MEMOIRES RAVIVEES HISTOIRE NARREE

eo.,n2en2YJ., CENJ'REDE DOCUAfENTA110N

£e,lte,M ARTEX7E
4 DOCUMF.NJ',fflON
CENTRE

SPRING 1992
<SARA DIAMOND) VOL. XV NO. 4
9,uuei an,d eu.en,ti
EDITORIAL BOARD 8 INDEPENDENT FILMMAKERS ON THE BIG SCREEN
Catherine Crowston, Pat Desjardins, Daria Essop, Gillian Morton
Sandra Haar, Laura McGough. Lloyd Wong
Barry Barclay, Felix de Rooy, Isaac Julien,
CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Rico Martinez speak about audiences, funding, and aspirations
Bruce Barber, Jane Farrow (Halifax), Marusia Bociurkiw
MEMORIES REVISITED, HISTORY RETOLD (Montreal), Clive Robertson (Ottawa), Dot Tuer
(Toronto), Joane Cardinal-Schubert (Calgary, Sara
12 IT'S A QUEER WORLD AFTER ALL
Diamond (Vancouver), Tom Folland (Brooklyn, NY) Marusia Bociurki\if
An Inside Look 'It the International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival Circuit
CONTRIBUTORS it:
Marusia Bociurkiw, Janisse Browning, Oliver
Kellhammer, Rozena Maart, Shani Mootoo, Gillian
~,·1
.,_, ...,•..
' • ,
~·~e:
\
)
•
::t-1<.
d
5Jl-i

Morton, Sarah Murphy, Ian Roderick, Aruna Srivastava eo.eumn, '~Ji

1;.
18 THE POLITICSbF DENOUNCEMENT { r ''.lM"

STAFF
Rozena Maart ,
Sandra Haar (Production)
Lloyd Wong (Administration) Clarence Thoma;:;as $qpreme Court Judge of the U.S.A.
• M',

~-

DESIGN
Blackbird Design Collective
20 WHAT IS ~T THAT UNITES fHJ»COLOURS OF ,B~ETTON~
Ian Roderick • •" .
BOARD OF DIRECTORS Visions of humanity from Blake -;: Benetton "tci
Karl Beveridge, Catherine Crowston, Pat Desjardins,
Daria Essop, Clive Robertson, Tom Folland
..
31 SELF-DETERMINATION AND CULTURAL APPROPRIATION
;>-,9'.
{
Janisse Browning
FUSEis published five tlmes a yeu (includes one double issue) by
Bringing experience to creation a~d :confro9tation
Arton's Cultural Affairs Society and PublishingInc.. a non•profit
artist organization. Our offices are located at 183 Bathurst -,;.}
Street, Toronto, Ontario, Canada, MST 2R7, tel: (416) 367-0159.
All news•stand inquires should be sent to this address.
;t;e,atu1z,e,
Still from The Lull Before the Storm Publications Mail registration No. 4455. Copyright ©1992
Arton's Publishing Inc. All rights reserved under International 22 THE STATE OF THE FOREST
Copyright Union. Copyright is shared equally between the
Oliver Kelthammer
authors and the publishers. Any reproduction without permission
is prohibited. Arton's Publishing assumes no responsibility for ; The Canadian la.ndscape,as Propaganda
by Jean Gagnon, with Karen Knights unsolicited manuscripts. Manuscripts not accompanied by a
stamped, self-addressed envelope will not be returned. \ i
Publication of an advertisement in FUSEdoes not include
The videotapes and video installations various approaches, from oral witness endorsement of the advertiser by the magazine. Opinions Yteu.iew.4. .,,y•c~~ "'·v ~ '
...
of Sara Diamond examine the place of to intellectual analysis, in producing her expressed outslde of specifically marked editorials are not
necessarily held by members of the editorial board.
36 FABLED T~RRITOllfE'S
,.,. . t1'Wl'.'
,
~
women in recent economic and social documentaries and dramatic fictions, Aruna Sriv,!tava,.qt'(d,.,,Shani
Mootoo :~ ...
history, while striving to disengage the and through the very multiplication of FUSE acknowledges financial assistance from the Canada Council, South Asia~;Briti~totography ex,fiss~s. dislocati~n,
discourse from the ideologies and voices escapes the speech of authority. the Ontario Arts Council and the Government of Ontario
through the Ministry of Culture and Communications and the
1f
hybrid idenfities, e!cblonization

~
strategies of patriarchy. The artist uses many hours of volunteer and partially paid labour which are
provided by everyone listed on our masthead. 1
'38., .• ""....
MYTWo ij,.·.:.l:·.•, o.......
·•r~~ ·';·,..:HERs,HER ~R ..··•e·•.··.A~,.GRANDFA:.,,.
..xHER, AND Me· !,
-i::•~
March 1992 Paper Bilingual ISBN 0-88884-622-3
Subscription rates: $16 per year; Institutions $26 per year (in Sarah Mun•;
'ti., ❖_; f
·~:•· ,·
·, ,7\
·;f~}>
, •
,,.. ""'"" •
1
96 pages, 1 colour, 16 b/w illustrations $20 (est.) . ~'<'' N' ,l'.
Canada only). Outside Canada $18 per year; Institutions $30. Leila Sujir'i. idek n:ttallation interwl,;.es narrative
Decisions regarding who qualifies as an 'individual' subscriber
remainthe right of the publisher.
memories,

I
Available through your local bookstore. Distributor: Prologue lnc., 1650 Lionel-Bertrand Blvd., Boisbriand, Quebec J7H 1N7
ISSN 0838-603X.
National Gallery of Canada, Publications, Ottawa KlN 9N4
FUSE is indexed in the Alternative Press Index
FUSE is a member of the
_CanadianMagazine Publisher's Association
Printed in Canada by Delta Web Graphics
 r
FREEVIDEO SCREENINGS
ONTARIO ARTS COUNCIL
TUES- SAT, 12 - 5 PM

RHONDA INFERMENTAL 1989

9: VIENNA
t£.TS
CONSEIL DESARTS DEL ONTARIO

litlllll]
Compilation of 45 works on video

March 18 - April 18 GRANTSTO WRITERS

The Literature Office of the Ontario Arts Council CANADIAN
SALM
MADELEINE offers two separate granting programs for professional
Any Case ...
writers who are residents of Ontario. ARTISTS'
Boites Obscures/In

March 25 - April 18
ARTS WRITERS REPRESENTATION
This program offers assistance to magazine writers in the
creation of criticism, commentary and essays on literature,
ONTARIO
KIMDERKO the arts and media.

An Intelligent Woman WORKS-IN-PROGRESS AN ASSOCIATION OF

This program offers assistance to writers to complete
April 22 - May 23
book-length works-in-progress of literary merit in INDIVIDUAL ARTISTS
poetry and prose.
SERVING WORKING VISUAL
RABINOVITCH
CELIA Deadlines: January 1, April 1, July 1, October 1
Application forms are available from: AND NEW MEDIA ARTISTS
The Grotto Cycle
The Literature Office
April 29 - May 23 Ontario Arts Council
151 Bloor Street West, Suite 500, 18} BATHURST STREET
Toronto, Ontario M5S 1T6 TORONTO ONTARIO
& BERENICCI
RANDY Telephone: (416) 961-1660
or toll-free in Ontario 1-800-387-0058 M5T 2R7
The Fourth Corner of the World
PHONE: (416)} 60,0780
May 27 - June 27
FAX: (416)} 60,0781

KALLAL
ROSE
June 3 - June 27

DEADLINES:
SUBMISSION
NEW ;, salle 1
May 1, 1992

October 1, 1992

February 1, 1993
-::s Denise Hawrysio
installation video
15 fevrier au 15 mars
Michael Fernandes
installation

vvz
conservateur Andrew Forster

Artists' Outlet 73 HARBORD ST.

TOR. ONT. MSS 1G4
"..
·-
21 mars au 19 avril

Robert Houle
Hochelaga
conservateur Curtis Collins
9 mai au 19 avril
(416) 922 - 8744

1087 Queen Street West, Toronto, Canada. M6J 1H3

HOURS: I. salle 2
MON.· THURS 10:30 • 6 PM, SAT. 10:30 • 6 PM video
tel. (416) 531-7869

YYZ acknowledges
fax. (416) 531-6839

the support of The Canada Council; the Ontario Arts

FRI. 10:30 • 9 PM, SUN 12 • 5 PM

WHEEL CHAIR ACCESS ta conservateur Nelson Henricks

21 mars au 19 avril

Council; the Province of Ontario. through the Ministry of Culture and

is a coffativdy optrat<tf,non-profitfurunist 6ooqum
• 'T.'J11.21. 15 mont-royal ouest #105 montreal H2T 2R9
(514) 842 9686
_____
Communication: the City of Toronto, through the Toronto Arts Council:

and the Municipality of Metro Toronto, Cultural Affairs Division.

, .. ,- ~
rf0K0N10 WOMtN'S f;O0KSTOR£
articulc est s:ubvcntionJCpar le Cooscil des Art., du Canada
le Minisl.cff:des Affai:es culturcllcs ct le Coo,eil des Arts de la C.U.M.
 •

1) !l)UVL, 9:.UYJ£:
IN "CULTURE JOCKS," A REVIEW
p,ined by factors other than actual visible
difference, and that the dividing
between whiteness and otherness are con-
lines !l)UVL, 9:.UYJ
£: IUbt
IS LARISSA LAI BEING DELIBERATE-
In the interests of setting the record
straight for those who will only have seen
Ms. Lai's piece, and in the hope that her
What is most peculiar, however, is that,,
in her last paragraph, Ms. Lai writes that
"there
post-modernists-and suggests thi.s as an
alternative to my "reactionary" stance.
She may be surprised to know that diver-
is no monolithic, unified 'racial

••
of Race to the Screen in the Fall 199I issue stantly shifti9g not only by the mainstream, ly mischievous, simply obtuse, 9r is she .as woefully and regrettable ignorance on marginalization."' Why then does she sity is as old as the first African who
of FUSE ( 15:I &2), Larissa Lai quoted me as but also within oppositional politics. The ignorant of the more fundamental issues issues will be somewhat remedied, I will describe my stance as reactionary when I decided to jump overboard and kill her-
saying that "those of mixed thrust of the Nazi project after all was to around racism, and what my position was reiterate what my "reactionary" position reject that very "monolithic, unified racial se If rather than go into slavery, as
Asian/European descent are merely con- demarcate "true" whites from "apparent" at the Race to the Screen symposium_/as was at the Race to the Screen festival, and marginalization"? Mischievousness perhaps? opposed to those who not only worked
fused." I in no way support this statement, whites. And witness the recent "colouring" she appears to be in her article "Culture still is. I understand racism, or white Where I have the greatest difficulty, for "massa" but also helped oppress his
although I understand how she could have of all Arabs (who actually come in different Jocks"? (FUSE15:I &2) J supremacy as I prefer to describe it, as a however, deciding on the bona (ides of Ms. own people. Clarence Thomas is but a
taken this from my story. I don't believe colours) bcfh by the dominant media and
1) that one's politics directly determine one's
race, gender, class, or sexuality. This is not
~

by progre!sives opposed to the Gulf War.

As well, for someone whose experience of
Early in her piece Ms. Lai se\5 up•~•
specious but confusing dichotomy:
"[W]hen we speak of race and racial dis-
mode of thought that explains that white-
skinned peoples are innately superior to
Africans, Asians and Aboriginal peoples of
Lai's motives is when she writes that my
position at the conference was that "until .
.. overt instances of racial aggression
more recent examp.le of this diversity. To
state the obvious, however, no group is
monolithic-but racist/white supremacist

'I
to say that consciousness is some free
floating, transcendent entity either.
believe that there is a dialectical process.
I
racism h~s always been linked to what I
look like, it was a learning experience to
work with aboriginal Canadians who stated
crimination, are we talking in terms ohkin
colour or in terms of culture?",'Ms.
never answers this question but furtner
LaJ j colour. (More recently Rushton has put a
new spin on this.) This ideology also hier-
archizes the inferiority in such a way that
cease [against black people], the question
of culture [was] not relevant." Not only is
the argument coarse and unrefined, but it
systems and individuals do view African,
Asian, and First Nations communities in
this way. Understanding this is not a bar

n The story referred to arose as I reflect-

ed on an anti-racist camp for high school
students I attended, in which a part of the
process called for students to situate
quite clearly that for them neither racism
nor native identity is primarily an issue of
colour.
I see the debates that took place at
on in her article she writes that I "adhered
to a reactionary stance. vis-a,vis identifica)''
tion on the basis of culture" (rriy emp~a-
sis). I expected to be describe·d as an
'
the African is often positioned at the bot-
tom, as being without those physical
markers of a civilization-literacy,
ten literature,
a writ-
organized religion, stone
is also logically untenable. Surely, if I held
this opinion I would not be participating in
a cultural event such as Race to the Screen;I
also earn my living writing and when last I
to accepting the existence of diversity.
Does all this mean that you spend
your artistic life responding to "the sys- .
tern"? Of course not. I strongly urge Ms.
themselves according to "the groups we Rqce to"'the Screen as ongbing. For me, the essentialist, one of the' more recent post. buildings, ancient heritage, and whatever checked writing was still considered a part Lai to read my "Notes Against Reaction"
belong to." Facilitators also told the stu- purpose of the event (of which I was an modernist buzzwords. I must, however, .. other indicia the European cared to of culture. I have also written in the Women's Press anthology WoN<sIn
and pub-
dents they could join others who are organizer) was to raise certain questions, rest content with being .a readiopar?j/\\" demand. lished that I believe for my people, Africans Progress. She could also have a look at
"seen" to be "like them." At this point,
students who were of mixed African and
to complicate models, and to develop a can only assume that the acc;eptable (, "J That racism manifests itself in very spe- in the New World, the articulation of their "Managing the Unmanageable" in which I
space for the critical reception of film and Ms. Lai) and non-reactionary stance would cific ways in the white western democra- culture is their only way back to their psy- argue that while I may be marginalized,
European heritage automatically went to video dealing with issues of racism and have been for me to accept that I cies like Canada. In Toronto, for instance, chic wholeness. What I did express at Race my understanding of margin is as a fron-
the black group, whereas students of racial i'dentity within a Canadian context. It belonged to one happy family, distin- it translates into a criminalization of the to the Screen, and what I hoped the audi- tier, which immediately makes the domi-
white and Asian parents refused to join is also my fe.eling that the increasingly guished by its diversity and sharing in .the black population; it results in violence per- ence understood, was my profound dis- nant culture the hinterland.
either the white or the Asian group, iden- complex debates within the academy largesse of the dominant cult1,.1re'sracism. petrated by the police on black youth; it is comfort with a certain aestheticization of Mischief, obtuseness, or simple igno-
tifying themselves as separate from both. about race, gender, class, sexuality and My experience of racism, therefore, as ii... also visible in a profound lack of respect, racism so that it becomes yet another rance? I still don't know which of those
My purpose in telling this story was that it popular culture, on the one hand, and the black woman in Toronto would become by the dominant culture, for the concerns flavour in the artistic pie. Racism has and motivated Ms. Lai's comments but I agree
is yet another illustration of how racial practice of grassroots activist politics and the same as an Italian Jewi~h wo.piari's ~ of the black communities who are seen continues to exact an inordinate burden- with her in one respect-she is having
identity is not natural but socially con- popular education., on the other, should experience, which in turn would be just . and treated in a monolithic way, except economic, physical, emotional, great difficulty and her piece reflects that
spiritual,
structed. It underlined for me how, in the confront each other more directly. With the same as a First Nations man's experi- 1 when it suits the media to portray those and psychic--on she is in over her head. Before
African Canadians. Too she
historical context of North America, any
amount of Africanness constitutes a per-
such an ambitious
always mixed.
agenda, success is ence and so on to infinity. If this is Ms.
"'
Lai's definition of a non-reactionary stance . very same communities as fragmented and
not being able to speak with one voice on
often for us the bottom line has been the
killing of our people, and although I work
attempts another such piece Ms. Lai has a
great deal of homework to do.
son as black, while Asian identity is not so
overdetermined. My point is that, although
there is a sense that people who are not
One final point is that I wonder
Larissa really intended to describe Marlene
Nourbese Philip's stance on the panel as
if then I am, for the first time
happy to be called a reactiona~.
•
jn
J
my life, ... matters-usually on matters related to
the police. While other racially visible
groups, such as native people, are treated
in the area of culture, I cannot and will not
forget that. It behooves every black per-
son-artist, domestic, or doctor-to
Yours truly, M. Nourbese Philip

white share a certain otherness in relation "reactionary." If she did, I don't agree with in a similar fashion, it behooves us all not understand the lengths to which those that
to the discourse of white supremacy, it is her. If she didn't, where are those FUSE to lump these groups together under this control the system will go to articulate

~
not productive to collapse and generalize editors? The work that FUSE does is great umbrella of "culture" Ms. Lai their belief in their supremacy. There are
our specific histories and locatio)ls into incredibly significant to the development of appears to advocate. To do so is to disre- many who do not want to face this, many
categories such as "people of colour," culture and politics in Canada but I often spect the particularity of the cultures and who themselves belong to those very

tt
although other terms which we could use feel that ~Ubmitted work could stand more the oppression. To understand the history groups that are oppressed, And what bet-
to articulate our solidarity are as unclear editing, clarification, and verification than is and lived experiences of one's group in no ter place to forget it but in "artistic" and
to me as it is obvious that this solidarity is currently the practice. This applies equally way precludes the formation of coalitions cultural settings. It was this aspect of reali-
necessary. to my own writing .. I recognize a shortage or alliances with other groups; neither ty I was attempting to introduce into the
Another related point, though not of resources but it would certainly should the latter process mean the reduc- discussion at the panel discussion at Race
communicated by this anecdote, is that it
is important for us to acknowledge that,,
what we "see" as "colour" is often deter-
enhance your already important work.

