsport running academy at waniskawan

1:01:41

her medallion reads quay meaning woman in ojibwe and this medallion was made in

1:01:47

collaboration with melanie parsons and um yeah it’s for this work i

1:01:56

i really wanted to center indigenous women in my life um and so i went to women who i

1:02:02

obviously had a relationship too but that they also had a relationship to community in some in some sense

1:02:10

you know it could be front line work it could be behind the scenes it could be youth work whatever

1:02:16

whatever the case may be i really wanted to highlight these women

1:02:22

and to to make them feel monumental to have them adorned in this rich color

1:02:29

palette to feel present and powerful and and all those things and so here are two

1:02:37

of them and these are two of the photos that are included in the exhibition itself and and these are done in in large

1:02:43

format um large format scale and these are taken by

1:02:49

tiniel campbell who like i mentioned earlier i collaborate with quite often

1:02:58

so this was the fun process um so if many of you

1:03:06

may be familiar but you can buy these perler beads and these big jugs and they come with sorted colors and then the top

1:03:14

row there that you see in the middle are the little templates that come in these packages and you place

1:03:20

these beads down and then you use this paper when you’re ready to iron so you’re not melting the

1:03:27

beads and you iron over top of them and that’s um yeah that’s the kid’s craft that’s the

1:03:33

instructions for it now when i went to make mine of course my

1:03:38

my garments um weren’t able to fit on these small little templates so i had to be a little bit innovative

1:03:46

and this took at least a month for me to figure out a way that was going to you know i could

1:03:53

operate and and be efficient in it in some in some sense

1:03:58

so i of course wasn’t going to sift through a huge jug of assorted beads i

1:04:03

um i went straight to to the perler company and started ordering these these bags

1:04:10

that were already you know certain colors and then i

1:04:15

took um what do you call those things like lint roller sticky sheets and

1:04:24

began to double side tape those down to a surface

1:04:29

so i eventually realized like i can’t just use my dining room table for this for two years straight so i

1:04:36

would i would sticky tape them to cookie sheets and then i could draw on

1:04:43

the sticky roller sheets themselves could draw my pattern down

1:04:48

and because they were just sticky enough i could place the um the beads on there and they would you

1:04:54

know be somewhat stable before i iron them and this process also allowed me to

1:05:00

create curvatures in my shapes it really opened um open the process up in terms of what

1:05:07

i could do and the the designs that i could formulate um by by changing it up a bit but

1:05:15

yeah it was uh trial and error um like i said i think just that finding

1:05:21

that was a roughly a month and then started to dive into my first piece

1:05:26

but in total i worked on these pieces for the full two years so

1:05:34

on and off of course but um started to go crazy by the end of it

1:05:39

with these pearly beads you see i mean when you see the exhibition and the full set of

1:05:44

of armor of gear basically you realize you know what and were talking about earlier sort of there

1:05:50

they are resilient they’re you know that they’re durable they have this flexibility they’re built so well

1:05:57

you know the labor involved yeah the fdv’s is very clear yeah it was interesting

1:06:05

too because another another um

1:06:10

roadblock was how to [Music] oh my goodness i’m just like sorry my

1:06:16

mind’s actually going back putting me at that table right now and i’m like overwhelmed

1:06:23

i had to figure out how they still could be malleable but still be fused well enough that they

1:06:29

were still you know malleable um and then i found that when you iron both sides of them they become

1:06:35

stiff and so certain certain things maybe i wanted to hold that form so i

1:06:42

would melt both sides of it but the majority of this work is only melted on the one side

1:06:48

and not so it had the capacity to wrap around the body and and you know move in certain ways

1:06:53

but yeah you’re right it was very resilient material and um i’m glad i figured it out because holy

1:07:00

smokes [Music] long process here’s just a

1:07:07

close-up shot um so you can kind of get an idea um and this is part of a cradle board

1:07:15

that you’ll see in in the next slides but here it is on the slide on the right or

1:07:22

the photo on the right um so um a large part of of the beginning

1:07:30

phase of this work was was the research the historical referencing and

1:07:39

to create something that didn’t um dive into costume and being costumey

1:07:46

because then we’re dealing with a whole other set of of problems and so

1:07:52

i was continually working and stepping back and then getting new eyes on a

1:07:57

piece and continually judging um you know what i was doing what i was

1:08:03

incorporating and it became very very overwhelming because i am trying to speak to a

