WEBVTT - Ḵúx̱de Kagux̱daháa: Landback, Languageback, Objectback 0:00:15.120 --> 0:00:21.480 They tried to colonizzs, try to genocide. Yet we're still 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:27.760 here with the tongue on brope and so to cut 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:32.600 you on klaya heen, well yeah he a car I 0:00:32.760 --> 0:00:39.760 woo ok, I woo uncooked oots. Welcome to the tongue unbroken, folks. 0:00:39.920 --> 0:00:43.560 The daylight has broken upon us again. One time Raven 0:00:43.680 --> 0:00:46.280 was sitting in a tree and these people were dignating 0:00:46.360 --> 0:00:49.600 for driftwood, and he says to them, send me something 0:00:49.640 --> 0:00:53.120 to eat, send me something to eat. I might break 0:00:53.159 --> 0:00:56.440 the daylight on you. So the daylight breaks like a 0:00:56.560 --> 0:00:59.160 rope in ling it in the language, which is really fun. 0:00:59.520 --> 0:01:03.760 And speaking of fun and exciting, we have an awesome 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:10.360 guest here today, Nicholas Glennin, an incredible artist, visionary and 0:01:10.600 --> 0:01:15.920 a Guggenheim fellow who is en route to other countries. 0:01:16.160 --> 0:01:19.520 So he's coming to us from an airport. So this 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:22.160 is gonna be a wild episode. We're trying to make 0:01:22.200 --> 0:01:24.920 things work, make the stars line up for us. It's 0:01:24.959 --> 0:01:27.959 exciting to sit down and have a conversation with you. 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:30.360 And could you tell the people who you are? 0:01:31.560 --> 0:01:40.000 Yeah, she had seen you hotykwan Nicholas and. 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:44.760 From Alaska. 0:01:44.959 --> 0:01:51.000 Children in them and yeah, I'm out here just babbling 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:55.200 right now from my way to give some artist talks 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:57.640 in Venice. So I'll be out there for about a week, 0:01:58.200 --> 0:01:58.880 living here. 0:01:58.760 --> 0:02:02.720 In this basic and continue on. So pleasure to be 0:02:02.800 --> 0:02:03.520 here and meet with you. 0:02:03.720 --> 0:02:08.200 Yeah, that's awesome and it's cheeesh. And thinking of your journey, 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:11.680 like as an artist, I know you come from a 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:15.320 line of artists. Artwork is in your family when we 0:02:15.360 --> 0:02:19.480 think about Northwest Coast native arts, and then you certainly 0:02:19.480 --> 0:02:22.239 do a lot of stuff. So could you maybe talk 0:02:22.240 --> 0:02:24.880 a little bit about how you got started and what 0:02:24.960 --> 0:02:27.560 kinds of things really got you on track as far 0:02:27.600 --> 0:02:30.839 as becoming your global name as far as Northwest Coast 0:02:30.919 --> 0:02:32.040 arts coast surely. 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:34.840 Yeah, my journey, you know, everybody's journey is different. My 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:39.079 journey from a young age I was was set forward 0:02:39.120 --> 0:02:41.160 in a lot of different ways. I think I come 0:02:41.200 --> 0:02:45.720 from families of makers and artists in this space, so 0:02:45.760 --> 0:02:49.480 that was highly relevant apparent to me in my time. 0:02:50.680 --> 0:02:53.680 The tools, a language, a cultural connection. 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:56.760 Even if I was not at home tabbling around as 0:02:56.800 --> 0:02:59.720 a youth when my parents separated and I was brought 0:02:59.720 --> 0:03:02.880 away home brought back, there was always there's always a 0:03:02.880 --> 0:03:06.920 connection there that I understood. I guess for me, it 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:09.360 became a parent of what I knew I wasn't supposed 0:03:09.360 --> 0:03:11.880 to do in this world, and that became a pbvious 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:14.840 at a working age where I was trying to enter 0:03:14.919 --> 0:03:17.760 the world work force. In certain ways, none of it, 0:03:18.200 --> 0:03:21.320 