Tannis Nielsen, Ishkode, 2021
Métis artist Tannis Nielsen paints a reproduction of Sunrise, and a new mural of her own, Ishkode
We were thrilled to engage Métis artist (of Sohto/Anishnawbe and Danish descent) Tannis Nielsen in painting the reproduction of Rita Letendre’s 1971 mural Sunrise. In addition to painting the reproduction of Sunrise, Nielsen has begun work on a new mural of her own. Titled Ishkode (“fire” in Anishnaabemowin), Nielsen's mural was commissioned to sit in dialogue with Sunrise.
Though fall 2020, in painting the reproduction of Sunrise, Nielsen spent hours each week engaging with Letendre’s methods and her vision as an artist. Ishkode is Nielsen’s response to Letendre’s legacy and influence. Pairing these two murals opens an intergenerational dialogue between the work of two Indigenous women artists and muralists in Toronto, who across decades, have each made remarkable contributions to the field of public art.
In her multi-disciplinary practice, Nielsen addresses themes of memory, forging connections between past and present, and citing and honouring her precedents. Over the past two years she has been working on two monumental murals on Simcoe Street, commissioned by the City of Toronto – Gchi-twaawendan NIbi/Honour the Water (Water Wall) and N'gekaajig kidowog/My Elders Said (Elder Wall), which depicts portraits of 28 local teachers and Elders and was completed in collaboration with Indigenous youth.
Both Nielsen and Letendre are unusual, exceptional muralists. Letendre’s original Sunrise mural from 1971 was an unprecedented accomplishment on a huge scale, spanning 60 by 60 feet and seven stories. Nielsen’s Simcoe Street mural is likewise unparalleled, stretching more than 420 feet – the largest realist mural of its kind.
With Ishkode, Nielsen responds to the dynamism, movement and light in Letendre’s paintings, bringing her own approach to artmaking to meet Letendre’s. Ishkode begins from the image of a sunray down the middle of the mural, painted in the hard-edge, geometric style for which Letendre is best known, and which she used in Sunrise. From the sunray in the centre, the mural extends in luminous colours, painted in Nielsen’s atmospheric style with layers of glaze reflecting and refracting the light.
Letendre’s paintings over the years – with titles such as Sunburst, Sunforce, Saturn’s Fires, Cosmic Storm – have offered metaphors of light and darkness, the self in relation to the world, the unrepresentable “force of life” and its energies and tensions. Ishkode nods to Letendre while expanding Nielsen’s own explorations of Indigenous cosmologies, electromagnetic energy fields and the nature of the visible and invisible.
About Tannis Nielsen:
Tannis Nielsen is a Métis Woman (of Sohto/Anishnawbe and Danish descent) with over twenty years of professional experience in the arts, cultural and community sectors. Nielsen teaches at OCADU, and holds a Masters in Visual Studies Degree (M.V.S.) from the University of Toronto, an Art and Art History-Specialist Degree from U of T, as well as a Diploma in Art and Art History from Sheridan College, in Oakville, Ontario.
Nielsen has served on the Aboriginal Engagement Committee at UBC-O, as a member of the Equity and Diversity Committee at OCAD-U, the Toronto District School Board, and is the past President of The Association for Native Development in the Performing and Visual Arts (A.N.D.P.V.A.), a national Native arts organization in service since 1972. She was also a member of the Toronto Native Community History Project and has assisted in organizing the last three annual “Indigenous Sovereignty Week” events in the city of Toronto. In 2012, Nielsen became active on the Idle No More-Toronto organizing committee and continues to contribute towards this vital international Indigenous grassroots movement from her current location in Toronto, Ontario.
We thank the artists and Gallery Gevik for their support and their hard work in making this project happen.
The reproduction of Sunrise was made possible thanks to the support of the Toronto Friends of the Visual Arts, Partners in Art and the Ontario Arts Council.
Nielsen’s Iskhkode was made possible thanks to the support of the Ontario Arts Council.