Haley Bassett

Exhibition text by Dr. Kaitlyn Purcell

In this conversation between the wild prairie rose and garden rose, Sticks and Thorns speaks to the experiences and inheritance of intergenerational strength through the women that have created us. Interwoven, conversational—or simply an intuitive impulse to come back to the circle. Between two artists working from coast to coast, a thread of circularity emerges in the work of Carrie Allison and Haley Bassett.

Carrie Allison’s multimedia art practice is an intimate study of the places and memories of her matrilineal lines. Continuing from her work in First Family, Allison expands on the piece that was for her grandmother, Elsie.

Elsie loved her family and children, but there was a large part of her that had been hardened by the world. Aside from making food or hemming clothes, she found it difficult to show affection for the people surrounding her. Elsie’s rose garden became a refuge to express her tenderness.

After witnessing the clearcutting of a whole forest, the artist processes her grief. Her grandmother’s roses become akin to the markers of time within each tree. When the tree is cut, it reveals an autobiographical account of its life.

The study of tree time was given the name dendrochronology. Can we translate this into nêhiyawêwin? Or any of the ancestral languages of the places we each call home. This is a decolonial wish. These circles of time, and these roses, are a gift.

Haley Bassett’s interdisciplinary art practice converges the histories of her Métis and Russian heritage, through her beaded portraits on painted canvas, matryoshka dolls, and mask making. Hybridity is stitched in seed beads over painted canvas, eyes over eyes, seeing through multiple perspectives at once.

In masks carved from poplar, Bassett explores the ecopoetics of these trees. A kind of wood known to warp and crack—their market value is reduced by their softness. They are the first to grow after a fire. Poplar trees are what is called fire resilient—emblematic of anyone that has been forced to overcome a disaster or tragic event.

Bassett honours all the women who created her, and the varying masks each had to wear. The heavy mask and the restricting mask. Hybridity splits into a new kind of mask—or masks. The matryoshka dolls, or Russian nesting dolls, are playful and experiential artworks which convey the interconnectedness between generations with the mother, or grandmother, as the matriarchal figure for each family.

There are systems of thought that sought to erase our Indigenous ways of knowing—wanted us to forget that our earth is our womb. One of many. They wanted us to forget our matriarchal systems. They wanted us to forget our medicines and teachings for reproductive rights and sexual sovereignty. There is so much wrong in this world that the enormity of it all could swallow us whole. Panic can occur when our circle of awareness becomes too big for us to cope with. When the world gets too big, we need to come back to our immediate surroundings. To cope with panic, we are taught to focus our attention a single object, to study it closely until the panic subsumes.

Allison and Bassett’s work evoke that practice of coming back into our innermost circles. Circling around the parts of our histories that help us to slow our breath. Similar to honour songs, they each are speaking to and from generations of knowledge that is passed down. From womb to womb, circle to circle. Stitching as a study of fauna or carving a feminist study of identity.

These roses are powerful despite this world always taking more than it needs. It cuts down too many trees, clearcutting whole forests of intergenerational strength. There are systems of thought that wonder how this would be translated into nêhiyawêwin. They wanted us to forget that this earth is an honour song.

To cope with panic, we must emulate fire resilience. Feel our feet on the ground. Our roots always find a way to sprout past the charcoal earth. In the wake of a tragic event, we are forced to ruminate it over until the memory begins to evoke the practice of coming back into our power. We will never forget those who attempted to destroy matriarchal circularity. Panic can occur as an intimate study of the places and memories for us to cope with—in a good way. When the tree is cut into a circle, there is power in witnessing its time. The study of these circles is called honouring our grandmothers.