senior elevant, are worth worthwhile for the time that we 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:24.160 have here to do what we have to do. That 0:03:24.240 --> 0:03:26.440 was the best. That's the best way I can explain it, 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:29.840 the calling that I'm doing. And I was fortunate enough 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:34.680 to have mentors around me that are still very important 0:03:34.680 --> 0:03:36.680 to me. I was at a young age where we're 0:03:36.880 --> 0:03:39.800 meant to decide our next you know, our next journal 0:03:39.920 --> 0:03:44.120 of this school system and these places, and that young age, 0:03:44.280 --> 0:03:46.840 I was showing up there to these studios and wood 0:03:46.840 --> 0:03:50.800 carving spaces and metal carving spaces and cultural spaces, and 0:03:52.200 --> 0:03:55.280 I would need happy, happier than anything else is worked 0:03:55.360 --> 0:03:58.520 to divide me a sense of fulfillment and power and joy. 0:03:58.840 --> 0:04:01.240 And that's where I'm just that was a calling for me. 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:05.440 You can and you are from the community of Sitka. Well, 0:04:05.440 --> 0:04:08.160 there's multiple paths that I certainly see you on, and 0:04:08.200 --> 0:04:12.040 so one of them is an artist who's doing installations 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:15.280 and museums around the world and giving talks and doing 0:04:15.560 --> 0:04:19.320 sometimes pieces that are something that maybe you think that 0:04:19.400 --> 0:04:21.360 people would have made long time ago, like a totem 0:04:21.360 --> 0:04:24.600 pole that was raised and I've seen several of those 0:04:24.640 --> 0:04:26.880 that have gone up in a dugout canoe. But some 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:30.159 other things are sort of different. So like there's pieces 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:33.640 that are incorporating a wolf that's kind of standing up, 0:04:33.640 --> 0:04:35.640 but then the back half of it is like sort 0:04:35.680 --> 0:04:38.719 of like looks like a taxidermist that flatten it out 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:39.839 to get ready to put. 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:40.159 On a wall. 0:04:40.200 --> 0:04:42.600 And so some of the pieces sort of like are 0:04:43.040 --> 0:04:45.680 pushing some of these boundaries as well in terms of 0:04:45.760 --> 0:04:48.800 conversation and some of the best conversations I think that 0:04:48.920 --> 0:04:51.320 I've seen, and in my opinion, the things that really 0:04:51.360 --> 0:04:54.520 ring towards me is bringing the concept of land back 0:04:54.720 --> 0:04:58.680 into these large public spaces. It's interesting to me because 0:04:58.680 --> 0:05:00.920 I don't like this concept of sort of like living 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:04.120 in two worlds. I think that's really really simplified. But 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:06.520 when you're looking at stuff, some things are intended to 0:05:07.040 --> 0:05:09.080 give a message. Some of the early works that I 0:05:09.120 --> 0:05:12.679 think I first saw of yours was the Indians logo 0:05:12.839 --> 0:05:15.760 that was the way that the baseball team would write 0:05:15.800 --> 0:05:19.000 their name and it was being etched in stone and 0:05:19.040 --> 0:05:21.440 stuff and then taking pictures of as if it's some 0:05:21.520 --> 0:05:24.040 sort of petroglyph. And it was at a time when 0:05:24.040 --> 0:05:26.760 I think we're calling attention to the use of Native 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:30.640 American imagery and names or not even names, but just 0:05:30.839 --> 0:05:33.400 like chiefs and braves and stuff that are being used 0:05:33.640 --> 0:05:37.839 in sports, and pushing these things for conversation. So it 0:05:37.880 --> 0:05:40.960 seems like your work is always pushing people to have 0:05:41.279 --> 0:05:45.520 conversations about subjects that are complex, whether those are how 0:05:45.520 --> 0:05:47.920 do we do the works of our people today, or 0:05:47.920 --> 0:05:50.279 how do we call attention to these types of things 0:05:50.320 --> 0:05:52.400 that are that I think need to be talked about. 