Jane Ash Poitras | Carl Beam | Jackson Beardy | Joane Cardinal-Schubert | Eddy Cobiness | Walter Harris | Alex Janvier | Goyce Kakegamic | Josh Kakegamic | George Littlechild | Mike MacDonald | Robert Markle | Norval Morrisseau | Daphne Odjig | Barry Peters | Carl Ray | Bill Reid | Allen Sapp | Vernon Stephens
“The Canadian mosaic supposedly allows for the growth of different cultural groups as a basis for building a better Canada ... The stronger the tiles within the mosaic, the stronger the mosaic as a whole. Before I can be a useful participating and contributing citizen, I must be allowed to develop a sense of pride and confidence in myself as an Indian. I must be allowed to be a red tile in the mosaic, not forced to become an unseen white tile.” (Harold Cardinal, 1969)This exhibition highlights the work of two generations of senior Aboriginal artists who created culturally new and identifiable art forms that drew from Native heritage and visual traditions, but also utilized modern aesthetics to create and carry meaning. These artists broke new ground with subjects and styles that were politically inflected from the beginning. Consider the young Norval Morrisseau who was chastised by elders for representing and exposing sacred symbols outside of their intended context, but was also criticized by an artistic establishment that undermined his creative work with inadequate, post-colonial critical frameworks.
RED TILE shows the beginnings of the Woodlands School of Art in the 1960s, characterized by the work of Norval Morrisseau, Daphne Odjig, Carl Ray, Goyce and Josh Kakegamic as well as works by members of the Indian Group of Seven, by artists such as Alex Janvier, Jackson Beardy and Eddy Cobiness, that date from later in the 1970s. The exhibition also represents important north-west coast traditions through the works of Bill Reid and Walter Harris. Also featured are senior contemporary artists: Carl Beam, Joane Cardinal-Schubert, George Littlechild and Jane Ash Poitras whose work has contributed to building the hard-fought base on which generations of Aboriginal artists continue to work today. Each of the artists in the exhibition has contributed to the legacy of art in Canada, and many continue to produce some of the most provocative art today.
The works in RED TILE date from the 1960s to the late 1990s, and have been drawn from the Art Gallery of Alberta’s collection, the University of Lethbridge Art Gallery collection and the Alberta Foundation for the Arts collection. They are important precedents that have come to define and influence contemporary Aboriginal art in Canada.