The Collection

The thing I was most curious about after agreeing to the project was to see the collection, albeit in digital photo form rather than in person. I had to wait for months and months before the research team in London was able to access the collection to photograph it, since the museum was locked down because of Covid-19 and summer turned into fall. In late November 2020 I finally received the dropbox folder containing the "boxes" with the collection items. I opened the "boxes" one by one and I see feather decorations, shell and seed necklaces, pipe heads, clay vessels, decorated gourds, leather clothing and much more. 

Box 12 Screenshot.

Some objects I can't identify, but later I find that many are described in Barbrooke Grubb's book An Unknown People in an Unknown Land. My first response is that I've seen similar objects in museums in Paraguay and in books and I experience a sense of familiarity. The objects are visually not entirely foreign to me. However, the culture they belong to or used to belong to is entirely foreign to me, even if similar objects are still used today by some indigenous groups in the Chaco where I grew up. How do I respond to something that is not mine, something I have no real personal connection with? How would I respond if I saw the objects in a museum? What if these objects were on display at the British Museum in an international context? What does it do to the objects to be taken from their original living context of being used in daily life, to be collected, boxed up, stored for decades? I feel a little uncomfortable with the task of the project at hand, but I want to take this opportunity and the challenge to continue to learn more about the peoples that I grew up to next to, their history, their reality (which is not usually portrayed in history books) on whose ancestral land I grew up in, and on all our shared colonial heritage. I am relieved that part of the response to the collection will come from indigenous artists themselves. 

Box 25 Screenshot.

The Project

I have received a Carte Blanche invitation to respond to the Paraguay collection at the British Museum. The objects in the collection are a starting point for the project, but they don't necessarily need to be part of the project. The objects are artefacts from the indigenous Enxet from the Southern Chaco region. They were collected mostly by anglican missionary Wilfrid Barbrooke Grubb (also Seymour Hawtrey) over the course of 30-40 years at the turn of the 20th century. I will write more about Barbrooke Grubb in a separate post. Which direction will my artist response take? It could be about the representation of the territory, or the context of the collection. Do I want to respond to museum practices and their role in colonialism? Perhaps the colonial practice of collecting leading to the displacement of the objects, similar to the displacement of people (a topic I've worked with before)? What is the connection between missionaries and colonial expansion? What part does the presence of missionaries play in the justification of land appropriation? Will I respond to reading materials and narrative? I'm interested in representation of narrative. Most articles and texts I've read are written from a euro-centric point of view, that of the missionary, the settler, the scientist. With great interest I've also read some first person narratives of indigenous voices who portray a very different (and eyeopening) narrative of certain events. Will I be able to offer a new perspective of some sort or find some positive points of resistance or conciliation through my work? I'm not sure yet where this project will take me or what I will end up creating, but I am curious to learn and explore as I reflect on difficult questions about my own colonial family history and indigenous/settler relations. 

Introduction

Photo: Trustees of the British Museum. 

Early last year I received an invitation to do an artist residency at the British Museum in London to engage and respond to the Paraguay collection in the vaults, which will likely never see the light of day. To be more specific, I was invited by the Santo Domingo Centre of Excellence in Latin American Research (from here on referred to as SDCELAR), based at the British Museum. The SDCELAR aims to create public engagement with the Latin American collections through artist responses and publications. One of the researchers had seen some of my work about disPOSSESSION in Asunción, which was the starting point for contact. I am very happy that indigenous artists from the Chaco collective will also be part of this project. Since the early invitation, our plans and the timeline have changed several times due to Covid-19. Long story short, rather than travelling to London last fall to see the collection and create art, I'm working from my home in Winnipeg/Canada over a longer period of time to respond to photographs of the objects in the collection and reading materials. While my experience of the collection obviously won't be same as viewing it in situ, I must admit that this current iteration of the project - working from home and having more time - suits me quite well, since I am a new mom and I split my time between the studio and being with little M., who is 13 months now. I will be able to reflect with greater depth on what this collection means in the context of its history and its existence today. Over the next few months, I'll share my thoughts and reflections about my research and creative process here on this blog as a form of project diary.