'Migrating seeds' exhibit traces ancestral journey, loss of traditional life

Sun, February 12, 2023 

Artist Ginnifer Menominee

An Anishnaabe artist is reclaiming her culture through an exhibit that delves into her ancestors' relationship with a food that has all but disappeared as they've become disconnected over time from a traditional way of life.

Manoomin — or wild rice — has a deep significance for Ginnifer Menominee. In fact it's rooted in her very name, Menominee, meaning people of the wild rice.

Her childhood was filled with stories with the grain taking a central role.

But there was also a sad undertone.

"There was this grief, this massive amount of grief that was felt in the community by not having that staple," she told CBC Radio's In Town and Out.

The older she got, the more central a role the rice played in how Menominee began to understand her identity as an Anishnaabe person.

"I would dream about [manoomin]. I would dream about going back and harvesting and taking that and eating that and consuming it and how wonderful it would be."

Family displaced

Part of the exhibit features a red carpet, a river of sorts, representing a long, arduous and dangerous journey following the War of 1812.

"What it's going to really represent is this journey of like reclaiming back the original manoomin that my family lost," she said.

That loss happened when her family on her maternal grandfather's side were forced to flee north after being forcibly displaced from the area that is now Wisconsin and Michigan.

"There was actual bounties on Potawatomi," she said.

They were then taken in by the Ojibwe people in and around Parry Sound, Ont., she said, an area that later became Wasauksing First Nation.

Since then, the wild rice has disappeared from Wasauksing First Nation.

Giacomo Panico/CBC

Holding the rice between her fingers, she begins to reflect on her ancestors, the pain they endured and spirit they had.

"We have such a deep connection to our land, to the water and it always makes me very proud to call myself Menominee, to call myself Anishnaabe, to represent my nation, to do the work of the people and walk that red road," she said, her voice breaking.

"Migrating Seeds" exhibit opened at Gallery 101 in Ottawa on Saturday and runs until March 11.