INDIANacts: Aboriginal Performance Art
This site is an Indian Act in and of itself—a chance to continue the heart journey that was the original Indian Acts: Aboriginal Performance Art conference (grunt gallery 2002), and carry that heart to others who could not attend the conference, but whose own hearts may be ignited by this archive and who can witness this conference through the material within this site.
Curated by Tania Willard and Dana Claxton
The starting point for most Indigenous performing art practices is not Cabaret Voltaire, rather, its roots are in Indigenous ceremony, struggle, beauty, thought and the “Indian experience” in all its many manifestations. Indigenous orality, culture and spirituality from diverse Indigenous peoples can be seen as being as central to some artists’ work as new media, technology and mainstream cultural references might be. What has been created in some instances is a form of Aboriginal performance that collapses and combines both western and Indian ways of doing, but always maintaining an Indian way of being.
We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada
through the Department of Heritage Canada Interactive Fund