“All forms of Indigenous futurisms are narratives of biskaabiiyang, an Anishinaabemowin word connoting the process of ‘returning to ourselves,’ which involves discovering how personally one is affected by colonization, discarding the emotional and psychological baggage carried from its impact, and recovering ancestral traditions in order to adapt in our post-Native Apocalypse world”
(Grace L. Dillon, Walking the Clouds: An Anthology of Indigenous Science Fiction – 2012)
This piece is an immersive installation centered around She Falls For Ages, a cyber art video created by Kanien’kehá:ka artist Skawennati, Co-Director of AbTeC (Aboriginal Territories in Cyberspace) and Research Associate at Obx Labs. She Falls For Ages is one of AbTeC’s many initiatives to develop cyber art pieces that empower Indigenous people. Based on the Haudenosaunee creation story, the video depicts Skywoman and the place she inhabited before her fall to a new world, culminating in the creation of the land that we know today as Turtle Island. The cyber art piece explores indigenous pride, self confidence, and adventure while tying in moments of humour to a fresh, futurist take on a timeless story. Like much of Skawennati’s work, She Falls For Ages challenges what we normally associate with Indigenous art and celebrates technology as a means to powerfully represent Native peoples.
Text by Sara Flicht, Anne-Marie St-Louis
In their Installation, Homage to She Falls for Ages, Flicht and St-Louis attempted to create a setting in correspondence to the world Skawennati had designed in her Machinimina, they wanted the audience to feel that they too could enter a world of Indigenous pasts and futures. They strove for a clean, modern look, and layed down astro turf to resemble the grass growing on turtle’s back.
CREDITS
She Falls for Ages cyber art piece created by Skawennati
Installation: Sara Flicht, Anne-Marie St-Louis
