a (gentle) reminder

Artist Statement

a (gentle) reminder is a commissioned work from the Bonavista Biennale which was co-curated by Rose Bouthillier and Ryan Rice. I’m honoured and grateful to have had the opportunity to participate in the Biennale, and importantly, to respond to the theme, Host.

I have many thoughts about the word, the feeling, and the energy of host/hosting. And to be honest, they changed a lot as I worked though a (gentle) reminder. In discussion with Rose, I heard the words of Beau Dick reverberating though my head, “we want to remind you that you are still our guests and we are still your hosts”. I remembered his walk to the house of parliament in Victoria, so-called British Columbia in 2013 when he broke the Coppers. I remembered his words, they live. I haven’t forgotten how I felt then, and I don’t think I ever will. My feelings came right to the surface when Rose asked me to respond to this theme, in this place, in my extended traditional territory.

There is a very strong narrative of Discovery on the Bonavista Peninsula. It is not my home, I don’t live there, I am a traveller and visitor there, but the place is part of my larger home. I am a part of my home.

Thousands of tiny stitches made over months hold hand-felted words and motif to madder and bedstraw root dyed linen fabric. The message I’ve held from Beau Dick for over a decade, “we are still your hosts”, is offered as a (gentle) reminder in one of the places of first colonial contact on Turtle Island. I’m offering this reminder in Port Union on a pre-existing flag pole, where the piece is surrounded by the sea, the land, by berries, by guests. I’m making the reminder with Mi’kmaq motif representing the land and water, with the colour red made of the earth - a colour that our ancestors and descendants can see: a time stretch. A declaration of the original Hosts. An indication of the land and sea as original hosts. A motion made toward all kin, in all time directions, who are, have been, and will be hosts too.

I consider this piece unfinished until it has been installed for one month in Port Union. As the environment and weathers impact the work and I collaborate with them, more of the nature of the piece will be revealed. I will ignore it, as the guest-host relationship has often been ignored by leading canadian institutions and corporations, by extractive industry, the canadian capital market, by local, provincial, national, and international governments. After this ignorance, after this weathering, I will come back to it and observe the damage. I will care for it. I will consider again the relationship of Guest and Host.

Flags are so often used to make a declaration, to state ownership, dominion, control. I imagine there was one such flag in exactly the place a (gentle) reminder is installed now; maybe. I offer mine as a call to come together, it’s an ask in a gentle and conversational way, an invitation. I ask the viewers to look around with the reminder in their minds and mouths, and ask:

how has the land in this place been treated? how is it treated now?
how are the people, the L’nu, Inuit, and Innu treated? how do I think of the people? how do I show respect?
what do I see around me? how am I held here? how could I be?
what is missing? what do I offer?

As time and weathers make their changes to this piece, as we collaborate together, I will have new questions and new thoughts.

A version of this written work and photos was published in you are here: the journal of creative cartography themed mapping all my relations and published by the University of Arizona.

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Technical Specs

a (gentle) reminder was made partially in Blönduós, Ísland in Winter 2023. Each letter and motif is made with Icelandic fleece that I felted on a felt loom at the Icelandic Textile Centre. I laser cut each letter and motif there too. I drew each motif before converting them to svg files (with a little help from some friends!) in order to keep the drawerly aesthetic of them once cut.

The construction of the piece took place in my home, in my home community, in one of my two traditional territories - Katalisk, Ktaqmkuk. The flag fabric is 100% linen and has been dyed with madder and bedstraw root. I tend madder root in my garden and I wild-harvest bedstraw from around the farm. The dye has been fixed to the fabric by process of tannin and mordanting.

Each letter and motif is hand stitched in place with thousands of small stitches. Thread is high ply organic cotton.

My partner created upper and lower clamp mounts with lumber and wooden dowels.

a (gentle) reminder was documented where it hung nearly daily for the duration of its installation by Bethany MacKenzie. Over time and with place, the piece changed as it dialogued with the sea spray, rain and waters, resident birds, the wind. When the piece came home to me, it was new, something different. Ghostly. It seems now, a haunted reminder.

I consider a crucial piece of this work to be collaboration with its installation site, the weather, the sea salt, the sun. Future exhibitions of this work are TBD and the body of work will include a performance intervention.