0:05:52.440 --> 0:05:55.919 So when you sit down in your studio, how do 0:05:55.960 --> 0:05:58.279 you think of like the next idea? 0:05:58.480 --> 0:05:59.960 It's a broad question, it's a good one. 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:02.919 I feel like I should clarify my studio as the world, 0:06:03.560 --> 0:06:07.120 and I'm in it right now. So there's no clear 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:09.880 cut answer here. There's a lot of things that we 0:06:09.920 --> 0:06:10.640 could talk about. 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:11.799 We could talk. 0:06:11.640 --> 0:06:16.920 About my journey and process, like creative work is a 0:06:17.080 --> 0:06:20.440 tool and a mechanism and a space. 0:06:20.240 --> 0:06:23.080 Where I have sovereignty and power. 0:06:23.600 --> 0:06:25.880 I have things the world tried to remove from us 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:30.320 as a form of tools and understanding. 0:06:30.760 --> 0:06:32.320 I don't have them because I made them. 0:06:32.360 --> 0:06:35.280 I have them because we provided for them those that 0:06:35.360 --> 0:06:39.599 came before us, and I understand what that means. So 0:06:39.680 --> 0:06:42.480 when we talk about pepeople in Stone, there's a lot 0:06:42.480 --> 0:06:45.479 of work there right now. And yes it does talk 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:49.560 about mascots and slogans of misrepresentation. 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:49.360 Of our people. 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:52.560 In that work, it talks about time. That piece talks 0:06:52.600 --> 0:06:55.920 about time to talks about our understanding of land in space. 0:06:55.960 --> 0:06:57.800 So I do work with I come back to you 0:06:57.839 --> 0:07:02.080 and I've learned to understand navigation a place in this 0:07:02.320 --> 0:07:08.200 conversation for me, Petriglaff, and that piece was a time 0:07:08.279 --> 0:07:12.080 based piece that understands that I'm creating something on the 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:16.680 sidelinds of our home community and it'll change meanings five 0:07:16.680 --> 0:07:19.040 thousand years from me right now in the forefront of 0:07:19.040 --> 0:07:25.480 our understanding. Yes, very apparent, maybe political means of who's 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:29.320 changing the sports team's name. Power we represented and misrepresented. 0:07:29.720 --> 0:07:32.040 But the power in that worked to me is that 0:07:32.080 --> 0:07:34.720 in five thousand years is still indigenous art. And it 0:07:34.800 --> 0:07:38.240 strips the trademark, it strips the logos and the corporate 0:07:38.360 --> 0:07:42.200 and it strips the commercial mechanisms of whatever that logo 0:07:42.600 --> 0:07:46.960 icon is and it becomes ours aga. So my work 0:07:47.400 --> 0:07:53.840 navigates layers like seasons, that navigates the changes throughout these spaces. 0:07:53.880 --> 0:07:57.840 It goes forward, indivision and features that are useful and 0:07:57.920 --> 0:08:00.760 helpful at all front of our community. Every it goes 0:08:00.800 --> 0:08:05.040 backwards and like understanding what we stand on where we 0:08:05.120 --> 0:08:09.840 come from within that now called a continuance, I find 0:08:10.560 --> 0:08:15.280 I feel like it's important to acknowledge it, recognize where 0:08:15.280 --> 0:08:17.480 we come from. Geeesh. 0:08:17.720 --> 0:08:20.200 And so that, yeah, that was a very broad question, 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:22.840 so let me narrow this one down. So one of 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:25.960 the most emotionally impactful pieces I think that I've seen 0:08:26.000 --> 0:08:29.040 of yours was, you know, you're a metal engraver. You 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:33.120 work in jewelry. You do incredible stuff with metal. And 0:08:33.720 --> 0:08:37.319 one thing I saw was an engraved pair of handcuffs. 0:08:37.760 --> 0:08:40.040 And I'll just leave it at that and just say, 0:08:40.400 --> 0:08:43.840 could you tell people what that was and why it exists? 