Jude Norris

The Bear is talking

The crowds are silent

The Antler is animated

And the Buffalo is breathing -in binary

You’re located within the networks of interdisciplinary artist Jude Norris’ design, a re-created, neo-colonial contact zone. Where digital projections and multiple mediums impart the circularity of colonial memory, embedded within the “cultural geographies’ of both organic and technical-lands. Upon which Norris has mapped out the live-matter of “disparate paradigms,” located within a “new-frontier” as an attempt to (re) engage the audience toward a positive, postcolonial dialogue.The artist’s epistemological intervention here-is spoken in relation to land.

As She speaks…

“They Speak- We Speak”

Toward survival / the resistance of erasure

She is also working toward

“Recovering the sacred”

Bear” witness, to what is “written” through rhythm, gesture, light, shadow and Spirit.

As you see the visual of the bear walking against text, he is animated, illuminated, with a knowledge of his own. Through guttural, animalistic gesture, he is heard speaking, toward land and culture. The Bear is talking, as he circles the boundary, of the dictionary in an effort to protect our ideologies from being overcome, erased, and replaced, by text. As we witness his refusal toward containment within the environment of “cognitive imperialism”

He Speaks

She Speaks

“They Speak-We speak”

Toward the decoding of a language

That originally sought to conquer our own.

He- Bears the scars born of his duty to maintain and protect (land and language) and She- bears the responsibility, of breaking, transforming the boundaries of these disparate (rhythm vs. ‘ism) ideologies. The artist / the bear, position new ground, of old distinction, with the hope for engaging in a just dialogue, of true democratic reconciliation. And yet- to prescribe any postcolonial position; we are first required to briefly “diagnose the disease” Milan Kundera once prescribed oppression, under imperialism as….

“The struggle of man against power-as the struggle of memory -against forgetting”

If the process of imperialism is an attempt to eradicate cognition / Indigenous memories of relationships to land, language, and ideology; then the effort to resist this type of erasure, must be to upload our cultural consciousness, as a means of not forgetting.

Indigenous artists for thousands of years had always maintained this function of uploading consciousness into our art forms. Norris “bears witness” to this, as she tells us of her own survival, of a history, that came with the forced imposition of an ideology initially inserted through language. The angst of this consciousness, is returned toward text, through the Spirit of the Bear’ devouring the dictionary.

The bear – ingests text

Not only -as a weapon of defense. -Against containment, in text

But by-ingesting text.

He internalizestext

In order to decode it

& “un-write the empire”

The bears teachings are two fold –First- to resist homogeneity / the erasure of memory, by refusing to be contained within only one singular language / frame of thought; as he is recognized to carry his culture forward. Seemingly contrary to this-the bear also suggests that the participants seek / ingest as many alterior ideologies, as we are capable (while remaining distinct) so that we may increase the possibility of building our emancipation,through engaging multiple understandings,that will in turn be transmitted towards the hearts and minds of “others.”

Towards those -who do not yet know-what we know.

Which is…if you can ingest my text- you may, feel my heart

“If you speak to a man in a language that he understands

It goes to his mind

But if you speak to a man in a language

That’s his own-

It goes to his heart”

The quote above tells of the importance of using language as a decolonization strategy. Spoken by Nelson Mandela. Suggesting that, if our goal is in working towards sovereignty then we must speak to the heart of others, not only in defense of self, (Land, Language and ideology) but instead with the aspiration to develop a shared understanding-, so that we may engage one-another with empathy, in working towards a true postcolonial space.

Rodney Bobiwash an Anishnawbe scholar, activist and warrior had also stated thus, when he said….

