The word agency has been used by various scholars from anthropologist Alfred Gell to sociologist Bruno Latour and now is used in art, anthropology and historical discourse to describe the complex relationships between objects, collectors, indigenous makers and museums. What exactly does it mean for an indigenous artist (maker) to have agency? Can an object have agency? How might we perceive agency? While the term is contested, it is also a useful way for thinking about how we as curators, scholars and indigenous people relate to objects and each other.
Based on my research with Métis community members in Ontario, I would argue that agency for Métis people lies in their relationships to culture, community and self. I use the term agency here to imply the decisions made by Métis to assert their identity, collect cultural items and create their own notions of self. Using Gell’s notion of agency, I will briefly look at how Métis material culture can be understood in this context.
Art objects, in the complexity of their design and physical construction, are imbued with strength from their maker’s skill and aesthetic choices. As Alfred Gell sets out in his controversial essay, “The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology,” (1992), they can act on a viewer’s physical and spiritual senses, making art a powerful tool as a social agent. Gell notes,
The power of art objects stems from the technical processes they objectively embody: the technology of enchantment is founded on the enchantment of technology. The enchantment of technology is the power that technical processes have of casting a spell over us so that we see the real world in an enchanted form. Art, as a separate kind of activity, only carries further, through a kind of involution, the enchantment which is immanent in all kinds of technical activity (Gell 1992: 52).
When viewing a piece of art, viewers are wrapped up in the aesthetic qualities of an object: its design. The fascination with the object is carried further because viewers can appreciate the artistic skill of the artist yet fail to completely understand how they created it, thus they must acknowledge that the “technical processes” or aesthetic skill presented, exceeds their own. Gell argues, “the moral significance of the work of art arises from the mismatch between the spectator’s internal awareness of his own powers as an agent and the conception he forms of the powers possessed by the artist. In reconstructing the processes which brought the work of art into existence, he is obliged to posit a creative agency which transcends his own”(Gell 1992: 52).
However, Gell’s argument that one understand objects as having agency solely through their stylistic designs, “their technology of enchantment” is inadequate especially in relation to indigenous ways of understanding art. I argue that an object has power not only in its ability to enchant viewers but also through its relation to the artist and community that it was made in. Material culture continues to play a vital role for the Métis of Ontario in the celebration of their heritage, and in the development of identity. Objects such as sashes, bags, jackets, flags and hats communicate to the public the pride that Métis feel about their past and also of the present. These objects then have a great amount of agency bestowed upon them by the creators and wearers of the clothing. A sash or beaded bag can communicate the pride that the wearer has in traditional Aboriginal arts such as beading, weaving or quillwork. They also act as signifiers for the Métis nation and unite people who wear them on occasions such as informal gatherings, National Aboriginal Day, Louis Riel Day and other events. For Métis Dennis Tremblay, collecting Aboriginal art and artifacts is an essential part of being Métis. He states the important role that his collection has in his life, “it (the collection) cements me to my heritage, it’s a direct connection with my past… When I pick up an artifact, it feels like a direct connection with my ancestors. I’m touching these items that they touched” (personal communication). Tremblay has actively amassed pieces and also received donations. The objects serve as a personal collection but also as a record of Aboriginal heritage within Northern Ontario since the nineteenth century.
For many Métis, an object has agency in its ability to mediate between various relationships, with the artist, community and wearer. In the words of scholar Sherry Farrell Racette, “because visual art is communicative, engaging both artist and audience, shared aesthetic expressions serve to bind people in an emotional response to what is culturally defined or well made - the collective linking of eyes, hands and heart”( Racette 2004:2). The processes of collecting, wearing and creating art for Métis will continue to be of utmost importance for us as we continue to develop as a nation.
Sources
Alfred Gell, “The Technology of Enchantment and the Enchantment of Technology,” in Anthropology, Art and Aesthetics, ed. Jeremy Coote and Anthony Shelton, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992.
Sherry Farrell Racette, “Sewing Ourselves Together: Clothing, Decorative Arts and the Expression of Metis and Half Breed Identity,” (PH.D. Thesis), Winnipeg: The University of Manitoba, 2004.
(Please note: the ideas presented here are largely based on my MA thesis work. Please contact me if you would like to reproduce this anywhere.)
Métis Ramblings: A blog about Native arts, Aboriginal issues and life in general
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Season of writing!