0:08:44.200 --> 0:08:48.360 Sure, a little preface Ingrady and I guess I keep 0:08:48.440 --> 0:08:50.880 coming back to some of these spaces that come up 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:55.239 from So I was trained in that's a lifelong involvement 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:59.360 for me. It's not a pursuit of ego, not pursuit 0:08:59.400 --> 0:09:04.280 of anything. It's a perceive of carrying the culture in 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:07.760 a way that were handed and caring it is best 0:09:07.760 --> 0:09:10.319 we can and I would I would say the metal 0:09:10.320 --> 0:09:14.120 work idea is similar in the understanding of it very 0:09:14.160 --> 0:09:19.720 technical process takes years to like train and get understood 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:23.960 and the tools and the forms. In that process, I 0:09:24.080 --> 0:09:27.679 understood and learned that there was things I didn't enjoy. 0:09:28.160 --> 0:09:31.360 The sea in the world of how people perceived me 0:09:31.920 --> 0:09:35.240 would love something shiny and beautiful people. I hate histories 0:09:35.600 --> 0:09:39.160 that represent things that are unaddressed, or things that are 0:09:39.200 --> 0:09:42.560 not acknowledged, and things that are not righted. And I felt 0:09:42.679 --> 0:09:46.520 I felt a deep responsibility in my practice to tell 0:09:46.640 --> 0:09:49.720 full stories. And some of the stories that I tell 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:53.000 my works include these things in the children's race that 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:57.360 was worn for me. They generate an emotional response from 0:09:57.480 --> 0:10:00.000 viewers and a lot of a lot of different reasons, 0:10:00.000 --> 0:10:02.960 as I suppose, one is the hard aspect of the material, 0:10:02.960 --> 0:10:05.600 and the other is the scale. In the scale, it's 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:09.800 in a perspective the harm of the women and this 0:10:09.960 --> 0:10:14.640 conversation and the horror historically that has still largely gone 0:10:14.640 --> 0:10:18.360 on address as we watch boarding schools transform from being 0:10:18.360 --> 0:10:21.400 an actual place of care and education to a place 0:10:21.400 --> 0:10:26.240 of violence and places of burial for children as we 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:30.080 watch the harm of children that can happen today internationally, 0:10:30.640 --> 0:10:35.640 there's imperials that were witnessing the work for me with 0:10:35.800 --> 0:10:40.360 Cavlanian Indian children's bracelets, and it was a very direct 0:10:40.920 --> 0:10:45.360 conversation of how a community loves to consume something that 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:49.840 they being goodic are beautiful or shining in this case 0:10:49.840 --> 0:10:53.120 our jewelry and our our digital language of our culture, 0:10:53.480 --> 0:10:57.560 yet failed to dive deeper and caring for the community 0:10:57.960 --> 0:11:01.120 that has created this in the community what this comes from. 0:11:01.280 --> 0:11:03.840 That's time and time represented day and day out in 0:11:03.840 --> 0:11:10.000 our current situation in this world with how we're navigating institutions, 0:11:10.480 --> 0:11:15.640 we're navigating government, our navigating violence, our communities, continuing things, 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:18.800 whether it's moment or children and all these things, and 0:11:18.920 --> 0:11:22.520 this piece kind of exchanges things in an interesting way 0:11:22.559 --> 0:11:26.160 where I engraved the designs and the shiny aspect that 0:11:26.200 --> 0:11:29.160 people love, but it's engraved on an object that represents 0:11:29.920 --> 0:11:33.040 the history, and so there's layers of entry to it. 0:11:33.200 --> 0:11:36.320 And in this case it's a residential schools, not just 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:37.720 in our communities. 0:11:37.160 --> 0:11:42.120 But across across the US canaday and in other spaces. 