Sincerely, ·Richard Fung ~o tion of one's history and experiences to

one happy common denominator of "dif-
ference."
to the Screen.
Ms. Lai is clearly excited by her discov-
ery of diversity-another buzzword of the

4 FALL 1991 FUSE

I-' l..2_I, ~ u YZ&
j.,,
 groups, it seems to me that all too fre- e.e. W-'J;U!.P.£: The additional information supplied by points out that Ms. Drainie makes several • tizations depicting powerlessness), diaget-
quently we find ourselves playing into a Micheline Savoie Ms. Offman that "well established critics remarks which, to him, constitute the ic sound (the "East Indian" accent), and
system of tokenism which guarantees that Canadian Broadcasting Corporation or academics with some TV experience" "most offensive part of the review." the extra-diagetic commentary (Ms.
only a few of us can "make it" by playing a Societe Radio-Canada from the South-Asian community were Given that speech is a greater indicator of Drainie's remarks) result in an offensive
time-consuming, never-ending game to P.O. Box 8478 unavailable only serves to multiply the the power relationships than it is of free- product. However, unlike Mr. Suleman,
determine who is the most genuinely 1500 Bronson Ave. questions of how or why this issue dom in that it exists in human situations the most offensive point for me is that, as
oppressed. Ottawa, Ont. became peripheral. Who, for example, and not solely at a theoretical level, the media professionals, you already knew
Marlene Nourbese Philip's concerns KIG 3JS decides whether a South-Asian critic or issue is as follows; Ms. Drainie, who is everything I have stated here yet you
regarding racism in this country against academic is "well established" and whose simultaneously empowered by her speech chose to ignore it an hide it behind a
people of African descent are legitimate. It Dear Ms. Savoie, community should this person be well position and culturally ignorant of her decorous reference to "freedom of
is certainly not my intention to posit any REGARDING MR. ZOOL SULEMAN'S established in? If it is true that many topic, has been situated by the producers speech.'' Is this what the Equitable
Asian group in "competition" for that letter (August 16, 1991) and your subse- South-Asian critics or academics do not of The Journal so as to have the freedom Portrayal in Programming department
space. Nor am I at all suggesting that the quent reply, it seems that a number of have TV experience, how are they to to make derisive remarks about Mr. does at the CBC?
notion of hierarchy should be dispensed issues were missed. While it heartens me obtain this experience when producers Suleman's culture with nothing but a void I would suggest that the "whole series
with, but only that it is less than a perfect that an Equitable Portrayal in Program- such Ms. Offman reject them as possible of silence to challenge her. This is the of programming policies" you claim to fol-
~ £ai 'd- tool. ming department is in operation at the candidates for television panels? Would it condition condoned in your recourse to a low are either not sensitive enough or
~: Recognizing that within the white racist CBC, your reply raises serious concerns not have been better had Ms. Offman theoretical notion of "freedom of have not been enforced in the case of the
I WOULD LIKE TO BEGIN THIS system ranking of various "of colour" at the level of both the nature of the pursued some of these questions before speech." It is inadequate. No New Land review. As I stated at the
letter by extending my apologies to groups in terms of such a hierarchy response to Mr. Suleman and the overall the program was aired rather than letting Thirdly, the offensive components of beginning of this letter, I am heartened
Marlene Nourbese Philip for describing occurs, I also want to recognize, in its cri- reaction to the issues raised. this key issue slide, offending South-Asian the review identified by Mr. Suleman are that there is an Equitable Portrayal in
her position on the panel "Constructing tique, that ranking the ways in which To begin, in relating Mr. Suleman's viewers, and then asking a member of the not addressed in either the committee's Programming department in operation at
Race" at Race to the Screen last spring as racially marginalized people are oppressed commentary on The Journal's review of No community she has just offended to help or Ms. Offman's letters. Again in parallel the CBC, but not if this department's
"reactionary." I would also like to apolo- homogenizes a whole gamut of oppres- New Land to your former scholastic activi- her locate appropriate reviewers? to the presentation of the topic in The actual mandate is to fabricate a formal
gize to Richard Fung for a careless mis- sions, that occur at numerous fronts and ties, whether those memories are good Secondly, should a member of the Journal, the committee has chosen to process which operates to renounce key
quote which unfairly decontextualized a in numerous forms, by assuming the same. or not, effectively reduces Mr. Suleman's committee wander into any public area in obscure the issue of racism, which is community-based issues under the guise
comment he made. criteria to determine them. I hope that I concerns to the level of a "good" aca- Toronto where conversation is taking clearly defined by Mr. Suleman in his of equity, thereby justifying the existence
Due to a number of circumstances, the would be one of the last in line to support demic discussion and thus dismisses the place, they may make the facile observa- lengthy discussion of the dramatizations, of racist programming at the CBC.
article never really got beyond the stage a model of "multicultural diversity" as one impact these issues have on the actual tion that when one person speaks, the by referring only to the use of accents in
of a rough draft. I should not have permit- big happy more-or-less-homogenous- lives of South-Asian peoples. In this way, other is silent. The structure of conversa- the voice-over. As professionals in media Sincerely, Linda Wayne
ted it to be printed. except-for-nifty-costumes-and-a-few- your response parallels The Journal's tion is built on social conventions which arts, you know that television representa-
With regards to my misrepresentation quaint-cooking-techniques family. review in its strategy of reduction and dis- dictate who speaks, when they may speak, tion is a formal system which operates
of what Richard had said during the In the second instance, her warning missal of the key issues, and subsequent and what they might say. The CRTC reg- through the dynamic synthesis of visuals,
Saturday morning panel, I could probably against the dangers of aestheticizing elevation of academic issues (i.e., charac- ulations governing radio interviews is but diagetic sound, and extra-diagetic com-
have done a better job of unpacking the racism are well taken. ter portrayal, plot structure, etc.). one example of these social strictures mentary. Therefore you know that in
argument. I thank him for his clarification. I would like to end this letter with the Moreover, although your standard rendered in guideline form. Indeed, one addressing your response solely to the
With regards to Marlene Nourbese hope that a useful and constructive rela- procedure for the treatment of Mr. may even be imprisoned in Canada for voice-over you treat but one portion of
Philip, although the word "reactionary" tionship may develop out of this. Suleman's concerns was nothing less (or verbally articulating "false news" about the overall representation which, as Mr.
was mischosen, I should clarify what my more) than appropriate, it seems that the King or Queen of England. In other Suleman has pointed out, is stereotypical.
discomfort with her position was. While I Yours sincerely, Larissa Lai many of these concerns were still not words, there is very little which is "free" That is, within the viewing instance the
agree that her description of white "heard" (as Ms. Offman puts it). I will go about speech and, in fact, the social use of tripartite tabulation of the visuals (drama-
supremacy as hierarchizing marginalized through these in order: speech is a greater indicator of power
groups has a basis in reality, I also wonder Firstly, in a country such as Canada relationships than it is of freedom.
if a focus on precisely what the ranking where cultural representation in every It is already evident to you and others
consists of is a useful strategy. Over the public forum, including the media, has on the committee that the absence of a
course of history, different groups have been a controversial issue for at least a reviewer from the South-Asian communi-
used a conception of race as a reason for decade, it is difficult to accept the com- ty yields a vacuous silence regarding the
oppressing people. But the hierarchy of mittee's explanation that a South-Asian concerns of that community. Thus you
who is more oppressed than whom is in a reviewer "should have been invited" to know that speech and silence, or in other
constant state of flux, and the histories of participate on the panel. Surely you did words, conversation, has already been
people of colour is the history of that flux. not need to form a committee to attain "tampered" with in the case of The Journal
When people of colour get together in this verdict. review. In this context, Mr. Suleman

6 FALL 1991 FUSE FUSE FALL 1991 7

 lit'.

• ~

t
hese filmmakers are all inde- Usually the only imagesthat
1 ■• pendents who are breaking into Audience/Reception
are seen are American black I Barry
0

I,,
the mainstream, either by mak- images. I feel black history 3 Barclay
i.:

-
0
ing bigger budget films (relative to Many filmmakers reject the idea is much vaster, much richer,
I "' those funded only by grants from arts of speaking for the communities that and much wider than only ~
~
Barry Barclayis quar-
councils), or simply by making feature they come from, partly because of those American images, for z

'
ter Maori, quarter
films they hope will reach large audi- example, those that are
6
the authority this implies and part- t5 Frenehand holf Scots,
I ences. As filmmakers of colour, they ly to emphasize their communities' being made by Spike Lee. iE
Hehas modenumerous
■ face not only institutionalized racism heterogeneity. This issue of speak- I was also hoping to documentaries for
television and in 1986ellrected
I■ in terms of barriers to production, but ing to their communities has become transcend the limits of Antillian cul-
also in their film's distribution (or lack ture and say something to the rest of
the cr1tically acclaimedtlooll,
increasingly important as filmmak-
He is also the authorof O!.u:...OdD

;) ~

.,
thereoO and critical reception. YOUNG ers acknowledge the constraints of the world. The Caribbean is very
.IJnQ9e<Longm PaUl, 19:KJJ ,
SOUL
REBELS
is the only film seemingly to producing and exhibiting work with- important because it is a laboratory
SYNOPSIS. Ie...Eu!J
is aboutthe
have faced few problems. having pre- in existing institutions. Reaching of multi-ethnic societies. Now Europe struggle of the Uritoto tribe to
miered with an award-winning per- beyond the art house/festival cir- is being confronted with the same bring tme sacredcarvingsstolen
formance at Cannes. cuit audiences already established problem or situation that the fromthem100yearsago. The
carvingsare now"owned"by a
by Gillian The other films experienced prob- for their work presents a particular Caribbean has been living with for a

Morton ... lems getting theatrical distribution. TE challenge. long time.

l!llseumin Berlin.
NannyMot1a,a Maori elder,
RuAcould not get a screening in Berlin, In Amsterdam AVA ANDGABRIEL
®! sendSRew!Marangal,a successful
even though the film is produced in Barry Barclay played for only seven weeks. It won a lawyer, performance peet Peter
association with the Berlin Senate and The majority culture seemsto have Golden Calf at the Dutch film festival HUol<a, md other youngMoar1
During the Toronto FESTIVAL
OF ¥:

is partially set there. (I wondered if ears like a sponge: you can talk your but the critics panned it. They said it octMsts to Germany. To make
FESTIVALS,
I had the opportuni- PUblic their struggle, they high-
this failure had something to do with TE tongue off, year after year; the ears was a racist film; that I didn't know what
ty to speakto a number of RuA'slinkage of the Maori activists with I was doing; that I made of mishmash
Jockh.istoric German sculptures,
flap, but in the end you feel you have
filmmakers.What follows are Cl1act lltlich leoctsto a shOWdOWn
Germany's "others," Turkish and black spent your life speaking to a great of too many issues;that I myself didn't
wtth the German state.
excerpts from conversations

-
immigrants.) Felix de Rooy alludes to sponge which does not seem to learn, know how to deal with them; and that

) wft~filmmakers Felix de
Rooy, RicoMartinez,and w•
-.,:.. the antagonistic reception of his work
in Amsterdam in what follows below.
Rico Martinez's film, which has the
but which is ever eager to absorb
more.
the film drowned in its diversity.
I have a history in Holland, of
course. The Dutch have the PRof being
Felix
IsaacJulien about their work. ""
I have come to believe we need to
de Rooy
-* potential of a camp cult classic, has be talking to our own people first-to a very liberal country. Everything'spos-

~
Another voice included here is
been limited to festival exhibition. be "talking in." (p.76) sible; they're so tolerant; there's no
Barry Barclay's,a Maori film- Bornin Curacao,
The FESTIVAL
was over many months racism in Holland (which I'll tackle in

~
I do not think this is turning Felix de Rooy is a
maker who was unable to ago and most of the films were never inward in an unhealthy way. Rather, I my next film). To be confronted with an painter, grOPhic

I .,;, ..
attend the festival due to ill-
ness.I have included excerpts
to reappear on Canadian screens. In
these exerpts the filmmakers comment
see it as asserting a cultural confi-
dence so that, if we shape things in
image totally contrary to their PR hit
them really hard. They felt, who's this
arttst, anctdirec-
tor of fllm, 1V,

I from his book OUROWNl¥Af.i-E

(LongmanPaul, 1990),which.,.
he wrote as an open letter to
on some of the concerns which inform
the debatesamongst independent film-
makers, their audiences and critics:
who the films speak to, how they are
our own way, we shall come to make
images that will be attractive to those
humans on the planet who wish to
enjoy them. I am not talking about
Caribbean guy who's using our money
to make a film which criticizes us?
Also, I had a very successful but
controversial exhibition in Holland
m<ltheatre, His
maJor feature films
are~,
Almaclta
Soulof Desolato,and
AYo(]JdGabriel; A LoveStory'
the Chief Pan George funded and received, and what aspi- minority programmes directed at a called WHITEONBLACK,
imagesof blacks SYNOPSIS.AvaandGabr1el
Memorial . "'·•
."'.-Foundation tn;ll¾ rations they have as filmmakers. minority. I am talking about a minor- in popular Western culture. Some of takes place in Curocooin the
* while working on
Vancouver ity being confident enough to talk with the items are Dutch and they show the late ''-!Os.TheSurlncrnoointer
racism that clearly exists in terms of Gctlr!el GOedtlloedarrives frnn
TERUA,his latest fil111, its own voice about whatever it choos-
Hollood,hoVingbeencamiissioned
es and as it does so, having a feeling stereotyping black people. WHITEON
Barclay'scommentsare gen,- to ooint a muralof the Virgin
'~"' me that the talk will be of interest tooth- BLACK
got a lot of international press
era! reflections about film- Maryby the DutchchUrCh.Clergy
• 4' ers who wish to drop in. (p.78) and the Dutch were quite upset. But onctlocals are confused;they
makingand not specific refer- they couldn't attack me personally. The werenot expectinga block
®
encesto TERuA. Felix de Rooy film premiered a few months after the painter, Gctlriel createsmore
The people I wanted to speak to exhibition and since they couldn't crit- coofUs1on by refusing to conform
to the customsof the close kn1t,
in the first place are the Antillian peo- icize me over the exhibit they took the
• pie, because they never see any ref- opportunity to attack the film. continued next page
""' erences to themselves on the screen.

FUSE FALL 1991 9

 I promote
Rico Martinez
myselfas
ll colonizedAntill loo society, His
choicefor the church'sllilral of To me, the way to infiltrate and
Funding a bimbot,
the Virgin Moryis Avo,a young be subversive is to be accessible, to a mixture of a
II
teacher,Whois from"m!xedori- disarm, to do something that could be robot and a bimbo.
i
gin." This beg!nsa controversy silly, that people would not be jaded WhenYOU think of
made up of all the physical and men-
If abouta black Madonna.
about-as opposed to doing something
Not surprisingly, independent film- one quarter in loans. The reception in a director he's
continued from previous page

Ava's nonce, the local Dutch makers are often preoccupied with Curacao helped save us from tal "states" of Asian and Hispanic cul-
that people who like avant garde stuff usually white, Celebrity Criminals.Martinez's
ool1cemaJor,is unhaPPy w!th her raising money: how to access funds bankruptcy. When AVAANDGABRIEL ture: an Edo period/Erotica/Porno
are going to go see anyway, people usually male, usu- kitsch sens1bility comments
sMy
decisionto POSe for Gabriel, came out there was some controver- state; a Bruce LeeState;a '70s low rider
and how to maintain that access. ally sort of on the pathosof Tan-Yoh,Troy,
particularly since the twoare who already agree on certain theories
(Festival press packagessuggestsome sy. On a radio programme called "The state, with Cholos, Mexican American andall wannabe trendSetters.
obviouslyattracted to onemoth- and certain politically correct issues. smart, Whynot
aspects of the business of marketing People are Speaking,"there was a very gang riders; an Aztec state; and a
er. FurtherCOOl'Jl1catingthe sex- What's the point? promote myself as
"marginality": brief histories of colo- angry man who said that I was cor- Spanish Inquisition state. There's a
Ir ual oodsocial intrigues, the I like to think that most people are possibly stupid,
I DutchGovernor'swife becomes
pretty smart. Not in a book way, not
nialism; filmmakers pictured in geisha rupting the morality of the youth. He as an image? Not
runaway from the planet who's a she-
Isaac
11
I
interested in Gabriel. Themelo-
drClllO
inevitably concludes with that they went to school or whatev-
girl drag: and background material felt that I had misused the people of take promotion
male, who I call "the figure." The fig-
ure runs away from Micro Mini to
Julien
detailing style as a social force which Curacao because I said was going to seriously, ques-
l the state/society's punishroont
Gabriel for his transgressions:
of er. But people are smarter than the
films that are made for them.
begin, appropriately enough, with make a love story, but what I was tion it.
become a supermodel in outerspace
where there are limitless fashion and
IsaacJulien was
quotes from VOGUE
MAGAZINE.) showing was "homosexual decadence." txirn in East London
.
deathat the h<lldsof the oollce RicoMartinez
He said that kids should be forbidden lighting opportunities. At a certain He ts a co-founder
force. Isaac Julien
to see the film-which in way helped point it becomes bored with fashion of SQnkofa Film and
Barry Barclay PHOTO
COURTESYFILMMAKER
In Britain LOOKING
FORLANGSTON
was
and decides to do a makeover, to get
Video, a groupaf
Rico seen by a white gay audience more
We have had mixed experiences because then all the teenagers want-
rid of surface. It becomes a spy on
youngblock fillMlOk- PHOTO: ELLEN'FLANDERS
Martinez than any other. I was dissatisfied;
with Maori funds. They tend to be
under-funded in comparison with their
ed to see it.
Micro Mini to find the secret of the
hovepro-
ers 1'1110
ducedradical workfor cinemaand
Langston was able to be spoken about
Pakehalnon-Maoril counterparts; they Rico Martinez beauty of the soul. TY, His earlier work1nc1UdesIbe
RicoMortinezis a solely in a gay context. As if the black
Possionof Remembrance.
Il1lill
Chinese-Fil !pino/
MexicanAmerican
communities of interest could just say,
are the first to be cut back in bad
times: they tend to introduce a ghetto
It's totally hard to make indepen-
dent films in L.A. You have to go out-
Movements;nreams and most of the active Maori film-
makers in the country have been part Isaac Julien Not AnAIDSAdvert. oodLOOlillJg
"Well, that's over there." for Langston.
filJIVll(Jker
Wholives factor as far as Maori artists are con- side-most of my money came from of that wider movement in some way- [In REBELS,]
I wanted to throw light
What I wanted to do with YOUNG SYNOPSIS. YoungSoul Rebelsis
in HollYWOOd, He cerned; and they have the effect of New York-based organizations. I got In discussion with filmmakers, two has created a climate within which the on black youth movements. They con-
SOULREBELS
was purposively involve set in 1977,the year of the
wantsto mke films closing off the major fund to Maori, a really weird grant from the Princess issues which cropped up frequently filmmakers feel confident enough to nected to the soul music in America,
black audiences in my work again in Queen'sJubilee, amidstthe
that are somewhere often through the media of pirate
who no matter what the scale or Grace Foundation. Al I the people on were the relation of the filmmaker's assert the same principles in their own groundswellof British national-
in between Y.o1.lfY a kind of confrontational, direct way.
radio. I still feel that the left has a kind
nature of their project are steered to the board are these old rich conser- practice to a specific political/histor- industry. ismand the growthof the
of the Dolls. By making REBELS
a narrative film, I
the Maori fund. (p.24) vative right wing kind of people: Nancy ical moment, and the filmmaker's aspi- of expedient relationship to black cul- NotionalFront, Therewasvibrant
NightFeverand~
Soturctoy hope to reach different audiences that
ture. This relationship is represented 0011ticol andcultural OPDOSi tion
B.1.sJ.ng
. The new noble savagewho may be Reagan, Frank Sinatra, Placido rations. The two are, of course, con- Felix de Rooy
wouldn't come to see more formally to the rise of racism;YoungSOU!
SYOOPS rs. Desoerate, shown off in the drawing rooms of the Domingo, that type of people. I nected, as the comments below illus- What I really hope is that at acer- through Billibud. He gets Caz in the
experimental representations, and gay Rebelsusesthe conventions of
Martinez'sfirst feature f1lm, white world is encouragedto rattle, not thought they'd made a mistake. It was trate. tain moment I get an other status than bedroom and it's "Let's put on the reg-
representations specifically. the mysterymoviegenreto
chroniclesthe history of two gae music." Caz doesn't want to be
the spear,but the camera,and the major- really weird. I met the royal family, the one of being an exotic cherry in explore the culturol dimension of
desperateCharacters,Tan-Ycilood In a screening in Nottingham,
placed in this particular way.
ity culture is pleasedto fund one or two Princess Stephanie, Prince Albert. We Barry Barclay the festival pies. I hope the film gets res1stance.
Troy. Thenarrative follows Tan- about ten straight black men walked
of them from time to time. But when you had a royal procession, totally formal. As filmmakers, most of us now distribution. If the films don't get a dis- Obviously, these experiences are Twoteenageblock boys, Caz
Ycil's attemptsto launcha out during the sex scene. Afterwards
turn into a difficult native, the drawing I promote myself as a bimbot, a have little compunction about stand- tributor and they actually don't make my own experiences-and they're not. andChris, onegay, onestrai911t,
singing career in PUnkrock, at the O-and-A it was uncomfortable,
In 1977I was doing my A levels. I was Shorea passionfor soul music,
countryand western,andfinally, room is likely to clear fast. (p.27) mixture of a robot and a bimbo. When ing up and saying, "Don't keep lectur- money, then my career as a filmmak-
very confrontational. But I felt that it Themurderof TJ, a gay mon
!n back-UPUpsync!ng.Troy, And it is convenient for the system you think of a director he's usually ing us about how to make films. Give er is endangered. As long as the struc- in no way as transgressive as Caz is,
was bringing it back home, bringing cruising in a park, IIK!kes Chris a
le gets caughtup in a
ineanlltll
to be able to view the committed Maori white, usually male, usually sort of or Chris. It's important to make soli-
us the resources and we will do it in tures in the Western world in terms of target for txith the killer and
"PYrClllid"scamand then in a these questions back to the commu-
filmmaker as some dedicated sod pre- smart. Why not promote myself as our own way." The boldnessand deter- race relationships and respect don't darity across these lines-across sex- the cops. R001011t1cinterests
OOY/bisexual parn film. Obsessed nities which I am from.
pared to have the telephone and elec- possibly stupid, as an image7Not take mination to do that has come from a change, my films will just be filed. ual and racial lines. But they have to be developingoutside their rela-
with fame,they txith PUrsuea
tricity cut off for non-payment in order promotion seriously, question it. It's much wider struggle. Hopefully one day, maybe in 20, 30, 40 on the basis of real reconciliation, real tionship andcliffering omblt1ons
series of fashionand cultural
acknowledgement of differences. for their SOU!Patrol Pirate
trends. Their final career to film other committed Maori being probably the Asian part of me; my Maori control of Maori matters (or years, they'll be rediscovered and re-
People try to make easy, expedient
radio station leads to bitter
choice, "txidYbuilders to the led off to prison in a good cause.(p.26) mom has all these Chinese sayings "mana motuhake," as it is called) is evaluated. But at least they're there.
argLIJlents.
Thefilm's finale is
stars," endsWhenthey murdera which more or less translate to the being pushed in the trade unions, in relations. REBELS
is trying to prob-
set ot o Stuff TheJubilee con-
sadistic satanist Whotries to lematize those relations between black
Felix de Rooy person that's not speaking that health care, in education, in local gov- Rico Martinez cert ln the park. Skinsand
keepthemas cagedcreaturesin and white, gay and straight.
The film cost one million dollars: appears stupid is sometimes the ernment, and in a host of other areas. My next film, MICRO
MINI, is a sci- NotionalFront sUPPQrters clash
his dungeon.Themurderallows
half came from Holland, one quarter smartest. Perhapsthat general determination to ence fiction film about this planet that Gillian Morton is an activist and writer with ounksas CazandChris
themto finoll y tr!Ufli)h OS
from Antillian sources, in services,and be in control of one's whole destiny- exists in a microchip. The planet is living in Toronto.
reun1te to confront the murderer.
tontinued next page