Hello All
As some of you know, nanowrimo is upon us once again, starting November 1. The goal of this challenge is to write 50 000 words by the end of the month (about 175 pages)You can write fiction, non-fiction - you name it - I figured out today that to meet this goal you have to write about 1666 words a day. You may think its crazy - but its actually a great challenge and gets you writing and thinking about things you wouldn't normally. Like writing craziness at 2am trying to get the word count. Anyways, i will be doing the challenge this year and will try and post throughout the month about the process.
I did the challenge last year and look forward to doing it again - there is something about writing alot that frees you up. Have you ever done nanowrimo? if so - let me know!
Feel free to join me :)
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Short Story: Beading My Identity: Tales from a Metis Grandmother
Literary news! My story was selected as a finalist for the 2010 "Our Story" Aboriginal Youth writing challenge. This is an annual challenge for all Aboriginal youth who would like to express a story about their heritage.
To read my author's statement and story you can click here..
I will also post this story below.
Please feel free to leave a comment or message!
Author's statement..
Cultural expression for the Métis was and is a vital component of identity. This story aims to shed light on the vital role of Métis and Aboriginal women who decorated objects and clothing for their loved ones with beadwork, quillwork and ribbon work and the stories behind these items. Often, Métis stories focus on the contributions of men such as Louis Riel or Gabriel Dumont but do not express the voices of Métis women who were essential to the production of Métis arts. My Métis ancestors come from the St. Andrew settlement at Red River, Manitoba. This story is loosely based on the tales my mother told me of her family’s experience of being of mixed-heritage and also draws on my contemporary interest in beading. In the past, my family often used clothing to express their Métis identity. One photograph from the mid-nineteenth century shows all the men wearing sashes and beaded moccasins, gazing solemnly out at the photographer. This story aims to give voice to the women’s hands that decorated moccasins, and beaded vests that clothed their families’ bodies. If the hands of my grandmother could talk, perhaps this is what they might say …
Beading My Identity: Tales from a Metis Grandmother
A drop of blood glistens for a moment on my finger and falls onto the soft, smooth hide. The needle has pricked my finger once again as I try to thread the beads onto the four-petal design. The blood spot looks like a little bead on the tan hide, yet it is misplaced, so far from the flower that I am trying to make. I always prided myself on my ability to create perfect beaded designs for my family and now in my old age, my eyesight is failing and I keep piercing my fingers with the needles. It wasn’t always so. When I was a young Métis woman I could stay up all night and bead, sew, bead, all the little sparkling gems onto hide shirts, moccasins and mitts. I prided myself on my work and all my sisters would come and ask me for help. I was the one they turned to if they wanted a new design, or help on a difficult technique.
Although learning beadwork was not an easy task, and there were many times that I wanted to give up, my mother encouraged me to go on. Like our Métis people who have persevered through so much animosity, my beadwork designs have been passed down through my family, giving hope, courage and beauty to another generation of Métis.
Things were not straightforward in my days as a young Métis woman; we were discriminated against because we had both Indian and European blood. People in my community called me “half - breed” and it stung, and cut deeper than they would know. Yet my mother who had married a Scottish man was proud of me, and her Anishinabbe and Cree traditions, and I drew strength from her stories. Let me tell you of when I first learned to do quillwork; it was a long time ago.
The wigwam was cozy and warm, there was a ray of light streaming down and illuminating my mother's tan, care - worn face. She squinted over her piece of hide and placed the bone white needle in and out to hold the beads in place. Red, green, purple, white, blue and yellow colours turned the hide into a wonderful sight - like a field of wildflowers in the summer sun. I wondered at my mother's nimble fingers and liked to guess at the pattern she would make, maybe it was a star or a flower or some symbol for an underwater being -- or maybe a spirit of the forest. My mother hummed a melodic tune as she worked, her nostrils flared as she hummed along and looked back at me as I worked on my own little piece of quill work.
I let out a huff and puff. I had been trying to split the quill to wrap it around the leather fringe for what seemed like eons and still could not manage it. My fingers were stiff and cramped from trying to work with the quills. But mother was insistent that I learn this quillwork so I could decorate my own clothing one day. I did not like to worry about the future and did not imagine ever having to take care of anyone but myself. The black and red quills made a nice cross-latch pattern, I was trying to make it shaped like a Thunderbird to represent the power in the heavens and earth. A favourite story that my mother told me was about the Thunderbird. It was a powerful god who looked at the good and the bad people in the world and spread its sheltering wings over both. I felt that the Thunderbird with its beautiful dark-brown feathers and white-snow crest, its powerful cry and sharp as flint talons, would be able to take me away with one fowl swoop.
