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The Kent Monkman criticism is essential as are questions of impact vis-à-vis his intended audience and representations of violence and trauma, including claims of anti-blackness. But in a bizarre twist conservative commentators are suddenly new fans of Monkman’s provocative work
Commentators like Jonathan Kay and voices in the Globe&Mail and National Post rush to defense, dismissing these critiques with often really bad attempts at visual analysis to support their responses. It is clear that their arguments are not sincere engagements with Monkman’s work
Rather, the controversy is being used as opportunity to dismiss Indigenous voices and to proselytize ( @rwetzler has shown this with her deft analyses of Jordan Peterson and Cato Institute)–Monkman’s visual content is malleable for their views, as any formal points tend to reflect
Some of these suspect arguments also completely miss the point of Indigenous-lead critiques, which concern how Monkman’s work is shaped by its imbrications in colonial art systems and thus his satirical and staunchly political images can have deleterious effects on communities
...but someone like Kay doesn’t want to justify the views of those communities as legitimate here, because that would legitimize them elsewhere, so he becomes a “fan” and praises the work for avoiding a "tear-drenched aesthetic" https://twitter.com/jonkay/status/1263159808938708997
This episode emphasizes what David Garneau has been recently writing, that Indigenous-lead critique is essential and at the forefront of these discussions, and can be internal critique so that the dismissals of Kay et al. lose their percussive force https://cmagazine.com/issues/145/writing-about-indigenous-art-with-critical-care
Hence the importance of this thread by that @fka_jayesimpson kicked it all off... https://twitter.com/fka_jayesimpson/status/1261458086163648513
And this important piece by @gagiibaaikwe addresses moments of anti-blackness in Monkman’s work, noting that his work, by virtue of its success, participates in broader regimes of representation than that affecting Indigenous communities https://nutmegandsage.blog/2020/05/21/miss-anti-blackness-kent-monkman-and-black-imagery/
These were set-up by the fantastic analyses of Monkman’s work at the Met by Regan De Loggans and @nick_w_estes that point out how the inclusion of his work in systems of institutional recognition can still uphold colonial realities
https://canadianart.ca/essays/mistikosiwak-kent-monkman-at-the-met/
https://aci-iac.ca/the-essay/a-vision-for-the-future-by-nick-estes
https://canadianart.ca/essays/mistikosiwak-kent-monkman-at-the-met/
https://aci-iac.ca/the-essay/a-vision-for-the-future-by-nick-estes
This is all to say that we should always be suspicious of arguments purportedly in favor of artistic expression that point to poorly defined formal features like "virtuosic style" or "tear-drenched aesthetics" to silence Indigenous voices and critiques!
My thanks to Regan and @gagiibaaikwe for pointing out how poorly worded my initial subtweet was!