10 FALL 1991 FUSE FUSE FALL 1991 11

I\

\t'~a International
\\

Inside Lesbian and

\ Look at the Gay f i\m
\ festival Circuit
An tions as lesbians
Although the SA
NFRANCISC LEOSBIAAN tions, and colle

ueer
\ ,' artists, and ac
tivists. ND to commercial ctives.
GAYFESTIVha
I Our emotions we
re as varied an
d con- 15years, most
ALs occurred an
nually for festival exposu
distribution or
re. The hand
wide In the context
of right-wing ba
ck-
\
tradictory as of the other fes ful of lash, these ga
our own cultu tivals women's film ins seems minu
\\ political identi
ral and didn't exist befor
e the mid-'Bos.
These
festivals did litt
le to now, and a yo
scule
ties. We felt va redress the ne unger genera
\ lidated;

/Ii
festivals were ed for wider au tion of
built on the mo

t~,
we felt co-opte diences.
'\ we felt invisi
d; we felt empo
ble. When
wered; women's film
and video fes
del of
tivals in
But they were
spaces: they ga
, and are, affirm
ative
women and les
artists, enter a
bians, activist
political world
s and

,~·,A
margin which mainstre ve us attention, fraught
becomescentr am invisibilitY they with division an
1\ e, new margins
are con- motivation for
is the allowed us to co d exhaustion. No
nnect with audie tions

or
structed, and od a separate realm nces, like pleasure,en
d things start to . The and they create tertainment, an
hap- film industry's d context-a d fash-
historic (and on space ion, have been
pen. going) where the fem revived. Politica
exclusion of wo inist content l cor-
The phenomen men as auteurs, of our rectness is as
on of plenty, vis di rec- work resonated volatile a term
vis lesbian and
a tors, and cinem
atographersme in concentric cir
cles of queers, these
with
gay cultural wo ant that discussion, ac days, as it is
rk, is women-directed tivist audienc with
a relatively re films had little es, and

~
cent phenom access feminist film/vi straights.

'\ enon.
These days,
deomaker colle
ague
there are few s.
er The word "lesb

a1-1era
women's film ian" is more fre
festivals than ely spo-
ever ken, gay storie
before, and ma s appear in pla
ny, like Montr ces like
eal's PEOPLE MAGAZINE
FESTIVINALTERNATIODE so,young dyke
NAFILLMS that there are ga s know
ETVIDEOS y people in the
DESFEMMES world.

~
have become But now that the
mainstream re is more of a
clones. few of image, young public
them highlight gay people ge
lesbian t their
work. Most ne identity from

~t~rd.'''
ver achieve co the mass media
nsistent tion of gay life depic-

\I state funding
sponsorship
and shun corp
strategies. Vo
orate
lunteer
ground culture
insidious prob
, instead of ga
, which is a ne
y under-
w and
AND NOW, MA stream succes lem ••••
NILA! ... OTTA sfor the other burnout is prob

tA
WA!. festivals. ably the most co -Sarah Schulm 2
St John's, Newf Corporate and mmon an
oundland! (Not state sponsorsh cause of death
to men- ip, a .
tion Moscow, To long roster of int
kyo, and Winter ernational gues While lessons
Park, ts,and in political activ Today's lesbia
Florida). Like sc a vivid public ism n and gay film
ragglyflowers in profile, contribu rarely get pass fes-
a hos- ted to ed on in tidy an tivals occur in
ti le landscape a confusing ma d con- a time of shifti
, queer festiv trix of inspirati tinuous ways, ng cul-
als are on and it does seem lik tural meanings.
springing up ev disillusionmen e the For lesbian cultu
erywhere. At a t. Attending as contemporary re in
time of a film- lesbian/gay mo particular, a po
steadily decreas maker and gu vement, litics of scarcit
ingfinancial and est, I was picke and therefore, Y finds
moral d up ;;t its film festivals itself colliding
support for les the airport in an , exist with a new
bian and gay cu sleek Audi (pro both as a partia phe-
lture, vided l result of. and nomenon of ple
the body of les by one of the co in reac- nty. Right-wing
bian and gay film rporate sponso t ion to, the and
/video rs)with feminist move conservative
work is expand the festival log ment. prohibitions
ing as never be o emblazoned Feminist activist (Helms,
fore, on the s learnt the ha Clause 2B, Se
and over 50 les front of the car. rd way cretary of State
bian and gay fes Two days later that identity po ), both
tivals , I, with litics without po blatant and su
worldwide are the other filmma litical btle, have, iro
struggling to ke kers, couldn't analysis leads nically,
ep up get a only to female inspired a proli
with both dema table at the ma corpo- feration
nd and supply. yor's dinner in rate executive of sexual
our hon- s, Margaret Th imagery from a
In November 19 our. The corpor atcher, younger genera
91,the AMSTER ate suits with the and glossy Ms tion of
DAM ir hel- . magazines. Fe lesbian artists.
INTERNATIONA met-haired wi minist And yet, withi
LELSBIAN ANDGAY FILM ves had taken gains, like expa n the
all the nded abortion new, spicy sm
FESTIVAL rights orgasbord of
programmed ov seats. (in Canadaanyw butch/
er 300 films ays), increased femme narra
and videos to So, instead, access tives, leather-dyke
huge crowds in we went out to education,
eight for daycare, and images, and se
theatres and tw Indonesian foo employ- xual sit-corns fea
o cities. The ric d and talked for ment, have ha turing
h aunt hours ppened only thr dildoes, Barbies
of the festival about the festiv ough , and tit-clamps,
circuit, the Am al circuit with longterm, tediou there
sterdam their s, and repetitive are certain die
festival (occur mainstream or orga- tary deficiencie
ring every five ganizing/progra nizing work by s. I still
years) mming trade unions,
provides a kin strategies, and coali- feel hungry.
d of standard our own politica
of main- l posi-

BY MARUSIA
eoc1uRKIW

12 FALL FUSE
1991 FUSE FALL 1991 13
 Overall, we seem to be in
a position not of imagin-
ing what could be, but
Who writes the recipe? up in an "ideo- rather of merely holding
rogate your- spaces and uncomplicated vistas that tivals indicate, however, that the reliable organizing tools. and lesbian spectacle exists a strong culture and humour onto film. While
Programmers or artists? Or both? A logical bantus- onto what has been. selves." Pratibha daily struggle in an unsafe world desire for challenging and politicized In her article "Choosing the
tan" that decrees desire to satisfy and to be satisfied. these works are now being re-released
quick look at programming themes of
I that you do not
Communities in crisis noted that, as evokes. work has not diminished. There are as Margins as a Space of Radical It's almost a co-dependant relation- as a kind of historical packagethrough
various festivals reveals a homogene-
I cross boundaries tend to turn inward and she sat on the I many feminists within lesbian audi- Openness," African-American writer ship, in which each enables the other's Frameline, a San Francisco-based les-

I
ity of curatorial trends. Segregation panel, she felt Countercultural or subcultural posi-
of your experi- ences as ever, and many feel disen- bell hooks proposes the notion of "a weaknesses.The desire to meet audi-
to rely upon identity poli- bian and gay distributor, Oxenberg
by gender and race is common to most ences ... One of tive images propose a complex "for-
like "an anthro- franchised as spectators. Curators politics of location" as a meansof deal- ence demand-another DESERT
HEARTS has herself gone on to produce a fea-
of the festivals; programs of lesbian my concerns as a tics as a way to maintain getting" of present realities-a resis-
pological, ethno- respond to what's out there and what ing with the multiple subjectivities that
tance to, say, the painful realities of feature is high on the lesbian wish- ture docu-drama about her relation-
shorts and gay shorts, and a boys' and filmmaker is to
a visible face in the graphic object of they perceive as audience demand. people with multiple oppressions
II girls' opening feature, characterize
challenge the
curiosity." She
war, powerlessness or poverty-and list-may occur at the expense of the ship with her Jewish grandmother dur-
I "normalizing" and world. There is a sense of "remembering" of possible alterna- Artists respond to audiences, markets, experience. Her metaphorical use of artist's professional and creative ing the last days of her bubbe's life
most of the festival structures. Work questioned the tives-peace, security, affluence ..
II "universalizing" and curators, as well as (hopefully) the idea of home is one I find helpful development. Artists with multiple
by lesbians and gays of colour is usu-
yearning for safe spaces Ithere is al growing wish for legiti-
that makes no mention of Oxenberg's
tendencies with- absence of local their own personal and political in attempting to create new defini- agendas (for whom home is no longer lesbianism. When I saw the film at
11
al Iy grouped together under such in the predomi- and uncomplicated vistas Black lesbians
mation, the longing for recognition,
desires. This complex interweave tions of a multi-faceted community just one place) may wish to produce Toronto's FESTIVAL
the desire to stay time, to make OFFESTIVALS,
I found
obscure headings as, "Under Repair" nantly white les- that daily struggle in an and gays, both as
I (NEWFESTIVAL,
NYC)or "Deconstruction" bian and gay
communities-to unsafe world evokes. filmmakers and
things as perfect as one wished they
could be.. -Jan Zita Grover6
makes it difficult to locate cause-and-
effect. And all the while, the invisible
which can resist stereotyping and co-
optation.
films that speak to many different
audiences, that may have no overt les-
it stunning for its rich mix of play and
reality. Oxenberg appears in the film
(IMAGEET NATIONFESTIVAL,
Montreal). as audience, as
assert the diver- proscriptions of the racist and homo- bian content at all. Is a film lesbian both as herself and as a cut-out doll
Programs of works about AIDS have well as the pres-
sity of cultural "A poetic look at sand sculp- phobic culture swirl around these fes- The very meaning of "home" changes just because it's made by one? It (herself as a child). Her relationship
become staple fare. Other headings and racial identi- ence of some with the experience of decolonization,
tures" ... "The ideal of love at first tivals like ominous rainclouds that shouldn't be so hard to just go back with her grandmother and Jewish cul-
seem to depend on clever word play ties within the obviously racist of radicalization. At times, home is
sight" ... "A sweet story about two nobody wants to admit are there. and forth between locations but the ture are presented with poignancy and
and generic groupings ("Music with umbrella category of gay and lesbian. nowhere. At times, one knows only
films at the festival. She wondered young girls" ... "Francie gives Barbie Recently, a programmer asked me
There is a need also to redefine com- extreme estrangement and alienation. contradictions can become over- respect, at the same time that she
Balls," gay music videos, Amsterdam; why filmmakers, whose concern is
munity and just as there isn't a a makeover that changes her life" .. for some suggestions for structuring Then home is no longer just one place. whelming in a single-issue world. sketches a sharp portrait of the limi-
"Love and Marriage," videos about les- images,weren't more concerned with
homogenous black community, there . "Bathroom etiquette, girlboy style" a three-day lesbian film/video festi- It is locations. Home is that place which A case in point: Jan Oxenberg'slat- tations and stifling proscriptions of
bian marriage, San Francisco ). isn't a monolithic lesbian and gay com- what those images said. "The lrecentl enablesand promotes varied and ever-
... "A coming-of-age story about val. There wasn't much time; films had est feature, THANKY0U
ANDGOODNIGHT.urban family life. In the context of the
Messages of political resistance are munity. rise of racism and fascism in Europe changing perspectives, a place where
two young girls" . "A comedy to be booked ASAP;it was a first-time Oxenberg's name is synonymous with FESTIVAL
(which out of some 400 films,
relegated to the other-within-the- -Pratibha Parmari one discoversnew ways of seeing,fron-
has been unprecedented," she con- about three lesbians who share a festival and the community wouldn't
tiers of difference .... -bell hooks1 the lesbian-feminist wave of film- programmed a total of four films by
other-lesbians and gaysof colour and cluded, "We must have dialogue house" ... "A houseful of bad girls stand for anything ambiguous or making in the '70s: her films A COMEDY out lesbians), this to me was a very
people with illnesses and disabilities. Lately, festivals have begun to across communities."
enjoy lounging in lingerie" ... These weird. We quickly came up with three IN Six UNNATURAL
ACTS
and HOMEMOVIE lesbian film. I recognized Oxenberg as
One is reminded of supermarkets and have panel discussions on race and It's time we started questioning
are excerpts from festival cataloguesof categories, one for each night: goofy- were coming-out primers for a gener- a dyke; I identified deeply with her
department stores. representation. While it would per- what we mean by terms like "lesbian
We must refashion a world where dif-
the past two years. A plethora of girl (Barbies, bras, bathrooms); cul- ation of lesbians, including myself. need for cultural tradition and conti-
An emphasis on new work (admit- haps be even more pragmatic to also ferences are openly acknowledged, film," and whether the definition has
tongue-in-cheek or simply sweet-and- tural difference (lesbians of colour); Oxenberg's work was serious fun; she nuity, which lesbian communities do
tedly, often a condition of public fund- have programmers who are people of layer by layer, side by side... become a little too self-contained. In
-Marlon Riggss girl ish lesbian work has emerged, and smash-the state (documentaries). was one of the first lesbian filmmakers not always provide.
ing) deprives communities of their his- colour (with very few exceptions, most the relation between lesbian spectator
which now dominates festival pro- Later, I wondered why I hadn't asked to synthesize contemporary lesbian In this year's frantic search for a
tories. Segregation by sex or by race of the festivals are programmed by
The current moral panic inspired grams. Politically explicit work, once some basic questions: what did the lesbian opening feature, THANKY0U
individual white curators), these pan- AND
separates audiences out and places
by AIDS, the demise of the illusion of foregrounded, now occupies a less community want, or need? What GOODNIGHT
has been generally over-
the onus of anti-racist discourse onto els have been rare sites of open and
the shoulders of people of colour. It radical political discussion at the fes-
the nuclear family, and shifting polit-
ical and economic conditions around
prominent space.Domestic melodrama
and comedy are having a comeback,
• were the gaps in lesbian discourse
in that particular place? What were
looked by the lesbian and gay festival
circuit: it doesn't say the "L"-word, it's
means we don't get to learn from one tivals.
the world, have cost lesbian and gay somewhat reminiscent of postwar cul- the obsessions? What issues had too documentary, it's too challenging.
another or to have debates that move At the Amsterdam festival, a panel
communities dearly, making us tar- ture during the McCarthy era. While recently affected local lesbians? what At the same time, Oxenberg is playing
beyond essentialist definitions. As fun entitled "Blackon Black"created a use-
gets for a capitalist, heterosexual the trend towards defiant sexual was the media saying or not saying hard to get with the queer festivals;
and innocuous as it all appears, an ful forum for exchangeamongst Dutch
moral agenda. Overall, we seem to be explicitness is refreshing, many of about them? What would be contro- her commercial distributor
Blacks4and Black filmmakers present doesn't
implicitly apolitical and complacent
in a position not of imagining what these new lesbian sex narratives versial, or pertinent? What would be return calls and Oxenberg, when I
trend begins to emerge, to which, it at the festival, like Marlon Riggsand
could be, but rather of merely hold- remain locked within a certain fixed
" fun? How did race and class figure talked with her, was vague about how
would seem, emerging filmmakers Pratihba Parmar. Marlon critiqued the
ing onto what has been. Communities iconography. As romantic in their own in that community's interactions and to get a hold of press material. Having
respond. construct of Black performer/(most-
in crisis tend to turn inward and to way as pulp novels in '50s, they speak self-definitions7 In short, as two languished in moneyless lesbian back-
ly) white audience. Tm asked to serve
rely upon identity politics as a way to a voice of resistance in muffled, dis- dykes with a long history of commu- waters since the '70s, Oxenberg is
It is important that we are not con- your needs, not my own," he said, and
maintain a visible face in the world. guised tones. nity activism and feminist/cross-cul- clearly going for big time. And who
strained and contained by fixed iden- demanded action on the part of white
tity tags ... that we do not get caught There is a sense of yearning for safe Informal discussions I've had with tural organizing, I wondered why we can blame her? Still, I find myself
audiences, saying, "You have to inter-
with audience members at various fes- had abandoned some of our most wanting more of a global view, like

t. ~,
\1 ~,~
14 FALL 1991 FUSE ~--Jp
41t
FUSE FALL 1991 15
 Oxenberg's, at the queer festivals, and presently concentrated on govern- counterpointing these programs. In
more out lesbian stuff (I'll even settle ment support for lesbian and gay cul- "creating a construct of self-victim- audiences are prepared to accept, or Many progressive people are
general, the notion of guest curators
for Barbie) at the big festivals. tural projects .... Non-commercial ization." understand. counting their losses these days-
I Meanwhile, gay narratives have
lesbian and gay media organizations
does seem to breathe new life into the
Notions of collective organizing friends lost to cancer or to Al DS:Black
I become tres chic. News reports about
and institutions are extremely fragile
financially and especially vulnerable to
tired old notion of one person's tastes
and cultural biases setting the agenda
and equality, so integral to feminist The effect of taking a risk, being pun- youth lost to police violence; programs
the recent SUNDANCE
FILMFESTIVAL
(an and lesbian movements, have not ished for taking a risk, but having the
lost to cutbacks; feminist and lesbian \~
I political forces.... Since these groups

~
for an entire festival. And finally, the risk itself unacknowledged, is chilling.
I American jumping-off point for inde- provide the infrastructure that sup-
Amsterdam festival, whose lesbian pro-
fared well in the festival milieu. In too
It makes it nearly impossible for us to institutions lost to the recession, the
pendants seeking commerical success) ports lesbian media production, very many cases, the (understandable) Mulroney government, and the GST
grammer, Annette Forster, prioritized evaluate the risks we are taking,
II crowed about the plethora of exciting
few lesbian artists have been able to desire for legitimation has led to an decide for ourselves whether the con- (Librairie l'Essentielle, Montreal;
I work consistently in this vein, which debate through the organizing of the- Endnotes
gay (read gay male) films. The popu- unfortunate wholesale acceptance of sequences make the risk worthwhile DIVERSITY
MAGAZINE,
1j accounts for the ever-changing roster oretical spaces-a festival cafe, where
Vancouver; INSIGHT l. For the record, only one of the
mainstream strategies. (Most main- for us. It may have the effect of mak-
larity of Gus Van Sam'sMYOWNPRIVATE WOMEN'SFILM AND VIDEO FESTIVAL, transgressive guests was male.
of producers in the various festival after-screening discussions could be ing us unwilling to risk. -Judith 2. On Our Backs Magazine, San
IDAHOhas created a kind of space for stream film festivals do not pay fees, Edmonton). The flourishing of a les-
11 programs. Many are young artists, held; and an exciting (though poorly Francisco, Fall 1988.
McDaniel 10
gritty homo films (which may be an often students, who make one or two except to stars.) Lesbian and gay film bian and gay media culture at this time 3. Protibha Parmar, "That