0:11:42.160 --> 0:11:46.080 So the work in the conversation that I view this 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:50.199 type of object is for me. It carries these things 0:11:50.600 --> 0:11:53.319 so that we don't have to because you show up, 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:56.720 I show up, our mentors, our peers, our students, whoever. 0:11:57.080 --> 0:12:01.280 People go up and they are base with carrying these 0:12:01.320 --> 0:12:06.880 conversations where they're inviting it, oftentimes to provide the work. 0:12:07.200 --> 0:12:09.840 And for me, this object will do that work so 0:12:09.920 --> 0:12:12.640 we don't have to and it relieves us and we 0:12:12.640 --> 0:12:14.439 can do what we're able to do and need to 0:12:14.559 --> 0:12:16.960 do beyond that from when it sits in an institution 0:12:17.200 --> 0:12:19.880 or a space, they hold it and the a the 0:12:19.960 --> 0:12:23.839 stories and do the work without you know, taking it 0:12:23.920 --> 0:12:25.800 without without us carrying it on our backs. 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:29.760 Yeah. Well, and the piece that we're talking about is 0:12:30.160 --> 0:12:35.280 an engraved pair of child's handcuffs that are affiliated with 0:12:35.480 --> 0:12:38.920 boarding schools and residential schools, which are we've talked about 0:12:38.920 --> 0:12:43.199 on this show as places of tremendous suffering and horror. 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:47.319 And then just thinking of this juxtaposition of this really 0:12:47.360 --> 0:12:52.240 beautiful engraving on this object that is such a terrifying 0:12:52.320 --> 0:12:56.280 thing for indigenous peoples and probably is just honestly just 0:12:56.320 --> 0:12:58.200 something a lot of people don't even know about or 0:12:58.240 --> 0:13:02.040 think about who maybe aren't inous. And so there's a 0:13:02.080 --> 0:13:04.679 couple other pieces that I think are really just amazing 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:08.040 and just sort of like as topics of conversations. There's 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:10.120 so much stuff that you do that I think is 0:13:10.520 --> 0:13:13.040 we could do like a whole series of shows on 0:13:13.080 --> 0:13:16.319 all of the impacts of these pieces, like a statue 0:13:16.440 --> 0:13:18.640 of I think it was Captain Cook or a colonizer, 0:13:18.679 --> 0:13:21.760 but it's sort of being extracted and it's really fitting 0:13:21.800 --> 0:13:24.120 now because as people were starting to sort of question 0:13:24.200 --> 0:13:26.560 the idea of statues, and you know, I remember I 0:13:26.600 --> 0:13:29.400 was in New York City and it was Columbus Day, 0:13:29.440 --> 0:13:31.720 and I thought, there's not a lot of conversations about 0:13:31.720 --> 0:13:35.559 like Indigenous people's day, Like it is all Columbus Day 0:13:35.640 --> 0:13:38.079 right here. And then there's a statue of him downtown. 0:13:38.200 --> 0:13:40.520 And then yeah, I was in Hawaii at this place 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:44.120 called the Cook Monument, and that's the place where Captain 0:13:44.200 --> 0:13:47.400 Cook he got it, you know, for trying to mess 0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:50.480 with King Kamihimeha. And so like thinking of like these 0:13:50.520 --> 0:13:53.800 conversation and it's more than just like a conversation piece. 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:58.320 It's pushing us to think critically about colonization and what 0:13:58.360 --> 0:14:01.360 it means now, to stand up and to face it, 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:05.880 because colonization is not something that stopped or reversed itself, 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:09.120 like it's it's a part of an attempt to completely 0:14:09.200 --> 0:14:13.120 annihilate languages and populations and cultures and ways of being 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:16.640 and connections to land and place and time. And so 0:14:16.640 --> 0:14:18.959 some of the other pieces, I think there was this 0:14:19.880 --> 0:14:22.840 amazing kind of let's see if I can even describe it, 0:14:23.320 --> 0:14:26.400 taking a book and like the Bible, and making it 0:14:26.480 --> 0:14:30.120 into the shape of a thing it mask. I don't 