Collective
Miranda Bellamy & Amanda Fauteux
Curated by Jessica Groome
5th October, 2023 - 11th February, 2024, Art Gallery of Grande Prairie, Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada.
Collective has been a process of accumulation. Over several years and across the many seemingly disparate locations we have visited, we have met with and photographed hundreds of marked trees. In our images, the makers of the varied traces we found etched into or painted on each tree are absent. We are left to wonder who is responsible for these marks, and why? Is it a secret code? An expression? What kind of message is this?
The trees and their marks have told us stories of loss, trauma, healing, renewal, cooperation, and guardianship. These stories speak to the immediacy of this moment, where biosystems strain under intersecting crises. Through our work we consider how we might, in approaching our relationship with trees through a new lens, be able to see past ourselves in a way that recognises the significance of our interconnection and honours their autonomy as living beings.
Read the accompanying essay by exhibition curator Jessica Groome by clicking here.
Read the exhibition response by Emily Jan commissioned by Contemporary Hum here.
Experience the exhibition online in the interactive self guided tour. Each work in the exhibition is interactive, allowing didactic, captions and additional information to be displayed by clicking. Collective is in galleries 3 & 4. You can jump to these space by clicking the map.
https://exhibitions.ortelia.com/AGGPJan24/
Collective was made possible thanks to funding from Arts New Brunswick.
We acknowledge that the locations visited in the making of Collective are the traditional homelands of diverse Indigenous Peoples.
Kjipuktuk (Halifax, NS) and wider Mi’kma’ki (which Sackville, NB, is located within), are the unceded homelands of the Mi'kmaq People. This territory is covered by the Treaties of Peace and Friendship, which the Wolastoqiyik and Mi’kmaq Peoples first signed with the British Crown in 1725. The treaties did not deal with surrender of lands and resources but in fact recognised Mi’kmaq and Wolastoqiyik title and established the rules for what was to be an ongoing relationship between nations.
Ndakinna (which Vermont, USA, is located within) is the traditional homeland of the N’dakina (Abenaki / Abénaquis) People, part of the Wabanaki (Dawnland Confederacy).
The Mana Whenua of Kawau Island, Aotearoa (New Zealand) are Ngāti Manuhiri, Ngāti Whātua, Ngāti Whanaunga, Ngāti Maru (Hauraki), Te Kawerau a Maki, Ngātiwai, Ngāi Tai ki Tāmaki, Ngāti Paoa. Mana Whenua are Māori iwi (tribes) or hapū (kinship groups) with tribal links to a region in Aotearoa (New Zealand).
The Mana Whenua of Tuatapere, Aotearoa (New Zealand) are Ngāi Tahu / Kāi Tahu.
The Mana Whenua of Te Whanganui-a-Tara (Wellington), Aotearoa (New Zealand) are Ngāti Toa Rangatira, Taranaki Whānui ki Te Upoko o Te Ika, and Te Atiawa (Wellington).
Treaty 8 territory encompasses Grande Prairie, AB, and the area surrounding Sturgeon Lake. The artists acknowledge this area as the traditional and ancestral territory of the Dane-zaa, Nehiyawak, and Dene, as well as the homeland of the Métis. They acknowledge the many Indigenous Peoples who have lived in and cared for these lands for generations.
We honour and pay respect to the knowledge embedded in the traditional custodians of these diverse lands and waters, past, present, and future.