I accidental space created by an anti-

woman culture). So, guess what?
short films or videos before taking
stock of their options and moving on
translated) festival catalogue, which
included essays by such international
festival organizers must begin to real-
ize the obvious: that festivals would
Before I left Amsterdam, I heard
is ironic, but timely (and uneven: les-
bian films still languish for lack of
Moment of Emergence."
Amsterdam
In
Lesbian and Gay
Film Festival Catalogue, 1991 .
to a more viable career .... folk as Jewelle Gomez,Nick Deocampo, a scary story. An 18-year-old British
Straight people are producing films not exist without the films, produced 4. "Black" is a term used in
funds or distribution). There's a fine
-Martha Gevers Karin Spaink,Jackie Goldsby, and many lesbian, Jennifer Saunders, had just European countries to refer to
with lesbian or gay content. Made for its inadequate representation of via the filmmakers' generally unpaid line between culture and industry, and
others. all people of colour.
been sentenced to six years in prison
without connection or commitment people of colour, the conference was labour. To expect that filmmakers con- as lesbian and gay audiences become 5. From the panel "Black on
It's important also to name Hopefully, changes will occur in for having consenting sex with her two Black" at the Amsterdam
to lesbian and gay culture or commu- an ambitious attempt to provide a the- tinue to donate labour and films at a market that can be tapped, festivals
instances where festivals have man- the relation between programmers and 17-year-old girlfriends. Since there are Lesbian and Gay Film Festival.
nity, these films appropriate an oretica I context for the festival. In the festival level is benevolent will be facing difficult 6. Jan Zita Grover. In Tessa Boffin
aged to introduce innovative struc- producers as well ... Ah, recognition! questions
no laws against lesbian sex in Britain and Jean Fraser, eds., Stolen
already very limited space. As both 1989, Hallwalls, the Buffalo, NY media exploitation. A conference solely for around corporate sponsorship and
tures or programs. In 1989,a one-time . Ah, hotel rooms! ... The plea- (Queen Victoria said they didn't exist), Glances (London, England:
these and Oxenberg·s film indicate, centre, organized a program of videos lesbian and gay video/filmmakers has mainstream and heterosexual co-opta- Pandora, 1991 ).
only event, How Do I LOOK?,
was orga- sures of an out-of-town gig are rare Saunders was charged with "indecent
and presentations called THEMEDIATED yet to occur, but, as our numbers 7. bell hooks. Yearning. (Toronto:
lesbian or gay content need not be the tion. However, if lesbian and gay film
nized by a New York group that called for many lesbian filmmakers, seduc- assault," based on a 17thcentury law. Between the Lines Press,
sole criteria for programming films. BODY,
which included lesbian, gay, fem- expand, such an event could do much culture can stay connected to its polit- 1990).
itself Bad Object Choices.A quirky and tive for all. Plane fares, accommoda- Saunders is a cross-dresser, and so,
The contradictions create big inist and other works in multi-dimen- to identify and organize around, com- ical roots, if it can function both as a
8. Martha Geever, "The Big
fascinating week-long festival of films tions, and the occasional per diem are the prosecution claimed that Saunders Picture: The Making of Lesbian
cracks through which lesbian narra- sional look at the body in the context mon issues. Connected to this is the pleasurable and as a radicalizing force,
and videos from the past decade generally seen by festival organizers Media." In Amsterdam Lesbian
had dressed as a boy in order to
tives can fall and disappear. They end of sexuality, disease, and other issues. fact that most lesbian/gay festivals are its effects will be felt in other areas. and Gay Film Festival
(shown at the Collective for a Living as reward rather than as standardized seduce and deceive her girl friends, Catalogue, l 991 .
up inhibiting the development of les- Vancouver's INVISIBLE
COLOURS,
the organized by volunteers, making fee- It is a profound feeling to experience
Cinema) formed the backdrop for a payment. After the eight naughty film- basing the charges on the archaic law 9. Bad Object Choices, ed. How
bian work. It's up to the lesbian and "International Women of Colour and for-service a vexing concept. invisibility; it is nothing less than rev- Do I Loak? (Seattle: Bay Press,
three-day conference where lesbian makers walked out on the mayor's din- which stated that "one may not dress
Third World Women Film/Video In a time of increased media and 1991).
gay festivals to provide a home for olutionary to take one's body and
and gay media theorists and activists ner in Amsterdam, the material con- as the opposite sex for the purposes of l 0. Judith McDaniel, "Taking
these many different sides of the les- Festival," (also in 1989) provided a state censorship and/or discrimina- one's history back. And, as the Jennifer Risks: Becoming a Writer as a
delivered papers which were subse- ditions of festivals and filmmakers sexual deceit." 11 British and Dutch
breathtaking model of programming tion, lesbian/gay filmmakers are an Lesbian." In Betsy Worland,
bian story, without abandoning a cer- Saunders case indicates, visibility can
quently discussed (and in some cases were hotly debated by all. Comparing women were busy discussingand orga- ed., Inversions. (Vancouver:
tain basic commitment to autonomous and conferencing that was unprece- increasingly important resource for also be dangerous. Lesbian and gay
completely taken apart) by a lively Press Gang, 1991).
notes, filmmakers realized some were nizing around this case, which pro-
lesbian/gay cultural space. dented, bringing together film and their communities. What are the ways images are tricky business.
11 . Quoted from courtroom docu-
queer audience. (A book with the same being paid fees and others not (this vides a portent of worse things to ments; cited in Mindy Ran, "No
videomakers of colour from around in which producers of images within
name, documenting the conference, was later rectified by festival orga- Steps Forward, One Millenium
come via the new political order of
Right-wing demands for elimination the world. It created an extremely rich an embattled community can be sup- Marusia Bociurkiw is a writer, Back," City Life Magazine,
was recently published by Bay Press.9) nizers). Unequal treatment and star- the British- and German-dominated Amsterdam, December 1991.
of public arts funding in the U.S. are exchange of ideas and experiences ported and even nurtured? The pun- video/filmmaker, and self-
Though at times a little academically dom are as common at queer festivals European Economic Community. Far 12. Minnie Bruce Pratt. "The
that no women's festival had yet man- ishments for being outspoken, femi- diagnosed film festival junkie
Friends of My Secret Self" In
de trop, the event was memorable for as they are in the mainstream. One right politicians and fascist and neo- living in Montreal and Toronto.
aged to provide. (Ir may well be time nist, and blatantly her Rebellion: Essays 1980-
lesbian can be
its brash mixing of academics and programmer I talked to said that it's Nazi groups are gaining prominence 1991 (Ithaca, NY: Firebrand,
for a lesbian and gays of colour festi- immense, within the straight film- 1991).
practitioners and the way it prioritized ridiculous for filmmakers to expect to in Europe. Lesbian visibility can work
Ideas and input from Cecilia
val of similar proportions.) Toronto's industry and even within the alterna-

¥
Dougherty, Protibho Parmar,
discussion. Everyone wanted to talk- be paid equally for their work. "If I both ways. Jennifer Saunders is the
RACE
TO THESCREEN
festival was anoth- tive art-world milieu. They are invis- Suzanne Downes, and Sandra
passionately. have to pay a fortune for a Derek first woman in British judicial history
er important model, which examined ible, unspoken punishments-reviews Hoar ore gratefully acknowl-
The next year, the SANFRANCISCO Jarman film, then of course I'm going to be jailed for consenting lesbian sex. edged.
race and representation by inviting not written, grants not received,
LESBIAN ANDGAYFILMFESTIVAL organized to try and get independent videos for
filmmakers. critics, and activists to money not gotten, positions never
a conference in conjunction with its free." A VILLAGE
VOICEcritic declared . And though we have found each
curate a program of films and then offered. They have profound conse-
10-day screening program entitled that the outspoken filmmakers had other again as lesbians, the divisions
deliver a paper elaborating upon or quences, and can result in more alle- of privilege are still painful between
"Rules of Attraction." Though criticized only themselves to blame; they were
gorical and oblique work than lesbian us. - Minnie Bruce Pratt"

FUSE FALL 1991 17

 Such simplified production of choices As Malcolm X stated, a good Black man Consciousness becomes a commitment for ;~~
:i~
orators and ideologues like Steve Biko, who ~
I
I
leave us with no tools by which to better
understand our acquiescence or defiance.
It leaves one with feelings of immense hos-
tility at either, or both, Clarence Thomas
is a dead Black man. George Bush's nomi-
nation of Clarence Thomas is about a par-
ticular death: it is about an alive man who
spoke about Black Consciousness as rally- ~-
ing around the cause of our skin colour,
_
has killed his own history-his history of that Blackness be exercised as a political ~I~;.,_
and Anita Hill. And indeed what a won- Blackness. But like all killings and death, identification not in opposition to white-
derful task to accomplish than to constantly none can be resurrected except as ness but as a political commitment to our-
II
hold Blackpeople hostage to their own real-
ities. Let us not be tom by divide and con-
Christianity maintains, only that of the
Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ. But Clarence
selves. But indeed here is a man who clear- ....~
··~..
l ly demonstrates to the agents of white dom- •'
Ii
BY ROHNAMAART
quer politics but let us re-assess on our own
terms the processes by and through which
Thomas proved otherwise. He resurrected
his Blackness with images and symbols
ination that they have succeeded in deter-
mining the extent of his being-his • 1
.
";
,
1i, the Clarence Thomases and the Anita Hills very much like Christianity when con- Blackness. Let me continue to say, indeed,
i• exist in this society. fronted with the true reality of Black men, this is not only about Judge Clarence ,..__
:· !
If indeed we consider the historical pro-
11 whom he does not identity with since he Thomas, but about the processes by and . '-~
cesses which have juxtaposed a "good" has never stood trial under white male dom-

-
through which white domination has pro- . ·."-
Black against a "bad" Black, we know that ination yet whom he publicly condemned ceeded to determine the false conscious- .-:•·
this stems out of a relationship which Black as they, not he, who live under this reality ness of the recipients of their racism. As ':;.,i
people had to develop with their slave own- of judgement by the law. Thomas then pro- recipients of white racism we constantly
··11ii
ers. It is thus one of submission and sub- ceeded by casting himself as a recipient of have to cast our existence at the backdrop
ordination; one of survivor and victim; one lynching, of a systemic act of racism gone of the white experience. We are chosen, our
e interpret reality based on the histories of acquiescence or acceptance; his- of House-Negro,working within the house-

W
by. He resurrected the burning cross, res- plights are highlighted, and our positions
known-the availability and cog- tories which reflect upon the true nature hold, and one of Field-Negro, working out- urrected images of suffering and pain, and within white-dominated structures are
nizance of the familiar-and pro- of their processed beings; histories which side in the cotton fields; it is one out of like true Christians whose purpose it is to alluded to if and only when we identify our-
ceed with interpretations which have existed as stumbling blocks in their which a set of social relations was created convince sinful individuals of a past, where selves as individuals emerging out of this
enable us to locate our respective respective paths to attaining the fulfilment through coercion to reflect upon the chastis- Jesus Christ was persecuted and we have racism, which through its institutionalized,
realities within a larger continuum of the of their beings. The continuum of (the real- ing qualities that the master and the whip to live by the goodness of his sacrament, structural, and systemic nature lies about
Real. Seeking meaningful interpretations ity of) Black people who live and exercise accomplished; it is also about a set of social Thomas identified the past-a reality he
of our realities is an imperative seldom exer- Clarence Thomas the fullness of their being within white- relations which was maintained through did not himself live under, but a reality that
who and what we are. The lies of white
cised. Of crucial significance to our under- domination are no less painful than the
dominated United States is one of sur- verbal celebrations of oral, African power, lives itself out in similar ways everyday.
i\ standing of the Real, is the knowledge that
perceptions are socially, politically, and
as Supreme Court vival-either through assimilation or revolt. about individuals who refused to genuflect These white men, upon listening to the
truth. For in truth we have learnt that our
histories have been shackled and with
The history of the Black struggle in the U.S.

i>
to whips, or to seek solace in houses which broadcast of George Bush, the most impor-

-
racially constructed, and often exist as a .Judge of the U.S.A. has been one of revolt. It was pursued and provided limited comfort, and indeed, a set tant white male god who really counts,
whips and chains that have kept our iden-
consequence of the exclusion of the buried tities in place, we emerged as defiant beings,
continues to be pursued by adherents of of social relations which continues to deter- made a decision to reflect upon the true
historical. Thus what we perceive or are opposing all the manifestations of racism.
I
Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Rosa mine the extent of defiance of Black peo- nature of their understanding of this very
1. able to perceive is channelled within exist- ple in the United States; the historical pro- Parks, Angela Davis, Fannie Lou Hamer, ple in the United States today. Such a con- Christian crucifixion of a Black man, who
The lies linger like rotten fruits-picked to
1. ing construction paths, where Truth exists cess of defiance of white domination; the die. If indeed there is a death to mourn, it is
and many other African-Americanmen and text thus provides us with a larger basis GeorgeBush has cast as an abiding,account-
as a consequence of a constructed reality historical relationship between the colo- about the death of a Black man's identity
women who revolted in known and from which to draw our conclusions and
11 and perception, a by-product of the racially-
configurated society within which we live
nizer and the colonized; and the historical
perseverance of pursuing a Black identity
unknown ways against U.S. white domi-
nation. Unfortunately, for many of the
create different ways by which to assess
information when it is about Black people
able-to-white-domination Black angel.
Christianized to their fullest potential, these
white men, significantly with not a Semite
constructed out of pain and suffering,where
unable to make meaning of the racism so
deeply inflicted, he emerged as a man about
the Real. This exclusion of the historical within a society which actively works Black men and women with whom I spoke,
's sets an agenda, a very different one indeed,
for a larger discussion of what takes place
towards the destruction of Black people.
The media-controlled, squared-eyed,
the debates seem to have centred around
who have acquiesced. It may explain why
Clarence Thomas was nominated! If we
on the bench, favourably judged the colo-
nized Hemite. Thomas then ascended into
to heal his pain by becoming the best can-
didate for white colonization. Unto the gods
[' when Black people are judged, and by televised version of the continuum of the
these two issues:
1. Believing Anita Hill or Clarence
consider what white domination identifies
as "good" certainly no Black man would
and upon the throne of the Supreme Court,
sitting at the (politically) "right" hand of
whom he suffered under, and under whom
whom. In order for any of us to understand Real as orchestrated by the representatives his colonized being suffered daily, in order
Thomas. be a candidate! What the nomination of the father (George Bush) where among the
what exactly took place not only on our of white America has treated both Clarence for him to survive, the only possible solu-
2. Approving of Clarence Thomas as a Clarence Thomas by George Bush suggests, white clouds he shall shine like a treasured,
television screens but within the larger Thomas and Anita Hill with utmost disre- tion for Clarence Thomas was to identify
Black man who was a candidate for the is that only when the Black identity colonized, Black jewel.
American society (of which, as Black peo- spect. Thomas and Hill have been relegat- with his colonizers-to identify and inter-
Supreme Court, where he will historically emerges at the backdrop of the white expe- Choosing Clarence Thomas as a Black
ple, we know the need for these linkages ed to positions held by pawns, where nalize the centuries of racism; to identify
be a Second, after the retirement of rience, only in this capacity may it even be man to grace the halls of the Supreme Court
and the subsequent development of our col- through systematic moves they would be and emerge as a startling example of a
Thurgood Marshall and yet again the only considered! Hence the choice of a Black is about choosing a Black, christianized
lective identity, even though we may live in eliminated. They have been identified in House-Negro who became a White-House-
Blackrepresentation on the Supreme Court, man who, although a recipient, would per- man who has denounced a tradition of
Canada), we need to proceed by forging an terms which do not address the complexi- Negro. A lesson has been learnt: one of suc-
and therefore to denounce Anita Hill for petuate and reproduce the ideologies Blackness. Here is a man who genuflects
agenda for the discussion about the histor- ties of racism as a consequence of colo- cess and one of failure. If we as Black peo-
her untimely public accusation of Clarence through which white domination is main- to the causes of the white man. Here is a
ical-the historical presence of Black peo- nization. They have been identified without ple intend to succeed we then have to fail
Thomas as a sexual harasser. tained! man, unlike the purpose by which Black mmurn ONPAG[ 21

18 FALL 1991 FUSE

FUSE FALL 1991 19

••• • • " .. '1 ··:-,~..,

,
', -
... •t.. , , .,
,• ,' •' •.'•
 INCITEFUL INSIGHTS
which their peoples "may henceforth and
to all eternity be the props of each other." 1
The potential success of their union is
Subscribe to ngues.
anity?
revealed by the growth of three roses at g an M.A.
I the feet of the continents/women who INDIVIDUALS me at

I stand on otherwise barren ground.

Blake seemingly disavows the colour
D $16 One-year 5 issues (14.95 +1.05 GST) outside Canada $18
D $26 Two-year 10 issues (24.30 +1.70 GST) outside Canada $30
1'' of one's skin as a determinate of one's a five
I► humanity. A prolific poet as well as
engraver, Blake's poetry equally expresses INSTITUTIONS
Negroesof
erica,
ii,IIIU a concern for the lack of equality between D $24 One-year 5 issues (22.43+1.57 GST) outside Canada $27 . I, 206.
." Songsof

,i;.
,11
"the races." The black youth whom Blake
ventriloquizes in "The Little Black Boy"
D $37 Two-year 10 issues (34.58 +2.42 GST) outside Canada $46
declares
11
!
And these black bodies and this sun- NAME_
i, burnt face,
Is but a cloud, and like a shady grove.2 ADDRESS ___________ _

1/~ And thus I say to little English boy. CITY ____________ _

When I from black and he from white
PROVINCE CODE __ _
cloud free,
And round the tent of God like lambs D My cheque is enclosed D Bill me later Our GST # - R123969768
we joy,-3 1 ney express me1r sympamy ror mem mis new1y rormeu mpan:ne as JUnca snu
By employing the metaphor of clouds,
Blake attributes superficiality and ephem-
largely through the construction of long-
suffering female characters. Only by mak-
bears the broken manacle of slavery while U~UtNUUN~tt\11EN
Europe continues to wear pearls. Unlike
of equality, or at least, of anti-racism. erality to skin colour and implies that ing reference to women can Blake and Blake's illustration, the Benetton adver- rROM
PAGf
19
This, however, is only half the suggestion, there is something deeper and common to Stedman describe the slaves' "powerless- tisement provides the viewer with no
WHAT IS IT the half that makes an attractive promise.
The image struck me when I recog-
us all which makes us human. What
makes us human, for Blake, is our soul.
ness," and so they participate in the femi-
nization of other races. It may well be that
prior context to the encounter being por-
trayed. The Benetton ad is only concerned
to be Black. If failing means having to main-
tain our dignities and pursue our beings
nized its resonance with an image I had What Blake, Stedman, and Benetton outside of these constructions, let failure
this was an acceptable way to describe the with the here and now, the immediate