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:32.320 even know how you do that, or much less like 0:14:32.360 --> 0:14:34.720 how you would envision that to look at a book 0:14:34.760 --> 0:14:36.840 and say I can make a mask out of that, 0:14:36.880 --> 0:14:40.640 which is so fascinating because it was the religion. So 0:14:40.680 --> 0:14:42.840 one of the things that really happened in Alaska is 0:14:43.120 --> 0:14:45.520 Alaska is governed by the military for a while and 0:14:45.560 --> 0:14:49.120 then they blow up some several thing at villages, cake 0:14:49.560 --> 0:14:54.040 Wrangle and Angoon, and they nearly destroy the villages. It's 0:14:54.360 --> 0:14:58.360 probably the only instance of the United States Navy attacking 0:14:58.920 --> 0:15:03.040 United States soil. And so shortly after that they said, okay, 0:15:03.400 --> 0:15:07.520 the military can't govern Alaska. Let's let the churches govern Alaska. 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:11.360 So there's someone who was in Sika named Sheldon Jackson, 0:15:11.600 --> 0:15:14.320 and he pulls out a map in Washington, DC with 0:15:14.360 --> 0:15:17.640 a few other I'm imagining white guys who are also 0:15:17.760 --> 0:15:21.480 religious leaders, and they divide Alaska into these chunks that 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:24.560 are now governed by religions, and what you could do 0:15:25.240 --> 0:15:28.320 was determined by the person in charge. So some of 0:15:28.320 --> 0:15:34.040 them were Catholic, some of the more Moravian, Salvation Army, Presbyterian, Episcopalian. 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:36.920 So they divided it up into the major religions of 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:40.320 the United States. And one of the things that they universally, 0:15:40.400 --> 0:15:44.480 pretty much universally banned was dancing with masks. And then 0:15:44.520 --> 0:15:47.400 I think the second thing was speaking your language. And 0:15:47.440 --> 0:15:50.520 there were some regions that escaped the language portion, but 0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:53.800 I think the mask dancing was fairly universal in terms 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:57.520 of banishing it outright. And so I remember one time 0:15:57.560 --> 0:16:00.440 someone said to me, well, it's America. Doesn't everybody have 0:16:00.560 --> 0:16:02.920 like all the same opportunities. I said, well, there's In 0:16:02.960 --> 0:16:05.480 the nineteen seventies they passed a Freedom of Religion Act 0:16:05.520 --> 0:16:07.800 for Native Americans, and there's a reason why you need 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:11.160 that act. So when you was it when you saw 0:16:11.200 --> 0:16:13.520 a Bible and you thought I could make a mask 0:16:13.560 --> 0:16:15.240 out of this, Like, how did you think of that 0:16:15.400 --> 0:16:16.240 and how did you do it? 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:18.320 I think it's a great place to start in some 0:16:18.360 --> 0:16:19.280 of these conversations. 0:16:19.280 --> 0:16:23.880 And for me, I was aware of that forced simulation, 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:25.400 that violence, and. 0:16:25.280 --> 0:16:29.040 That you know, the what was removed. 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:33.480 While being like heavily pressured in place into these ideas 0:16:33.480 --> 0:16:38.600 and understanding the organizations for the simulation as a student 0:16:38.600 --> 0:16:40.640 of the culture and the art forum and not as 0:16:40.640 --> 0:16:44.480 a student that was trying to access the language. There 0:16:44.560 --> 0:16:47.400 was nothing here I was studying with. I was studying 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:50.600 with generations of artists at the time. I think Lewis 0:16:50.640 --> 0:16:54.400 Minari was studying with my uncle will to work with 0:16:54.440 --> 0:16:58.120 my great grandfather George Benson. I was, and all of 0:16:58.120 --> 0:17:02.760 our objects were everywhere else here from this conversation, I 0:17:02.800 --> 0:17:05.680 was in the UK, in London, studying jewelry design and 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:08.960 silversmith in and all my off time and all my 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.440 free time while I was at home, while I was 0:17:11.480 --> 0:17:14.880 doing anything else outside of school, I was reading heavily. 