Over 100 residents and out-of-town visitors attended the opening of Indigenous Art 2024 exhibition, supported by the Brown Homestead, at the Woodland Cultural Centre on Saturday, August 3, 2024.
This is the 49th annual juried exhibition show and this year’s installment features around 60 pieces of art from 39 artists.
To kick off the big event, Patricia Deadman, Curator for Woodland Cultural Centre (WCC), led a large group of people through each of the pieces for a “Director’s Preview” as Heather George, Executive Director of the WCC, was unable to be there.
During the preview, Deadman discussed a bit about each artist and their work, as well as whether or not the pieces were up for sale or not.
“We’re going to do a quick run through of the art works to give you some idea of the types and styles that are here, as well as what contemporary Indigenous art is like today,” said Deadman. “We do this Director’s preview to bring forward the opportunity for private collectors, galleries and museums to add to their collections. Now, we do add a minimum of 30 per cent to the artist’s prices and if the piece is sold, that revenue comes back to the centre and goes towards further acquisition and arts programming.”
While a few pieces were not up for sale, a majority of the artwork on display was available for purchase, ranging anywhere in price from from $130.00 to $15,450.00 and one special piece going for $35,100.00
As the preview wrapped up, visitors headed into another room for a few snacks and a Thanksgiving Address, as well as some more information about the jurors and the submissions they went through.
This year our jurors were Rachelle Dickenson, David M. General and Maxine Noel,” said Deadman. “We had 143 submitted works from 64 artists to go through, of which, around 58 works were selected by 39 artists.”
Afterwards, visitors headed back into the three galleries for a chance to chat with the artists on site and admire the various multimedia works.
From paintings to photography, mixed media pieces, digital art, beadwork, stone carvings, and pyrography, there were plenty of examples of contemporary works mixed with traditional elements for guests to discover.
Pyrography artist, Victoria Grant, said that this year’s juried exhibition show was the second time she’s had her art displayed in such a way, and that having her work chosen was something she was still trying to wrap her mind around.
“It’s hard to believe. I’ve been doing art in different ways for forever but I never even thought I was an artist,” she said. “I didn’t even think this would ever happen, it wasn’t even part of my dream until it became reality and I’m just so grateful I get to do this full time now.”
Grant has three of her pyrography canoe paddle pieces on display and when speaking about her piece “Great Blue Flight,” she said she was inspired by her husband as well as the Seven Grandfather Teachings.
“I originally made this for my husband to actually paddle with, and then I ended up spending over 30 hours working on it so we decided that maybe he shouldn’t do that,” laughed Grant. “In reading the traits of the heron and the Grandfather Teachings, they all just reminded me of my husband and so I wanted to create this for him. On the paddle is a blue heron, strawberries, the moon, and fish, and on the back there are a lot of hidden images that are inspired by Métis culture as my dad is Métis.”
Another artist, Alex Jacobs-Blum, a Cayuga nation photographer from Six Nations of the Grand River, said that her displayed triptych inlet piece, as well as her other works in general, often feature clay materials, reclaimed wood, and natural materials, things that weave the elements of her Indigeneity directly into her artwork.
“These pieces are really meant to be in conversation with one another. They’re meant to feel like this portal transitioning you through different realms of existence; through the water world, through the land and then through the sky world,” she said. “I’m really using my body in each of the works as this kind of performative element to understand my relationship with the land and through clay specifically, more deeply. Clay is very much a part of the Haudenosaunee practice and so it’s meant to represent this intrinsic connection that we have with the land and it’s in understanding that activation that I’m able to kind of build this relationship.”
She said that creating art is very much a healing process for her.
“My practice talks a lot about my mixed identity and it’s this kind of sense of coming home to myself,” she said. “It’s my healing journey and it’s an undoing of these intergenerational traumas that have been thrust upon my family but it’s also a way to build a deeper understanding of Haudenosaunee histories and how Haudenosaunee people, women specifically, live through my body. It’s all about how I have that knowledge built into my DNA.”
Jacobs-Blum said that, overall, having her work displayed with established artists uplifts her.
“As an emerging artist showing next to people who have been creating for many, many decades, to see their work in this space and to also have my work in conversation with it, it’s just a really special and uplifting feeling,” she said. “We’re talking about storytelling on so many different levels from so many different entry points and it’s just amazing to see.”
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
