Greetings Adele,
Last week I had the privilege and pleasure of visiting Six Nations to guide some LTTA guests from Fort McMurray. The depth of cultural knowledge that was shared with us was incredible. It was a profound and very memorable experience.
An artwork at the Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford, featuring a sentence from the treaty guaranteeing the Six Nations people six miles of land on either shore of the Grand River from Lake Erie to the head waters. The treaty was broken quickly and the people of Six Nations have had their reserve land reduced to a small fraction of what they were promised.
The Two Row Wampum Belt. As I understand it, the two rows represent the two different peoples; those from the Six Nations and the Europeans. One row symbolizes the canoe that the Six Nations people would travel in, the other row symbolizes the boat the Europeans would travel in. They don't cross over, they run side by side. If you choose to travel in the canoe, you must follow the laws of those people. Same for boat. This Wampum Belt makes a statement that is deep and broad and very profound in it's beautiful simplicity.
David General is a sculptor and former Chief of Six Nations. He currently teachers at OCADU. His powerful eagle monuments are at Battlefield Park in Stoney Creek. They represent so much, the Medicine Wheel, the four directions, aspects of Six Nations language and culture. They are designed so that you can sit on their massive bases and look up at them and consider what they represent and what they mean to you.
I had a fun game of hide and seek around the sculptures with Qila, David's 5 year old grand daughter, She is the daughter of Megan General, one of the artists who was working with us for our projects in Six Nations and Tyendinaga Territory.
I hope that we can have a cup of tea together soon.
Good wishes and hugs,
John