Sometimes I dreamed that the Thunderbird would pick me up from my encampment, piercing me lightly with its sharp strong talons and bring me to its nest where I could preen its feathers. Then, I thought, I would not have to help my mother tan the leathers or pick berries or harvest wild rice.
My mother warned me though, that the Thunderbird was a spirit that was both generous and dangerous. Like the fast-flowing river that could dash a man and his canoe to many splinters, so too could the Thunderbird judge humans and put them in a terrible place or bring them up to live with him in the clouds. I hoped that I would be the one to live up in the heavens and not be dashed against the rocks like a grey clam. As my mother told me in stories and songs, there were also powerful spirits in the waters so I did not like to get too close, except some days when they would harvest clams and then use the pearly interior shell that reflected like a rainbow, to make beads. My mother and I would take a large stack of shells and break them into pieces and then rub the shells with flint and other rocks to make them smooth. Then we would drill them and make holes to string them on necklaces and put them on leather garments.
After working on my quillwork for many days, I eventually found the rhythm of the materials and my fingers eased into the task. That summer I became a woman and created my first real quillwork design - it was a five-petal flower with curling tendrils and had a large Thunderbird who spread its wings across the earth and sky. I gave it as a gift to my sister, who was mourning the loss of her husband. Her tears ran from her eyes when I gave her the gift and I knew that the hours I had spent making this were not in vain, in fact, it seemed these designs had healing properties. From that moment on, I tried to learn everything I could about quillwork and beading and took a great amount of pride in the designs I created.
Another memorable moment in my life was my first Métis dance. Everyone in our community wanted to look fancy so all the women got together and beaded moccasins and vests for their beaus and family members. I was lucky at that time, I had a beau named Andrew and made him and myself a pair of fancy moccasins with bead work all over the top of them in a wild-flower design. While wearing those moccasins, he was the handsomest man at the party. I remember dancing at the ball…
We heard the sound of jigging and moved towards the lilting, pulsing rhythm. Entering the crowded space, we saw a fiddler with rosy cheeks rubbing away on the strings. He was tapping his foot in time to the mantic nocturne his instrument produced.
My insides coiled tighter and tighter as the fiddler played faster and his toes started tapping involuntarily. The demon within me was dying to get out, it was like the music was drawing the toxins out of my body. The room spun around as I took a few steps and my mind reeled, the ceiling became the floor and the floor the ceiling. The tune shifted pace to a slower beat and I began to feel better. The people around me cleared the floor and began to dance; their lithe bodies were elegant. There was a mix of white and brown faces in the barn, all illuminated with revelry from the dance. Their hands moved. The feet of the men with their moccasins brushed the floor and created a whooshing sound and pounded and shook the space. They danced and jigged, circling around and around. They took off their sashes and used them like a maypole, each dancer turning and twisting like a snake in time to the music. Smiles were abound in the room and I noticed Andrew had also joined into the dance as well. His hair bounced around his head like a red flame. Many people were fascinated with his red hair. He basked in the attention and jigged like no one and everyone in the room was watching. His hands firmly placed on his waist, his feet danced as if inhabited by a Wendigo, they moved so swift and so gracefully. Men and women danced in a circle, prancing around and tapping their toes to the beat. I could not help smiling.
Our spirits soared as the dancing continued. The fiddler started another fast paced tune and the whole crowd starting jigging, many others stood around clapping their hands to the beat, longing to engage in the rhythm somehow. It was as if the fiddler knew the hearts of each of the dancers and was in tune with them, his swelling breast beat in time with ours. We moved in unison while some jeered and cheered at the dancers in the middle who were flaunting their ability. They lived to flaunt. Their bright sashes and metal earrings glinted on their bodies drawing the eyes of everyone in the room.
The music was still playing and the fiddler was driving away at the instrument, as if the fiddle had a mind of its own and possessed the player. I let the music wash over me like water and was enveloped into the sound. The music, like the beading, had healing properties and I felt that some of the hatred and anger that my Métis family had experienced ebbed away through the energy and vitality of this dance and the beauty of the beaded costumes that the dancers wore.
Andrew really appreciated the moccasins I had made him and wore them to every single dance after that. Not soon after that first dance, Andrew proposed to me and I accepted. I liked to think it was due to my wit, but I think my beautiful beadwork designs had a much larger role.
