TIPI_LOOPS.dreamwaves

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Brendon Many Bears, "TIPI_LOOPS," 2021

TIPI_LOOPS.dreamwaves

In Bridge Space.

Joey Big Snake, Jeremy Bobosky, Maci Jordan, Brendon Many Bears, Kaitlyn Purcell, Laurencine Saddleback

dreamwaves an (affirmation) poem by Kaitlyn Purcell

In late August, writer, artist and community activator, Kaitlyn Purcell met emerging artists Brendon Many Bears and Joey Big Snake at an Indigenous Science Telus Spark event where they were having an artist talk with their mentor, astrophysicist Rob Cardinal. Big Snake and Many Bears had collaborated on the event’s welcome banners, and Big Snake and Cardinal had collaborated on a featured digital painting titled Morningstar (Venus Risen), which was further brought to life through stories of shared visions for its creation. Synchronicities abound, Kaitlyn was preparing to teach a first-year English class for Indigenous students at the University of Calgary with Rob Cardinal as the first assigned text on her syllabus; after this event, they shared a conversation which led to an opportunity for Purcell’s students to meet Rob Cardinal.

This audiovisual digital art installation came together as a reflection by Purcell, Many Bears and Big Snake on themes from the fall 2021 exhibition RELATIONS: Diaspora and Painting, with contributions to their work from UCalgary students Jeremy Bobosky, Maci Jordan and Laurencine Saddleback—completing this constellation.

TIPI_LOOPS.dreamwaves is an exploration of one’s relation to place, and how the individual experience becomes constellations through the synchronicities that brought us together. We find our place through the land that nourishes us. We find our place through the stories and ceremonies that brought us here. We find our place through our dreams and the synchronicities that act like signposts—the guidance from our ancestors. The dreamcatcher, the spiderweb, and the stories in the sky; they remind us where we come from and where we ought to go. They remind us that we are all connected.