Redefining the Past: Christian Chapman’s Edmazinbiiget and the remaking of Anishinaabe Visual Art

In the Super-8 film Edmazinbiiget (2008–2014) by multidisciplinary Anishinaabe artist Christian Chapman, there are moments where the male protagonist is seen sitting at a table, smoking and painting. During these moments, the viewer gets a glimpse of what everyday life may have been like for this particular Indigenous artist during the 1950s and 60s: it may have consisted of subsistence living; working in the relative isolation of northern Ontario and being surrounded by the vast lushness of the Boreal forest. The term ‘Edmazinbiiget’ is the Anishinaabemowin word for “s/he who draws”, and the male character of Edmazinbiiget is the embodiment of artists that have influenced Chapman, such as Norval Morrisseau (1932-2007), Jackson Beardy (1944-1984), Roy Thomas (1949-2004), Benjamin Chee Chee (1934-1977), and Carl Ray (1943-1978).¹ Dramatically scored by Anishinaabe viola player Melody McKiver, Chapman’s black-and-white film imagines and situates the interior life of these Indigenous artists. Ultimately, the film seeks to make the intimate histories of these artists poetically come alive. Adding to the reflective mood of the film, curator and artist Lisa Myers writes that, “the grainy quality of the Super 8 film visually enhances the nostalgic feel of the narrative.”²

In writing about filmmaking practices, experimental filmmaker Sami van Ingen points out that “the history of cinema is, in part, a history of control and power–it emerged as a new way to make money and as a propaganda tool.”³ However, unlike many other filmmakers, Chapman’s non-narrative approach and subject matter dissolves the hierarchical and propagandistic motives of mainstream filmmaking. Chapman’s experimental film attempts to address an art history that for so long, was systematically marginalized and excluded from “cloistered and exclusionary exhibition and acquisition policies contemporary Canadian fine art institutions, critical and curatorial communities” as well as “national museums and many commercial fine art galleries.”⁴ In Edmazinbiiget, the audience is indirectly confronted with the reality of Canada’s past-present tensions, while reminded that “in supposedly reconciliatory times like ours, Indigenous artists are burdened with answering the call to envision a good post-colonial future, but we are still hurting in the present and we are not finished trying to figure out how to activate collective survival.”⁵

The visual heritage of Northwestern Ontario stretches back to the pictographic traditions of the Anishinaabe. Found along the sheer rock cliffs of Lake Superior and many other freshwater bodies in the region, artist Norval Morrisseau called the places of these ancient red ochre images the “Indian’s cathedrals.”⁶ Considered the Mishomis of Indigenous art in Canada, perhaps no visual artist is better known globally than Morrisseau.⁷ His work was rooted in–and expanded upon–the considerable knowledge of Anishinaabe oral traditions and their interconnected imagery. Despite the considerable challenges he faced throughout his life, including attending St. Joseph’s residential school in Thunder Bay, Morrisseau’s work continues to have a significant influence on generations of artists who have similarly experimented with the Anishinaabe visual culture. The arts in Northwestern Ontario continue to draw from this history for inspiration and resistance.⁸ Along this trajectory, Chapman’s work builds upon the life-affirming work of his Great Lakes predecessors and presents an examination of the current social and political tensions within the Canadian settler-state.

My first opportunity to meet with Christian was during the fall of 2010. Located on Fort William First Nation, Chapman’s studio is his grandmother’s former home. The house sits within meters of the shores of Lake Superior and looks directly towards Nanabozho, now commonly known as the “Sleeping Giant”. The contemplative artist showed me his proposed work for an upcoming solo exhibition at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery. These large paintings, all titled with the prefaced word “Don’t”, explored the cautionary advice Chapman received while growing up. Advice such as “Don’t Eat the Fish”, “Don’t Marry White Girls”, and “Don’t take God’s Name in Vain”, directly speak to the concerns and experiences of his family in the series. These works amalgamate and contrast the sharpness of photographic images with acrylic brushstrokes, familiar idioms and the artist’s wit. These images also ask their viewers to reflect on their own familial warnings and the ways in which we are taught how to live a good life.

