Transforming the Potential of Digital Collections through Distant Awareness, or Mootookakio’ssin

I am grateful to have been able to work on this article on the territories of the Haudenosaunee, as well as Treaty 13, and Treaty 19 territories. I spend most of my time working in Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang/Montreal, unceded Indigenous lands; the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation is recognized as the custodians of these lands and waters.

In July of 2018, Blackfoot Elders and researchers from the University of Lethbridge (ULethbridge) gathered for their first official circle to discuss the possibility of digitizing 18th and 19th century Blackfoot objects currently held by museums and galleries, many of them in England. These artifacts, which were once the cultural and historical possessions of the Blackfoot community, ended up in England as a result of a colonial tide that swept the artifacts—and the historical connections they might have otherwise fostered—overseas.

Digitizing collections can be a complex issue but the Blackfoot Elders involved in the project believed virtual access to the collection “would fit in with their ongoing efforts to revitalize Blackfoot art and traditional knowledge.”¹ Thus, researchers, Blackfoot Elders, and Blackfoot students—including Blackfoot Elder Jerry Potts, Director of University of Lethbridge Art Gallery (ULethbridge Art Gallery) Josephine Mills, and Blackfoot student Melissa Shouting—travelled to England to visit a collection of Blackfoot objects in the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Cambridge. During the trip, the group began the process of creating highly detailed images using photogrammetry and reflectance transforming imaging (RTI), essentially resulting in 3D images that can be manipulated and closely inspected. These objects are now showcased on a website—an integral part of the Blackfoot Digital Library—which has been aptly named Mootookakio’ssin by Blackfoot Elder Dr. Leroy Little Bear. In Siksikáí’powahsin, the Blackfoot language, mootookakio’ssin means distant awareness, and this project is about distance—between a people and their history, a people and their artifacts—but it is also about an act of renewal and return; it is about bringing something home.

My interest in this project is both personal and professional. As someone who studies digital work produced by Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour (BIPOC) globally, I was immediately interested in Mootookakio’ssin because I wondered about how the digital had been used to connect a community to objects that are so far away. Some curators and museum workers are reluctant to fully embrace digital spaces for several reasons. Through my own experiences, I have come to understand some of the complexities around digitizing collections or acquiring digital works into collections, such as the nuance involved in storing digital works as compared to physical objects, or even issues around intellectual property rights. However, what is at the root of these concerns is perhaps an unwillingness to change operations and learn from different kinds of communities about their diverse and distinct needs. After considering the possibilities of the digital for a long time, I have begun to think about digital projects as a way of connecting with communities that have persistently been excluded— materially, culturally, ideologically, financially— from institutions. Without a doubt, digitization projects like Mootookakio’ssin bring challenges as well as boons and how these projects work to mitigate the resulting consequences is becoming one of the prevailing issues of our time and should not be ignored. But the domino effect of accessibility that digital spaces offer, the domino effect that can arise from a single connection: this is quite unique. Through the work of Potts, Shouting, and Mills—members of the Mootookakio’ssin team—I’ve seen it myself; it can be truly spectacular.

Helping to steer the project, Blackfoot community members determined which content to include on the website and how an audience might engage with the collection of objects housed in a museum in another country that is at a distance. This is especially important because past colonial imagery of Indigenous peoples attempted to remove their sense of agency, particularly by showcasing portraits or photos that cast the sitter as part of a static past or vanishing group of people. (I think, here, for example, of the photos taken by white settler photographer Edward S. Curtis). Their leadership role in this project is crucial to how the Blackfoot produce content on their own terms, especially in the context of a project like this, which seeks to revitalize Blackfoot art and culture by re-configuring the use and experience of colonial collections. Many Indigenous scholars, like Métis/German/Syrian scholar Julie Nagam and British/Samoan scholar Lana Lopesi, highlight how Indigenous artists and communities use online and digital media to resist colonial ideologies that might see them as primitive or stuck-in-the-past.² Mootookakio’ssin follows suit, but the team behind the digital collection and website design go one step further. They used the digital space to create a network of people who can work with one another on- and off-line, share knowledge, and continue to support Blackfoot students and youth in their own journeys as artists.

