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13 Jan – 9 Apr 2017

Walter C. Koerner Library, 1958 Main Mall

Koerner Library: Marianne Nicolson

  • Marianne Nicolson

    Artist

    Marianne Nicolson (Kwakwaka’wakw, Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw First Nations, b. 1969) is an artist and activist of the Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw Nations who are part of the Kwakwaka’wakw (Kwak’wala speaking peoples) of the Northwest Coast. She is trained in both traditional Kwakwaka’wakw forms and culture and contemporary gallery and museum-based practice. Her practice is multi-disciplinary, encompassing photography, painting, carving, video, installation, monumental public art, writing and speaking. She works as a Kwakwaka’wakw cultural researcher and historian, as well as an advocate for Indigenous land rights. She holds a BFA from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design (1996), an MFA (2000), MA in Linguistics and Anthropology (2005) and PhD in Linguistics and Anthropology with a focus on space as expressed in the Kwak’wala language (2013) all from the University of Victoria. Solo exhibitions include the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (2008); Artspeak, Vancouver (2006); Esquimalt Municipal Hall (2004); Thunder Bay Art Gallery (2002); National Indian Art Centre, Hull (2001); Campbell River Public Art Gallery (2000) and Or Gallery, Vancouver (1992). Group exhibitions include the 17th Biennale of Sydney (2020); the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver (2020); the Vancouver Art Gallery (2019-20); the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (2018-19) and the National Museum of the American Indian, New York (2017-19), among others. Major monumental public artworks are situated in her home territory of the Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw First Nation, Vancouver International Airport, the Canadian Embassy in Amman, Jordan and the Canadian Embassy in Paris, France.

    Following Nicolson’s Hexsa’am: To Be Here Always, a 2019 project with the Belkin that functioned as research, material, media, testimony and ceremony to challenge the western concept that the power of art as limited to the symbolic, This Is An Emergency Broadcast (2023) is another moment to amplify Indigenous tradition.

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  • Lorna Brown

    Curator

    Lorna Brown is a Vancouver-based visual artist, curator, writer and editor. Brown is a founding member of Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, and is an ongoing member of the Other Sights Producer team. She was the Director/Curator of Artspeak Gallery from 1999 to 2004, an artist-run centre focusing on the relationship between visual art and writing. Between 2015 and 2022, she was Acting Director/Curator at the Belkin, curating exhibition series such as Beginning With the Seventies that explored the relationship between art, archives and activism. Brown has exhibited her work internationally since 1984, and has taught at Simon Fraser University and Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she received an honorary doctorate of letters in 2015. Awards include the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts Award (1996) and the Canada Council Paris Studio Award (2000). Her work is in the collections of the Belkin, SFU Galleries, the National Gallery of Canada, the BC Arts Council, the Surrey Art Gallery and the Canada Council Art Bank.

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Marianne Nicolson, Tunics of the Changing Tide: Dzawada’enuxw Histories, 2007
Courtesy of the artist

Marianne Nicolson’s paintings graphically depict the back view of two tunic forms placed upon black- and grey-bordered backgrounds. Ghostly traces of raven, human and wolf figures float on the negative spaces like constellations, while a tree of life along with thunderbird, mink and serpent forms sit in bold symmetry on the tunic shapes. Signifying wealth and social standing, coppers (both intact and ceremonially broken) are affixed to the panel, as are abalone discs, coins and military-style brass buttons. With these paintings, Marianne Nicolson addresses the shifting state of economic growth and decline amongst the Kwikwasut’inuxw and Dzawada̱’enux̱w – the Gilford Island and Kingcome Inlet communities of Nicolson’s ancestry – following from contact with non-Indigenous peoples. The “changing tides” of the titles suggest the irresistible forces of economic and cultural change as fortune and influence turned from a mutually beneficial economic relationship in the 1880s to an amplified campaign of cultural suppression. The earlier period saw an influx of wealth through trade and the availability of new materials – as well as the introduction of decimating diseases. The tradition of button blankets and tunics grew from access to new materials, emerging when the culture was intact enough to incorporate new materials into existing forms in ways consistent with tradition. The 1920s saw the enforcement of the anti-potlatch laws that had a devastating effect on the social, cultural and economic well being of many Northwest Coast communities. On the Kwikwasut’inuxw painting, centered on the Thunderbird’s abdomen, is a coin dated 1929. This is the year that the tides turned on the decline of the Kwakwa̱ka̱’wakw, marking the beginning of a population revival that continues into the present. Tracing the push and pull of world views through the materials she uses, Nicolson’s work is part of a contemporary resurgence of Indigenous cultural practice and a means to resist its political and social assimilation.

