The Concept of Land

The Concept of Land questions removing the Land’s agency within our relationship to own it. Colonial powers made the relationship with the Land inferior, and those who chose to live harmoniously with the Land were made inferior as well. However, the future will require us to reengage with Indigenous practices to give agency back to the Land and view our relationship with the Land as equals.

Author Audio Reading Below

Begins with Land

In the beginning, grew a tree from land and water and air

The existence of bugs, animals, and humans all of which we compared

We could’ve continued this expansion of human existence to one of understanding

To look at the world as one to know and grow in

Rather than a playground to dominate

We call this natural

The concept of owning things

Consequently, making everything else concepts of themselves

We give more agency to our pets, tools, and computer systems

Before we even consider the agency, land has had

We don’t own it

We could never

Discovery is a human invention of firsts when existence was the first to discover

We conjure higher powers yet never adhere to them

Suddenly home is measured by the dirt we tread

Losing all value while we sacrifice dignity instead

So, when you look at the tree, the mountain, the waters on a leaf

Know that it remembers long before the fifty-year-old that claimed it

Know that it remembers the pain we cultivated to mass produce a strain of it

Know that it’ll remember the future we paint with it

Where we fall backwards into the future trying to rebuild that time where we perhaps

Coexisted in the existence of home and land and everything in between it

The Process...

The Concept of Land was my first piece for this collection. Indigenous practices and research heavily inspired this artwork. I had learned from Howard Munroe in his The History of Métis course and additional research outside of the course for this piece. It ultimately dictated the framework I would follow to cultivate the rest of the collection. I wanted to explore my merger of illustration and creative writing that found a sweet spot in between everything.

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