One of the most striking and political of these early paintings continues to be Don’t Break the Law (2009). Painted in the style of Francisco Goya’s iconic work The Third of May 1808 (1814), Chapman’s acrylic on canvas work replaces the central figure of a Spanish resistor with a photographic image of Ojibwe activist, Anthony “Dudley” George. The French army is replaced with a faceless OPP Officer who is pointing his rifle directly at George. The date George was fatally shot during the Ipperwash crisis is written at the top-centre of the painting: September 7, 1995. In imitating Goya, Chapman draws parallels to the history of grassroots resistance to imposing colonial powers. Moreover, the work seeks to establish a representation of a moment of time in Canadian history, pointing to the troubled, unresolved tension between the state and Indigenous sovereignty.

In this case, and as in many others, the loss of Indigenous life is a familiar consequence. The 1995 Ipperwash crisis (much like the Oka Crisis of 1990) demonstrates how treaties and land claims are deeply intertwined with state-sanctioned violence. In her research on Indigenous life and the law, sociologist Sherene Razack aptly observes, “Indigenous bodies haunt settlers, a too-present reminder that the land is indeed stolen, these bodies must also serve to remind settlers of their own modernity and entitlement to the land.”⁹

In Heartbeats (2012), Chapman departs from his painting practice to create an installation that speaks to a much more personalized approach to his work. In this piece, a large handmade pow-wow drum with a screen-printed heart is surrounded with four empty chairs. Upon being approached, the large electronically synched drum senses the viewer and pulsates. For Chapman, this work “explores issues of body and spirit from an intimate perspective” and the drum acts “as a metaphor for the human heart while incorporating ideas of mortality, lineage and health along with tradition, spirituality and ceremony.”¹⁰ Once beating, the sound of the pow-wow drum reverberates and is felt in the viewer’s heart. A kinetic connection is quickly made between the drum and the viewer that continues when they are in close proximity. Though fairly brief, this humanizing encounter centres on the intangible: a sense of belonging. It is most likely that this would be the first time for many individuals–particularly in a gallery setting–to encounter or hear the voice of the pow-wow drum.

In some of Chapman’s more recent explorations in painting, the process of echoing iconic artworks reappears. The most direct of these recreations is Elvis Transforming into a 77 Thunderbird (2014), which references Norval Morrisseau’s colourfully vibrant 1977 six-panel painting, Man Transforming into a Thunderbird. Chapman’s multi-panel work draws on the theme of transformation to articulate a much more pop-cultural reference. As cultural theorist Stuart Hall reminds us:

Metaphors of transformation must do at least two things. They allow us to imagine what it would be like when prevailing cultural values are challenged and transformed, the old social hierarchies are overthrown, old standards and norms disappear or are consumed in the ‘festival of revolution’, and new meanings and values, social and cultural configurations, begin to appear. However, such metaphors must also have analytic value. They must somehow provide ways of thinking about the relation between the social and symbolic domains in this process of transformation.¹¹

Chapman’s use of Morrisseau’s powerful imagery provides a means to unpack images in popular culture–in this case, the image of an icon of country western music– but also an opportunity to poke fun at the use of the name ‘Thunderbird’ for an American luxury car model. The Thunderbird (Animki), one of the most sacred and powerful beings for the Anishinaabe, is able to transcend the commercial nature of the car decal made in its image. Elvis Transforming into a 77 Thunderbird subverts and embraces popular culture to reveal how North American settler culture has consistently relied on Indigenous culture as a source of inspiration.

More recently, Chapman has joined forces with his partner Jean Marshall and her twin sister Leanna Marshall to work collaborately as the Anemki Art Collective. Working together for the Zaagi’idiwin (Love) Project led by Leanna Marshall, Chapman assisted in screen-printing the fabric for Marshall’s jingle dress, titled Listen to the Trees (2016), while her sister Jean contributed to beading embellishments on the garments. These healing jingle dresses tell the stories of Marshall’s family–life on the land, the impact of residential schooling and the changing circumstances of their lives in Kitchenuhmaykoosib Inninuwug (also known as Big Trout Lake or Indian Reserve No. 84). With a total of nine jingle dresses created for this project, the collaboration marked a recuperation of a regional, Indigenous history in a good way– one that had for so long gone unacknowledged.

