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Interventions in Traditional Territories: "Cistemaw inyiniw," A Performance by Cheryl L'Hirondelle
by Candice Hopkins
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Each additional performer interacted with the
community in a separate way. Joseph Naytowhow recited the story
in typical Cree tradition by becoming the spirit of Cistemaw inyiniw
He offered tobacco to the people he visited and alerted them to
Cheryl's action. Louise Halfe chose to do a photo essay in addition
to informing the community about the performance and recording their
opinions of the action. Cheli Nighttraveller visited the home of
an elderly man in the nearby community of Loon Lake and documented
her visit with photographs.
During L'Hirondelle's performance, three radio
stations, Flying Dust Radio, MBC, and CJNS, broadcasted the story
of Cistemaw iyiniw in Cree as told by Harry Blackbird. While Flying
Dust Radio is broadcasted to the reserve, MBC and CJNS are stations
that play mainly Top 40 hits. The idea of a Cree story interrupting
the regular streams of Shania Twain and 50 Cent is subversive in
itself.
Each component of the performance—L'Hirondelle's
running, the visits with the members of the community, and the radio
broadcasts—extended public reception of the event. The visits
with the community informed people of the performance, broadening
her audience; the radio broadcasts ensured that the community had
access to the original story; and L'Hirondelle's action physically
inscribed Cistemaw iyiniw's story in the landscape of northern Saskatchewan.
 The
term "public art" doesn't resonate with most Native people.
After all, they do not make up a large percentage of the museum
audience. They certainly aren't viewed as constituting the public
or even one of the more carefully defined "publics." Rather,
they are part of a community. Will the community of Makwa Sahgaiehcan
remember L'Hirondelle's performance as a great moment of contemporary
Native public art? Probably not. However, it will resonate
in the minds of those who witnessed it as an honorable act.
See Cheryl's project at http://www.ndnnrkey.net/cistemaw/
Candice Hopkins (Metis/Tlingit) is a
curator and an artist. She has worked for Aboriginal organizations
nationally and internationally and has been a project director for
the Treaty 8 Tribal Association responsible for the development
of a new Cultural and Interpretative Centre. She received her Master
of Arts in curatorial studies in contemporary culture from the Center
for Curatorial Studies at Bard College, where she attended on a
scholarship from the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation.
She has written and presented on Aboriginal and contemporary art
and curated exhibitions featuring the work of distinguished artists
such as Faye HeavyShield, Elaine Reichek, Jimmie Durham and David
Hammons. Hopkins is currently the Aboriginal curatorial resident
at the Walter Phillips Gallery. The exhibit A Sense of Place was
recently up in the Walter Phillips Gallery.
Cheryl L'Hirondelle (aka cheryl l'hirondelle
waynohtew, cheryl koprek)
is an alberta born but currently a vancouver based, halfbreed (metis/cree-non
status/treaty, french, german, polish) multi/interdisciplinary artist.
Since the early 80's she has created, performed, collaborated and
presented work in a variety of artistic disciplines: performance
art,
music (voice, percussion), theatre (actor/writer), performance poetry,
storytelling, video and new media.Since the early 90's she has also
worked as an arts programmer, cultural strategist/activist, arts
consultant and producer independently and
within the national artist-run network, first nations bands and
tribal councils,
and government agencies (provincial & federal).She is currently
developing performative physical endurance interventions and producing
interactive net.art projects (www.ndnnrkey.net), still performs
with her singing duo nikamok and is teaching first nations net.art
and digital storytelling at Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design.
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