“Let them weep,”

For the tens of millions of our ancestors buried beneath that pavement and concrete;

(…) And, allow those tears to wash away the scales of willful ignorance from their eyes,

So that they may join us in the redemption of the earth,

In the salvation of humankind

And (also) in the reclamation of history

Indigenous artists have carried this function of reclaiming / rewriting history since contact and today-Norris attempts to “wash away the scales of ignorance” by suggesting that the witness - ingest text

Of Land language- Of Our language- Of Bear language

So those, by becoming familiar with a language of disparate ideology, may work toward, increasing our knowledge base, and protect our cultural geographies from becoming extinct. Norris uploads this type of critical consciousness through the use of audio-where one must employ headphones; making the participant, go inside oneself, in an inserted effort to listen. Once inside the audio-you hear / ingest, altering languages / cultural communication systems relaying differing definitions of the term “bear.”

They speak,

In English and Cree,

Accompanied by the guttural, animal

Ancestral sounds

Of bear -defining “bear”

Main Entry: 1bear

Function: noun

Bear: any of a family of large heavy mammals of America and Eurasia that have long shaggy hair, rudimentary tails, and plantigrade feet and feed largely on fruit, plant matter, and insects as well as on flesh

Bear: something difficult to do or deal with

To bear arms

To bear the weight of oppression

To bear the responsibility of protecting land and language

And in not becoming forgotten

The same responsibility that is evident in Norris installation titled “Highly populated Antler Series”

see artist link for imagery

http://www.judenorris.com/installation-work/indigenous-metropolisimmigrant-wilderness

Which situates a moose antler hanging from the ceiling, by a crudely knotted noose. The Hanging Antler is further weighted, by video projections of a highly populated New York city, street scene.Where both- the people projected and the moose-have in reality-all been displaced. We can hear the pandemonium of the streets, by the pounding of their feet. Reminiscent, of the thousands of “trail(s) of tears” that have been forced upon this world. The removal of Indigenous peoples from ancestral lands. The exodus of a mass migration of moose / of people, speaks towards the countless others who have also been stripped of sovereignty, dispossessed of Land, left fragmented, broken divided, missing parts of our epistemological foundations, upon which we are dependant for survival. By sharing our stories in text and audio/ uploading our consciousness into our art forms and also online, we may recognize each other and begin to unify; in solidarity –to honor the diversity amongst our memories.

Norris has created the grounds for us to share our experiences, so we will not forget.

The Animated antler reads as a ground to meet, share / re- write our memories. The Antler acts as a type of “mystical magical writing pad” that maintains its diversity, by giving precedence toward Judes’ geography. The artist maintains her local knowledge by uploading her consciousness as being genetically embedded within the landscape of the antler.

Norris is also genetically embedded within the Buffalo. As women-we are genetically embedded within all that is living. Our women are respected as being “the direct manifestation of Earth in Human form” (laduke) these teachings inform us that the Land is Our Mother. She is the living / breathing infrastructure that provides us with the essence of Being; She nourishes Us with the basis of our inherent, epistemological systems.

The buffalo is representative of woman

When The White Buffalo Woman first appeared to us she taught us the basis of our responsibility toward “all manners of life” She carried with her a Sacred Pipe, that is the tool used in bringing us together. The Buffalo / Puskwa Moostoos (in Plains Cree) emanates majesty, power and wisdom, bravery, tenacity, and strength of community. The buffalo in the past provided for all of our needs and sustenance by offering herself to the people. For this nourishment and matriarchal devotion we remember & honor ,serve, revere and protect her. For If the buffalo demise, it is also equal to the demise of our women.When Norris uploaded the consciousness of a buffalo online, her purpose was two fold

In speaking

Toward survival & the resistance of erasure.

She also worked toward

“Recovering the sacred” (laduke)

As the buffalo is seen, emanating from the screen, the Power of her Spirit is illuminated-animated beyond the border of any physical domain. Her Spirit has become repopulated within alterior geography, created in binary. The artist transformer, shape shifter, has transformed aspects of the fourth world, into a new ground of alternative territories

Is the buffalo breathing in binary? Can Spider web theories allow- for Spirit -in cyberspace? Well, Yes! If we look to string theory as spider theory, when all is in harmony, is the same as saying “all is related.” Spider / String theory, as an understanding of cyberspace, enables the indigenous consciousness to be successfully animated / uploaded/into the web. And like the bear, our consciousness will not chose to be contained solely within another’s “cognitive imperialism” Because the Spirit of the bear is able to walk beyond the boundaries of both physical and virtual space. The Creator/ artist-has uploaded an Indigenous consciousness- (through he bear, antler and buffalo) in order to re-write / over-ride - the divide.

