The Great Mystery
The Hood Museum of Art
April 8 - December 16, 2023
Featuring two paintings commissioned by the Hood Museum of Art, Kent Monkman’s exhibition The Great Mystery centres on the Cree concept of mamahtâwisiwin, a state of tapping into the great mystery of the universe, of spiritual interconnectedness of all life, and of unknowing-ness. Canonical Western abstract painters like Mark Rothko pushed the language of painting to the outer limits and also extended the thematic explorations of the subconscious. When Indigenous and settlers observe each other across a vast cultural divide, the intersection is a junction of different values from which there is often misunderstanding and puzzlement. In folding the Cree concept of mamahtâwisiwin into Western abstract paintings, The Great Mystery explores the commonalities in our understandings of the unknowable.
Exhibition installation photography by Rob Strong
Being Legendary
Royal Ontario Museum
October 8, 2022 - April 16, 2023
In Being Legendary, Kent Monkman displayed original artworks alongside objects curated from the collection of the Royal Ontario Museum to challenge colonial narratives of history. With exhibition text written by Gisèle Gordon from the perspective of Monkman’s alter-ego Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, Being Legendary involved consultation with Indigenous knowledge keepers including Cree Elder Pauline Shirt, Cree star lore expert Wilfred Buck, Cree-Métis historian and scholar Keith Goulet, Cree-Métis archaeologist Paulette Steeves, and settler historian of ancient science and classical folklorist Adrienne Mayor. Being Legendary frames the damage wrought during the colonial period as devastating and profound, but also as a relatively short blip in the long timeline of Indigenous presence on Turtle Island. While acknowledging the deep intergenerational impacts of colonialism, particularly that of the residential school system, the exhibition emphasizes the resilience of Indigenous peoples in keeping many cultures, histories, and knowledge systems intact.
Exhibition installation photography by ROM
mistikosiwak (Wooden Boat People)
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
December 19, 2019 - April 19, 2021
Created for The Met’s Great Hall Commission in 2019, Kent Monkman’s mistikôsiwak: Wooden Boat People is a diptych consisting of the monumental paintings Welcoming the Newcomers and Resurgence of the People. mistikôsiwak, literally wooden boat people, is the Cree word to describe the French and, by extension, all Europeans who colonized Turtle Island (North America). Monkman's diptych evokes the historical and contemporary relationships Indigenous people of Turtle Island have had with newcomers to their lands. At the centre of both works is Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, Monkman’s shape-shifting, time-travelling, gender-fluid alter ego who embodies inclusive gender and sexual identities within a Cree worldview.
Exhibition installation photography by Hyla Skopitz and Anna-Marie Kellen
Launched in response to Canada’s bicentennial celebrations, Kent Monkman’s major solo touring exhibition Shame and Prejudice challenged mythologies around Canadian nationhood from an Indigenous perspective. As told by Monkman’s shape-shifting, time-travelling, gender-fluid alter ego Miss Chief Eagle Testickle, this critical examination of Canada’s history revealed the devastating impact of European settler cultures on Turtle Island as well as the enduring resilience of Indigenous peoples. To tell this story, Monkman curated archival objects and original work by other artists along with his own original artworks.
Art Museum at the University of Toronto (pictured)
January 26 – March 4, 2017
Glenbow Museum
June 17 – September 10, 2017
Agnes Etherington Art Centre
January 6 – April 8, 2018
Confederation Centre Art Gallery
June 23 – September 15, 2018
Art Gallery of Nova Scotia
October 14 – December 16, 2018
McCord Museum
February 8 – May 5, 2019
Museum London
June 1 – August 25, 2019
Winnipeg Art Gallery
September 27, 2019 – February 23, 2020
Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia
August 6, 2020 – January 3, 2021
Exhibition installation photography by the Art Museum at the University of Toronto