When I opened Gallery Phillip in 1976 and began regularly showing First Nations and Inuit artists, there was still a tendency in the Canadian art world to categorize this work as something craft-like but not always vital and contemporary.  This changed by the late 1970s when the public began to see past the elements of design and understand the legends and history behind the work and it’s unique vocabulary.  More importantly, each of the artists that emerged during this important period had a unique voice that refused to be framed by anyone else’s expectations and it was very exciting to behold.

Norval Morrisseau was at the center of this shift – his strength of line, stunning colour sense and clarity of vision strongly announced itself while Daphne Odjig brought something equally powerful, and entirely her own: a warmth, a humanity, a natural ability to reinvent herself and a political astuteness that made you stop and reconsider what narrative painting was capable of.  What continues to amaze me all these years later is how unique each of these artists are from one another.  Eddy Cobiness approached his figures with a stylized lyricism, while Blake Debassige evoked Anishinaabe legends with a more cosmic, other-wordly perspective.  Benjamin Chee Chee experimented with textures and fine lines with a beautiful precision.  Clifford Maracle pushed in yet another direction – his portraits are impressionist in their use of brushstroke and intensely psychological.

What connects these artists is not a shared style, but a shared resolve. They were not interested in fitting into pre-existing ideas of art.  They created their own and they did so with a force and clarity of purpose that is much more widely appreciated today.

Throughout the month of July, Gallery Gevik is pleased to present The Rise of Indigenous Modernism, an exhibition of works by some of the artists that defined this early period in Canadian and Indigenous art history, including Norval Morrisseau, Daphne Odjig, Eddy Cobiness, Blake Debassige, Benjamin Chee Chee, Don Ense, Saul Williams, Clifford Maracle, and Alex Janvier.