Norris- “Yeah! (An) intertribal ether-territory.”

Guillermo Gomes Pena from The New Barbarians 12.23.06 @ 02:08 pacific

A declaration of poetic disobedience from the New Border

Winona Laduke from Recovering The Sacred: The Power Of Naming And Claiming (Hardcover - 2005-03-01) Publisher: South End Press

Marie Battiste- “Reclaiming Indigenous Voice and Vision”

4 gomes pena

5-The Book of Laughter and Forgetting is a novel by Milan Kundera, published in 1979.

Howard Adams “"we've internalized the values of our oppressors"

Rodney Bobiwash

Re-Materializing the Matriarchy

INDIGENOUS WOMEN AS ARTISTS
(RE) MATERIALIZING - THE MATRIARCHY

Indigenous women know that our societies traditionally followed under whats been termed, a “matrilineal order.” Although western anthropologists continue to dispute this, as being a mere “myth of matriarchy,” our art forms have carried these facts forward. We know of matriarchal systems because our traditional art forms have transmitted these teachings unto us through a unique Indigenous process. These teachings are carried, generation upon generation, through the multimedia of our art form. From the pictographs of ancient times, to the quillwork found on baskets, the function of our art form has always served in the purposes of transmitting cultural knowledge. As oral peoples’, our artwork has acted as the method of writing, history and identity. Indigenous artworks created during the past five hundred years are evidence of this, as our art has depicted the coming of the westerner, the spread of disease and the demise of the buffalo. However - It is also with the demise of the buffalo that our traditional role as women, demised. Before the arrival of colonialism, our women were not considered inferior. It was the beliefs of Christianity that infused this patriarchal mentality amongst our Nations and it was the illegal legislation of the Indian act, which took away our respected matriarchal positions. The effects of these Eurocentric theories upon Indigenous peoples, has been horrendous, but it is the role of woman as Matriarch, which has suffered most.

As colonial expansion and the industrial revolution sought control, the Nation became infected with a colonial contagion that raped, and exploited our land, and because we (as women) are the “direct manifestation of Earth in human form. ” we also, suffered rape, disease and devastation. - We continued with the responsibility of maintaining our cultural and ecological “survivance” by taking care of our land, carrying our culture forward, and also by transmitting this knowledge through the “writing” of our history and contemporary reality, into our art forms. It is the role - of the contemporary Indigenous women artist, to continue that function, of transmitting the messages of the Matriarchy, to the masses. Today – we continue to create artworks that pronounce these messages of matriarchy - by representing its legacy in material form.

The Conundrum of critical pedagogy in Arts Education

The Conundrum of critical pedagogy in Community Arts Education

As an Aboriginal artist, Mother, activist, and educator, I have always held the belief that the main purpose of community arts education was to provide a vehicle to facilitate the voice of marginalized societies. Yet- all that I have witnessed during the past decade of my own involvement within these institutions is the continued subjugation of Indigenous knowledge. Case in point, during my seven years of studying "Art and Art History" in Canada, I never once was presented with the opportunity of studying an Aboriginal art history. Imagine how an aboriginal student would feel, as they attend these institutions, which are located upon traditional territory, and never once being witness to an accurate representation of them-selves within. What are the effects of this academic apartheid upon the Aboriginal students psyche? As we recognize ourselves as being non-existent within the academy, we become forced, either to succumb towards feelings of inferiority "by the death and burial of our local culture,"(quote) or to revolt. If the complete negation of traditional Aboriginal epistemologies from the academy, is part of Canada's plan to create a homogenized society(ibister) , then educators employing critical pedagogy must challenge the hegemony of Eurocentric thought by decolonizing the curriculum, through enabling the complete recovery and validation of the subjugated students knowledge. Our revolution will be only be realized by ensuring that the Indigenous local, become precedent. For- if we attempt to mobilize international social justice movements without maintaining this requirement, we will only become guilty of contributing towards the homogenization of resistant culture. It is only through recognizing and maintaining our diversity locally, that we may find our strengths, in the struggle against the colonization of culture, globally.