I THAT UNITES seen before. It echoes an etching by

William Blake (1757-1827) which also pro-
cannot escape is their reliance upon a
Euro-centric teleology. The "humanness"
relations between races for the abolition-
ists: equal, but somehow subordinate.
moment of contact.
There is no guilt or anxiety, no sign of
be our motto and succession be our death.
For the politics of denouncement, of fail-
I, fesses to be egalitarian, which promises a which Blake and Stedman seek to reveal ure, of denial, of a system that requires us
complicity for the viewer of European
1: THE COLOURSOF pure democratic speech act, and which
demands the cessation of slavery.
in the "Negro" is defined in terms of qual-
ities which the white man is already said BUT
OfMYSOUL
/5 WHIT£
ancestry. We can comfortably enter the
encounter with the cultural Other because
to exist as appendages of the system of
white domination, can be of no use if it
Blake's Europe Supported by Africa to possess. The purity of the soul is means a constant death of all of who we
I, they are not really very different from our-
BENNEI ION? and America is one of a series of etchings
consigned to Blake as illustrations to
defined by its whiteness:
My mother bore me in the southern wild,
selves. Like the English boy in heaven, we
can seen our own image in the similarly
are. Denouncement of an ancestral pride
that rings with rebellion and shines with a
accompany Captain J.G. Stedman's A resistance of survival-only through true
And I am black, but O! my soul is attired and "coloured" people.
by Ion Roderick Narrative, of a five Years' expedition, recognition of these histories can we move
white. Even if the Benetton ad were ironic in
against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam forward towards fighting the colonizer, and
White as an angel is the English child: intention it would be inappropriate. To
on the Wild Coast of South America; before we denounce ourselves, denounce
But I am black as if bereav'd of light.• describe the mural as ironic suggests the
WHILE WALKING UP A MAIN STREET from the years 1772 to 1777. Stedman was the system which has taught us to
possibility of still enjoying a common
by my home I happened to notice a bill- This dubious relationship between the denounce who exactly we are. -Oct. 20, '91
a mercenary in Guyana and an unlikely subject position from which one can
board for Benetton clothing which had white and black child is only to be
opponent of the slave trade. In Guyana to "read" the ad. Not only does the ad still
just been posted. Typically it was an resolved in heaven which the black boy Razena Maart works in the areas of Black
aid French attempts to put down the fre- speak to a universal subject but it privi-
"inter-racial" advertisement. It portrayed anticipates as: Consciousness, Psychoanalysis, Feminist
quent slave revolts, he could do little leges a subject who can occupy the posi-
three young women, one black, one white, more than deplore his own circumstances. And then I'll stand and stroke his silver Theory and Violence Against Women. She
tion of the benevolent observer. As a paro-
and one Asian. They faced me straight on hair, teaches "Racism and Feminism" (a feminist
Blake's plate suggests a collective dy it can only make reference to a white,
and cheekily stuck out their tongues. The And be like him, and he will then love theory course)in Women's Studiesand "Socio-
endeavour between the three continents. middle class, male vision of equality.
ad suggested that under the pigmentation me.5 cultural and Political Issues in International
They stand before the viewer naked and If Blake chooses a white soul to sym-
of their skin they all had pink tongues; Literature" in Continuing Education, both at
given to his gaze, as if they were a chorus The conclusion with which one is left bolize the commonality of all humanity
that they all spoke with the same tongue; joined in song. The song they sing is one the Universityof Ottawa. She has publisheda
is that the white child must see his own then Benetton makes the same suggestion
that they all spoke the universal language poetry-and-essay collection Talk About It!
of harmony between the continents in image in the black child before he may with its pink tongues. We should ask our-
(Williams-Wallace, 1991 ).
selves what the three contemporary fig-

20 FALL 1991 FUSE

FUSE FALL 1991 21
 BUSINESS
No Postage
REPLY CARD
Stamp Necessary if
Books A11ailable
ongues.
Mailed
Postage
in Canada
will be paid by:
through FUSE manity?

g on M.A.
I me at

I PIECE OF MY HEART/ Silvera $17 .95

CREATION FIRE/ Espinet $17.95
i•
FUSE
YEARNING / hooks $14.95 ifa five
I SULTANS OF SLEAZE/ Nelson $15.95 Negroes of
erica;
UNSETTLING RELATIONS / Bannerji $13.95
II, SOME IMAGINING WOMEN / Allen $9.95 (audio tape)
. I, 206.
." Songs of
,111111111 MAGAZINE
II I
:, MAIN FLOOR Name

)
183 BATHURST STREET Address

TORONTO, ONTARIO
CANADA. MST 929
I~ My cheque for ____ is enclosed.

n.._, }VJJ
1 hey express their sympathy tor them this newly formed tripartite as Africa still
By employing the metaphor of clouds, largely through the construction of long- bears the broken manacle of slavery while OfDENOUNCEMEN
Blake attributes superficiality and ephem- suffering female characters. Only by mak- Europe continues to wear pearls. Unlike
of equality, or at least, of anti-racism. erality to skin colour and implies that ing reference to women can Blake and Blake's illustration, the Benetton adver- fROM
PAH19
This, however, is only half the suggestion, there is something deeper and common to Stedman describe the slaves' "powerless- tisement provides the viewer with no
to be Black. If failing means having to main-
WHAT IS IT the half that makes an attractive promise.
The image struck me when I recog-
us all which makes us human. What
makes us human, for Blake, is our soul.
ness," and so they participate in the femi-
nization of other races. It may well be that
prior context to the encounter being por-
trayed. The Benetton ad is only concerned
tain our dignities and pursue our beings
outside of these constructions, let failure
r nized its resonance with an image I had What Blake, Stedman, and Benetton this was an acceptable way to describe the with the here and now, the immediate
be our motto and succession be our death.
ii THAT UNITES seen before. It echoes an etching by
William Blake (1757-1827)which also pro-
cannot escape is their reliance upon a
Euro-centric teleology. The "humanness"
relations between races for the abolition-
ists: equal, but somehow subordinate.
moment of contact.
There is no guilt or anxiety, no sign of
For the politics of denouncement, of fail-
ure, of denial, of a system that requires us
L fesses to be egalitarian, which promises a which Blake and Stedman seek to reveal complicity for the viewer of European
to exist as appendages of the system of
THE COLOURSOF pure democratic speech act, and which
demands the cessation of slavery.
in the "Negro" is defined in terms of qual-
ities which the white man is already said BUT
0/ MY50UL
/5 WHITE
ancestry. We can comfortably enter the
encounter with the cultural Other because
white domination, can be of no use if it
means a constant death of all of who we
Blake's Europe Supported by Africa to possess. The purity of the soul is they are not really very different from our-
L are. Denouncement of an ancestral pride
' BENNEI ION? and America is one of a series of etchings defined by its whiteness: selves. Like the English boy in heaven, we

I'
that rings with rebellion and shines with a
consigned to Blake as illustrations to My mother bore me in the southern wild, can seen our own image in the similarly
resistance of survival-only through true
accompany Captain J.C. Stedman's A And I am black, but O! my soul is attired and "coloured" people.
recognition of these histories can we move
I by Ion Roderick Narrative, of a five Years' expedition, white. Even if the Benetton ad were ironic in
forward towards fighting the colonizer, and
against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam White as an angel is the English child: intention it would be inappropriate. To
before we denounce ourselves, denounce
on the Wild Coast of South America; But I am black as if bereav'd of light.4 describe the mural as ironic suggests the
the system which has taught us to
WHILE WALKING UP A MAIN STREET from the years 1772 to 1777. Stedman was possibility of still enjoying a common
This dubious relationship between the denounce who exactly we are. -Oct. 20, '91
by my home I happened to notice a bill- a mercenary in Guyana and an unlikely subject position from which one can
white and black child is only to be
board for Benetton clothing which had opponent of the slave trade. In Guyana to "read" the ad. Not only does the ad still
resolved in heaven which the black boy Rozena Maart works in the areas of Block
just been posted. Typically it was an aid French attempts to put down the fre- speak to a universal subject but it privi-
anticipates as: Consciousness, Psychoanalysis, Feminist
"inter-racial" advertisement. It portrayed quent slave revolts, he could do little leges a subject who can occupy the posi-
Theory and Violence Against Women. She
three young women, one black, one white, more than deplore his own circumstances. And then I'll stand and stroke his silver tion of the benevolent observer. As a paro-
teaches "Racism and Feminism" (a feminist
and one Asian. They faced me straight on Blake's plate suggests a collective hair, dy it can only make reference to a white,
theory course) in Women's Studies and "Socio-
and cheekily stuck out their tongues. The endeavour between the three continents. And be like him, and he will then love middle class, male vision of equality.
cultural and Political Issues in International
ad suggested that under the pigmentation They stand before the viewer naked and me.5 If Blake chooses a white soul to sym-
Literature" in Continuing Education, both at
of their skin they all had pink tongues; given to his gaze, as if they were a chorus The conclusion with which one is left bolize the commonality of all humanity
the University of Ottawa. She hos published a
that they all spoke with the same tongue; joined in song. The song they sing is one is that the white child must see his own then Benetton makes the same suggestion
poetry-and-essay collection Talk About It!
that they all spoke the universal language of harmony between the continents in image in the black child before he may with its pink tongues. We should ask our-
(Williams-Wallace, 1991).
selves what the three contemporary fig-

20 FALL 1991 FUSE

FUSE FALL 1991 21
 BUSINESS REPLY CARD
No Postage Stamp Necessary if love him as a fellow human being. This In toto, the three continents do not • ures tell us when they speak in tongues.
Mailed in Canada can only be done by the passage of both stand as a choir, but rather, Europe's voice What is the yardstick of their humanity?
white and black clouds so as to reveal predominates. Africa and America serve
Postage will be paid by: Ion Roderick is currently completing on M.A.
white souls! as the chorus offering vocal support to and
Likewise, Blake's work Visions of the in Sociology/Anthropologyprogramme at
singing through Europe.
Carleton University in Ottawa.
I Daughters of Albion (1793) follows a simi-
lar tack. Written at about the same time
The advertisements of Benetton are
intended to appeal to a cosmopolitan audi- ENDNOTES

• FUSE that Blake was illustrating Stedman's A ence. As with Blake's, Benetton's cos- I. Captain J.G. Stedman. A Narrative, of a five
Years' expedition, against the Revolted Negroes of
I

-
Narrative, it is the story of the failed love mopolitanism is largely Euro-centric. Surinam, on the Wild Coast of South America;
of Oothoon, a female slave, and the free- Both Blake's etchings and the Benetton from the years 1772 LO 1777. II 796). Vol. I, 206.
ii~ man Theotormon. Oothoon, though a ads with which we have come to be so 2. William Blake. "The Little Black Boy." Songs of
MAGAZINE Innocence. II 789). lines 15-16.
slave and clearly intended to represent all familiar are typically ethnographic. They
'I•, MAIN FLOOR black slaves, is illustrated as a white promise a moment of contact with the
3. lines 22-24.
4. lines 1-4.
I 5. lines 27-28.
woman. Her whiteness grants her human- cultural Other that is always harmonious.
11, 183 BATHURST STREET 6. Visions. line 20, page 3.
ity and thus allows the reader to recognize In order for the peoples to be united there
TORONTO, ONTARIO
..,...,.,,
the crimes against it. Oothoon proclaims: must be a corresponding moment of uni-
15 CANADA. MST 929 "And I am white and pure to hover round versalization or homogenization. For
''
Theotormon's breast. 116 Stedman and Blake our unification comes
YPJICi .J?•W,' ....- [· il·I
1J ..... Despite the constant mutinies aboard through "our" common Creator and the
slave ships and slave revolts of which
Stedman's own narration attests, both he
"pure" souls he has endowed unto us.
Within Europe Supported the viewer is
THf
and Blake envision the slaves as victims. reminded of the history which precedes POUTICS
n\,., JVJ1 They express their sympathy for them this newly formed tripartite as Africa still
By employing the metaphor of clouds, largely through the construction of long- bears the broken manacle of slavery while OfDENOUNCEMEN
Blake attributes superficiality and ephem- suffering female characters. Only by mak- Europe continues to wear pearls. Unlike
of equality, or at least, of anti-racism. erality to skin colour and implies that ing reference to women can Blake and Blake's illustration, the Benetton adver- fROMPAGE 19
This, however, is only half the suggestion, there is something deeper and common to Stedman describe the slaves' "powerless- tisement provides the viewer with no
to be Black. If failing means having to main-

l! WHAT IS IT the half that makes an attractive promise.

The image struck me when I recog-
us all which makes us human. What
makes us human, for Blake, is our soul.
ness," and so they participate in the femi-
nization of other races. It may well be that
prior context to the encounter being por-
trayed. The Benetton ad is only concerned
tain our dignities and pursue our beings
outside of these constructions, let failure
nized its resonance with an image I had What Blake, Stedman, and Benetton this was an acceptable way to describe the with the here and now, the immediate
be our motto and succession be our death.
'
I THAT UNITES seen before. It echoes an etching by
William Blake (1757-1827) which also pro-
cannot escape is their reliance upon a
Euro-centric teleology. The "humanness"
relations between races for the abolition-
ists: equal, but somehow subordinate.
moment of contact.
There is no guilt or anxiety, no sign of
For the politics of denouncement, of fail-
ure, of denial, of a system that requires us
I I
fesses to be egalitarian, which promises a which Blake and Stedman seek to reveal complicity for the viewer of European
to exist as appendages of the system of
THE COLOURSOF pure democratic speech act, and which
demands the cessation of slavery.
in the "Negro" is defined in terms of qual-
ities which the white man is already said BUT
0/ MY50UL
/5 WHITE
ancestry. We can comfortably enter the
encounter with the cultural Other because
white domination, can be of no use if it
means a constant death of all of who we
Blake's Europe Supported by Africa to possess. The purity of the soul is they are not really very different from our-
are. Denouncement of an ancestral pride
1·
BENNEI ION? and America is one of a series of etchings defined by its whiteness: selves. Like the English boy in heaven, we
that rings with rebellion and shines with a
I consigned to Blake as illustrations to
accompany Captain J.C. Stedman's A
My mother bore me in the southern wild,
And I am black, but O! my soul is
can seen our own image in the similarly
attired and II coloured" people.
resistance of survival--0nly through true
recognition of these histories can we move
I by Ion Roderick Narrative, of a five Years' expedition, white. Even if the Benetton ad were ironic in
forward towards fighting the colonizer, and
' against the Revolted Negroes of Surinam White as an angel is the English child: intention it would be inappropriate. To
before we denounce ourselves, denounce
I on the Wild Coast of South America; But I am black as if bereav'd of light.4 describe the mural as ironic suggests the
the system which has taught us to
WHILE WALKING UP A MAIN STREET from the years 1772 to 1777. Stedman was possibility of still enjoying a common
This dubious relationship between the denounce who exactly we are. -Oct. 20, '91
by my home I happened to notice a bill- a mercenary in Guyana and an unlikely subject position from which one can
white and black child is only to be
board for Benetton clothing which had opponent of the slave trade. In Guyana to "read" the ad. Not only does the ad still
resolved in heaven which the black boy Rozeno Moort works in the areas of Block
just been posted. Typically it was an aid French attempts to put down the fre- speak to a universal subject but it privi-
anticipates as: Consciousness, Psychoanalysis, Feminist
"inter-racial" advertisement. It portrayed quent slave revolts, he could do little leges a subject who can occupy the posi-
Theory and Violence Against Women. She
three young women, one black, one white, more than deplore his own circumstances. And then I'll stand and stroke his silver tion of the benevolent observer. As a paro-
teaches "Racism and Feminism" (a feminist
and one Asian. They faced me straight on Blake's plate suggests a collective hair, dy it can only make reference to a white,
theory course) in Women's Studiesand "Socio-
and cheekily stuck out their tongues. The endeavour between the three continents. And be like him, and he will then love middle class, male vision of equality.
cultural and Political Issues in International
ad suggested that under the pigmentation They stand before the viewer naked and me.5 If Blake chooses a white soul to sym-
Literature" in Continuing Education, both at
of their skin they all had pink tongues; given to his gaze, as if they were a chorus The conclusion with which one is left bolize the commonality of all humanity
the Universityof Ottawa. She hos published a
that they all spoke with the same tongue; joined in song. The song they sing is one is that the white child must see his own then Benetton makes the same suggestion
poetry-and-essay collection Talk About It!
that they all spoke the universal language of harmony between the continents in image in the black child before he may with its pink tongues. We should ask our-
(Williams-Wallace, 1991).
selves what the three contemporary fig-

20 FALL 1991 FUSE

FUSE FALL 1991 21
 THREE P.M. ON A LEADEN AFTERNOON HEWERS OF WOO
on Vancouver Island. Fat raindrops are pelting down from a
sullen sky. A chilling mist is rolling in from the Pacific. I am
Canada's rapacious forest products industry ,~lent financially for corporations to
standing in the midst of a "clear-cut"-a vast expanse of scorched
hide its visible effects from an increasin of the environment with linguis-
earth. charred tree stumps and rubble strewn gullies in which
deforestation has been compared to
I pristine mountain streams once flowed. My hiking guidebook.
real reform. The corporate "P.R."
nguage with which to inocu-late a
rl which is out of date, tells me that I'm in an area of "old-growth"
forest which is "currently" embroiled in a controversy between
so vast as to constitute a dominant landfor at emerges is a strange new Orwellian Ian-
I environmentalists and the logging industry. It is clear who won. A
visible in satellite photographs.2 The f: • all "ForestSpeak." The federal government
image problem and has resorted to various rroach. At a recent Vancouver silvicultural
11' large plywood sign advises that the sea of destruction stretching
order to continue its agenda. It has tried to ry minister Frank Oberle advocated "rewrit-
I~
out in front of me is a Western Forest Products Ltd. "tree farm"
ence regarding the natural environment toward the corporate view-
'I·,I bulary" through a "public education campaign"
, and that the scorched ground has been "treated"-with chemical
herbicides-to "encourage the growth of young conifers." Judging
point through the skilful use of language. that might "have an emotional impact on the
11 One method is to invent a new language. Preferably, this lan- government and industry to "assure everyone

tt,e
by the surrounding stumps, most of the trees (hemlock, cedar
guage should have a limited vocabulary and employ superficially s of Canadian forest management practices."5 The
I SHOULDU ~
and some Sitka spruce) were hundreds of years old when cut or
"harvested" (as it is called in the industry). If this was indeed a
familiar terms to mean new things. Consequently, industry advertis- ·er glossary of some "ForestSpeak"terms cross-indexed
ers and public relations consultants expend a great deal of time and
"tree farm," who planted it in the first place hundreds of years
~AFT effort making sure that the language of the debate is completely
ago? Clearly the reality of the devastation in front of me did not
under control. As soon as a given dispute can be stated effectively in
corroborate the language used on the corporation's sign. Soon I "FORESTSPEAK"
the coded language of the corporation, it is ready for a public hear-
learn that such absurd dichotomies between physical reality and

0t{?~~:t
ing-the corporation being secure in the knowledge that even the "public education"
the corporate worldview have become a hallmark in the debate
more radical expressions of public opposition will be constrained by
over Canada's forests. "ecoterrorist"
the linguistic framework which it has imposed.
"tree-farm" or "fibre-farm"
THE FOREST... Canada's"mantle of green." To many of us, this con-
In our office, there is a team of experts rewriting our
The Carmtad·,jran. cept still invokes memories from schoolbooks of stalwart lumber-
jacks, dwarfed by the vastness of primeval wilderness. Perhaps we
vocabulary.
"over-mature timber"
"decadent forest"

imagine a trapper's cabin, amidst towering pines, or perhaps the sight -Frank Oberle (Federal Minister of Forests), Vancouver, "preservationist"
of a moose by a lake at sunset or the "drip-drip-drip" of sap into the November 1991.
'I buckets of a maple grove in late winter. No matter what particular
I image comes to mind, our concept of "forest" is clearly archetypical
i,

(, iC
and one that is deeply ingrained in the Canadian psyche. THE VOCABULARY OF
I
DESTRUCTION:
I' The forest has often been a defining factor in Canadian social "ForestSpeak"
log shortage
II and cultural history. To aboriginal peoples. it provided (and in many A typical example of this language distortion and invention is the for-
!, 1 cases, continues to provide) food and shelter as well as a context for est industry's use of the term "tree-farm licenses" (TFL's)for areas of park

complex cosmologies and aesthetics. It shaped the patterns of the virgin timber on crown (i.e., public) land over which they have been wilderness
1' ,. <:~lrb";'«»f'*~l- granted control. When an environmental or aboriginal group con-
I European colonization/subjugation process, aspects of which contin-
by Oliver Kellhammer anticipated regional
11 ue to this day. It was the forest which fuelled the fur trade and the tests the right of the corporation to denude a piece of landscape and
I
economic/ecological collapse
shipbuilding industry-factors essential to maintaining the power the watersheds that it may contain ("landscape" and "watershed" are
due to industrially instigated
11 base of the invading Europeans. terms which connote public interest), the industry simply responds
deforestation
At present the forest is serving the needs of corporate capital. that its "tree-farm" licenses are being threatened ("farms" connote
The result of these needs is wholesale forest destruction. The corpo- areas of "private" interest, "farm" being an archetypical concept of Areas not wanted by forest cor-
rate sector, in collusion with various levels of government, has "property" and a cornerstone of North American capitalist myth). porations due to poor quality or
sensed the potential for public outrage over this escalating ecological Inevitably, this strategy arouses the sympathy and support of the relatively inaccessible timber
catastrophe. As a result, it has launched a sophisticated propaganda legal system which is already strongly predisposed to emphasizing Nitrogen fixing trees (alder, etc.)
campaign aimed at denying the catastrophe and attempting to repro-
gram our basic forest concepts. Thus. by the time the catastrophe is
property rights over human rights.
Recently, a right-wing British Columbia politician (in a complete
vital in the process of forest ,-✓,_.
~
succession but of lower
complete, most Canadianswill no longer possessthe frames of refer-
ence necessary to describe forest destruction in a meaningful way.
capitulation to the corporate line) decontextualized the term "tree-
farm" further, inventing the term "fibre-farm"3 which. thankfully, did
not gain public usage. In point of fact, "tree-farm" licenses represent
more that just a linguistic privatization of public space. Key informa-
commercial value