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:15.640 I was so. 0:17:15.800 --> 0:17:18.840 Engaged in trying to get information about the culture and 0:17:18.920 --> 0:17:22.639 my object are objects that became all right, all the 0:17:22.680 --> 0:17:26.080 things that were moved that I would arrange my trips 0:17:26.200 --> 0:17:29.800 around Europe. I was studying London, England, that would go 0:17:29.960 --> 0:17:33.520 to places because of the music, because of the collections, 0:17:33.560 --> 0:17:35.840 And I learned at a young age how to navigate 0:17:35.880 --> 0:17:36.960 institution because of it. 0:17:37.160 --> 0:17:40.480 I knew her to contact to say how to get in. 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:44.480 I brought my camera, I went in and got out. 0:17:44.880 --> 0:17:47.000 That was all I was doing because I was trying 0:17:47.000 --> 0:17:50.120 to access these things. And I was highly aware as 0:17:50.160 --> 0:17:54.360 I sat through this also the information I had available 0:17:54.400 --> 0:17:57.439 at home versus the information that I was reading. The 0:17:57.480 --> 0:18:02.280 consumer and the academic scholars and the spaces and people 0:18:02.320 --> 0:18:06.040 that were set writing these in these publications. None of 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:09.479 them were from our communities. None of them understood what 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:14.000 it meant to wake up and fish or hunt or 0:18:14.040 --> 0:18:16.960 walk on the land, or to do something seasonally, or 0:18:17.000 --> 0:18:20.360 to wait or nobody under said any of that. They 0:18:20.400 --> 0:18:29.359 went through anthropological, physiological representations of homogenized hierarchy of knowledge 0:18:29.720 --> 0:18:32.440 that was mind from our elders, and it was only 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:36.119 validated when it went to don Fast forward to my 0:18:36.240 --> 0:18:39.639 time in Altaroa in New Zealand. I was aware of 0:18:39.720 --> 0:18:41.880 these things. I didn't know what to do with. I 0:18:41.920 --> 0:18:45.480 was demonstrating at Harbor at the Park. So I'm doing 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:47.840 my life mission work, which I would say my lifelong 0:18:47.880 --> 0:18:51.440 work that I do is my cultural work with firing 0:18:51.640 --> 0:18:54.600 and all that you don't arrive, we do it. We 0:18:54.720 --> 0:18:56.840 do it your whole life. I mean, you share it 0:18:56.840 --> 0:18:58.879 with people that you can share it with. I was 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:01.960 on that I started that, I begun that I'm still 0:19:02.000 --> 0:19:04.719 there and in that space doing that work technique, I 0:19:04.800 --> 0:19:09.040 realized the text I was reading and the people that 0:19:09.080 --> 0:19:12.640 were writing it and the spaces and institutions and navigation 0:19:12.720 --> 0:19:15.919 of it was not what we understand or see in 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:18.520 our community in the power structures of how and why, 0:19:19.040 --> 0:19:21.760 And that's where that work came from. It became one 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:24.680 of my first There was actually a very specific moment 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:27.720 for me and my creative work that I felt the 0:19:27.880 --> 0:19:32.880 frustration and the need desire to voice my experience now. 