Enacting Emancipation-

ENACTING EMANCIPATION-an exhibition at A-Space gallery

The sixtieth memorial of the Palestinian Nakba

(catastrophe of 1948)

inspired this study of the interconnectedness of Indigenous experience

under colonialism.

Tannis intro-

When addressing the similarity of colonial oppression(s) between the Indigenous peoples of North America and Palestine, it is crucial to remember the words of the late Edward Said, who stated that the task at hand was for the individual “to universalize the crisis, to give greater human scope to what a particular race or nation suffered, [and] to associate that experience with the suffering of others.”[I]

Born from this intention, Enacting Emancipation unravels a universal, international system of colonial technique and strategy in order to reveal diverse, localized modes of resistance. Cognizant of the dangers in homogenizing resistant cultures, the curators sought contrast in defining the individualized artists strategies of defense, which in turn elucidated the fact that the differences of defense were culturally based and inheritably Indigenous.

The importance of maintaining diversity was addressed by the late Anishnawbek scholar and activist Rodney Bobiwash, when he said…

We will reject the mediocrity of cultural homogenization and embrace the immense power of diversity forged in respect for the complementarities our different communities bring to the struggle. The heart of the struggle must be community. Although the struggle is international in nature, the site of conflict and resistance is local.[II]

Enacting Emancipation honors these distinctions in both the display of artwork as well as the structure of curatorial text.[III]

Tannis:

The universal nature of colonial strategy is predicated upon “the myth of emptiness” theory. Whereupon Indigenous peoples are viewed as living in a “state of nature”, without morals, government or civility, deemed to be forever thought of as; primitive, savage, backwards and inferior in comparison to euro-centrism. The belief that Indigenous peoples are without knowledge and unable to govern lands- is the myth which is used to justify colonial occupation. The ongoing confiscation of Indigenous land in both America and Palestine, is the continuation of such mythic belief. The artists of “enacting emancipation” aesthetically deconstruct the colonial “myth of emptiness,” through their revisionist portrayal of Indigenous identities, rooted (as always) in relation to land."

The heart of the struggle for Indigenous Peoples has always begun with Our profound relationships to Land, and the immediacy of needs in defending it. This relationship to Land is the preeminent, analogous essence amongst our nations. Although knowledge system(s) stemming from Turtle Island are not universal in nature, a common teaching – amongst an array of ideology – tells us that the Land we are fighting to protect – is Our Mother.

She is the living / breathing infrastructure that provides us with the essence of our Being; She nourishes Us with the basis of our inherent, epistemological system(s). Through these teachings we have come to know that WE ARE the Earths descendants; Our “Women – are the direct manifestations of Earth – in Human form.”

Erica Lord knows this to be true. Lord (re)defines her body / her land as being rooted from a particular ideology, born of the ecosystem of particular place. It is from this traditional place that Lord receives her power, to re-write / recover her context as an Indigenous woman. In the Sun Tan Series Lords body is written as the “site of conflict.” “Colonize This!” read the English words, branded upon skin, slithering up on flesh, toward mounds of thigh and buttocks, the language of imperialism impounded against body, attempting to exploit her land. Imagery embedded behind the psyche of a “colonial gaze,” reading Lords body only as exoticized savage, empty, there for the taking, the settler, master, preacher, man, who is wanting to harness her Lands. The racist’s own ideology is used as bait in Lords’ re-writing of the fantasy of their encounter, wherein Lord successfully undresses a universal ideology of oppression. For Lord lies not in waiting and NEVER in submission, rather she is prowled, painted, traditionally prepared for their encounter, in defense of her territory, resistant to the Rape of America saying “Colonize this” – you patriarchal prick, I dare yah.