1:08:11

diversity um as mentioned that that is not my own right like i i’m den a but how how can i

1:08:18

possibly speak to all these different nations that i’m trying to um showcase so

1:08:24

one way that i i began was to was to go back and do as much research

1:08:31

as i could but when that became overwhelming it actually led me to collaboration

1:08:37

and that was that’s another really powerful aspect of this work is is the amount of collaboration that

1:08:45

that happened throughout its creation and so this is just kind of an example of my

1:08:51

process or or you know how i mimicked certain

1:08:56

certain ideas within my work and and this is a traditional cradle board on the left hand side

1:09:04

um certain nations might refer to it as a papoose there’s a moss bag there are different

1:09:10

variations of of this apparatus that would hold carry a child and

1:09:16

and then there’s mine on the right that i created of course with no child in there for the

1:09:21

runway show that would have been spectacular

1:09:28

um and here it is again um so this is devin fiddler the the water

1:09:34

handweaver as i’ve named her and um this is her son

1:09:39

tucker who is just just a baby at the time and um yeah i wanted

1:09:46

i wanted this work to to incorporate large-scale portraits like i mentioned

1:09:52

um and so this was doable to have to have tucker in this for the sake of a

1:09:58

a photo um the behind the scenes of these photo shoots was really incredible

1:10:04

um speaking to that resilience of the models that that i that i chose or that were

1:10:10

involved um this for example was an absolutely frigid day in downtown saskatoon and

1:10:18

both mom and baby were just absolutely resilient and and holding poses and then running

1:10:24

to the vehicle to warm up between takes and it was really incredible to to witness

1:10:31

the process of it because i wasn’t the photographer i could just aid in in the in the

1:10:39

process itself and kind of helped to direct

1:10:45

but but more so gave to neil the idea of what i wanted and then she would formulate the shot um

1:10:52

but also this idea that i was creating this this armor um or this regalia

1:11:00

and when the wearers put it on and this happened in almost every shoot

1:11:06

that their their stance changed that their shoulders you know they were standing up straight

1:11:13

and proud and shoulders back and they were just ready for for whatever it took

1:11:20

for these shoots and um i think it’s a testament to [Music]

1:11:25

to the work itself being successful that if that if they weren’t comfortable with

1:11:30

what i was adorning them in then this was an absolute fail so

1:11:36

um it was really beautiful to see that play out in in the process and then the the photo

1:11:41

shoots themselves um yes one of the things also just

1:11:48

bring it back to this idea of place and the you know the images we saw were very rural this is

1:11:54

very urban obviously you were interested in thinking about what land is right

1:11:59

and yeah you know where wherever people live right yeah yeah yeah yeah exactly

1:12:05

challenging challenging that perception of of place and of of indigenousness

1:12:14

right and like how do people how do people see us right as

1:12:19

contemporary indigenous people and and the fact that we we um occupy all different sorts of

1:12:28

places and spaces and where were not heard well maybe i wanted to insert us in that

1:12:35

in that space to say something more about um about that as well so again um kind of

1:12:44

referencing again those those more historical photos and like the edward curtis that i mentioned

1:12:49

before and really wanting to just like completely smash that perception

1:12:55

and and create something very vibrant and contemporary and aesthetically

1:13:01

visually and at one point i remember kind of thinking

1:13:08

about it in terms of how we’re misrepresented or not represented so often and one way is

1:13:16

through like these dolls like when you’re when you’re a little girl and you go to the store and there’s like

1:13:22

barbie and fair-skinned babies and you don’t see yourself represented in

1:13:28

those ways and so i was thinking of these women being presented as these like

1:13:34

real life indigenous gi joe figures that are just like badass and

1:13:41

you know conquering these stereotypes and and being powerful in that way so it was

1:13:47

kind of like always in my mind that to create something that

1:13:53

was cohesive that that how do i say that like

1:13:58

i’ll kind of talk about it a bit more as i go through these slides but visualizing this pop culture reference

1:14:06

and for me that came with the apparel that also came under the garments that played a huge

1:14:12

role in how i visually set up this this image so having her in these

1:14:20

leggings and then mimicking the legging shape and color into that chess piece and then

