This exhibition highlight builds upon the stories told through Shifting Ground, while fostering a contemporary perspective on histories of Indigenous Peoples in Canada. These works reflect continuing discussions on reconciliation and acknowledge stereotypes, cultural collision, and genocide through the artists’ perspectives of how history has been portrayed in a colonial context in contrast with their own experiences. Monkman, Johnson, and Bennett challenge the colonial perception of history and critique these beliefs using references, materials, and visuals that are contemporary, familiar, and comforting, further stimulating conversations between people of varying backgrounds.
THE ARTISTS:
Kent Monkman is a First Nations artist of Cree ancestry who works with a variety of mediums, including painting, film/video, performance, and installation. His work is known for its provocative reinterpretations of romantic North American landscapes and explores themes of colonization, sexuality, loss, and resilience – the complexities of historic and contemporary Indigenous experience.
Ursula Johnson is a performance and installation artist of Mi’kmaw First Nation ancestry. Since graduating from NSCAD in 2006, she has participated in over 30 group shows and 5 solo exhibitions. She has been exploring various mediums including performance art, sculpture, music and printmaking, while utilizing delegated performers as well as collaborative processes in the making of new works. Johnson was the recipient of the 2017 Sobey Art Award, Canada’s preeminent prize for contemporary art.
Jordan Bennett is a multi-disciplinary artist of Mi’kmaq descent from Ktaqmkuk (Newfoundland). He has participated in over 75 solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally in venues such as the National Museum of the American Indian (New York), Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (Santa Fe), The Power Plant (Toronto), and the National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa). In 2015, he was one of two artists to represent Newfoundland and Labrador in the Venice Biennale at Galleria Ca’Rezzonico
