Artwork Description
Cara Romero – Gikendaaso
Dimensions: 43.5 x 41.5 x 2″ framed / 34 x 34″ paper
Year: 2022
Medium: archival fine art photograph
Edition: ed. 4/7
I often use a repertory of my friends and family, who show up in my photographs over and over as themselves, but also different characters. In Gikendaaso, that’s Leah again and they’re plugged into her mind. Gikendaaso is the Ojibwe word for “she knows” or “she is knowledgeable,” “she’s educated.” Through Ojibwe language, it’s visually referencing the power of Indigenous intellect and how the world is going to need to plug into the knowledge of our Indigenous culture bearers, our Indigenous women, moving forward. Leah is also a photographer, so I asked her if in her sunglasses the reflection could be one of her own photographs that she’s seeing. She goes back as often as she can to photograph the powwow dances in Keweenaw Bay in the woods. They’ve been dancing in the same place for hundreds of years. That’s actually one of her black-and-white photographs that I digitally illustrated onto her glasses to give that sense of hopefulness. All these strategies help me say that no matter where we go, we’re going to take our really old practices with us because as Indigenous people we don’t exist without them. There is no future without all of the things that we’ve been able to hold onto and preserve for all of these years.