NEW YORK -- When he accepted a commission from Metropolitan Museum of Art, Toronto-based Cree artist Kent Monkman says he was excited by the opportunity to reframe one of the greatest collections in the world with an Indigenous perspective.
As throngs of visitors pass through the main entrance of the New York institution in coming months, many will see a pair of paintings that may seem like familiar 19th-century European tableaus at first glance. But upon closer inspection, Monkman said they'll find these tropes have been upended.
"My project has been to challenge the work and look for ways to interject and intervene with this art history that has largely excluded us from the telling of the story of this continent," Monkman, 54, said by phone from New York.
"I hope that they're sort of surprised to find they can recognize these references to European painting but see them invigorated and transformed into something new."
The installation, titled "mistikosiwak" ("Wooden Boat People"), is set to open in the Met's Great Hall on Thursday.
It consists of two large-scale canvases that form a diptych. On the left side, "Welcoming the Newcomers" depicts the arrival of Europeans to North America, while "Resurgence of the People" celebrates Indigenous resiliency in the face of colonizing forces.
Trained as an abstract artist, Monkman said he rejected representational modes of art as "passe" early in his career. But as he became interested in North American art history, he grew to appreciate the sophistication of these methods, even as they were used to misrepresent Indigenous subjects.
Monkman said "mistikosiwak" draws from iconic images in the Met's collection, such as the famed 1851 painting "Washington Crossing the Delaware," to assert Indigenous Peoples' place in the artistic canon, while debunking European distortions of an "extinct" culture.
"You want an audience to feel that we are very much alive and well," he said. "That's the message I like to carry with my work is that it's about honouring Indigenous people for our incredible resilience through some very dark chapters of history."
Monkman's time-travelling, gender-fluid alter-ego, Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, is prominently featured in both paintings.
The character, who recurs through much of Monkman's work, is a tribute to pre-contact conceptions of gender and sexuality, he said, and reverses the colonial gaze to put forward a new artistic vision of Indigenous Peoples.
"I created that character to ... turn the gaze back on the European," said Monkman. "With that gaze comes power, so it's really about a reversing the dynamic of power."
Monkman believes the Met commission marks a "turning point" in the museum's efforts to reckon with its own history.
"The Met is a world history museum that has objects and artworks from all over the world, and these colonial institutions were created with ... a European lens," he said.
"I think it really sets an example for other museums around the world and especially in North America to engage Indigenous people and people from diverse backgrounds to reflect on our shared histories."
"mistikosiwak" runs at the Met from Thursday to April 9, 2020. Monkman's solo exhibition, "Shame and Prejudice: A Story of Resilience," is touring museums across Canada until 2020.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 17, 2019.