Now in my age of wisdom, I sit and hold these beaded moccasins and I feel the memories rise to the surface of the beadwork, and I can almost hear the joyful tune of the fiddle and the scuffling of moccasins on the wooden-barn floor. I hope that the beaded designs I have given my family will provide the same joy that they have given me. I pick up my needle and begin to bead again.
(Please note: this story is my original work and please contact me if you would like to reproduce this story).
To read my author's statement and story you can click here..
I will also post this story below.
Please feel free to leave a comment or message!
Author's statement..
Cultural expression for the Métis was and is a vital component of identity. This story aims to shed light on the vital role of Métis and Aboriginal women who decorated objects and clothing for their loved ones with beadwork, quillwork and ribbon work and the stories behind these items. Often, Métis stories focus on the contributions of men such as Louis Riel or Gabriel Dumont but do not express the voices of Métis women who were essential to the production of Métis arts. My Métis ancestors come from the St. Andrew settlement at Red River, Manitoba. This story is loosely based on the tales my mother told me of her family’s experience of being of mixed-heritage and also draws on my contemporary interest in beading. In the past, my family often used clothing to express their Métis identity. One photograph from the mid-nineteenth century shows all the men wearing sashes and beaded moccasins, gazing solemnly out at the photographer. This story aims to give voice to the women’s hands that decorated moccasins, and beaded vests that clothed their families’ bodies. If the hands of my grandmother could talk, perhaps this is what they might say …
Beading My Identity: Tales from a Metis Grandmother
A drop of blood glistens for a moment on my finger and falls onto the soft, smooth hide. The needle has pricked my finger once again as I try to thread the beads onto the four-petal design. The blood spot looks like a little bead on the tan hide, yet it is misplaced, so far from the flower that I am trying to make. I always prided myself on my ability to create perfect beaded designs for my family and now in my old age, my eyesight is failing and I keep piercing my fingers with the needles. It wasn’t always so. When I was a young Métis woman I could stay up all night and bead, sew, bead, all the little sparkling gems onto hide shirts, moccasins and mitts. I prided myself on my work and all my sisters would come and ask me for help. I was the one they turned to if they wanted a new design, or help on a difficult technique.
Although learning beadwork was not an easy task, and there were many times that I wanted to give up, my mother encouraged me to go on. Like our Métis people who have persevered through so much animosity, my beadwork designs have been passed down through my family, giving hope, courage and beauty to another generation of Métis.
Things were not straightforward in my days as a young Métis woman; we were discriminated against because we had both Indian and European blood. People in my community called me “half - breed” and it stung, and cut deeper than they would know. Yet my mother who had married a Scottish man was proud of me, and her Anishinabbe and Cree traditions, and I drew strength from her stories. Let me tell you of when I first learned to do quillwork; it was a long time ago.
The wigwam was cozy and warm, there was a ray of light streaming down and illuminating my mother's tan, care - worn face. She squinted over her piece of hide and placed the bone white needle in and out to hold the beads in place. Red, green, purple, white, blue and yellow colours turned the hide into a wonderful sight - like a field of wildflowers in the summer sun. I wondered at my mother's nimble fingers and liked to guess at the pattern she would make, maybe it was a star or a flower or some symbol for an underwater being -- or maybe a spirit of the forest. My mother hummed a melodic tune as she worked, her nostrils flared as she hummed along and looked back at me as I worked on my own little piece of quill work.
I let out a huff and puff. I had been trying to split the quill to wrap it around the leather fringe for what seemed like eons and still could not manage it. My fingers were stiff and cramped from trying to work with the quills. But mother was insistent that I learn this quillwork so I could decorate my own clothing one day. I did not like to worry about the future and did not imagine ever having to take care of anyone but myself. The black and red quills made a nice cross-latch pattern, I was trying to make it shaped like a Thunderbird to represent the power in the heavens and earth. A favourite story that my mother told me was about the Thunderbird. It was a powerful god who looked at the good and the bad people in the world and spread its sheltering wings over both. I felt that the Thunderbird with its beautiful dark-brown feathers and white-snow crest, its powerful cry and sharp as flint talons, would be able to take me away with one fowl swoop.
Sometimes I dreamed that the Thunderbird would pick me up from my encampment, piercing me lightly with its sharp strong talons and bring me to its nest where I could preen its feathers. Then, I thought, I would not have to help my mother tan the leathers or pick berries or harvest wild rice.