1:14:27

having the cradle board focus the the syllabics on the back of the cradle board so that still has

1:14:34

presence and pops from the rest of it like all very like visually um you know conceptualizing all

1:14:41

of this but but the the flip side of that was that once i put those beads down and once i

1:14:48

melt them there’s no going back from those hours of work so it was like you know that constant play

1:14:55

of am i doing the right thing is this gonna work is this but but also trusting the photographer and that she

1:15:02

will you know she will um she has an eye for that too

1:15:07

and she she’ll set it up in a way that that we can make that all happen so and uh yeah

1:15:14

tanil took um many many different shots it was very hard to choose the

1:15:19

photos that i chose to to be exhibited in this work this was another one she had taken that i

1:15:25

i absolutely adore fell in love with this photo um but it became it came down to um

1:15:34

you know diluting it to what what am i trying to say within each portrait

1:15:39

you know and and how much can i say without overwhelming the viewer with you know all these nine portraits

1:15:45

high in the gallery space along with the armor so going through that that image or that

1:15:51

process of selection was a tough one too because i i mean you can’t deny that this is

1:15:56

another beauty photo so i just wanted to include it for the close-ups of the work itself and

1:16:03

and then the earrings um were a collaboration with melanie parsons also known as savage

1:16:09

rose her jewelry business and she created those for me using the mini perler beads so i thought

1:16:17

the pearly beads were difficult

1:16:22

so yeah it was pretty amazing work and um lovely that it all came together

1:16:29

i’d give a little bit of direction on what i what i thought would work and then she had the creative momentum to

1:16:36

to design the way she wanted but maybe it was like the color palette that i suggested or some such thing um

1:16:44

and then the choker that devin’s wearing is actually uh traditional glass beads

1:16:51

and it’s it’s syllabics for um let me get this right now it’s been a

1:16:57

while i believe it’s the syllabics for mother in dene

1:17:03

and the cradle board was my mother increase lobbix

1:17:14

so this one is sorry if you hear that noise outside

1:17:21

[Music] not that fast um so this is a portrait of uh that includes my my good friends

1:17:29

kirsten and erica ryder both from morley alberta and it’s titled warriors

1:17:36

of the rocks and the medallions read strong spirits in stony nakota which is their their

1:17:43

native tongue um and their sisters and

1:17:48

members of the stoney nakoto i already mentioned that nation kirsten is the director of training and

1:17:54

development for their band and erica is an educational assistant at morley elementary school in the

1:18:00

special needs class both are also mothers and so

1:18:05

this was another insane shoot where we had them walk out into the water um

1:18:13

freezing water and uh they yeah they were they were insanely

1:18:20

uh resilient and and held their pose and they spent i don’t even know maybe 20

1:18:25

minutes in the in the frigid cold um holding poses so this is the one that

1:18:30

i ended up choosing um and they were all very powerful shots but this one for me referenced

1:18:38

water protectors and land protectors in a sense and i was really um

1:18:45

intrigued by how the the medallions themselves touch the water or just skim skim the

1:18:51

surface and for me it almost looks like these straws that are feeding the water back into

1:18:58

their bodies so yeah it was another

1:19:04

another beautiful photo shoot and the the fluorescence of the the

1:19:11

two yeah yeah i i think i was also like um

1:19:17

i was obsessed with that that reflective tape at the time i knew i wanted to incorporate it i had plans on

1:19:23

incorporating it in more garments but this is the only one it really shows up in i think

1:19:30

and uh again it’s like that visibility i’m speaking to or or the the non representation

1:19:38

or no visibility right so it was like in whatever way i could like um make

1:19:45

something pop more um was was important if it worked right so this it worked in

1:19:52

this in these medallions so i went with it but

1:20:00

so this is just another process shot of kind of how some ideas would

1:20:06

formulate and that’s a let me get this right now

1:20:12

um women’s fancy shawl on the left top left so taking that idea of a dance

1:20:21

dance regalia that’s all beaded so incredible work and then the right

1:20:27

hand side is an inuit amati i hope i’m saying that right um and these these uh garments were often

1:20:36

used there’s there’s different uh styles so there would be like a kidz amadi a woman’s a men’s

1:20:42

um and the one that i was referencing was a woman’s amadi and that was um you’ll see them where they carry