Lords relationship to land is the gendered addition to the Artifact Piece, Revisited performance, (first performed by James Luna in 1987. Luna’s original performance challenged the taxonomic study of the American Indian. By inserting himself into the anthropological discourse as a living breathing animated Indian, Luna “un-wrote” the theories of race based representation). Lords (re)writing of the western taxonomic study of her body-as-artifact, challenges the notion that man is in control of her nature. Lords Lands – refuse to be contained – especially by a language not her own.

This strategy of recovery’ of body / land and culture is also evident in James Lunas Apparitions piece. An image consisting of five Grandfather Spirits (seen as smoke, transparent in the sky), is joined by five of their descendants (standing on the ground below). All men raise rattles and shakers (instruments of ceremony) to salute and honor the Spirits of their past, present and futures. Recovering memory, based in Land, moving forwards, a circular continuum, of warrior men, who portray the necessity of utilizing culture as a weapon of defense.

The colonial strategy of forcefully uprooting Indigenous nations from traditional lands is an attempt to remove us from culture and erase our inherent distinctions to Land. Stripped of sovereignty, dispossessed of Land, we are left fragmented, broken divided, missing parts of our epistemological foundations, upon which we are dependant for survival. For the descendants who’ve been disenfranchised from their lands and culture, Luna provides them with a chance to (re)connect. Situated directly below, (a ceremonial object that provides us with the ability to communicate with Ancestors). This peace pipe is no artifact – it’s still being used in an esthetic sense of ceremony. The work reconnects us to the Ancestors, who remind us that in order to (re)gain our strength and heal from oppressions, we need to reconnect with the traditional foundations of our land and culture.

Vicky:
Originating with the moment of forced exile from indigenous lands, John Halaka’s larger-than-life-sized figurative drawing memorializes the Nakba: the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians that took place in 1948, when the state of Israel was created. Stripped of Our Identity and Driven from Our Land is built from a single stamp that reads “forgotten survivors.” Through the aggressive act of stamping the ink and paint onto the canvas, the artist has created a pounding (rather than a drawing). The rhythm of Halaka’s muscular action expresses “the harsh style [and] hand-to-hand struggle” that political theorist Frantz Fanon argues artists create when fully engaged in the resistance of their people.[IV] The monumental repetition of the phrase “forgotten survivors” dwarfs the viewer’s body. Standing before the pounding, viewers are encouraged to confront the violence and disorientation of this cataclysmic moment in history. At the same time, the rendered figures are devoid of specific cultural markers, thus rather than the Nakba, the work could evoke the Cherokee Trail of Tears for some viewers or the Jewish Holocaust for others, for as cultural critic Walter Benjamin has written, history can be perceived as “one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage.” [V]

Emily Jacir’s Where We Come From looks at familial and cultural fragmentation caused by the restrictions currently placed on the movement of Palestinians within their occupied homeland. Jacir’s photo- and text-based social intervention began with a question posed by the artist: "If I could do anything for you, anywhere in Palestine, what would it be?" The question’s resonance relates to the fact that Palestinians are denied the right to return to their ancestral lands, as well as denied freedom of movement based on their citizenship status. Those in the West Bank and Gaza, for example, are stateless refugees and are essentially jailed within a maze of checkpoints and behind the apartheid wall – the Berlin-like Wall built by the state of Israel that is taking more Palestinian land and estranging Palestinian communities from one another. Jacir, however, has an American passport that allows her a somewhat privileged freedom of movement. In one request to the artist, Jihad, a man who lives in Ramallah and is denied the right to travel to Gaza to see his mother, asks her: “Visit my mother and hug and kiss her and tell that these are from her son,” In this work Jacir has made visible the absence and longing that haunts the intimate moments of those living under colonial rule.