At the heart of Christian Chapman’s work is his ability to show the power of storytelling, particularly focusing on subverting grand narratives to show the nuances of contemporary Anishinaabe culture. Recognizing the power of storytelling and the ways in which it has forcefully contained and simplified the life and afterlife of Indigenous peoples, Chapman reclaims the script. More importantly, he also shares the ability to transform this narrative and imagery with four Indigenous collaborators: Sébastien Aubin, Marja Bål Nango, Nathan Young, and Caroline Monnet.¹² These collaborators remix and re-envision Chapman’s footage to produce short films, which also contribute to the larger, communally informed storytelling. In an article on Edmazinbiiget, writer Andrea Stach notes:

While the raw images do not change, the artists edit the film to change the sequence of presentation and use different filters and speeds to create four entirely different stories of the same person. Known as recasting, this technique suggests the remaking of something or reassigning an established role. In addition, each film has an original musical score that carries the viewer along as they watch the protagonist embrace the beautiful and sometimes harsh elements of his surroundings.¹³

The artists embodied in Chapman’s film have all passed onto the spirit world. Many of their lives have been cut short, often willfully, and systematically. Edmazinbiiget and indeed, Chapman’s practice as a whole, seek to lovingly assuage the histories of these artists, and hold them in their own light. Cree Poet Billy-Ray Belcourt writes, “decolonization is something of a becoming-feral, as it rewilds Indigenous life and detaches our ideas of sovereignty from the settler state’s norms of belonging.”¹⁴ Working across image-making practices of painting, screen-printing and film, Chapman’s work also rewilds the idioms and conventions of images to create works that respond to the visual language of the Anishinaabe today.

More importantly, these works draw from the past to reinterpret the history on his terms. If there is anything more to be drawn from these works, it is that Indigenous artists from the past are fully embraced, cherished and, above all, continue to have a dialogue with the present. Chapman’s work presents us settler viewers in this place now called Canada with images that contradict our assumptions, and generously brings us into this polyvocal conversation. This breathes life in our ethical responsibilities as Canadians and challenges us to do better.

Watch Christian Chapman’s full Super-8 film Edmazinbiiget here: https://vimeo.com/304644402

The author would like to thank Christian Chapman, Tom Hunter and Emerald Johnstone-Bedell for their comments and feedback.

Nadia Kurd is an Edmonton-based art historian who is currently the University of Alberta Art Collections Curator. In 2018, she was an Arts Writer-in-Residence at the Banff International Curatorial Institute.

1. Lisa Myers, Recast, https://gallery44.org/sites/default/files/attachments/exhibitions/%5Btitle%5D/g44_catalogue_lisa_myers.pdf (accessed 19 September 2018).
2. Ibid.
3. Sami van Ingen, Moving Shadows: Experimental Film Practice in a Landscape of Change (Helsinki: Finnish Academy of Fine Arts, 2012), 20.
4. Barry Ace, “Reactive Intermediates: Aboriginal Art, Politics and Resonance of the 1960s and 1970s”, 7: Professional Native Indian Artists Inc.: Group of Seven (Regina: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 197.
5. Billy-Ray Belcourt, “The body remembers when the world broke open”, http://artseverywhere.ca/2017/02/08/body-remembers-world-broke-open/ (accessed 20 September 2018).
6. Elizabeth McLuhan, “Return to Ahnisnabae Land and Widening the Circle: Roy Thomas’ Affirmation of Ahnisnabae Discourse.” Vision Circle: The Art of Roy Thomas (Thunder Bay: Thunder Bay Art Gallery), 27.
7. Carmen Robertson, Norval Morrisseau: Life & Work (Art Canada Institute: 2016), https://www.aci-iac.ca/art-books/norval-morrisseau/biography/#early-years (accessed 20 September 2018).
8. It is also important to note here the distinct work of contemporary artist such as Rebecca Belmore, Michael Belmore, Frank Shebageget, and the Kakegamic Brothers Roy, Joshim and Goyce, have also drawn on Indigenous life and culture in Northwestern Ontario.
9. Sherene Razack, Dying From Improvement : Inquests and Inquiries Into Indigenous Deaths in Custody (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2015), 32.
10. Gallery 101, “In-Digital”, http://www.gallery101.org/exhibits/digital (accessed 20 September 2018).
11. Stuart Hall, “For Allon White – Metaphors of transformation,” Stuart Hall: Critical Dialogues in Cultural Studies, eds. David Morley and Kuan-Hsing Chen (London, New York: Routledge, 1996), 286.
12. Andrea Stach, “Christian Chapman’s ‘Edmazinbiiget’ — Artistic Inspiration and Recasting in FWFN Film,” http://www.thewalleye.ca/christian-chapmans-edmazinbiiget-artistic-inspiration-and-recasting-in-fwfn-film/ (accessed: 20 September, 2018).
13. Ibid.
14. Billy-Ray Belcourt.

This article is published in issue 35.3 of BlackFlash magazine. Get this issue