1:20:48

their child in the hood of it and so i was really

1:20:54

taking certain aspects of that design mixed with aspects of the

1:21:00

the shawl to create the piece at the bottom

1:21:05

for for the next work and as well i incorporated plastic bag

1:21:13

for for the shawl the pieces that hang from the shawl

1:21:18

my goal was to only use plastic in this in the majority of these works because i

1:21:24

was working with a plastic material i was speaking to this mass consumption

1:21:32

of plastic and plastic waste in our society and commenting on the or

1:21:40

evolving it to speak back to this adaptability or innovation of indigenous

1:21:45

of indigenous art and garment making so i tried to keep it to plastic as as

1:21:52

much as i could i think the only things that aren’t are the straps in the back that

1:21:58

adjust it to fit the models themselves

1:22:03

um so this is katrina eaglechild also known as a mother of mobilization

1:22:11

for this work katrina is a youth coordinator in our community of patunak

1:22:18

she is also the mother of three beautiful children and she’s wearing a medallion that reads

1:22:26

um mother in sign language so i tried to um

1:22:34

i speak a little bit about that later too but i i really wanted to exemplify or highlight

1:22:40

um different languages and that diversity again through the medallions themselves and if i could make it

1:22:47

somewhat more personal for the wearer then that was the intention behind the medallion design

1:22:58

another kind of process shot um like i mentioned earlier because of this

1:23:04

overwhelming diversity and and historical context i was getting really

1:23:10

lost in the direction of certain pieces and that’s when this idea of collaboration kind of sprung about and

1:23:17

and why wouldn’t i utilize other indigenous um designers in this work if i could and

1:23:24

have their voice voices speak through it as well and so in some in some works um the futuristic

1:23:32

form came first and then i inserted this more traditional aspect to come to these

1:23:39

pieces and then vice versa on other works it was based on more traditional aspects

1:23:44

and then throwing in that that futuristic flair to come to the the final

1:23:51

structure so this piece on the far right is the piece i

1:23:57

created and it is worn on the churchill challenger which i don’t know if i’ve included in

1:24:04

this but this is it on the runway so my work got

1:24:10

invited onto runway um kind of shortly after it went into

1:24:17

exhibition it was invited onto runway show for indigenous fashion week toronto

1:24:24

and then after that for otakiaki fashion week in calgary and so this is an image from

1:24:30

one of the runway shows and so i’m just going to go back really

1:24:37

quick again so that work there on the right that i’ve created was in collaboration with this

1:24:44

person here elano and zerza alano is um i do have his information here

1:24:52

tel-tan he’s a multimedia artist and entrepreneur based in vancouver and i approached elano

1:25:00

after seeing his his work here on the left birth of the beaver clan

1:25:05

and i wanted to incorporate his work and collaborate with with him to create

1:25:10

that piece so i just wasn’t pulling from from anywhere and i i could be respectful of that and so he

1:25:17

was on board he was more than happy and he also passed along the

1:25:24

the garments that some of the models wore underneath of the piece i created so there’s a

1:25:31

a beautiful collaboration oh i did include it here it is here so some of the works differ

1:25:38

from um the exhibition how they are seen on runway differs from how they are seen

1:25:44

in exhibition so here it’s um my work show showcased or our work is showcased on

1:25:51

you know a black a black shirt just to make that work pop more and to draw the focus for this

1:25:58

torso shot and this is my sister christina duffy

1:26:03

also known as the churchill challenger her medallion kaa

1:26:08

for kick ass auntie because she is also that and um yeah she was again a trooper this

1:26:16

was like minus 35 degrees i think in saskatoon something crazy like

1:26:22

that and she stood pretty solid just another example collaboration this

1:26:30

is with artist tessa sayers using her pattern called my calling as culture on

1:26:36

the left and this would have been the start of one of my designs on the right um it

1:26:44

often my my patterns and designs would change dramatically from where i

1:26:50

started i’d i would sometimes make a piece and then hold it up to the mannequin form to see how it would

1:26:57

wrap around the body and then know where to go from there so this went from like

1:27:03

originally it was going to be a blanket piece hung over an arm um and then it changed

1:27:10

completely when i wrapped it around the mannequin and saw this more bustier-like um piece start to emerge