Anyone not in full agreement

with forest industry policies
-==
--
--..
t ,. ,_ 1,
tion concerning corporate activities on these public lands is kept rou- pro-corporate view "balanced"

22 SPRING 1992 FUSE

FUSE SPRING 1992 23

 ELIMINATING POINTS versial "Red Squirrel" logging road has become the most heavily sub-
OF COMPARISON sidized logging road6 in Canadian history-all in order to assure the
Winston: "But it did exist! It does exist! destruction of a small, yet highly symbolic, remnant of Ontario's
It exists in memory. I remember it! You remember it!"
original old-growth pine forest.
For the forest industry and David Peterson's? Liberal govern-
"I do not remember it," said O'Brian.
ment, the Temagami wilderness represented far too important an

I -George Orwell, 1984. environmental rallying point to be left intact. It was one of the most
significant stands of old-growth forest left within easy access to
1, Canada'sindustrial heartland. Furthermore, it is home to the Teme-
,I While these examples of "ForestSpeak"exhibit some simple language AugamaAnishnabi, an aboriginal people who have long claimed title
•
'I'
coding techniques employed by corporate propagandists aimed at to the land. In keeping with tradition, the province's ruling capitalist
'~ I
"industrializing" our forest concepts, they are just an adjunct to a elite was eager to marginalize these people further; it feared setting
much larger and more insidious arsenal of psychological warfare. "altruistic" precedents that might limit profits. In addition to spend-
I[
To achieve the maximum conversion of public forest resources ing over 3-5-million8 in tax dollars to construct the logging road, the
I into private capital (with a minimum of public interference), the for-
est industry has prioritized destruction of potential public rallying
province footed the bill for over 370 arrests9 and detentions of
protesters-a staggering policing cost and totally out of proportion
points, i.e., areas of forest wilderness which have developed special to the potential benefits in revenue expected from the logging pro-
cultural significance. These forest icons or archetypes hold certain cess itself.
qualities which contribute towards a "forest concept" in the popular It has become evident that this push to open up 80 per cent of
consciousness.Their very existence serves as a link to a pre-indus- the Temagami wilderness to logging was more than just a simple
trial, non-mediated past and can often arouse deep-seated emotions entrepreneurial venture or a job creation exercise for an economi-
incompatible with contemporary mass-industrial paradigms. cally marginalized area. The "Red Squirrel" road was a concerted
Corporations are very eager to tamper with such concepts. effort to re-write Ontario's ecological history by destroying one of
Perhaps the nearest physical manifestation of the "pure" forest the last symbols of an ecological past. As these last forest wilder-
concept is that of the "old-growth" forest. This is a forest that has nesses are impinged by corporate activity, any existing reality not
reached a state of dynamic equilibrium, spanning long periods (in controlled in some way by corporate culture will be unimaginable.
Canadaas far back as the last ice age and in the case of some tropi- Public opposition to the corporate world view will become a moot
cal rain forests, possibly much longer). Becauseof a relative lack of point becausethe only paradigm of pre-corporate reality available-
disturbance, the plant and animal communities contained within wilderness-will have either been eliminated as a non-mediated
such old-growth forest can, over time, become very complex and for form, or at best, enshrined and "museumized" in public parks. The
the same reason, individual trees within these forests can, under major challenge for the corporate propagandist, then, is to assuage
Ii certain conditions, attain great age and size. If such an ecology the public's fears about corporate control over (formerly) public
remains intact over a fairly large area and is relatively free from wilderness and downplay the land's destruction by concealing the
I,

I
industrial effects, it approximates many people's concept of forest effects or presenting them as desirable and ultimately inevitable.
"wilderness." As old-growth forest ecosystems become increasingly Industry's fragmentation of the wilderness has already been
I'I rare, changing from environmental ground to environmental figure achieved with phenomenal successthroughout much of this country.
11 in only a few generations, their symbolic and cultural value becomes Most of the areas now in dispute are at the periphery of corporate
more significant to Canadians. exploitation, such as the few remaining unlogged watersheds on
I It is precisely becauseof their symbolic value that the last con- Vancouver Island or the aspen parklands of northern Alberta. All
tiguous examples of old-growth forest are being systematically other areas have been turned into a corporate "Kulturlandschaft" at
destroyed. The arguments put forth by industry to justify their defor- least to some degree. For example, British Columbia's tourism min-
estation practices ("x" number of jobs, "so and so" many millions of istry, eager to capitalize on its "Super-Natural" image, recently had
dollars into the local economy, etc.) have become largely unsustain- ferry cruise ads photographically retouched to remove evidence of
able. The real short-term monetary value of the "resource," i.e., logs ubiquitous "clearcutting" on coastal mountainsides. 10 Presumably, ~
and jobs, is now often exceeded by the long-term expense of realistic depictions of the landscape could be detrimental to the
extracting the timber and dealing with the litigation that environ- potential tourist dollar. W·1
11 tour·
mentalists and native groups initiate when these last stands of old- WiJJFil 18t s Pay to see these forests that have never been logged?
growth are threatened. However, massive government subsidies m companies use these forests to shoot films about life long ago?
have been injected into the industry as face-saving measures. The

1
Temagamiwilderness of Ontario is a case in point. Here, the contro-

24 SPRING 1992 FUSE

FUSE SPRING 1992 25
 MAC FOREST
present a blatantly pro-corporate view on contemporary forest issues.
-THE THEME PARK
A Grade 5 social studies text, Explorations, 14 with a "unit" on

'
When photographic retouching fails, the forest industry presents its
"Exploring the Forest Resource" discusses possible future scenarios
large-scale destruction of wilderness as an improvement. In the

1
for the province's forests, such as, "trees planted in straight rows"
ever-evolving wonderland of corporate advertising, the industry
with "radio-controlled robots spraying the pests," "genetically engi-
appears as the "steward" and "custodian" of Canadian forests-a new
neered supertrees" and "mills completely run by computers in which

·1
and improved surrogate for a beleaguered Mother Nature whose
trees are (according to one corporation's literature) rife with \ ARENEEDED"(author's emphasis).
NO WORKERS

Any information on alternative forestry practices is conspicuous-

II "insects" and "disease,"requiring the interjection of "intensive forest
management" and the "DesignedForest System.''11
ly absent. Suchconcepts as ecologically sustainable forestry, producer
I· In order to make the radical transformation of forest wilder-
co-operatives, and community land trusts are completely ignored-
~ apparently deemed too antithetical to the existing corporate oligarchy
'I'~ nesses into charred stump fields and chemically sprayed "tree-
•
, farms" more palatable, the corporate identity is being transformed
for young minds.

\
In this same book, elementary school children are presented
11 into the identity of nature itself. To achieve this objective, it is nec-
with the inevitability of wholesale destruction of the environment. In
essary to replace the public's concepts of "forest" with those of the
I corporate agenda. Reminiscent of Disneyland, the industry is eager
a double page spread extolling the "wages, taxes and exports" that the
forest industry provides, the hapless child is confronted with an
for Canadiansto view our forests as a sort of generic theme park-a
I imposing chart entitled "Good Times and Bad Times in the Forest
sanitized framework in which the corporate image and worldview
lndustry," 15 a simplified version of the right-wing "trickle-down" theo-
can be promoted relentlessly.
ry of economics. In "Option 1,""Bad Times," "Very few housesare built
The proposed tree-cutting in Vancouver's Stanley Park epito-
in the United States," our forest industry makes "less money," "less
mizes this "theme park" mentality. Stanley Park, logged by primitive
taxes are paid" and your school won't get any "computers or soccer."
methods in the 1860sand 1880s, miraculously retains a few stands
If, on the other hand, "Option 2"prevails; and "Canadian forest compa-
of exceptionally large old-growth conifers. In addition, a lush sec-
nies sell a large amount of lumber to the United States," "more tax
ondary-growth forest of massive alders and big-leaf maples has
money is paid" and there will be "good times for your school," if you
emerged on the sites originally logged, resulting in a rich, mixed for-
like computers or soccer. Why the forest companies or the United
est of ecological diversity exceptional for an urban park. All was
States are allowed to dictate community economic conditions in
well until, in a proposed 3-million dollar "forest regeneration plan,"
Canada is an issue which is never addressed, nor is our chronic need
forestry giant MacMillan Bloedel ("Mac-Bio" in B.Cs vernacular)
to develop viable secondary industries in order to avoid being held up
offered to "clear-cut" 5,000 mature deciduous trees in order to
for this kind of ransom.
replace them with evergreen seedlings to create "a forest typical of
For older children, the forest industry provides "scientific"
our native coastal forests with as natural an appearance as possi-
brochures to help children with their school projects. "Mac-Bio" 's HOW
ble." 12"Mac-Bio" also kindly offered to "chip in" 1.5-million dollars-
half the cost of the program, in order to ensure its completion. Wu1modern mill b .omputers and robots? THE FORESTGROWSbooklet is typical. It describes botanical facts such as
e completely run . y C d finished papert~;!'.fftg:incipal conifer species of the west coast" but it also warns
I, However, due to the region's natural forest ecology (an irritating Can You imagine ill where logs go 1n one en •
detail to the "high-tech" oriented industry), the presence of the stucYentsfn~ 9Utn ~~t'()fhof all Canadians to assume that the
deciduous alders is vital in providing the soil nitrogen required for
and no workers forest industry is regulated on a s~rf,not greater than that of other
needed? countries ... (or else) ... we ("Mac-Bio") will be in no position to sup-
the proper growth of the very evergreen seedlings scheduled to be
ply the new jobs that the growing Canadian labour force will need." In
planted. Consequently, the plan also calls for the dumping of 200
other words, unless the forest companies are allowed to proceed with
kilograms per hectare of artificial chemical fertilizers so the left for most Vancouverites-so much so, that it is willing to fork As long as some places remained free and wild, the idea a minimum of environmental accountability, all economic hell will
seedlings can grow into the "natural" forest envisioned. Although over 1.5-million dollars to do it. By performing these large scale and of free and wild could still live. break loose and students won't get a job after high school. In addi-
there was considerable public outcry, the plan was passed in a highly visible alterations to the park's vegetation (presumably sign-
tion, students are taken on subsidized field trips to monocultural
slightly modified form in June of 1990,by a municipal parks board. posted with "forest management brought to you by MacMillan -Bill McKibben, The End of Nature. 13
"demonstration forests" where sanitized versions of contemporary
But what could "Mac-Bio" possibly hope to gain by chopping Bloedel"), the park is transformed from a relic of intact ecological
forestry practices are relentlessly flogged by government and industry
5,000 trees out of the heart of Canada'smost environmentally con- process into an artifact in which nature becomes a "theme" with THE HIDDEN FRONT:
spokespeople. Unless steered elsewhere by enlightened teachers,
scious metropolis? The timber value of the park's alders and maples which to promote the corporation. In addition, by putting itself in FOREST INDUSTRY
British Columbia's youngsters are presented with marginal choices in
is clearly negligible and the cost for the project is exorbitant by log- the position of redefining what is "natural" about Stanley Park, the PROPAGANDA
their economic and ecological future by a corporate propaganda sys-
ging industry standards. As a public relations gesture of corporate corporation neutralizes the park's value as a rallying point for envi- IN THE SCHOOLS
tem dedicated to maintaining the status quo.
charity, the plan was incomprehensible because it predicated obvi- ronmentalism, a movement which derives the bulk of its support More frightening than clearcutting parks and "share the forest" ad
ous and sustained public outrage. The only plausible rationale from urban dwellers. Tragically, Stanley Park's conversion to a for- campaigns is the forest industry's influence on school curricula. For
remaining is that of corporate brand identification. "Mac-Bio" wants est industry theme park suggests,to some, an inevitability of corpo- example, in B. C., the logging interests and their sympathetic levels
to place its corporate identity or trademark on the only bit of nature rate control and privatization of public green spaces. of government have used elementary school textbooks in order to

26 SPRING 1992 FUSE

FUSE SPRING 1992 27
 THE WORKERS
AND trees was only 27 hect,ares,inconsequential in terms of job loss to the
THE "WORKING FOREST"
loggers or corporate profits. When larger areas are in dispute, such
Any discussion of Canada'sforests would be incomplete without exam-

f
as in the recent controversy over the Tsitika/Robson Bight region of
ining the role of forestry workers. Nationwide, the forest industry
employs a considerable number of people (one in ten Canadians),16 northern Vancouver Island, the workers have consistently followed

both directly and through secondary industries. the company line, declaring themselves "Economic Hostages of
I Unfortunately, in many regions of Canada, forest jobs are the only
Native Land Claims"22 as well as verbally and physically attacking

.I income available to workers. Thus, minor downturns in international protesting environmentalists.

One would like to think that the isolated acts of foresight shown
II demand for forest products can result in dramatic increases in regional
by members of forest industry unions indicate a groundswell of con-

~1-
unemployment. The "one industry town" is a familiar byproduct of such
,1· sciousness emerging which is still drowned out by the vociferous
I a resource-based economy, as is seasonal employment. It is not sur-
prising then that environmentalists (or "preservationists" in industry presence of a right-wing, pro-corporate minority. Many people work-
I~ parlance) are perceived with some hostility as a "threat to jobs" by ing in the tree-planting industry, for example, are strongly supportive
I
;J many forest industry workers, as are aboriginal people. How did we get of the environmental movement, perhaps because they have first-
I,

to such a sorry state of affairs where unionized workers are co-opted hand experience with the mess that the forest corporations leave

by the corporate agenda, away from what might seem to be more natu- behind. It remains a fact however that in many communities depen-

~
ral political alliances with environmentalists and aboriginal people? dent on forest jobs, considerable social pressures ranging from ostra-
cization to the threat of physical violence are put on anyone known
Aboriginal people are commonly treated with scorn by forest
industry workers, especially when asserting land claims for areas slat- to profess sympathy for environmental reform. This factor must be

ed for logging. Natives must endure the deep-seated racism endemic in taken into account when examining the appalling lack of environ-

Canadian society as well as suffering significant semantic injustices

against them inherent in our European-based legal system. Anti-abo- -·-....."'..
C
mental leadership shown to date by organized workers within the
industry.

riginal viewpoints are actively encouraged by the corporate bosses w

who (in British Columbia) give loggers days off with pay to protest at (I,) THE FUTURE FOREST
V'l
courthouses and legislatures against aboriginal efforts to secure land Both nationally and internationally, people realize that the Canadian
'C
titles or against environmentalists advocating wilderness preservation.
Many Canadian communities have become deeply divided over
-e ...
(I,) e,..
y

0
'-'l

0~
The right-wing stance often exhibited by the Canadian forest
industry unions has complex historical roots and is indicative of a
larger malaise which has long plagued the American labour move-
forest industry is exacting a terrible price in return for the benefits
that it provides. European foresters balk at our ecologically disas-
trous practices, claiming that they would "go to jail" 23 if they partici-
these forest land use issues The confrontation at Oka was precipitated w
through differing visions of forest land use-Mohawk homeland versus
"""'
. ..= ment and is now infecting the Canadian labour climate. Perhaps pated in the "forestry devastation" that has become routine in the

a private golf course. In the West, loggers have threatened British

...,
,.._
~
VI ,,... decades of television propaganda have encouraged workers to see Canadian woods.
«.I
....
"" .....
Columbia's Lil'wat people with guns and "blood going to be spilled" 17 =
::t. ;/';
themselves as part of an aspiring middle class, far removed from the
drabness of proletarian concerns. The co-optation of union leader-
According to one reporter, Canada's timber industry is "more
highly subsidized than any of its main international competitors, yet
over a logging road blockade. In addition there have been media ~
0 ....r'•
~
ship by business interests has also taken its toll on any progressive is among the most irresponsible when it comes to environmental
o.,; "'0 ...
reports of environmental activists being run off the road by loggers on ~
movements developing within the rank and file. This is particularly accountability." 24 Another points out that our governments "grant
Vancouver Island as well as having their pets poisoned. Loggers have (I,)
....
C'.I ~
been used by police to "beat up" protesters arrested at logging road
blockades, most recently at the controversial Tsitika/Robson Bight site
~
11)
\..
=
~
,_.
.;::.
• rJ;
evident in the I.W.A., one of the largest unions representing forest
workers in Canada, until recently under the leadership of the flam-
control over vast tracts of public and aboriginal lands to multination-
al consortiums in perpetuity-for free," 25 even though these tree

.....,.C'.I
(C 0.. (I,)
boyant and tactless Jack Munro. 19
on Vancouver Island.18 farm licenses become valuable and saleable corporate assets.
(C b 13.) Despite these daunting preconditions, there are signs for opti- In addition to being obscenely wasteful, the forest industry is
It is difficult to completely understand the sheer animosity direct-
ed by forestry workers toward environmentalists. Part of the blame
-s..,.,0.. (I,)
~
\..
(I,) mism. For example in 1989, members of 1.W.A. local l-80, working poisoning us. It is responsible for "half the water pollution in

can be placed at the feet of the environmental movement itself, which

.s:::
rJ;
.,.
(l.l
(I,)
... ~ for Fletcher-Challenge corporation, formed what they called "a
woodworkers survival task force Ito] fight wasteful and environmen-
Canada"26 (according to a leaked Environment Canada report). This

has shown a lack of class analysis/consciousness in dealing with forest '"'

..... ~
·-
tally damaging logging practices on Vancouver lsland." 20 More
has resulted in the closure of many productive fisheries and the elim-

industry workers. Environmentalists are perceived (with some accura- ~

,.._ -
<Ji ~
11) recently, a group of loggers working for "Mac-Bio" near Campbell
ination of countless jobs associated with them. It is also becoming
obvious that the increasing number of landslides and floods associat-
cy) as urban, middle-class, well-educated persons who are quite unfa- t t ..=
m i I ia r with the day-to-day concerns of the average logger. The ~ re • River (again on Vancouver Island) refused to cut a magnificent stand ed with bad forestry practices is draining the public purse.
.:(..I of old-growth Douglas Fir on these grounds: "We have nothing left in Although an important job source, the industry willingly uses
Canadian environmental movement has not been successful in con- .... lthisl watershed, where you can take your family to ... We've these jobs as bargaining chips and threatens to eliminate them if
vincing forestry workers that it is wasteful logging practices and ruth- 0
cleaned everything else out of there." 21 Although, in the words of forced to adopt, for example, pollution controls. In terms of actual
less implementation of job-destroying technological changes that most
logger Dave Morrison, "IMac-Blol wasn't too happy," the majority of

-
threaten their future and not conservation efforts, which only mark forest jobs created, Canadaranks significantly behind its competitors
the local union representatives and area residents expressed soli- (the U.S., New Zealand, and Sweden), creating a paltry 1.67jobs for
small areas of forest unavailable for commercial exploitation. The cor- cy
porations, of course, have capitalized greatly on the workers' paranoia :;; darity with the loggers' action. every 1000 cubic metres of wood cut. 27 This is due, primarily, to an
e- Unfortunately, these are isolated incidents. The Campbell River unconscionable lack of corporate investment in secondary industries
generated by the current economic recession. q_; t;J
"' (I,)
~ "' situation, for instance, wasn't controversial because the stand of which could provide stability for workers dependent on the forest.
0 (I,) '5
28 SPRING 1992 FUSE C'.I
Q,
5 w0
I.I.;;
FUSE SPRING 1992 29
:::::: ::::-~
..... - cy
ii: $ ii:
 -· -
The state of the forest is at a crossroads in Canadaand we must
now collectively decide on its future. The present situation is (in the
words of one spokesperson for professional tree planters) "a gigantic
feudal structure." 28 We must now choose between the style of
open the door towards building a sustainable future. If we do not act
then future generations will be cheated out of an essential part of
their natural and cultural heritage. SELF
I
·I
resource exploitation used in the Third World by the multi-nationals
or smaller scale. community-based development models that are
sustainable. Forest industry "information management" is a hin-
Oliver Kellhammer is a visual artist whose work deals with
ecological/political issues. He currently divides his time .. DETERMIN
ATION[I
drance to this much needed and fundamental reform. ',
between Toronto, Vancouver. and gardening. His last piece in
As a response to this crisis, there have been some encouraging
II signs of coalition building between environmental groups and abo-
Fuse was entitled "Corporate Money Laundering through the
Arts." The author would like to acknowledge the assistance
1·
l riginal communities as well as some landmark community initiatives. of Anita Cudmore, Zoe Lambert, and the Canada Council in
i The town of Hazelton in northern British Columbia, for instance, has
issued what it calls a "Forest Industry Charter of Rights" which advo-
cates "a more holistic view of how the environment, economy and
politics should interact," 29 through ecologically sustainable forestry
preparing the research for this article.