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:36.840 That moment was in Vancouver, British Columbia. I was young, 0:19:37.400 --> 0:19:40.520 my first exhibition i'd ever been part of. James Hart 0:19:41.080 --> 0:19:44.440 had invited me into the exhibition in which I later 0:19:44.520 --> 0:19:46.720 learned my father was invited and said no. 0:19:46.800 --> 0:19:50.280 Don't take me. Put Nickers in their feet and changed 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:50.879 everything for me. 0:19:51.440 --> 0:19:55.760 But I was in Vancouver and interfering with and people 0:19:55.800 --> 0:19:59.760 with cameras and their fishing for this mystical information around 0:19:59.760 --> 0:20:02.280 the world I was doing, and that's where I realized 0:20:02.320 --> 0:20:05.399 that I'm not here to feed the narrative. I'm not 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:09.720 here to provide something that to shit their exhibition plans 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:11.879 or this or that. I need to speak for what 0:20:11.920 --> 0:20:14.360 we're doing right now and what we experience right now. 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:16.679 And my work and the next work to follow was 0:20:16.720 --> 0:20:19.240 that to which is what have we become? You know, 0:20:19.440 --> 0:20:22.320 was taking a cut of thousands of pages of the 0:20:22.400 --> 0:20:26.119 anthropological texts to begin with into form in things, and 0:20:26.200 --> 0:20:30.720 it was potentially non indigenous form at first, because our 0:20:31.520 --> 0:20:34.200 iconography is so strong and impactful that it tends to 0:20:34.359 --> 0:20:37.320 let people active amantasized perspectives if we work with it. 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:41.159 Only so I chose to work with Gumeric Faith and 0:20:41.200 --> 0:20:42.520 then my Face, and then. 0:20:43.080 --> 0:20:46.120 Eventually I realized that it was that our elders needed 0:20:46.119 --> 0:20:48.159 to be seen in this work and we needed to 0:20:48.280 --> 0:20:51.080 include them in the culture. For me to include them 0:20:52.080 --> 0:20:55.359 using our cultural imagery, because that is the generation of 0:20:56.200 --> 0:21:00.320 imagery that has understanding and importance in all these things. 0:21:00.400 --> 0:21:03.520 So that's where I started doing the indigenous forms in 0:21:03.560 --> 0:21:04.560 the book format, and. 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:05.760 One of them was the Viable. 0:21:06.040 --> 0:21:08.600 Some of them were under Mount Saint Elias and Sonia 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:12.240 as a pological text, and that work still kind of 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:13.800 carries on. I don't think I'll do much more of 0:21:13.880 --> 0:21:16.200 it because it's so intense in the process and literally 0:21:16.520 --> 0:21:19.640 every page. And but it was looking at how our 0:21:19.680 --> 0:21:22.000 work is homogenized, and I think about the work you do, 0:21:22.359 --> 0:21:24.919 and I think about the work that we look at 0:21:25.040 --> 0:21:27.880 and listen to and understand as we try to see 0:21:28.240 --> 0:21:31.879 understanding culturally today, and we look at our mentors, and 0:21:32.320 --> 0:21:34.200 not everyone was able to be critical of that in 0:21:34.280 --> 0:21:37.399 the timeline of their life, of our what we're. 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:38.440 Represented in which way? 0:21:38.600 --> 0:21:41.000 But I think our generations are thinking more and more 0:21:41.200 --> 0:21:43.160 able to because of the work that was done before. 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:46.760 Yeah, well, good of cheese, and we are here with 0:21:47.320 --> 0:21:51.280 yet Kittsen, Nicholas Galannon, check out his work. We're going 0:21:51.359 --> 0:21:53.440 to take a little break and we'll be right back. 0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:54.200 Good to cheese. 0:22:10.280 --> 0:22:10.879 The past. 0:22:11.160 --> 0:22:12.760 Who's gone on the bye? 0:22:13.080 --> 0:22:14.800 My bylas By. 0:22:18.200 --> 0:22:19.919 With the birds really fled. 0:22:20.160 --> 0:22:30.159 We only see whether the loss of the royal. 0:22:34.280 --> 0:22:37.199 Because a bang bang on. 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:38.760 The drum sect by. 0:22:50.040 --> 0:22:55.960 If you are listen say. 0:22:58.000 --> 0:23:03.880 If you are all, it will be change. 0:23:06.520 --> 0:23:08.920 I don't know, long. 0:23:12.440 --> 0:23:22.280 Time watch. 0:23:29.960 --> 0:23:36.320 When we won't want a mile now. 0:23:38.160 --> 0:23:40.240 Very small for dance. 0:23:46.000 --> 0:23:59.439 And the voice song allud Sere. 0:24:02.160 --> 0:24:05.000