remember Peace & Friendship in Ktaqmkuk

Artist Statement

I know my home community as x̣aʔx̣aʔ.

remember Peace & Friendship in Ktaqmkuk is a triangulation of three important Land sites with installation, performance, video, and projection. This work is about territory and inheritance from/in place. This work gives the opportunity to ventilate some truth and acknowledges the privilege of community and place knowledge—the performance works were a moving release to event (as a verb) to remember important parts of Katalisk. Nocturne and Codroy Seafoods have given me space to share this work.

Using the textile from a (gentle) reminder with new performance interventions and body prayers on site I connect the place of first colonial contact in 1492, the Bonavista Peninsula, where colonial interruption and violence unfolded across Northern Turtle Island; Codroy Island, the place of Peace & Friendship Treaty affirmation in September 1763, one month before the Royal Proclamation was adopted; and Kjipuktuk, the site of treaty ideation, formation, and agreement in Mi’kma’ki.

The work and series is about (re)presencing; filling out narrative; drawing attention to important spaces, places, and times; remembering and making memory; and reminding that we and our places are whole, even with the gaps, holes, and interruptions in our experiences. The work is about calling the spirit of the agreement made in Peace & Friendship back, it’s about calling our spirits; it’s about emotional knowledge, land and water memory, and interstitial spaces.

Ktaqmkukewaq L’nu are ignored in treaty agreement in our territory, treaty rights are ignored, and the people are most often left out of political negotiation and processes of consultation. It’s critically important to bring Ktaqmkuk into territorial presence—Mi’kma’ki includes Ktaqmkuk and our Beothuk relatives—because colonialism is an on-going process, not a one-time, or belonging to a time event. It’s now.

The research and then giving away of this work might be the most important part of it. Please contact me to use images or the video; scroll down and download a document from the UK National Archive for your own personal archive, to share with your family, kin, and community.

Technical Specs

Over the Summer months of 02025 I worked in-studio and on-site with contemporary dancer, choreographer, and movement artist Hilary Knee to locate the movements in my body and create performance works.

The video and audio for two projections were made by Kurtis Walsh on Codroy Island.

My friend and frequent collaborator, Kristin Pope, captured still images during the on-island performance.

My cousin, Myles Gould, brought us to the island in his family’s fishing boat in September, 02025 to make the first performance. (This was the 262nd anniversary of the Treaty affirmation.)

In Kjipuktuk where the third artwork was made, I was supported by Nocturne festival and HRM. Advanced Systems provided audio gear, a projector, screen, and other tools to project the video.

Over many years, I moved toward this work and made my research through community conversation, reading, movement, visiting, being on-island, and archival work from my home studio with the UK National Archive.