Nibi (she/her/they/them), 2024
What if the Red River was a person, what would it be like if it held personhood status? In 2017, New Zealand/Aotearoa passed a groundbreaking law granting legal personhood status to the Whanganui River. Nibi is a work that poses the concept of the Red River and Lake Winnipeg gaining personhood through supporting the work of others that have been advocating on behalf of the waterways in Manitoba.
Embedded in Indigenous worldviews, water is sacred, the water ways are like mother earths veins, the lifeblood of our existence; sustaining and nurturing life. The Red River an important waterway of Winnipeg and envisioning a future for it as a person is compelling.
Colonial interferences polluted the the Red River and Lake Winnipeg to the point of dangerous environmental degradation impacting human livelihood, food security, and precious water security. In 2022, 60 million litres of raw sewage spilled into the river and again in 2024, more than 230 million litres of raw sewage caused extensive environmental damage directly impacting the health and wellbeing of many dependant on the waterways.
Nibi in Anishinaabe translates to water. My grandmother, Elder Dr. Mary Courchene shared with me the meaning of our city namesake “Winnipeg,” to translate to muddy waters, in Anishinabe, Winipek. Lake Winnipeg, known as Weenipagamiksaguygun in Anishinaabe, is considered a living being with a spirit. Many believe they have a duty to speak for Weenipagamiksaguygun and the life within it. Women as water carriers, as water guardians are the inspiration for the Red River and Lake Winnipeg to take on a feminine spirit and shape.
Camera/Editor/ Technician Scott Benesiinaabandan
Drone Technician: Cory Penner
Technicians Projection Mapping: Manufacturing Entertainment
Footage: UHD 4K, 10 mins loop
Site: Nuit Blanche 2024, Canadian Human Rights Museum, Performance, Installation, and Film projection. Photo: Katherena Vermette (Author of the River)
Brings to Light, 2013-2024
Brings to Light is an exhibition of mixed media sculpture, installations, performance and film responding to the legacy of the Residential School system (IRSS) and colonial structures that devalued Indigenous knowledge systems and restricted rich cultural languages and traditions.
In this time of uncovering truths of the IRSS, families and communities are trying to find meaningful ways for dialogue, to heal and to find redress. Brings to Light is a personal story of intergenerational Indigenous experiences of trauma, memory, resiliency and reclamation. Isaac’s mother, grandparents and other relatives attended Fort Alexander Residential School (FARS) which was located in Sagkeeng First Nation on Treaty One Territory. In addition to presenting earlier pieces, Brings to Light includes new works that address intergenerational knowledge and language reclamation, reflecting Isaac’s journey of knowledge repatriation and access to Anishinaabemowin from her grandmother, Elder Mary Courchene.
The exhibition includes a series of integral public program events: a film screening, feast, conversations, and a bilingual (English/Anishinaabemowin) publication. Brings to Light will generate dialogue around kin, community and knowledge of intergenerational significance.
Mino Pimatisiwin Wiisiniwin, 2024
Mino Pimatisiwin Wiisiniwin film is a celebration of food and language revitalization, it is about "living the good life through food." This 20-min film is a look at learning and reconnecting with the Anishinaabe language through making a moose-meat pie with Jaimie and her grandmother Elder Mary Courchene. Language is gifted through sharing a family recipe and stories while making good food together. Filmed like a cooking show, you can follow along to learn some Anishinaabe and make a mooz meat pie.
Time: 20 mins
Language: English, Anishinaabe, Subtitles
Themes: Works by women, Feminism, Food, Gender Language and food revitalization, Family
Region: Manitoba
Music: DJ Boogie the Beat
The Kookum’s Lounge, 2023
The Kookums Lounge is interactive space of light and comfort. Traditionally, the tipi represents a women’s skirt, sheltering community and kin. Considering the tipi an Indigenous femme architecture and institute, it is a gathering space to share and transmit knowledge, stories and languages. Instead of hide, upcycled water resistant sails from sailboats are sewn together for the tipi covering, material used to symbolize migrations of many people that came to Turtle Island from across the oceans on boats. The tipi flooring is sewn together insulated tarp, and sewn onto of the tarp is kookum scarf material to resemble blankets of matriarchal comfort. The tipi lining shows archival photos of my ancestors sitting as witnesses in the space. I grew up sailing and I received a kookum scarf from my great grandmother both aspects bring a particularly close relationship to the materials in this project, which are coded with history and visual literacy that speak to intercultural understandings. The temporal architecture of the tipi provokes ideas of comfort, expectation, displacement and movement while also a space for stories and experiences to be shared. Creating and holding space for collective understanding and dialogue is what is being presented as a concept in Kookum’s Lounge.
The Eighth and Final Fire, 2021
The Eighth and Final Fire prophecy of the Anishinaabe written on birchbark scrolls and in oral histories foretells the coming of settlers to Turtle Island. It predicted the complex relationships with Indigenous Peoples and the land. The future is evolutionary and rising.
Each flame represents the eight fires and timelines in the prophecy. Each of the eight flames shed light on those nearby both day and night. Their soft amber and red hues are like those from a fire, calming and contemplative. Though fire can be destructive, it also has regenerative powers in natural ecosystems. Grounded in the earth, each chevron implies movement, and is elemental evoking wind, water and fire.
Through geometric triangular symmetry and repetition, shares an interpretation of the prophecy in representing each of the eight fires, elemental power, generations, time and relationships.
The Eighth and Final Fire was commissioned by The Winnipeg Foundation for The Forks.
Medium: Corten and steel
Location: Near Oodena Circle, The Forks, Manitoba.
Nimaamaa, 2018
Nimama means “my mother” in Cree, Ojibwe and Métis. This 30-foot-tall sculpture represents motherhood, Mother Earth and new beginnings. She has seven strands of hair, one for each of the seven sacred teachings. She is pregnant; she is water, land and stars; she is kneeling toward the sun signalling rebirth.
Medium: Polished and painted steel, copper, coreten metal
Location: Niizhoziibean, The Forks, Winnipeg, Manitoba
Artists: Jaimie Isaac, KC Adams, Val Vint