Halaka’s pounding shows us the originating moment of removal from the land, while Jacir’s installation shows us the ongoing forced fragmentation of an indigenous community. These are some of the strategies – part of a larger project of genocide – that make possible the colonizer’s myth of terra nullius (empty land). By stripping people of their identity, driving them from their land, and denying them the possibility of return to a connected community, the colonizers’ hope is that these people will perish. In the words of the first Prime Minister of Israel, David Ben-Gurion, “the old will die and the young will forget.”

In North America the strategy of forcing the young to forget was enacted and supported by government policy. Beginning in the 1800s and continuing in some places until 1996, Indigenous children were forcibly removed from their families and placed in church-run residential schools, where they were forbidden to speak their languages, taught their culture was evil, and often physically and/or sexually abused. Rather than simply forgetting the moment of violent displacement, residential schools aimed to estrange Indigenous children from their families and their culture. This is a desired end for the colonial power, as the empty-land myth becomes successful when the survivors and their offspring no longer claim membership in the oppressed group.

After and during the forced estrangement and dispersal of colonized communities, and while our ancestry naturally continues to become mixed as we live in the world, James Luna’s Half Indian / Half Mexican triptych series suggests that we do not become half. Rather than loosing authenticity or the right to speak as a part of the colonized community, mixing instead causes an expansion where the mixed persons become links. The terminology of “half” suggests that something is not whole, that part of it was lost. Luna’s visual terminology suggests that he is doubly whole. Identity is fluid and fragmentary, yet Luna refuses to have the indigeneity of his identity dispersed. Rather than the estrangement that is forced and fostered by colonialism, Luna’s essentialism is self-aware and strategic. The strategy of defense that Luna offers here is one that keeps him linked to his inheritance. In other words, if there continues to be First Nations people then there continues to be someone with whom the occupier must settle land claims. And if there continues to be Palestinians then there remains the possibility of a sovereign Palestinian state. What is at stake in claims to Indigenous identity in North America and in Palestine is the refusal to foreclose on the possibility of decolonization.

Tannis conclusion:
Together, the artists in this exhibition – James Luna, Emily Jacir, Erica Lord, and John Halaka – signify the individualized experiences of Fourth World peoples who have been stripped of context, denied distinction, and disenfranchised from traditional territories. Together, they present an immediacy of need in defending land and citizenry, the recognition of sovereignty, and their personal engagements in the quest for freedom.

-Tannis Nielsen & Vicky Moufawad-Paul, Curators

[I] Edward Said, Representations of the Intellectual: The 1993 Reith Lectures. (Pantheon Books, New York, 1994), p. 33.
[II] Rodney Bobiwash, “Statement to the World Social Forum,” in Porto Alegre, Brasil, 2001.
[III] The curators’ belief in the necessity of articulating two distinctive First Voice pedagogies in the interpretation of these artworks was maintained with the hope that their unique readings would offer the audience a wider means of language to work from in the development of emancipatory knowledge.
[IV] Frantz Fanon, Wretched of the Earth, (Grove Press, New York, 1963), p. 220.
[V] Walter Benjamin, “Theses on the Philosophy of History,” in Illuminations, edited by Hannah Arendt (Schocken Books, New York, 1988), p. 257.

thesis-needs visual component-to make sense

-2006-
Not Forgotten!
really only makes sense with the visual thesis that can be viewed here
http://www.isuma.tv/hi/en/tannis-nielsen

She knew.

“No!”

About being an Indian.

“I used to know those things.”

She knew,

because she was witness,

to the erasure

of her-story.

