Power, 2021

3 channel video, 4 channel spatialized audio
15:00

The mouth of the Niagara River was the site of negotiation of the 1764 Treaty of Niagara, which agreed to mutual protection and sovereignty among the British and twenty-four Indigenous Nations. The three women walking by the Niagara River in this work each live in Niagara because ancestors migrated when an invisible line was drawn down the river creating an international boundary; Kanyen’kehá:ka from the Grand River Territory, United Empire Loyalist and later, Freedom Seeker. The river’s power drove industry resulting in great degradation of the water. Today the health of the water is much improved with much remediation still to be done. Can we listen to the river, the Treaty and our different histories to remediate our relationships with each other and the water?

In this work, soundless video of the three women walking by the Niagara River, images of hydro-electric power generation, river remediation, and alliterated words of ecological remediation and decolonization flow across three screens. The video images primarily reflect the artist’s real-time, walking body and follow the river’s flow downstream from Lake Erie to Lake Ontario and the sites of negotiation for the Treaty of Niagara. Sound moves through space of spoken excerpts from historical documents, the women’s voices and soundscape of the river above and below the water’s surface.

Power concludes a body of performance, photo and media installation works about Niagara waters emphasizing embodiment and movement of image, sound and human bodies embedded in the social and political as expressed in governance documents, especially pre-Confederation Treaties between the Crown and First Nations.

Exhibited
Riverbrink Art Museum, Queenston ON, July 21, 2021 – October 23, 2021
, Curated by Debra Antoncic

Resources
Listen to an Artist Talk presented by Riverbrink Art Museum, September 23, 2021 here.

You can view still images and remarks about the river remediation content of Power here, in this 8:50 segment following the talk The Niagara River Remedial Action Plan: Collaborative efforts toward a healthier Niagara River presented by Natalie Green on May 20, 2021, a Riverbrink Art Museum Education Event to accompany Power. Learn more here.

Read text by Curator Debra Antoncic here.

(Power credits to follow)