1:27:20

and then on the right uh you can see how the shoulders have changed since the piece

1:27:26

on the left to kind of give it this like flight this this like bird-like

1:27:32

kind of feel um to it and that to me really read like

1:27:38

um superhero-esque and so that’s it on the toronto indigenous

1:27:45

fashion runway in 2018 it’s so interesting like the yeah i

1:27:51

guess i keep thinking about how these are so futuristic in some ways and

1:27:56

you know i think what’s interesting is the questioning process that you had throughout and that collaboration was

1:28:02

always the answer to sort of where should these go right yeah thinking about the future we still need

1:28:09

to think about the past and to do that collaboratively right i think right right so it’s like a very each each

1:28:16

piece sort of breaks me you you sort of come down to the same questions right yeah yeah and how and how does it um

1:28:24

how do those things inform like you say the future right like taking the past and the present and and and

1:28:31

making sure too that i was making that leap into the future right because that was

1:28:39

the whole tone of the show was this this continued presence um into the future and so yeah

1:28:47

got some questioning there and also um i didn’t mention in this piece too that

1:28:53

there was another collaboration just with the dress underneath

1:28:58

underneath that model i’m blanking right now on her name i apologize

1:29:04

but i used two of her dresses and in this work as well uh

1:29:11

stender lisa stender i believe

1:29:16

and yeah so even though they’re futuristic they’re still happy you’ve made them to be born right

1:29:25

so this um this particular slide um the photo on the left is my my

1:29:31

grandmother’s uh mukluk the back of of one of the mukluks she had made for me

1:29:37

and my grandmother created in floral motif and also geometric design

1:29:45

and so it tended to be more geometric later later in her life and so i take i had

1:29:52

taken components of her work and incorporated them into the piece on the right and

1:29:57

you can kind of see some of the arrows and and those blocked checkered checker-like pieces

1:30:04

coming into play in the top half and then really honoring my grandmother um

1:30:10

and one way i thought would kind of be fun was this portrait of of her and it’s kind of cool my

1:30:16

my parents helped me make that actually when i was living back in saskatchewan i i rallied the troops to to get some of

1:30:23

this work done and and they were busy creating the portrait with me so that was

1:30:29

also a nice collaboration in that sense

1:30:37

and then this slide so this is my my good friend akina weaselhead

1:30:44

also known as captain kane iowa with her partner susanna

1:30:51

[Music] and i wanted to include this slide in particular

1:30:57

oh i’m sorry my dog to illuminate um indigenous

1:31:04

female identities within this body of work um identities and experiences

1:31:10

to to uh surpass the these certain gender binaries that

1:31:16

we’re so so used to um you know being represented by because the

1:31:23

indigenous communities are often include

1:31:28

two-spirited uh non-binary people and so it’s i wanted to showcase that include that

1:31:37

represent that in this body of work as well and i also wanted uh nikina and her

1:31:44

partner to feel not um how do i say it i guess just not in

1:31:51

competition with each other within the frame itself that they’re both represented at the

1:31:56

same level hence they’re both standing but also trying to differentiate that nikina is

1:32:03

the focus in this photo and so it was um it took some time to kind of

1:32:09

figure out how i would go about that but of course the end result was that she wore

1:32:14

the actual regalia or armor and susanna did not but um but still

1:32:22

figuring out what worked best in terms of giving suzanna presence within the frame as well and so

1:32:28

um i was looking back at again all historical photos where you know the man typically the man is

1:32:35

sitting and the woman is behind whereas in my photo they’re

1:32:40

both standing and there’s still that aspect of um

1:32:46

a relationship right with her arm wrapped around so yeah it was important for me

1:32:53

to include that as well and um i also like really worked with the

1:32:59

models in certain cases um when all in all cases but more so in

1:33:05

certain collaborations so with nakina she was a bit more shy to get involved and

1:33:11

and i really let her take her time with it and of course didn’t force anything and eventually she um she was like yeah i

1:33:18

think i want to do this like i want to be involved and so it was about knowing that balance on

1:33:25

on how how to make everyone comfortable within the shoot but also have them

1:33:32

understand on this grander level of what this work is representative of and it was hard at the time because i

1:33:39

hadn’t done i hadn’t finished any you know of the work it was still all being made as i was scheduling these