Born into a political position of imperial subjugation in 1914, My Grandmother suffered the effects of living under a colonial policy that was “[…] designed to […] obliterate identities, memories and to silence or to suppress [traditional] ways of knowing […]. “ (Pg. 36 Smith) “Not forgotten!” is a visual oratorical narrative of reclamation, “ of reconnecting and reordering [our] ways of knowing “which were submerged, hidden or driven under ground”(pg. 69 Smith) by an imperial domination, that was born and justified by theories stemming from the enlightenment. Theories such as Thomas Hobbes’ "state of nature," “manifest destiny” and modernists reference to the “theory of the universal”. The negative effects of these theories upon Indigenous peoples have been countless, and today, we continue to be “oppressed by theory” (pg38 Smith)

“Not forgotten!” is a visual, oratorical form of resistance against “cognitive imperialism.” Both the artwork and the writing, serve as sights of testimony against the structures that enforced the “forgetting” of localized histories.

In writing about this work, I attempt to deconstruct / decolonize the structures of English literacy by utilizing an anti-colonial “first-voice” Indigenous perspective. I choose sovereignty in writing with the recognition that “language carries culture and the language of the colonizer became the means by which the mental universe of the colonized was dominated.” ( Ngugi wa Thiong’o Pg 36 Smith.)

and also because;

attempting to use

an imperial structure / a foreign language

to articulate my Grandmothers voice

would only serve in taking “it” away.

making it

further - forgotten.

forced to become

erased and replaced

by the colonial -containments –

of an english punctuation.

it is ….THIS

I RESIST

because attempting to use

the structure of a language

that originally sought to contain

my Own

would only serve in

taking it way

contributing further

to the loss of My Grandmothers

ORIGINAL -Traditional - Rhythmic,

Indigenous essence.

Indigenous scholars such as Jean Frye Graveline, and Peter Cole and Ngugi wa Thiong’o have already set precedence for this type of ant-colonial discourse. In fact, Peter Cole wrote his entire dissertation “without chapters and punctuation.” When asked how he was able to have his dissertation accepted he replied that “he didn’t ask if he could; he recognized that it was just what he needed to do. The permission resided in himself” (CAUT report). Cole wrote

we are narrators narratives voices interlocutors of our own knowings
we can determine for ourselves what our educational needs are
before the coming of churches residential schools prisons
before we knew how we knew we knew

As a Native woman writing within the academy, I choose “this view of [performative literature as it] parallels the commitment within certain forms of “Red Pedagogy to the Performative,” as a way of being, as a way of knowing, as a way of expressing moral ties to the community.” (Graveline, 2000, p. 361; Grande, 2000, p. 356).

this performative style of writing

is parallel

to the circular nature of the narrative

in “Not forgotten!

as my intent in creating this piece

was to represent

the decoding of colonial memory

I could not write of it

by using

a colonial voice

and so

I choose sovereignty in writing

Because My voice and rhthym

Refuse to be contained

within definitive

definitions

That are not my own.

“I lack imagination you say

No. I lack language

The language to clarify

my resistance to the literate…”

(Cherrie Moraga)

in “Not forgotten!”

I use “first voice” perspective

x’s four.

as the stories being told -are narrated by

my Mother

my Grandmother

my Earth Mother

and Myself.

by doing this –

I wanted the viewer

to feel a sense

of how it would be

to visually layer

voice

within the movement

of memory.

as retold, reflected and repeated

upon the mylar

and upon the walls

an all encompassing

Matriarchal subconsciousness

-here

it was my hope

that the viewer would also recognize

themselves

in the story

of colonialism.

as we are all involved

there is no escaping

that truth

only Light

is seen to escape

Light = truth

escaping time

Light Creates Time

the Light here

is an Ancient

Embryonic time

a primordial soup

a Living Entity

Created

and – animated by memory

here,

I wanted the viewer

to feel

as if they walked into an

inner-cognitive space

containing narratives of healing

from oppression,

Resistance and of mourning.

and because the space here

is connected to land

the voices of Earth

are comfort

to the experience

Of listening

to Crow, to Cricket,

to Eagle

Wind and Thunder

and this space here

is circular

as is memory

as is

time

and with - all Time

the rising of Time

begins in the east

this is why

Silver faces clockwise

towards

(the place -of all beginning).

