tīná gúyáńí (Deer Road) (VA)
© seth cardinal dodginghorse
The works in k’ō-dī īyínáts’īdìsh (new agency) are a political response to the environmental and psychological effects of the South West Calgary Ring Road, through the reclamation and continuation of traditional Tsuut’ina/Niitsitapi methods of storytelling.
*QR codes
agency:
*to make decisions in another’s best interest
*loss
*loss of agency when Indian agents, government officials-municipal, provincial, and federal make decisions for you and your family.
*loss of agency when Indian Act Chief & Councils make decisions for you and your family.
*loss of agency when using the Indian Act to decide
*loss of agency will leave you silent and powerless
*loss of agency will make you invisible
*loss of agency will erase you
new agency:
*redefined
*make your own decisions
*to make decisions for you by you
*to make decisions without the Indian Act
*you are no longer invisible
*you are powerful
*now
tīná gúyáńí (Deer Road) - Are a two-person artist collective comprised of Tsuut’ina mother and son, Glenna Cardinal and seth cardinal dodginghorse. In 2014 they were forcibly removed from their homes and ancestral land for the construction of the South West Calgary Ring Road, a highway. Their work utilizes their family’s history and experiences of displacement to challenge the South West Calgary Ring Road’s ongoing colonial damages.
Exhibition text
Your House Became a Highway
by Annik St-Arnaud
A house is more than the walls that trace its limits
A house is a story lived and told
a place where we keep coming back
A point of origin
that contains us / that surpasses us
Your house became a highway
A place of transition
From point A to point B
We barely see the landscape
protected by the blinkers of our daily lives
Ephemeral speed
We gain seconds
forgetting the time
that has already passed
We are complicit
On the road, between our houses
and our stories
We hear voices - echoes
Between anger and powerlessness
Resonates a resolution
Fed by the violence of bureaucracy
It will be heard with force
with self-determination
The struggle will be visible
Intimate memorial
grief activist
Between archives and memories
At each iteration
A home takes shape again
object-feelings
object-tools
To never forget
Make experiences resonate
transforming them into collective memories
Discursive Activity
tīná gúyáńí (Deer Road) and Annie Wong in Conversation
In this informal conversation, seth cardinal dodginghorse and Glenna Cardinal discuss with Annie Wong their hybrid exhibition (between virtual and presential) k'ō-dī īyínáts'īdìsh (new agency).
*To access the rest of the virtual exhibition, scan the QR codes (barcodes).