Installation Pidikwe by Caroline Monnet

Dance and language are approached here as tools for healing rooted in community. Indigenous women have survived centuries of assimilation, abuse, exploitation, and the dispossession of matriarchal values. The body is doubly threatened, anchored in colonial and patriarchal spatial constructions. This reinforces the belief that Indigenous women’s bodies are to be seized—objects or landscapes to be possessed and controlled. Here, those bodies are reintegrated into our cities, our lives, our families, and our imaginations.

Created from the eponymous short film shot in 16mm, this iteration appears as a digital sculpture. Pidikwe triples the screens and increases tenfold the potential for immersion in an enveloping trance that blurs the boundaries between the Roaring Twenties and the contemporary era. The costumes are conceived as floating bodies, inviting viewers to lose themselves in this world of freedom, personal expression, exuberance, and creativity.