Art gallery displays unique photos

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Rebecca Baird and Phillip Cote have completed a cross-Canada trip to gather archive photographs of First Nation families from First Nation visual artists. The result is a touring exhibition called Everyday Light: First Nations History As Seen Through The Family Photograph Album that opened Oct. 3 at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery.

The 38 black-and-white photographs dating from the early 1900s up until the 1960s are on display until Nov. 23.

"It is called Everyday Light because it is about everyday family photos, using the light from the camera. (It is) all about how a photograph is captured.

"It was just incredible going across Canada; it was pretty fast because we had six weeks. I knew the project was good-that there were a lot of beautiful photographs hidden in boxes and in photo albums, and so on. I've been an artist since 1983, and I know a lot of the First Nations writers and artists across the country, where we've just been in shows together or where I've just seen their work. So a lot of the people (supplying) the photos, I already knew pretty well as friends or colleagues. So I just mailed invitations," Baird said.

The photos have been enlarged up to 2 feet by 3 feet and are set in laminated panels. Beside each photo panel is an abbreviated biography about the artist who submitted the photo, which includes the artist's comments about the people in the photograph and what the photograph means.

Baird and Cote are familiar names on the arts scene, having both earned numerous professional credits, commissions and awards.

Baird is a founding member of the Tecumseh Collective and a co-organizer of the Tecumseh Arts Festival. For more than 20 years she has explored Native identity themes through installation/sculpture, painting and printmaking media.

Cote is soapstone carver, a graduate of the Ontario College of Art and Design, and a co-ordinator of the Tecumseh Arts Festival.

Baird and Cote began the trip on Aug. 14, 2001, in Toronto, with stops in Sault Ste. Marie, Thunder Bay, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Regina, Medicine Hat, Calgary, Kamloops, Vancouver, Victoria, Whitehorse, Yellowknife, Montreal, Moncton, Halifax and points in between.

The project began, though, in 1999, when Rebecca Baird, Phillip Cote and friend Bev Koski formed the Sweet Grass Collective as a result of hearing talk of special projects being formed for the new millennium.

Funding for the project came from the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation, the Ontario Arts Council, and finally in 2001, the Department of Heritage gave them travel money.

Baird said that they were lucky to acquire many other invaluable contributors to the project.

Tracey Henrikkson, curator of the Thunder Bay Art Gallery said the photos are diverse in images, striking and beautiful.

"I've seen them, and they've turned out really well. A few of them are studio portraits, but a lot of them are a lot more casual. We get a good sense of the people's personality. They are all different, about people doing everyday things. There is quite a time span ... We even have one that was taken in 1917. It was about a mother harvesting tobacco; it was quite interesting, it evoked a very specific time and place," she said.

Initially the gallery in Thunder Bay was going to be the first gallery hosting the exhibition, but because of delays and a lot of interest from Winnipeg, the exhibition made its debut in Winnipeg at the Urban Shaman gallery. The exhibit got a good response from the visiting public in the month it was in Manitoba.

On Oct. 3 and 4, the Thunder Bay gallery had an opening reception called Everyday Light Celebration, which included hand drumming by local performer Alice Sabourin-Nowegjic and storytelling by Delores Wawia, an Elder in residence and a professor at Lakehead University.

"It went really well, the speakers were great ... We had a good turnout. That was nice to see. Everyone was really interested and drawn to the exhibition. A lot of times peopl will spend only three seconds at a work of art and they will move on to the next one, but at this exhibition they were really taking their time and studying each image. It was really great to see that." Henrikkson said.

She hopes the exhibition will tour nationally. "What our registrar is working on is organizing bookings. We are going to be sending out information packages to different galleries and venues that might be interested in having the exhibition. Yukon has expressed an interest."