1:33:45

photo shoots i was like don’t worry you’ll look great it’ll be great but i was like oh my goodness like

1:33:52

please trust me um so it was really a testament to that that trust too that all of these models

1:33:59

and friends and family had with me and so um i wanted to represent nikina’s love

1:34:04

and passion for sport and basketball and so we had this talk about

1:34:11

and this this happened with um the majority of of the models but oh sorry

1:34:19

oh oh sorry there we go um how this relationship to identity

1:34:26

and how how she sees herself and how she wants to be represented and we talked a little bit about her

1:34:34

experience as a basketball player

1:34:39

and on a team and kind of her role within the team and she thought of her role as like

1:34:45

being this this bridger of two worlds with indigenous and

1:34:50

non-indigenous people on her team and that she could she could help unify or or start that

1:34:56

dialogue in a different more sports oriented way and so hence why i have mvp as her

1:35:04

medallion just kind of representative of that aspect and uh kind of a more athletic

1:35:12

chess piece in terms of like it’s kind of representative of uh you know the sports what do you call

1:35:19

them like padding for football or whatnot and so that was also a way that we could kind of

1:35:25

i was like it’s okay i’m gonna make it like this and it’ll be kind of sporty and she’s like okay okay like that’s cool so there’s ways of

1:35:33

like working through all of these um yeah ways of seeing ourselves too right and

1:35:40

and again leads back to that idea of the power of dress and how it’s transformative

1:35:48

these are just some close-ups of the medallion pieces that accompanied [Music]

1:35:54

the the armor pieces themselves or the outfits um so some are indigenous languages

1:36:02

others are acronyms i’m just gonna see my notes here for a

1:36:09

second and yeah this is uh i mentioned it earlier but i was fortunate to have this

1:36:15

work um debut on on the toronto indigenous fashion week runway

1:36:20

and then afterwards it was in the otopiaki runway as well as the santa fe

1:36:26

hope couture runway in new mexico and so it was really incredible

1:36:33

to see this work and movement because i had it on the body for the

1:36:39

portraits themselves but then to see it take on a whole other form um you know moving down the runway

1:36:47

being worn and again how these models just encompassed the power they were

1:36:53

just exemplified everything that that work was meant to do and um

1:37:00

yeah it made me so happy to witness that that again that i i was successful in

1:37:07

in that sense of achieving that goal you know it’s also unusual

1:37:13

you know when you think of an exhibition and even in the exhibition you have the garments and then the photographs but

1:37:19

to have this other level as well out in the world that you know that it was in in kind of

1:37:25

like worn and moving at one point as well yeah so yeah in these different ways it sort

1:37:31

of adds an element that you don’t have with most exhibitions right because yeah yeah and

1:37:37

also why it’s included in the exhibition itself too it’s important to include a video segment of that happening um

1:37:44

because it also speaks to this idea of the indigenous you know understanding that all all

1:37:51

objects have life that they’re they’re they’re breathing living things that that there’s life beyond

1:37:57

just you know a gallery space and seeing them in that setting or or in a museum space that that they were

1:38:04

meant to be worn and used and cared for and loved in so many different ways so

1:38:14

just another runway shot and then kind of leads me into some um

1:38:21

more current work this was um work from 2019 uh

1:38:28

titled with these hands from this land this is an install shot in the

1:38:35

college galleries in saskatoon and this is for residency work

1:38:42

the culmination of that residency work was this was this show and um as part of this

1:38:49

show i really wanted to examine tools um

1:38:54

and explore explore the functionality of tools but also the objectivity

1:39:01

objectivity of tools and like i just mentioned previous this idea that indigenous

1:39:10

understanding is that everything holds life and is living and so i really wanted to

1:39:16

free free the pieces from cases and from this like musiological way of

1:39:23

of looking at objects um and indigenous objects specifically in this

1:39:28

historical context and to just remove them from that to be seen in these you know open

1:39:36

open settings so you can really look at them and it was really interesting because a lot

1:39:42

of my family came to this opening or more family than usual and uh right

1:39:48

away like certain people didn’t want to touch right it’s a gallery setting you don’t

1:39:53

touch the work and then my family came flooding in and they’re like grandma’s rock oh my god and they’re like i haven’t