Within the context of reconciliation and repatriation, especially in Canada, it might be easy to label Mootookakio’ssin as a repatriation project. As is often the case, it’s not that simple. As Shouting explains, the Blackfoot community is advised by a committee of Blackfoot Elders who decide which objects are to be repatriated: ceremonial objects, most often. For Blackfoot, there are several reasons why an object would not be repatriated: if knowledge about how to care for the object is non-existent; if the purpose of the object is unknown; or if there is no safe space for the object to be stored. Here, it is crucial to note that Indigenous nations and groups across North America and the world have different protocols, responsibilities, and perspectives around repatriating their own community’s objects. Mootookakio’ssin does not seek to offer an alternative to repatriation, but a way to engage with objects that hold cultural knowledge, connecting people to the past, present, and future of the community.

Mills insightfully points out that processes of repatriation could be misused by museums, allowing them a “quick fix” to the ongoing retention of stolen or dubiously acquired objects in their collections.³ In other words, instead of working with communities on a deeper level, museums might default to repatriation rather than interrogate the systemic colonial issues that permeate a museum’s collection. Thus, Mills explains, it was important for the ULethbridge Art Gallery to not just be part of the project but to actually offer spaces and deploy resources based on the advice of the Blackfoot community. The digital collection seeks to connect with the community throughout Treaty 7 Territory meaningfully and deeply by developing programming, activities, and networks of support with the community. This approach can be considered what Unangax^ scholar Eve Tuck sees as working with and learning from a community to prevent further harm or the reinscription of some form of colonial violence. The resulting frameworks, as Tuck says, are “concerned with understanding complexity, contradiction, and the self-determination of lived lives.”⁴ With Mootookakio’ssin, the team seeks guidance from Backfoot Elders from Kainai, Siksika, Piikani, and Amskapipiikani, who ensure that protocols are followed. As well, they work with Blackfoot students, like Shouting, and allies across the university. The project is indeed Blackfoot-determined, but it is supported by institutions who are questioning their deeply rooted colonial histories and are using their resources to repair relationships with the Blackfoot.⁵ To this end, the ULethbridge Art Gallery refuses any exclusion of the Blackfoot from their internal operations, which many galleries and museums across Canada have been guilty of doing for several decades. As Mills explains, this includes craft-based activities, at Potts’ suggestion, but also programming that caters to the surrounding Blackfoot audience and students at the University. Effectively, the gallery’s doors are more open to suggestions and comments from the community on how to best use their space.

Elder Jerry Potts was one of the Elders involved in the project from the beginning.⁶ Potts is one of many who oversee the website content and ensure that it follows appropriate protocols. He brings to the project a wealth of experience working with museums to prevent the display of ceremonial objects, as processes of museum display have often disrespected Blackfoot belief systems. When I spoke with him, Potts explained that the objects in the museum collections provide an opportunity for the Blackfoot community to learn how the objects were originally crafted: what materials were used, how certain objects were stitched and sewn together. As Potts points out, these objects offer material knowledge that is important for the continued transmission of traditional and cultural knowledge. As a skilled craftsperson himself, Potts recognized the importance of not only observing and looking at the 3D images but understanding the practices that went into creating such objects. With this in mind, he suggested that some of the activities around this new access to the objects should also be craft-based, and the ULethbridge Art Gallery, especially Director Josephine Mills, were thrilled to host these craft sessions, beginning with beading circles. The gallery and several instructors at ULethbridge also hoped to incorporate the objects into their art classes, but unfortunately, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the official launch of in-person activities was delayed. While this is still the plan, Mills noted that the pandemic presented an opportunity for the team to develop the backend of the website and focus on the kind of language and imagery that was produced around the digital collection. As a result, the website and digital collection are fairly polished and easily navigable for anyone who wants to see all of the wonderful objects that have been tucked away in gallery storage spaces in England. As the website clearly articulates, these objects ended up in galleries and museums across the United Kingdom, especially in England, through precarious means. In some cases, the objects were collected as part of a colonial process of ethnographic salvage, where anthropologists—usually European—strove to create a record of vanishing Indigenous communities who were in this situation because of European settlement. In other cases, Indigenous peoples were suffering from starvation, and the Blackfoot were specifically struggling to survive as a result of the extinction of the buffalo (also due to European settlement), an integral part of their way of life. In these cases, Indigenous communities like the Blackfoot traded their cultural objects for food or other basic needs to ensure their survival.

