mnemonic memory

Mnemonic Memory
The city of Chicago is filled with and famous for its numerous public sculptures. Many of theses sculptures are categorized as monuments to persons significant to U.S, Illinois and Chicago history. However, within the public art and public consciousness there is very little representation of the Indigenous history.

Indigenous people along the Atlantic coast and the Great Lakes have made wampum beads, out of the welk and quohog shells for thousands of years. The beads were woven into belts as mnemonic devices recording treaties, historical events, and personal social transactions. There are numerous belts exchanged between Indigenous nations before contact as well as between settler governments and Indigenous nations after contact.

Mnemonic Memory seeks to insert Indigenous memory and consciousness into Chicago’s colonial consciousness. It is a durational performance that recreates images of Wampum Belts using chalk paint on the city’s concrete surfaces. The recreation begins by marking the rows of the belt with a chalk line; these lines serve visually and practically as the warp of the wampum. I then begin to paint the individual beads in purple and white. The first iteration of this performance was done at the Illinois Centennial Monument in Logan Square. The slow emergence of the belt in public spaces allows for conversation between viewers and myself. I can engage the audience in a conversation about Indigenous and colonial history in Chicago and North America. Simple questions from curious passers-by such as; what are you doing and why are you doing it? Lead to answers about the Council of Three Fires, the Treaty of Grandville and my great grandmother.