1:40:00

seen this since whenever and and uncles were touching certain pieces

1:40:05

and it just yeah it made me laugh a little bit because i mean that’s that really was the um

1:40:13

the path that i wanted this this work to take and so um these are some of my grandmother’s

1:40:19

hide scraping tools and then in the middle is her rock that she used to

1:40:24

pound dry meat into pemmican which is just like the process of taking dried

1:40:30

meat and pounding it into a more like um grinding it basically and then

1:40:36

pemmican was historically made into these these balls using uh animal fat and

1:40:42

berries and they were easy to preserve in that sense and so they’re a great like

1:40:48

uh yeah food for um that type of life nomadic lifestyle um and so

1:40:55

grandma would bring this brock when she’d come to visit us no matter where we were and she knew

1:41:00

that my favorite thing was pemmican so she would often bring this rock and set up her tarp in the basement and be pounding this pemmican

1:41:07

meat for me and it has a really i have a personal attachment to

1:41:12

um that piece itself in the center and and then my cousins who are now um hide

1:41:18

tanners and learning that themselves the traditional techniques um were really you know intrigued by the

1:41:25

the scraping tools seen on the left and right plants

1:41:31

and then one way that i wanted to reflect this more contemporary notion to the work was

1:41:38

to redesign my grandma’s florals and so

1:41:43

my my friend who’s a graphic designer helped me to create these wallpaper or vinyls for the front

1:41:50

of the plinths and that was a way of like kind of reflecting these these two worlds you know

1:41:55

coming coming together and uh yeah speaking to a a presence

1:42:02

or a a contemporary presence in this work

1:42:09

this is just a close-up of the the pemmican rock

1:42:15

i was thinking about indigenous knowledges and stories in this work and

1:42:22

um i guess reiterating these that indigenous understanding that all

1:42:28

all things hold hold energy and hold power and so focusing on that throughout this

1:42:37

this is another piece in the show um i’m not going to attempt to say it because i don’t speak dna and i will

1:42:45

butcher it but um the english title of this would be can you say it again

1:42:51

and um it’s kind of a two-part i guess uh there’s a photo you

1:42:58

see hanging on the wall of me and my mother and we’re wearing the headsets and then

1:43:04

the headsets themselves that you see in the foreground here are playing a dialogue that is emitting from

1:43:11

the plinth itself and it’s um a dialogue me and my mother are having where she

1:43:17

is um teaching me den words or denny the den language and i’m

1:43:23

repeating it and um yeah it was it was really a focus

1:43:28

on tools like i mentioned but also um seeing tools and different perspectives

1:43:35

and different lights and the fact that like headsets are a tool um indigenous on or sorry online

1:43:42

learning in terms of learning indigenous languages is a tool contemporary tool but i was also really

1:43:50

interested in the disconnect that happens between the two during the learning

1:43:55

aspect of this which is that things are lost in translation or things the intonation of words

1:44:04

are not always accurate or in the right dialect and so it was this

1:44:10

constant like how do i learn the language if i’m not surrounded by it um and someone might

1:44:18

say will you go to the online learning tool well what if the tool is not in the right dialect and it becomes this very

1:44:25

complex way of understanding um and learning language and and how hands-on that really is

1:44:33

right to to the need to be surrounded by it to fully grasp it

1:44:40

so yeah

1:44:46

that’s just a close-up so i just beaded i beaded the um the tops of the headsets

1:44:52

and the the one closest to us says like this with a question mark and then the other

1:44:58

headset has uh just beaded question marks all along it so kind of making visual

1:45:05

that that dialogue that was happening and there was a lot of laughter also involved in the making of this work

1:45:11

which was really um important too oh my battery

1:45:21

that’s a sign yeah um but yeah it was it was a it was a nice

1:45:28

moment for me and my mother to have the making of this work so

1:45:34

and this is another piece from it called trap line and i’m i’m speaking to both my my

1:45:41

grandfather’s history of being a trapper fisherman provider in that sense

1:45:47

and um sorry inserting also my grandmother’s feminine

1:45:54

touch in terms of adornment and so the the blood dripping from the traps is

1:46:00

actually all beads and the beads pool there to mimic blood and uh the pink just adding a little bit

1:46:08

more of a feminine flair to it and so it becomes a reflection of both of those worlds and

1:46:17

processes and identities and all of it

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