MARIANNE NICOLSON | Ta̱wi’stalisa̱la (To Walk Around the World): Reclaiming the Intangible

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Marianne Nicolson, “Ta̱wi’stalisa̱la (To Walk Around the World): Reclaiming the Intangible,” 2023

exhibition view presented at VOX, centre de l’image contemporaine as part of MOMENTA 2023. (Photo by Mike Patten)

Marianne Nicolson advocates for Indigenous ancestral land rights and to preserve the sacred rituals of her community in Gwa’yi (Kingcome Inlet, British Columbia). The works that Nicolson presents in a contemporary art context negotiate the complex dynamics between visibility and invisibility to counter the logic of compensation through visibility as practiced by political and cultural institutions. Rooted in her reflection on the photographic image, Nicolson performs what she calls “reverse appropriation” of the medium that has contributed to the dispossession of Indigenous peoples and continues to exhibit them.

Nicolson is an artist activist of the Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw First Nations.  The Musgamakw Dzawada’enuxw Nations are part of the Kwakwaka’wakw (Kwak’wala speaking peoples) of the Pacific Northwest Coast.  She is trained in both traditional Kwakwaka’wakw forms and culture and contemporary gallery and museum-based practice. She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Emily Carr University of Art and Design (1996), a Master of Fine Arts (2000) from the University of Victoria, as well as a Master of Arts (2005) in Linguistics and Anthropology and a PhD (2013) in Linguistics and Anthropology with a focus on space as expressed in the Kwak’wala language.