Indigenous artists make cultural stand By: Jen Zoratti Posted: 7:00 PM CDT Thursday, Sep. 27, 2018

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/09/2018 (2185 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

What makes a place?

That question was at the heart of This Place on Treaty 1 Territory & the homeland of the Métis Nation, a new public-art project featuring four sculptural works by contemporary Indigenous artists — Rebecca Belmore and Osvaldo Yero, Kenneth Lavallee, Julie Nagam and Roland Souliere — commissioned by the Winnipeg Arts Council. Installed around Air Canada Park in downtown Winnipeg, these pieces will be unveiled to the public at a concert celebration from 3:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. featuring a slate of Indigenous performers, including Leonard Sumner, the Help Wanteds, the Asham Stompers, Nikki Komaksiutiksak, and Ray (Co-co) Stevenson, Rhonda James and the Walking Wolf Singers.

Friday’s unveiling of This Place is one of the 470 free cultural events happening this weekend as part of Culture Days Manitoba, an annual three-day celebration of art and culture — the things that make this place our place. From Sept. 28-30, Culture Days will be celebrated in 26 communities, towns and cities in Manitoba.

The Winnipeg Arts Council believes in the importance of decolonization through public art. To that end, This Place is the result of several years of consultation with the Mayor’s Indigenous Advisory Circle, as well as Indigenous artists, elders, knowledge-keepers, curators and scholars. “It’s like an iceberg,” says Alexis Kinloch, the project manager of public art at the Winnipeg Arts Council. “You’re seeing the public art part, but below or before that came a lot of asking questions and listening.”

The four works that compose This Place are striking and varied: Belmore and Yero used concrete and weathering steel to create O-ween du muh waun (We were told), a stack of school chairs erected as an “anti-monument” to forced colonial education. Lavallee’s The Square Dancers is an ode to jigging, the traditional dance of the Métis — itself a symbol of resilience — in blue-painted steel. Souliere’s Mediating the Treaties is a vivid $3 coin that “captures the ambivalence of Treaty No. 1.”

Nagam’s Electrical Currents, meanwhile, is an abstract water turbine made from glass and steel.

“I’d been thinking about my time in northern Manitoba — I lived in Thompson for six-and-a-half years — and I’ve seen a big chunk of the hydroelectric developments that have happened in northern and central Manitoba,” says Nagam, who was one of the co-curators of the Winnipeg Art Gallery’s Insurgence/Resurgence Indigenous contemporary art exhibition that was on display last winter. “I was really interested in bringing to light the aspects that southern Manitobans might not be aware of. I was interested in thinking about how we’re constantly consuming energy without understanding where that energy comes from. We know that hydroelectricity is one of the better sources, but it still has detrimental effects on communities.”

Together, these four works create a space for reflection, celebration and connection, as well as representation and reclamation.

“When we think about what reflects a place, public art is a big part of that,” Kinloch says. “The artists in this case spent time in this park and talked to people who spend time in this park. That’s the importance of public art: reflecting the meaning of community. It can also be a place-making thing as well. Something that becomes iconic and exciting for people can act as a meeting place as well.”

“It sparks people’s curiosity. It reaches masses of people in a way that a gallery or museum can’t. It can shed light on political and social issues that can get ignored or forgotten”
– Julie Nagam on the role of public art in society

That kind of collective excitement about art has been a big driver of Culture Days’ growth, says Nicole Matiation, co-chair of the Culture Days Manitoba board of directors. Since 2013, Winnipeg has consistently outpaced other Culture Days cities in Canada in terms of number of events hosted, but Culture Days is not just a Winnipeg thing. Dauphin, Flin Flon, Gimli, Morden, Virden and The Pas are all featured cultural “hubs” this year.

“Because arts and culture is about place and because they’re about people gathering, it’s spread all over the province,” Matiation says. “We often point to Flin Flon because it’s been such an amazing example of how a place that already has a strong engagement with arts and culture can really grow and expand through a regular activity that then starts focusing this energy around arts and culture into a single weekend.” (In 2017, Flin Flon was No. 3 in the country for number of events hosted, just behind Toronto.)

Public art has the power to keep the party going all year round, so to speak. The works in This Place, for one example, will have lives beyond the three-day festival; every day is a culture day in a city with a strong public art scene.

“(Public art) marks space in a different way,” says Nagam, who has long advocated for more public art in Winnipeg. “It sparks people’s curiosity. It reaches masses of people in a way that a gallery or museum can’t. It can shed light on political and social issues that can get ignored or forgotten.

“Cities that are rich in culture are rich in all aspects. They’re economically strong, they’re socially strong, they’re emotionally strong. I think people can underestimate the power of art, but it can bring communities together, it can spark dialogue, and it’s the sign of a healthy, thriving city.”

jen.zoratti@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @JenZoratti

Jen Zoratti
Columnist

Jen Zoratti is a Winnipeg Free Press columnist and author of the newsletter, NEXT, a weekly look towards a post-pandemic future.

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