misponkisikaw.com

I am Asiniskaw Īthiniw and Anishinaabe from Pinaymootang First Nation with ties to Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation and O-Pip-Pon-O-Piwin Cree Nation. Through the mediums of beading, printmaking, and installation my work is focused on themes of intergenerational memory, familial narratives, language, and materiality.

My work is rooted in Indigenous research methodologies that includes storytelling while visiting with my family. The intentional choice of my materials including birch, tarp, rabbit fur and family portrait photographs is essential to my work as they act as a connection to my family. I enjoy working with tangible materials that hold memory.

My work this year was an exploration between birch bark etching and biting and contemporary materials and technologies as a form of dialog between the past and present. This show centres on oral history and collecting familial narratives while asking what it looks like to carry on these stories. Combining the mediums of screen printing, laser cutting, and birch bark etching I work in effort to honour the knowledge that my Nimihšōmihš (Grandfather) and Nōhkomak (Grandmothers) pass down as well as the importance of this practice.

Birch bark bitings and scrolls typically documented stories, ceremonies, and narratives that were passed on from generation to generation. My work similarly uses these materials but incorporates new modes of translation that expands upon birch bark etching, bridging between traditional and contemporary knowledge. The laser cut works transform and recontextualize the traditional practice in response to the digital age while visually translating my familial narratives.