HERE-

in the EAST

spring.

breaks Water

giving Birth,

Breath and Light

to Life

to Time

to memories

of clarity

through projected illuminations

from which my Grandmother speaks

of Inherent

Cultural Memory

here- She remembers

saying

Yes!

I remember!

shooting at that target

Bullseye!

We’re good like that-Yah know

Yes!

from the Chippewayans

I remember

I was thinking…

“oush tehm o’ tay”

come here sweetheart

Yes!

I remember

“oush tehm o’ tay

here

the cuts

between each edit

in the east

brings light

flashing

in unison

to

the voice of an Eagle

(our connection)

to Light

to Truth

to Creation

to the east.

which is free

un-contained

uncontaminated by

colonial infection.

that sickness / imperial contagion

begins in the south

a time of adolescence

of learning and trusting

in the evil of

whats been taught by settler society

here

my grandmother remembers

her erasure

she says

“the nuns were the ones:

“I greatly feared”

when I was young

I wonder why I was such a scaredy cat

when I was young

I greatly feared!

Christ

when I was young

the priest

had a gown

and prayed for me

to be cured

I was no good

And…

at that convent

you know

we all went to school with the nuns…

I wonder why I was such a scaredy cat

when I was young

the nuns were the ones…

I greatly feared

when I was young

so that’s where we learnt

I was no good

here- in the southern direction

I edited

and filled the cuts

with blackness

and Thunder

as blackness, seems empty-

like an erasure

-though Thunder fills

the space in between

blackness

as an opposition

filling in

resistance to erasure.

the Thunder

…….like the Drum

also resists

what is to come from the west

adulthood

Confrontation

Authority

and Anarchy

the shadows

become long

they grow- to protect and to blanket

my Kookums Knowledge

from becoming

Completely erased.

here my Grandmothers voice

opposes what my mother

is saying.

as my mother remembers

what she’d been told

by her Father

about her people

Grandmother denies

only

as a means to protect

her daughter.

here they speak together

about being Indian

No!

She knew

No!

About a culture

No

That took

No

Our culture

No

Away

No

Took our children away

No

She knew about being an Indian

No

She was crying

No

She knew

No

About life

No

Of Liberty

No

And Happiness

No

Except for Indians

No

Dumb Indians

No

Stupid Indians

Oh I forget

Stealing Indians

She knew

No

about being an Indian

here

in the west

edits were cut

to the sound of a loon

suggesting night

and darker shadows

filled with trickster sounds

of crickets

first calming

then screaming

under skin

a struggle

a confrontation

taken place

in the west

between my Mothers

and Earth Mother

while

my Grandfather sings

in Cree

yes-

a song

in Cree

though not a traditional song

it’s about drinking

see the struggle

feel the crickets

and the pounding of thunder

in the hearts of my mothers

EARTH BEATS

memory -into my mothers

so that their stories

will be told

and Not Forgotten

here

I wanted the viewer to feel uneasy

by editing into the piece

a rhythmic insistence

to listen

to all of my Mothers

mothers

and Grandmothers

Resisting.

here

I hoped that the viewer would feel

their own resistance

to the telling of our truths

as told by my Mother

Grandmother

and Earth Mother.

who say

She knew

No!

Why white people are insulted When I defend

No

My race

No

My people

No

Do they not think

No

We are just as tired

No

In the North

the place of winter

all is tired

except for

Memory

and so, the North

is a place to begin

the emancipation of memory.

because-as time gets slow

and shadows

become night

there begins a time for stories

about ancestors who had falling

Fighting

For freedom

here

my Grandmother tells the story

as she remembers

here

the north

was not broken

Memories

flow and are edited in

a visual rhythm

there is a sense

Of quiet

Of death

Of struggle

Of Memories

and also of Spirits

Freeing memory

so that Grandmother

can return to the east

in a good way.

full circle

both in and out of colonialism

a colonial narrative that became undone

by the telling

of what she had witnessed

her testimony

is not forgotten

is Not Forgotten!