These works are presented in conjunction with the exhibition To refuse/To wait/To sleep at the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, and is a collaboration between the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery and the Walter C. Koerner Library at The University of British Columbia, and is made possible with the generous support of the Audain Foundation. Art in the Library offers new perspectives on contemporary art by presenting art that questions our current perceptions about the world around us.

Marianne Nicolson, Tunics of the Changing Tide: Dzawada’enuxw Histories, 2007.
Photo: Two Rivers Gallery, 2015

  • Marianne Nicolson

    Artist

    Marianne Nicolson (Kwakwaka’wakw, Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw First Nations, b. 1969) is an artist and activist of the Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw Nations who are part of the Kwakwaka’wakw (Kwak’wala speaking peoples) of the Northwest Coast. She is trained in both traditional Kwakwaka’wakw forms and culture and contemporary gallery and museum-based practice. Her practice is multi-disciplinary, encompassing photography, painting, carving, video, installation, monumental public art, writing and speaking. She works as a Kwakwaka’wakw cultural researcher and historian, as well as an advocate for Indigenous land rights. She holds a BFA from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design (1996), an MFA (2000), MA in Linguistics and Anthropology (2005) and PhD in Linguistics and Anthropology with a focus on space as expressed in the Kwak’wala language (2013) all from the University of Victoria. Solo exhibitions include the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (2008); Artspeak, Vancouver (2006); Esquimalt Municipal Hall (2004); Thunder Bay Art Gallery (2002); National Indian Art Centre, Hull (2001); Campbell River Public Art Gallery (2000) and Or Gallery, Vancouver (1992). Group exhibitions include the 17th Biennale of Sydney (2020); the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver (2020); the Vancouver Art Gallery (2019-20); the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (2018-19) and the National Museum of the American Indian, New York (2017-19), among others. Major monumental public artworks are situated in her home territory of the Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw First Nation, Vancouver International Airport, the Canadian Embassy in Amman, Jordan and the Canadian Embassy in Paris, France.

    Following Nicolson’s Hexsa’am: To Be Here Always, a 2019 project with the Belkin that functioned as research, material, media, testimony and ceremony to challenge the western concept that the power of art as limited to the symbolic, This Is An Emergency Broadcast (2023) is another moment to amplify Indigenous tradition.

    Read More

  • Lorna Brown

    Curator

    Lorna Brown is a Vancouver-based visual artist, curator, writer and editor. Brown is a founding member of Other Sights for Artists’ Projects, and is an ongoing member of the Other Sights Producer team. She was the Director/Curator of Artspeak Gallery from 1999 to 2004, an artist-run centre focusing on the relationship between visual art and writing. Between 2015 and 2022, she was Acting Director/Curator at the Belkin, curating exhibition series such as Beginning With the Seventies that explored the relationship between art, archives and activism. Brown has exhibited her work internationally since 1984, and has taught at Simon Fraser University and Emily Carr University of Art and Design where she received an honorary doctorate of letters in 2015. Awards include the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts Award (1996) and the Canada Council Paris Studio Award (2000). Her work is in the collections of the Belkin, SFU Galleries, the National Gallery of Canada, the BC Arts Council, the Surrey Art Gallery and the Canada Council Art Bank.

    Read More

Funders

  • Audain Foundation