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