Mootookakio’ssin not only offered the community an opportunity to engage with objects that are far away, but it facilitated meaningful connections and networking between Blackfoot youth and students. Initially nervous about travelling to England, Blackfoot ULethbridge student Melissa Shouting recalls being pleasantly surprised to see that she was already connected to the other community members who travelled with her. On the trip, all of the members shared stories about the objects, detailing what they knew about the objects from their own families or their own craft-practices. When Shouting shared some information that she learned from her grandparents, she realized that one of the Elders on the project knew her grandmother. Through these discussions, Shouting highlighted that the point of the project was not only to bring Blackfoot objects virtually closer to their community but to allow community members to see how they are connected to each other in different ways. In this way, the project really facilitated a space for engaged networking, care, and, what Shouting calls, “a realization of kinship alliances.” Indeed, this community of Indigenous students, technicians, researchers, and artists established Blackfoot representation that is important to encourage Blackfoot youth to attend university. Shouting and Potts both noted that many students did not know that arts programs existed, let alone Mootookakio’ssin, and that they could explore Blackfoot artistic and cultural practices as part of an art career, too. Though it was difficult to find youth to apply for university, Shouting reached out to the youth she works with and encouraged them to apply and create a portfolio, and encouraged them to join the project. As Shouting so aptly put, the website and digital collection really had a domino effect of involving and encouraging community growth and connections. Mills might also argue that the project had the effect of supporting the growth of hardworking, community-engaged students, like Shouting, who now feel inclined to confidently incorporate their art and cultural practices into their own careers.

Though the kinds of connections that arise from this project are as unique and varied as the collection itself, it is important to note that Mootookakio’ssin does indeed follow a movement of Indigenous artists, scholars, elders, and students who use digital spaces with the particular focus of developing community and large networks of support and kinships. British/Samoan scholar Lopesi argues that the ways in which Indigenous peoples use online and digital spaces foster connections, relationships, and sharing of identities on local and global levels.⁷ There are many other Indigenous-led, digital-based projects globally that have these goals of fostering connections and sharing of identities like Mootookakio’ssin, including the Canadian-based The Space Between Us and the Oceania-based digital art project, Mana Moana. What these projects suggest is that the digital is an integral space to explore kinship networks and that what happens online can support activities and communities offline. Considering the kinds of shared stories and exciting long-term effects that have resulted from Mootookakio’ssin, it is difficult to overstate the positive impact of the digital.

Acknowledgements:

Thank-you to Melissa Shouting, Elder Jerry Potts, and Josephine Mills, for taking time to speak with me about this article. I am grateful for the chance to learn about such a wonderful project. Your careers have inspired me to continue forth with my own research and projects in the future.

Jasmine Sihra is a Punjabi settler/second-generation immigrant, born and raised in Tkaronto/Toronto. An emerging scholar and curator, she researches the intersection of artistic practices, climate change, critical curating, decolonizing methodologies, and sustainability. She completed her Master of Arts in Art History at Concordia University under the guidance of Dr. Heather Igloliorte in April 2022, and she will be pursuing her PhD in Art History in September 2022 under the supervision of Dr. Igloliorte and Métis Art Historian Dr. Michelle McGeough. Her research has been supported by a SSHRC CGS-M, SSHRC CGS-D, and a Concordia Graduate Fellowship. Jasmine’s website: https://jasminesihracurates.ca/

1. “About.” Mootookakiossin: Distant Awareness. Accessed May 31, 2022.
2. Heather Igloliorte, Carla Taunton, and Julie Nagam, “Transmissions: The Future Possibilities of Indigenous Digital and New Media.” Public 27, no. 54 (December 2016): 7.
3. Elder Jerry Potts wrote an article about repatriation in the book: We are Coming Home: Repatriation and the Restoration of Blackfoot Cultural Confidence (2015). The chapter is called “Reviving Traditions.”
4. Eve Tuck, “Suspending Damage: A Letter to Communities.” Harvard Educational Review 79, no. 3 (September 2009): 416.
5. Of course, museums are known for housing contentious collections that were the result of colonial conquest, but universities have, too, been complicit in attempts of erasing and assimilating Indigenous peoples across Canada.
6. The Blackfoot Elders involved in the project include Jerry Potts, Dr. Leroy Little Bear, Velma Crowshoe, Kent Ayoungman, Linda Little Chief, John Murray, Carol Murray, Martin Heavy Head, and Amethyst First Rider.
7. Lana Lopesi, False Divides (Wellington: Bridget Williams Books Limited, 2018), 8.