CULTURA
11 practices under community control. Typical of the "new forestry,"
the Hazelton charter promotes the settlement of native land claims
as a necessary part of its envisioned implementation-in marked
ENDNOTES
1. In fact, "The Brazil of the North." Timothy Egan, New York Times; reprinted in
the Vancouver Sun, 22 April 1990.
2. Martin Mittelstaedt, The Globe and Mail, 11 December 1990.
APPROPR
'
3. Dave Parker, former Social Credit Minister of Forests, in a televised speech,

ATION
contrast to present corporate policies. The Hazelton initiative
Victoria. B.C..25 May 1989.
appeals to many other groups pressing for industry-wide reform.
4. Catherine Caufield, Vancouver Sun, 18June 1990; excerpted from The New Yorker.
On a global level, there are indications that changing conditions 5. Ben Parfitt, Vancouver Sun. 19 November 1991.Also, Zoe Lambert, Squamish
in the world marketplace will make it more difficult for the forest Times, 26 November 1991.
6. Canadian Press, 4 April 1990.
' IT HAS ALWAYS BOTHERED ME THAT SOME
industry to go ahead with "business-as-usual." Canada's negative people can package images of other people, their
7. Premier Bob Rae was arrested for protesting on behalf of tl\is wilderness
"Amazon-like"3° environmental image is already having repercus- (blocking the logging road). The full ramifications of the new NDP characteristics and experiences, interpret them
sions in Europe, which currently imports 3.6-billion dollars31 worth environmental policy on the Temagami wilderness are not'yet clear but there are according to trendy, whimsical fashion, and market
indications of at least some half-hearted attempts at refo,;;;.
of Canadian forestry products per year. Canadian forest products them for a fast buck. I'm talking about that sensitive
8. See endnote 6.
could be boycotted like tropical hardwoods, but on a larger scale. subject of cultural appropriation.
9. ibid. t.f)
Germany has already begun purchasing pulp products from sources 10. Personal communication.
that it considers more environmentally-friendly than Canada.32 11. Excerpted from various MacMillan Bloedel "Forest M;magement" literature.
12. Glen Bohn, Vancouver Sun, 9 December 1989. ;; "'
YOUCAN'TSERVE
THEMBOTH
Proponents of the Canadian industry have taken this threat seriously
and commissioned both a 58,000-dollar "media content analysis"33
13-Bill McKibben, The End of Nature (New York: Random Hou~., 1989).
14."Exploring the Forest Resource," unit 1, Explorations (Vancou_ver:Douglas and
ONTHESAMEPLATTER
of its European image problem along with an anti-boycott propagan- McIntyre, 1983). BY JANISSE BROWNING
da campaign designed by a prestigious Ottawa ad agency. 15. ibid. :: t:
16. Ken McOueen, Ottawa Citizen, 25 November 1990. ,0 Different forms of cultural production-film, TV,
Apparently, European buyers can obtain their requirements from 17. Steve Berry, Vancouver Province, 4 November 1990. - literature, visual art, theatre, dance-help to shape
Russianand Scandinavian sources which are becoming more attrac- 18. BCTVNews Broadcast. Interview with protester who Was
ar~~sted. our understanding of ourselves, others, and the envi-
19. Famous for his involvement in the 1983"Kelowna Sellou\'" \\'hlch effectively
tive due to the exigencies created by European economic union and ronments we inhabit. However, from my perspec-
disemboweled an emerging BC-wide general strike, cal.led to protest the
the dissolution of the U.S.S.R.Politicians are also particularly eager repressive social and labour policies of the (then) Social Cretltt provincial tive, the scales have been tipped to favour some ways
to garner support from the powerful "Green" lobby present within government. of seeing and understanding over others. The way the
the Europarliament. On this continent, the rising demand for recy- 20. Wendy Mclellan, "Island Forest Waste Alleged:· Vancou.v.erSun, scales are tipped has a lot to do with power, money,
30 August 1990. t,."'
cled paper products is causing the larger corporations to move south and history ... those who have control over the
21. Larry Pym, Vancouver Sun, 5 November 1990.
of the border, away from the Canadian forests and close to big means of production and dissemination of their
22. Larry Pym, Vancouver Sun, 31October 1990; and televised coverage.
23-Canadian Press, 28 May 1990. wares, and those who have had limited or no access

- --
American cities which provide the market, raw materials, and cheap,
24. ibid. _...., to the means of cultural production and distribution.
non-union labour. These developments will create economic and Ill .>
25. Catherine Caufield, op cit. Cultural appropriation, as Metis film- and video-
cultural havoc in our forestry-dependent communities, unless pro- 26. Glen Bohn, Vancouver Sun, 15March 1989. ..::::., maker Loretta Todd has described it (Parallelogramme
gressive forestry reforms can be implemented in time. 27. WCWCEducational Report, November 1990.
16:1) is the inverse of cultural autonomy. Cultural
28. Interview with editor of SCREEFMagazine, on "The Rational,"

-
Canada has always been a land dominated by its forests. The autonomy, writes Todd, signifies a right to cultural
Vancouver Co-op Radio, 14March 1989.
forest has served as a context for both our history and culture. The 29. A Forest Industry Charter of Rights, specificity, a right to one's origins and histories as
(I., (',.
0...
land's abuse by corporate culture parallels our abuse by the right- Corporation of the Village of Hazelton, 1990. (.I
told from within the culture and not as mediated
30. Ken McQueen, Ottawa Citizen, 25 November 1990. er, C (1.1
wing agenda. We must understand the propaganda that is used to ;:: ·:::- :,, from without. Read on, and you might see why I
justify the devastation in order to defend against it. By exposing the
corporate remanufacturing of our ecological history, we can at least
31. Dennis Buekert, Ottawa Citizen, 25 May 1990.
32. Ben Parfitt, Vancouver Sun, 19 November 1991.
3J. Dennis Buekert, op cit.
,a
i:tt

(tt
s
....
Clt; ::
0
>..
believe cultural autonomy is a necessary step
towards the liberation of people like myself. I will
C'
i:tt
=
O "0
0 also give a recent and obvious example of an incident

30 SPRING 1992 FUSE u::;;..,"'"'

:::: C' "tr ILLUSTRATIONS BY GRACE CHANNER FUSE FALL 1991 31

fi~f
 IT'S A CONSTANT
STRUGGLE
TODEVELOAPPOSITIVSENSE
E OFIDENTITY
IN A WORLD
WHERE
YOU-ASA BLACK
PERSON,
ANDPARTICULARLY,
ASA BLACK
FEMALE

,,
1,._

1-
-ARE EITHER
ABSENT
FROM
MOSTCULTURAL

which describes the insidious nature of

appropriation. I conclude that people
PRODUCTION
...
enigmatic "career." However, a formal
education mixed with life experience has
helped me refine my knowledge and
skills to recognize and challenge imbal-
world where you-as a Black person, and
particularly, as a Black female-are either
Canadians." The masks of colonialism,
imperialism, racism, sexism-various
forms of domination that most of this
society chooses to accept as "normal"-
must be exposed and removed. Each of us they fail to acknowledge, challenge, and
porters who attended the opening at a
downtown Vancouver gallery) was the
over-zealous and insensitive manner in
i absent from most cultural production or should be learning how we can best con- thus, change their positions of privilege which a white woman was selling her
from the dominant culture who engage in ances of power and privilege. I've learned are misrepresented as a racial or gendered tribute to the process of attaining self- and dominance.
1: practices of appropriation and misrepre- to identify racism in its many insidious anomaly. Looking back helps me under- determination, community empower- Cultural producers need to understand
artistic interpretations of sexualized
"womanhood" as it is embodied in Black
sentation obstruct the process of achiev- forms and am better equipped to articu- stand how the social environment I was ment, and cultural autonomy for disen- the degrees of complexity that come with women. The white woman, once again,
ing cultural autonomy for people like
:11 myself.
late what mechanisms help perpetuate its
existence. My experiences surviving
raised in forced me to be aware of and
sensitized to racial, cultural, and sexual
franchised people ... especially if that
means stepping aside to make room for
racial and cultural differences. While
many white cultural producers-writers,
assuming the role of "interpreter" of Black
women's experiences. I have not seen a
' I'm writing from personal experience Euro-centric, upper-middle class institu- differences. the cultural expression of those who have filmmakers, visual artists, etc.-have
''I
l
here, especially when I think about the
various levels of cultural awareness I've
tions like universities also taught me
about colonialism. I have almost always
The herstories and histories of indige-
nous Black Canadians (many of whom,
been affected by racial, class, and sexual
domination most directly and painfully.
been busy creating what they thought
Black Canadian woman artist granted as
much attention as Thorsen. But then
I moved through in my life so far. I haven't
was the reality of people like myself, I've again, I have rarely had the privilege of see-
known that colonialism affected me, but like much my family, are a melange of That's how real learning and growing been busy trying to piece together the
ii
r
always had a strong identification with
my African heritage, and my awareness
didn't always have the verbal or literary
skills to express what I knew.
heritages including African, First
Nations, and some European) have been
takes place.
There are many of us who recognize
fragments of my experiences and hersto-
ries/histories. I've been trying to find my
ing images of Canadian women of African
descent who directly share those experi-
ences of oppression created by women
of the Native blood which courses Like many people of colour and First the importance of our herstories and his-
conveniently excluded from textbooks. own truth, let alone communicate it to (especially in Vancouver, where we consti-
11 through my veins was rarely spoken Nations people in this society, I've been Our existence in this country's recorded tories because they are central to under- other people in a mediated art form. But tute a relatively small segment of the pop-
about. My understanding of the impor- engaged in an ongoing bout against the standing our identities in relation to the
social memory has been represented only while I've been doing this-living my life, ulation).
tance of his/herstory, as I embody it, inner workings of racism-those voices rest of society. I refuse to just accept or
in relation to Euro-centric cultural per- trying to get by, and searching for my It was almost two years ago that I was
didn't happen overnight. in the head that almost convincingly lament the erasures of our past and pre-
spectives. For those of us blessed with an own cultural truth/pride/understanding- first confronted by Thorsen's paintings,
As long as I can remember, I've always whisper, "White is the norm." My earli- abundance of skin pigmentation, all that sent struggles and accomplishments from I've been perturbed by the abundance of while writing an article for a Vancouver
wanted to be an artist of sorts-a dancer, est, most vivid realization of this inner the larger society's memory. That's why I
seems to remain visible of our herstories cultural appropriation that's crossed my arts magazine about new galleries and
writer, or painter. My family somehow battle was in grade four. There was one write. I feel it's important to have a sense
and histories to the rest of society is our path. interviewing owners of the independent-
managed to scrape up enough money to other Black student in my class. The of where I'm coming from to convey why
difference from "mainstream white One of the most difficult cases of cul- ly-owned gallery where her paintings
put me through several years of ballet teacher set up a bulletin board display of I have beliefs and reactions to things that tural appropriation I've recently confront- were exhibited. Feeling uncomfortable
schooling until I was old enough to barter drawings that all of us students had may differ from other people's. So often, ed involves an upper-middle class, white with being surrounded by sexualized
with my instructor for free lessons by coloured in. Only one picture had the the experiences of people like myself North Vancouver artist who paints highly images of women that resembled women
"doing time" as an assistant instructor. faces of people coloured in brown. have been recorded, interpreted, and re- sexualized images of Black women as her like myself, I finished my interview with
After years of volunteering as a dance That picture wasn't mine. It was a interpreted (and thus, negated) by others primary motif. In the predominantly the four white male gallery owners and
instructor for a couple of community shock to discover that I was illustrat- who don't really have a clue about what white, mostly male alternative art scene got out fast as I could. The paintings dis-
centres in my hometown, I found myself ing what I saw as the world around it's like being persecuted by racism in in Vancouver, this artist displays and has turbed me, but I wasn't sure why. I asked
with very little time to develop my own me (or my imaginary ideal world) this society. We (people of African sold her interpretations of Black women, one of the gallery owners about the artist
skills as a dancer or painter. I realized and this world did not include descent or mixed ancestries) can't shed fetishizing our bodies, maternity, and and he assured me that, although the
that I did not have the privilege, support, dark-skinned, curly-haired people our skins. We have hidden knowledge-a eroticism. The artist, Katerina Thorsen, artist was white, she had a daughter who
or perseverance needed to become a full- like myself. I think this was wisdom of experience we embody-that exoticizes Black women in paintings with was "part Black." That still didn't sit
time artist. On top of that, it seemed that the beginning of a long and can't be accessed by white people because erect, larger-than-life breasts, sometimes right with me, so I attended two more of
everyone was telling me I had to be "ten ongoing journey towards con- they have not been forced to continually with splayed open vaginas that invite the Thorsen's exhibits over a six month peri-
times as good" as the average white per- scientization. combat white oppression like we have. gaze of onlookers. Her representations- od. Her images only seemed to get
son in all my endeavours because of Although my extended fami- Most of us hold some things secret, some like many images acquired mostly from increasingly wild and voluptuous. She
racism, and nobody was saying I was an ly has been involved with com- things sacred, and are wary of sharing too watching films and TV as a child-magni- also added an explanatory catalogue in
extraordinary dancer or painter. So, I munity education around much of our knowledge because of past fy the sexual prowess of Black women. which she cited various African-
dropped the idea of being an "artist." Black history and Black issues betrayals. Any representation of ourselves Such images construct and reinforce dan- American women writers as her inspira-
There I was, a young Canadian of African for more than a century, I dis- and our cultural experiences done by an gerous stereotypes that already exist in tional/spiritual sources. However, her
and First Nations descent (usually tinctly remember being con- outsider would be from a comparatively many white people's imaginations. After explanations didn't justify the stereotypes
referred to as "Black") who had relatively fused about my identity as a superficial perspective, simply because expressing my disdain to the artist and that were produced on canvas.
few options for obtaining financial securi- young member of a so-called he/she hasn't had the experience of sur- her supporters at an opening last April, I Discouraged by the lack of meaningful
ty ("working class" or "blue collar," they "racial minority group" in an viving racial oppression-complete with realized how concretely power relations dialogue I was getting from people in the
call it). I figured the best possible route environment saturated with all its complications, consequences, and are reproduced in the image-making busi- predominantly white alternative arts
for getting ahead was to get a student white people, their values, cul- contradictions. Outsiders could also be ness. scene regarding Thorsen's questionable
loan, go to university, and choose some tures, and images. It's a con- contributing to the process of coloniza- One of my concerns (similar to those of images and with the encouragement of a
kind of a career. After almost seven years stant struggle to develop a pos- tion by "speaking on behalf of us," since several other Black women and our sup- friend, I spread word about the April
of university, I still haven't found that itive sense of identity in a

ORAREMISREPRESENTED
AS A RACIAOR
L GENDERED
ANOMALY.
32 FALL 1991. FUSE
-- FUSE FALL 1991 33
 opening among Black women friends and
allies of various heritages and racial back- neatly discarded, quietly swept out the
grounds. The outrage and disgust spread. ed below the bust. None of Thorsen's disseminate "our own images" in main-
back door.
About 15 of us, including some women images represented women who were vis- stream or alternative galleries. Presto-
What happened at the opening was a
more outspoken than myself, attended ibly aged beyond their so-called "prime" chango is not my reality. These things
Thorsen and her supporters, must assume
I the opening. Other than those who ... they were all sexualized and
reminder of the ignorance around cultur-
al and racial issues that pervades this
take time ... and space ... the space that
responsibility for their transgressions.
I planned to attend for critical purposes, I
could have counted the number of people
inviting/inticing the onlookers' gazes.
The reality is that growing up in racist
society. Thorsen's young daughter, whose
is taken up by artists like Thorsen who
fill people's galleries and homes with
Those who are unfamiliar with our pain
(absent) father is Black, was confused by and the nature of our racially- and cultur-
1, of colour on one hand. The show was a Canada, a Black woman is made to feel trendy images of "exotic Others."
ally-influenced ways of seeing and experi-
the controversy that three-dimensional
I voyeuristic adventure into, and exploita- more alienated than "exotic," and this Black women seemed to be creating
The owners of the gallery which
encing life should tend their own gardens
tion of, our so-called "mysteries of aspect of our experiences was virtually around the exhibit. I was sorry for the
NOTEVEYONEHASTHE housed Thorsen's exhibit organized a
before they jump into hoeing ours. They
strength and exoticism." Even, and espe- panel discussion the week after the open-
I cially, one painting which represented
ignored. Whether or not Thorsen realized girl's confusion, but recognized the LUXURYOFTIME, ing to address the controversy that had
might be cultivating weeds instead of
this, her images conformed to racist rep- importance of asserting our positions as flowers-without even knowing it. As
I Sojourner Truth was upsetting. Larger- resentations which perpetrate the "white Black women with voices-not images
MONEY,AND erupted. Although a close friend asked
women of colour, Aboriginal women, and
than-life and with exposed disproportion- me to attend with her, I refused to go.
I ate breasts, Thorsen painted her image of
as norm" myth, implying that whites are who silently approve of their positions as RESOURCEOR
S, SUP- Apparently, my instincts to avoid the
women of mixed heritage, we must con-
intellectually and socially superior, while slave to a white public's indiscriminate tinue to create art because this is neces-
I Truth with excerpts from the well- PORTANDENCOURAGE- event were right. Just as I anticipated, the
Black women once again are relegated to consumer appetite. When Thorsen and I sary to our survival. Not all of us will be
,I known "Ain't I A Woman" speech paint- the realm of emotion and sexuality. Black MENT,TOSIMPLY event was comprised of a predominantly
women were reduced to foreign images,
had a chance to talk that evening, she MAKE white audience surrounded by Thorsen's
considered "professionals," but we can
said her work was an attempt to explore assert our images and stories to represent
hung for sale in a white-owned and oper- "goddess" culture and to create positive
ANDDISSEMINATE offensive images of nude Black women
our multiple identities and experiences. If
(some with colours squirting from
ated art gallery (richly priced and sold to images for her daughter. Some of us "OUROWNIMAGES." between their legs). The artist and her
our images and stories are not produced
mostly white patrons) while the com- pointed out the contradictions between or told, our voices will go unheard-or (as
plexities of our daily experiences and her- her desire to create positive images for
PRESTO-CHANGISO supporters were seated at the front of the
with cultural appropriation) someone else
gallery in a traditional hierarchical speak-
storical struggles for autonomy were her daughter and her perpetuation of uni- NOTMYREALITY ing arrangement. I was later informed by
will take the liberty to "speak on our
dimensional stereotypes of Black women. behalf" before we can get our utterances
several sources that the "discussion" was
She had not seriously considered her posi- out. Let's get to it and not let others get
&·""
arguments by claiming the right to play dominated by the panel, which was most-
tion of power as an image-maker and as a away with their attempts to control us-
in the "never-never-land" of fiction and ly supportive of Thorsen's "right" to
white woman with access to privilege- or images of us.
artistry without respecting our herstories image-making. Questions of representa-
painting, framing, and selling her indis- A group of artists of African heritage
of artistic disenfranchisement in main- tion were pushed to the margins. The real
creet interpretations of Black women and stream Canadian society. They were, in
from diverse backgrounds and cultures
issues were ignored. If I had attended the
Black women's "cultures." After some effect, securing their power over the
have been organizing in Vancouver. This
meeting, my blood pressure would have
explanation about the roots of my disap- images of Black women's bodies. The
is not directly in response to the misuse
sky-rocketed. Why didn't these people
proval, Thorsen apologized to me, of our images by white artists, but is part
paintings hung in that public space for start this important dialogue with us at
acknowledging that women were feeling of an ongoing process of community-
almost a month-for all to either enjoy, the opening? ... Because they wanted to
hurt and exploited. However, she also disregard, or be disgusted. based self-determination in cultural pro-
control who would speak and when.
tried to avoid confrontation with us, thus duction. Black artists are, and have been,
Thorsen's brother approached me at They wanted to set it up in their familiar
failing to accept responsibility for her the opening and asked, "Are you an creating images of ourselves which are
bourgeois fashion and attempt to diffuse
actions. When others gathered around to self-empowering-images which seek to
artist?" I imagined where he intended to (negate) the imperativeness of our argu-
engage in our dialogue, Thorsen appeared take me with his question. Would he create meaning out of our rich experi-
ments. They wanted to assume a facade
uncomfortable, then quietly retreated to a argue: "Well, if you don't like the kind of ences, imaginations, critical perspectives,
of "objectivity" and sterility despite the
room removed from public access. images we make of people like you, then and desires. A collective showing of
inherently subjective and emotional
The gallery owners and Thorsen's why not make your own?" I replied that I artists called iBlack? Untitled #1 is
nature of the problems associated with
(mostly white) supporters failed to might have been an artist, but have not scheduled to exhibit at the Pitt Gallery
cultural appropriation and representation.
understand our outrage. Many of them been willing or able to make the sacri- in Vancouver, May 1992. Those involved
They wouldn't honestly face up to the
simply didn't want to deal with our fices (or take the risks) required to with organizing this exhibit see it not as
consequences of their implication in
anger because it disrupted the become a full-time artist in a white-dom- a singular event, but as part of the pro-
white domination of Canadian cultural
comfortable social scene inated society where support is rarely cess of reclaiming our right to self-repre-
production and colonialism. Typical.
they had constructed. They handed to people like me on a silver plat- sentation.
Black women's pain must heal before
refused to acknowledge ter. His question was loaded-loaded its absence can be fully celebrated. We Janisse Browning currently lives and writes in
that they had walked into a with confidence and ignorance that are, and have been, visible targets for sex- Vancouver. She grew up in the Windsor, Ontario area
battle over Black women's comes with being white, male, and privi- ist and racist aggression. Our not-too-dis- where some of her ancestors settled after escoping
rights to culturally defined leged. Not everyone has the luxury of from slave plantations in the States. Her First
tant past of forced maternity in slavery
self-representation. They time, money, and resources, or support Nations ancestry (Chippewa and Cherokee) has not
and the everyday threat of rape and abuse
attempted to diffuse our been institutionally recognized because those ances-
and encouragement, to simply make and must be acknowledged. Others, like tors were women.
--~1/

