Post #91
Love Ethic and Access on Treaty One
After spending a day with peers and guests looking at art in Winnipeg for Dr Julie Nagam's course, Public Art: Nuit Blanche and other Ruptures, and an evening drinking, eating, and unpacking class concepts together, a few of our group went to see classmate KC Adams’ exhibition at C2 Centre for Craft. This spontaneous viewing was prompted by Shaneela Boodoo, C2 employee, curator, and member of Patterns Collective. At this time, the exhibition had only recently been installed but is up and running until June 25, 2022, with an opening reception on June 3, 2022.¹
Together, four of our cohort sat with artist KC Adams in her installation Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan, Our spirit awakens when we remember our past.² Animal hides were laid out on the floor with bundles of cedar branches cradling handmade pottery vessels. The pottery had a distinct patina from the open fire that hardened them, the cedar had an aroma that allowed you to imagine the trees they came from, the hides brushed up against your skin and the fur pushed between your fingers.
In this space, we listened to a video of KC and her kin, sat within and on the installation, and heard KC’s story. Our conversation slowly evolved into discussions of sexuality, family and school. This experience of being in the artwork together, with friends we care for and the artist whose career we are in simultaneous awe and support of, transformed my engagement with the artwork. It was the embodiment of listening and learning that KC refers to in the exhibition press release.³
As Alyssa Fearon states in “A Scarborough Love Ethic,” by paraphrasing M. Scott Peck’s definition, “...love is the will to extend oneself for the purpose of nurturing one’s own or another’s spiritual growth.”⁴ This extension helps to expand my understanding and experience of the artwork, dissolving the boundary between object, space and participant, ushering in feelings of nurturing, care, and collective growth. The connection with my peers inside this art installation was, in the words of Nagam from “The Future of Nuit Blanche and the Space Between Us,” a “catalyst for the radical transformation of place and for creating conditions for social change.”⁵ As our gathering entered the private space of the C2 gallery, the place and people informed each other, both affected by our cohabitation. Though it could be said that the space we made was more exclusive as we entered after hours and in the company of the artist herself, it was also, in some ways, a transgressive and intimate way of viewing the artwork. This viewing existed both inside and outside of the gallery. Inside the physical gallery space but outside of the conceptual limits of the gallery. Lights off, staff away with no consuming public, the gallery after hours ceases to be a gallery at all. For me, and as stated by Leah Sandals in “Why I Care(d) About Nuit Blanche,” this counter viewing, as an example of an art system outside of its comfort zone, “... opens things up a bit.”⁶
In large part, the ability for this to be a welcoming, nurturing and inclusive act, as opposed to yet another articulation of exclusivity and elite access, is due to the generosity and openness expressed by both Adams and Boodoo. Though this could have been an opportunity where cultural workers engaged exclusivity as a form of capital, both acted against this ethic of dominance, foregrounding the love ethic Fearon centres in her writing and curating.
Seeing this behaviour modelled by persistent, resilient, and caring cultural workers has brought me into my education, a community and this place. Their enactment of this love ethic encourages me to embody and reflect back the warmth and generosity essential for having critical discussions to inform and facilitate social change.
Figure 1. Installation shot of Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan, Our spirit awakens when we remember our past with friends. Photo credit: KC Adams.
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1 “Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan – Our spirit awakens when we remember our past.” C2 Centre for Craft, April 15, 2022. https://c2centreforcraft.ca/2022/04/15/gidamajiigoomin-maamikawiseyang-gidoodaanaaminaan-our-spirit-awakens-when-we-remember-our-past/.
2 “Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan.”
3 “Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan.”
4 Alyssa Fearon, “A Scarborough Love Ethic,” in Holding Ground : Nuit Blanche and Other Ruptures (Tkaronto, Canada: Public Books, 2021), 51.
5 Julie Nagam, “The Future of Nuit Blanche and the Space Between Us,” in Holding Ground : Nuit Blanche and Other Ruptures (Tkaronto, Canada: Public Books, 2021), 299.
6 Leah Sandals, “Why I Care(d) About Nuit Blanche,” 71.
Bibliography
Fearon, Alyssa. “A Scarborough Love Ethic.” in Holding Ground : Nuit Blanche and Other Ruptures. Tkaronto, Canada: Public Books, 2021.
“Gidamaji’igoomin maamikawiseyang gidoodaanaaminaan – Our spirit awakens when we remember our past.” C2 Centre for Craft, April 15, 2022. https://c2centreforcraft.ca/2022/04/15/gidamajiigoomin-maamikawiseyang-gidoodaanaaminaan-our-spirit-awakens-when-we-remember-our-past/.
Nagam, Julie. “The Future of Nuit Blanche and the Space Between Us.” in Holding Ground : Nuit Blanche and Other Ruptures. Tkaronto, Canada: Public Books, 2021.
Sandals, Leah. “Why I Care(d) About Nuit Blanche.” in Holding Ground : Nuit Blanche and Other Ruptures. Tkaronto, Canada: Public Books, 2021.
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Grace Braniff