My mother warned me though, that the Thunderbird was a spirit that was both generous and dangerous. Like the fast-flowing river that could dash a man and his canoe to many splinters, so too could the Thunderbird judge humans and put them in a terrible place or bring them up to live with him in the clouds. I hoped that I would be the one to live up in the heavens and not be dashed against the rocks like a grey clam. As my mother told me in stories and songs, there were also powerful spirits in the waters so I did not like to get too close, except some days when they would harvest clams and then use the pearly interior shell that reflected like a rainbow, to make beads. My mother and I would take a large stack of shells and break them into pieces and then rub the shells with flint and other rocks to make them smooth. Then we would drill them and make holes to string them on necklaces and put them on leather garments.
After working on my quillwork for many days, I eventually found the rhythm of the materials and my fingers eased into the task. That summer I became a woman and created my first real quillwork design - it was a five-petal flower with curling tendrils and had a large Thunderbird who spread its wings across the earth and sky. I gave it as a gift to my sister, who was mourning the loss of her husband. Her tears ran from her eyes when I gave her the gift and I knew that the hours I had spent making this were not in vain, in fact, it seemed these designs had healing properties. From that moment on, I tried to learn everything I could about quillwork and beading and took a great amount of pride in the designs I created.
Another memorable moment in my life was my first Métis dance. Everyone in our community wanted to look fancy so all the women got together and beaded moccasins and vests for their beaus and family members. I was lucky at that time, I had a beau named Andrew and made him and myself a pair of fancy moccasins with bead work all over the top of them in a wild-flower design. While wearing those moccasins, he was the handsomest man at the party. I remember dancing at the ball…
We heard the sound of jigging and moved towards the lilting, pulsing rhythm. Entering the crowded space, we saw a fiddler with rosy cheeks rubbing away on the strings. He was tapping his foot in time to the mantic nocturne his instrument produced.
My insides coiled tighter and tighter as the fiddler played faster and his toes started tapping involuntarily. The demon within me was dying to get out, it was like the music was drawing the toxins out of my body. The room spun around as I took a few steps and my mind reeled, the ceiling became the floor and the floor the ceiling. The tune shifted pace to a slower beat and I began to feel better. The people around me cleared the floor and began to dance; their lithe bodies were elegant. There was a mix of white and brown faces in the barn, all illuminated with revelry from the dance. Their hands moved. The feet of the men with their moccasins brushed the floor and created a whooshing sound and pounded and shook the space. They danced and jigged, circling around and around. They took off their sashes and used them like a maypole, each dancer turning and twisting like a snake in time to the music. Smiles were abound in the room and I noticed Andrew had also joined into the dance as well. His hair bounced around his head like a red flame. Many people were fascinated with his red hair. He basked in the attention and jigged like no one and everyone in the room was watching. His hands firmly placed on his waist, his feet danced as if inhabited by a Wendigo, they moved so swift and so gracefully. Men and women danced in a circle, prancing around and tapping their toes to the beat. I could not help smiling.
Our spirits soared as the dancing continued. The fiddler started another fast paced tune and the whole crowd starting jigging, many others stood around clapping their hands to the beat, longing to engage in the rhythm somehow. It was as if the fiddler knew the hearts of each of the dancers and was in tune with them, his swelling breast beat in time with ours. We moved in unison while some jeered and cheered at the dancers in the middle who were flaunting their ability. They lived to flaunt. Their bright sashes and metal earrings glinted on their bodies drawing the eyes of everyone in the room.
The music was still playing and the fiddler was driving away at the instrument, as if the fiddle had a mind of its own and possessed the player. I let the music wash over me like water and was enveloped into the sound. The music, like the beading, had healing properties and I felt that some of the hatred and anger that my Métis family had experienced ebbed away through the energy and vitality of this dance and the beauty of the beaded costumes that the dancers wore.
Andrew really appreciated the moccasins I had made him and wore them to every single dance after that. Not soon after that first dance, Andrew proposed to me and I accepted. I liked to think it was due to my wit, but I think my beautiful beadwork designs had a much larger role.
Now in my age of wisdom, I sit and hold these beaded moccasins and I feel the memories rise to the surface of the beadwork, and I can almost hear the joyful tune of the fiddle and the scuffling of moccasins on the wooden-barn floor. I hope that the beaded designs I have given my family will provide the same joy that they have given me. I pick up my needle and begin to bead again.
(Please note: this story is my original work and please contact me if you would like to reproduce this story).
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