FUSE FALL 1991 35

 ..
n, FABLED
EXHIBITION

TERRITORIES territories or imagined communities from fight racism and sexism . .. We are the com- 't'j,,,.
\l!"-'·-
VANCOUVER ART GALLERY, VANCOUVER
highly contested worldly ones. munity telling the people, rather than
I
.,,,~
'<
The works in Fabled Territories can be someone else looking at us telling people." ~{-
NOVEMBER 11, 1991 - JANUARY 26, 1992 {k,,, ,.
loosely divided into two genres-"art" Juanito Wadhwani's series of silver
BY SHANI MOOTOO AND ARUNA SRIVASTAVA photography and documentary or journal- bromide photographsis a created and
\ ~"'
1_. -'~

:I
,,n,
istic photography. For the most part, it is
the former genre that seems here to be
most challenging, innovative, to be map-
ping out the hybrid imagined territories of
staged performance inspired by, and a kind
of parody of, the kathak dance form. For
the artist, the shamanistic dancer figure is
from a "no-man's land," a place between
n
0
,
C

E~
.,,
::r
~
0

..
~
-n
•cfNf--··
tA
,,;
-1111,fA,._, ~-
..
.. ~
the exhibition's simultaneously nostalgic cultures and sexual orientations. This .
....
<
Cl.
-i
'}.~-

i!E
~

G IV E N TH E C O NT RO V E RS Y contexts only hinted at here, and to the ~ ~

and promising title. work in particular strives for a new aes- g ~-
surrounding the Vancouver Art Gallery's exhibition, and the works, within it? It Alan De Souza's work, "Promised thetic, a cross-pollination of pasts and pre-
< 0
, ;·,
~

>~
I
importing of Fabled Territories from Britain can't. But it can shift precipitously from Land," demonstrates the artist's knowl- sents, not simply of memories and present , n
~ ..
and its lack of outreach to local artists of context to text, back to the frame itself. edge that the medium itself brings fully environents, but also of histories, cultures, .-
Cl:;;

11~ colour, it becomes increasingly difficult to Therefore, a review such as this is only loaded meanings to the work; the medi- and myths: the hybridization
;=~
~ !'
RHONAK
of early
,, write a review of the exhibition which is partly about individual works within um of photography in particular, by South Asian religions, kathak, with perfor-
itself divorced from these considerations, frames. Instead we found ourselves look- inscribing its subject/object in the viewer's mance art, with photography. "WHERE
11 DO MY MUM AND DAD COME FROM?"
from the immediately local, political, and ing at how the specific use of the English and photographer's gaze, makes changing Suresh Karadia's work belongs to the RHONAK SINGH DIGWA
cultural context of this exhibition's (sadly language, for instance, or particular pho- these meanings near impossible. De genre of photojournalism with a system of and black-and-white photos of demon- tography, particularly as they are found in
unheralded) arrival in Vancouver. tographic idioms, give the exhibition a Souza's work offers us an art object that codes that would take phenomenal cre- strations against Clause 28, a clause that "realistic" portraits and snapshots of
A "simple" review/overview of the place to locate a new system of aesthet- uses the medium of the West-colour ativity to dislodge. Outside of the show's prohibits gay and lesbian co-habitation entire cultures and histories, work against
works shown in the exhibition is impossi- ics; or do they tame, colonize, leaving the xerox on wood-in the form of a lotus context, nothing in these photographs, and cultural expression by outlawing so- this destabilizing (and enabling) disjunction
ble, not simply because of these local viewer an arms-length voyeur with an flower, and renders his practice one in whether they are of Benazir Bhutto, Rajiv called "pretended family relationships." and hybridity: the exposure of the seams
events, but because 1992 is a landmark anthropological gaze? In all curating situa- which he invents a culture that is partly Gandhi, or the haunting image of the Guru Guyanese Roshini Kempadoo uses a and ruptures between artistic expression
year for such controversies, a time- tions, of course, there are exclusions and Kenyan, partly Asian, and partly British. Nanak school in Delhi, demonstrates an similar process of juxtaposing text and within and across cultural, racial, sexual,
many of us hope-for a reclamation of inclusions with specific implications; the Sutapa Biswas's work, similarly, thema- attempt to (re)create cultural meanings or black-and-white, and colour photographs class difference.
power by colonized people, indigenous range of experience represented by age, tizes its materiality as much as its subject imaginations, and shows little of the fluidi- to explore the contradictions of life The predominance of the comfortable
people,the marginalized around the religion, sexual orientation, gender, class, matter, using text and a series of trans- ty, creativity and self-reflexivity of some "here" in Britain and "there" in Guyana, seamlessness of some of the work in
world. Closing as it did, quite appropri- and political stances in this exhibit, how- parencies to explore the multiple cultural contemporary photojournalism. Here, of two homes. Her work, like Gupta's, Fabled Territories is both instructive and
ately, at the beginning of the so-called ever, are laudable. meanings of the image of a foot in sand or though, we arrive at the very paradox set does not comfortably create a hybrid alarming. We come to a photograph of
Year of Columbus, Vancouver's Fabled As an array of photographic art work- clay to point out not only the complexi- into play by establishing a show's contours form, but rather expresses dislocation or Rajiv Gandhi lighting his mother's funeral
Territories was the occasion for many of us ing within and challenging (often simultae- ties of artistic practices, but the literal lay- and contexts by racial or national origin. the holding in place of several identities pyre. A fellow gallery visitor and reviewer
to recognize the importance, the necessi- nously) held traditions and values, both ering of interpretations that result from Why should we criticize Karadia (report- and homes and aesthetics. of sorts-a parent escorting a rather
ty of context in our politics and histories, artistic and political, the exhibition is at each viewing subject's edly well on his way to becoming a com-
(including the In a similarly haunting way, Pratibha
and of challenging those holding power in reluctant young child around the pictures
best uneven-this unevenness perhaps artist's herself) apprehension and creation mercially-successful fashion photographer) Parmar's short video Sari Red is a video placed a little too high for his craning
cultural and artistic institutions to begin speaking to the difficulty of creating fabled of her work. for either his photographs of the news- poem with some singularly beautiful and comfort-comments to her captive audi-
to recognize those histories and politics. Interestingly, the selections from the worthy subcontinent for their touristic memorable images and sequences docu- ence that these Indians, see, are heathens,
Is the work of the artists in such an Mount Pleasant Photography Workshop gaze. Isn't that falling back into the old, menting how racism in Britain resulted in burning their dead folk. Imagine, she says,
exhibition as Fabled Territories, or that of in Southampton provide some of the orientalist, and patriarchal art-versus-pop- the violent death of a young South Asian contradictorily, if you burned your own
the curator, diffused or deformed, and is exhibit's strongest work. The artists here, ular-culture divide? woman, Kalbinder Kaur Hayre. As with mother alive like that! Not surprisingly,
the work's importance eroded by being all between the ages of IO and 12, The colour photography of Nudrat much of the other photography in the she didn't stop for a few minutes at the
co-opted by institutions primarily con- demonstrate a confidence of subject and Afza differs from many others in the exhibition, Parmar's medium and her end of their trip through Fabled Territories
cerned with colonizing and exoticizing of point of view and what seems to be a exhibit in that it concentrates on scenes of idiom are sharply at odds with the imme- to watch Sari Red.
what is unfamiliar? How can reviewers, matter-of-factness about multiple cultural outdoor life in England; indeed curator diacy of the subject matter: the day-to-
artists, gallery visitors, and staff resist this identities (most tellingly and humorously Sunil Gupta notes, of the exhibit, that "the day life of diasporic South Asians. Aruna Srivastava is an assistant professor
erosion through their writing, public pro- shown in three drawings about parental streets of England are noticeably absent. It is this disjunction, which imbalances of English and Women's Studies at the
gramming, attention to cultural and artis- roots) that work by more experienced Clearly they are not safe terrain. On the the viewer's, critic's, parent's, or cura- University of British Columbia in
tic detail, through communities affected artists does not reveal. Clearly, these chil- streets South Asians remain vulnerable, tor's gaze, which opens up this space for Vancouver.
by these exhibits, through specific cultural dren and young adults are also politically strangers in a strange land." Gupta's own artists to "seek new territories which as
practice? Indeed, how can a short review astute; one of the workshop participants works are colour photos of mixed-race yet have no fables." However, the heavily Shani Mootoo is a painter, writer, and
like this "do justice to" so many of the writes that their photographs gay couples juxtaposed with poetic text
"help to sedimented codes and traditions of pho- video artist living in Vancouver.

36 SPRING 1992 FUSE "YELLOW EARTH," JUANITO WADHWANI

FUSE SPRING 1992 37

I
 VIDEO

MY Two GRANDMOTHERS,
MEMORIESREVISITED,
HISTORYRETOLD
HER GREAT GRANDFATHER, & ME
LEILA SUJIR

MUTT ART GALLERY, CALGARY

APRIL 9 - MAY 4, 1991

I
I BY SARAH MURPHY

I
'1
Photo D. James and A. Jarenk
1
I
LIKE MUCH RECENT (AND NOT- The tapes, in their own way, are yet time, told from the point of view of a
so-recent, if we are to go back to such another park, another garden-full of woman never allowed authority over his-
oval figures as Frida Kahlo and Remedios contrasting colours, contrasting tory, yet expected to contain it and nur-

"
narra-
Varo) women's art, Sujir's installation, My tives, contrasting memories, contrasting ture it and reproduce it through those
Two Grandmothers, Her Great Grand-father, places and cultures. All are brought manifestations of culture and story con-
and Me, with its framed narrative, its auto- together using special effects patterns tained in the organization of time and of
biographical references, its sense of life which resemble both the mosaic of the space that is the home. That is both the Detail from the installation Patternlty
writing on videotape, hunts for a way to garden and the quilts of the home. In cer- easiest and the hardest part of any culture
5 March - 24 May
inscribe a woman's life (this particular tainly the most intelligent and intuitively to lose, certainly the easiest to "mis-
A thought-provokingvisionof womenin recent economicand socialhistory.
woman's life) into cultural metanarratives, well-wrought use of those effects I have place," to lose one's place in and to thus
metafictions, metapatterns. (I doubt that yet seen, each repeated diamond, each lose contact even with those who have PJINational Gallery Musee des henux-nrts
• of Canada du Cnnndu
this is a word but there are metapatterns repeated rectangle, each central oval or gone before, with the making of their
380 Sussex Drive, Ottawa, Ontario K 1 N 9N4 (613) 990-1 985
in our management of space.) Sujir finds circle, decorative in and of itself, tells why hands, or with their voices.
her methods not through reference to people have decorated their space, their What Sujir does here, in creating her
and criticism of European high art, or even surroundings, their bodies: to converse time-based quilt, with its way of inter-
high art's critique of mass media, but with each other and to make meaning. weaving different levels of story and
though reference to the roots of her own The blue of the North Sea near Calgary, image, colour and texture, and space
consciousness, in Indian textiles, women's Scotland (the blue Colonel Macleod itself, is to show how memory can loop
quilting bees, tropical and northern parks, translated into our Alberta sky to back on itself, how narrative can come to
through the making and organizing of rename this place) is first background, inhabit the moment, coetaneous rather
space in another mode, the mode of home then foreground, then middleground to than sequential, is to suggest the con-
and garden-a mode that has nurtured the rocks of Scotland or the green of struction of a space so complex, a
the artist on two continents. India. The tape is an interweaving of nar- moment so powerful, that even after dis-
What we see as we walk into the rative, of images, of meaning that move placement, our spirits may come there to
room where the installation has been into language, declaring again and again: rest. And, the garden now becomes an
mounted is first the garden, and next, the home, history, story, displacement, love. altar (doubly exorcised: its video moni-
home. Inviting us to sit is a park bench While on another series of monitors it tors degaussed, its space blessed). With
surrounded by rocks and flowers, family says: " ... a doubled sense of ... as we its calla lilies and its marigolds, we may
photos and photos from the video, as well come to feel just that, the doubled sense encounter and, if need be, bury our
four monitors covered with translucent of dislocation, immigration, the crossing ancestors. Welcome now, like the ances-
sari cloth whose stationary patterns inter- of boundaries and the mixing of cul- tral spirits on the day of the dead, into
act with the moving videotape. Then, in tures." this place to call home.
front of and above us, we encounter 21 Sujir's story, the unspoken story of
more monitors showing, in varied the faces of her two grandmothers look- Sarah Murphy is a Calgary-based writer,
sequence, one or another of the four ing out from the video monitors, looking translator, and visual artist. She is the
source tapes, while in the middle of a out from the quilt that contains them, is author of three works of fiction, The
flowered quilt, yet another version of one exactly that story: the metanarrative of Measure of Miranda, Comic Book Heroine,
of the tapes passes. displacement, of immigration. Only this and The Deconstruction of Wesley Smithson.

38 SPRING 1992 FUSE FUSE SPRING 1992 38

 -
• d. ~ c» NO BURDEN TO CARRY
BooK~;
;: ~.H
"' Narratives of Black Working Women

~
in Ontario 1920s to 1950s
Upcoming ... by DIONNE BRAND
with the assistance of Lois De Sheild and
• Home Camcorders: the Immigrant Women's Job Placement Centre
Shoot Like a Pro "No Burden to Carry Piece of My Heart

*
II exquisitely weaves the No Burden to Carry Creation Fire
• Basic Production & Editing "-J.ur.atiH:l of Bla<"k\tUrking: \\hmt:ll tr A Lesbian of Colour A CAFRA Anthology
threads of autobiography in Ontado 1910, '" 11/SO, ij~ Anthology
11 • Advanced Editing and history into a flexible
of Caribbean
Anthologized by

t
• Women in Production and meaningful Women's Poetry
j' M~aSll~ra
I relationship. Never again $17.95 ;dlte'dby
... and more RamibaiEspinet
,i will I be at a loss for
names of Black women Ii
:-:-
$17.95

Call (416) 593-1332 who have stood at the ::::

172 John St., 4th Floor junctions of Canadian [i
Toronto, Ontario history."
MST 1X5
-ANGELA Y. DA VIS :i
-..,11tlfll'
f>ml lilt lw,1,,~H<tl """"'•Q\
~,,><t¥U<J «( I <'I• t~sl:.t,,111
~ l'hc""""t( ~,.,~:::;.:
;=!~
i:;::h:« .. N«•·<ek$A¢;;«;;;;:;;:;: ..}
TRINITY SQUARE
288 pages 5 1/2 X 8 1/2 $17.95 pb 0-88961-163-7
VIDEO
TSV thanks the Canada Council, The Ontano Arts Council,
The Toronto Arts Council, The Munic1pahtyof Metro Toronto - Cultural Yearning
Affairs,The Ministryof Culture and CommunicatlOns,and Trinity's
members for their suppart.

•STAYs;INFORMED
Quebec BECOME
Aw
MEMBER
and the A Space member-

•spaCe
shipsare available
Alllerican for $ 20/year
member's forand
rights full .•..•
Drealll $ 15/year, newslet-
ter only. '
BYROBERT
CHODOS
&ERIC
HAMOVITCH
next.•/~.u.bmis}siofi
L
ISBN 0921128439X $19.95 pbk
1se '0921284381 $39.95 cloth
.d·e•.•aa··1•
..·•i1u• ~It1·•
··i•·og : ~i•e
!ill~ Unsettling Relations Some Imagining Women
A Space submission deadlines are Jan. 15 and The University asa.,Siteof
June 15for exhibitions and other long term programmes. Audio Cas~ette
Chodos and Hamovitch vveave a blend of Feminist Struggles
Special Events such as worl<shops, lectures. readings.
produced by Lillian Allen
and also some screenings and performances are
anec-dote, quotation and scholarly insight programmed throughout the year. by Himani Bannerji, 6 authors read their work from
A Space is a multi-disciplinary art centre featur- Linda Carty, Kari Dehli, The Women's Press short
to provide a historical account of the ing community-based and community-referenced Susan Heald, Kate McKenna fiction anthology
programming. The gallery isopen to proposals for both $13.95 $9.95 (tape)
interation betvveen French Canada and individual and group exhibitions. and is particularly
interested in encouraging and assisting emerging cu-
the political economy of the United States. rators and programmer;, as well as emerging artists.
We welcome work which combines formal innovation
with cuttural insight and sensitivity.Please write or phone
~etweersWiresgg for a floor plan and documentation of the gallery.

394Euclid
Ave, Toronto
OntM6G2S9 A Space 183 BathurstSf.Ste. 301,
Toronto,Ont, MST2R7(416·364 3227)
LOCALMOTIVE
1

MARY ALTON ROBERT BOZAK JUNE CLARK-GREENBERG

BILL CRANE CATHERINE CROWSTON MAX DEAN

TERESA DOBROWOLSKA JAROS LAW GWIAZDA MARTHA JUDGE

WARREN QUIGLEY MARIO SCATTOLONI BRIAN SCOTT

KATHRYN WALTER ALEXANDRA WASCHTSCHUK BARB WEBB

An exhibition of site-specific works to be held in the junction gardens

west toronto area from may 9th - may 31 1992. Opening may 9th, 12:00 to 8:00 pm

at the southwest corner of keele & dundas west, bank of montreal parking lot.

We gratefully acknowledge ,he support of ,he Canada Council, the Ontario Arts Council, the Toronto

Arts Council, the Junction Gardens Business Improvement Committee, and Fuse J\1agaz:ine.

For more information call 536-3347 or 769-/291.