Travis
18:43
hey Terrance, you got ten minutes for
an interview?
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Terrance
18:43
hey Travis I do have 15 minutes
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Travis
18:43
hey now
what's been happening since the last
time we spoke?
that was about four months ago now,
im ashamed to say
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Terrance
18:44
mm well I went to Thunder Bay for my
Givn'r show and did 7 artist talks/tours
lol
just been getting back in the saddle
with work starting new series'
currently have work up in fort
Simpson NWT at the OPEN SKY Gallery
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Travis
18:46
what new ideas are you working on?
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Terrance
18:46
well I have a video series I am working
on right now that Involves Video Portraits of
Residential school attendee's in their favorite
place or space
ALL FOR YOU: Fall Cycle (still)
Terrance Houle [2008–09]
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Travis
18:47
what ages?
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Terrance
18:48
the ages are from about 50+
so its a feature length video work
that I am in the process of right now.
as well I am starting the national
Indian Leg Wrestling League
I have an upcoming show with Rebecca Belmore at the OR Gallery in
Vancouver opens end of
April
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Travis
18:49
so... not much going on then...
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Terrance
18:50
hahaha
no not really
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Travis
18:50
ha! tell me about leg wrestling and
this upcoming exhibition
both sound pretty exciting
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Terrance
18:51
The show with Rebecca is a two person
show curated by Darrin Martin from Vancouver
The works are still kind of in
Development for that show
The National Indian Leg Wrestling
League is a series of Photo/performance/installation
and film works based on Wrestling and Leg Wrestling
I've asked several First Nations
Artists to create their Leg Wrestling Identity and I
will be creating wrestling costumes
then do portraits of them in classic
wrestling Posters of the 50s, 60s, 70s
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Travis
18:53
that sounds incredible
we've got to get you over to
Liverpool
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Terrance
18:53
yea man its pretty amazing stuff
ive been basing them off old
wrestlers like
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Travis
18:55
I was wanting to write a piece on
your previous exploits, anything your particularly
proud of?
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Terrance
18:55
mmm yea I created a work for my show
Givn'r which is about my Father and my Kookum
(Grandmother in Ojibway)
it is an installation were I
recreated my Kookum's sitting area in her house with
doilies, picture of the queen and Jesus and
religious articles
There is a clock radio on the table
next to a rocking chair and you can hear static and then my
father's voice reciting his letters he wrote to his
mother from age 13 the time he was taken away to
residential school
until he retired
so basically you hear him calling out
to his mother. as he never grew up with any parents
because of residential school
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Travis
18:59
oh man
how accurate is the recreation?
is it like sitting back in her room
for you?
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Terrance
19:00
mm pretty close that my great uncle
and aunt and uncles came to see the work in Winnipeg
and they cried and told me it was
like she was sitting there
yea but kind of like she was a ghost
or haunting
like you didn't know if she ever
really listened to my father
or if he knew anyone one listened or
cared
but in the end its the audience who
listens to his story of his life in the army and
being a native alienation
sorry his feeling of alone and
alienated
because of the government policy of
residential school
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Travis
19:03
I always got the impression that you
liked to use a lot humor in your work, but that
piece sounds pretty far removed from that
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Terrance
19:03
I guess its kind of a yin yang thing
humour vs seriousness
The Givn'r show was full of all my
humorous satire pictures and right in the middle of
the gallery is this work
I guess what I have realized is I
like to deal with emotion in my work
my life seems humorous but when I
tackle my other family it seems more serious and
deep
which seems to be a balance
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Travis
19:05
what did you give talks on?
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Terrance
19:06
basically about the last 5 years of
my work
about humor and how it impacted my
earlier works
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Travis
19:06
is it retrospective time already?
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Terrance
19:07
hahah yea
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Travis
19:07
man o man
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Terrance
19:07
the show is a mini retro of the last
5 years of work
since i graduated
about 70 works
in the show
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Travis
19:08
that's... a lot
you cover installation, photography,
video, performance...
audio...
Pray for me Terrance Houle
[2008]
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Terrance
19:08
lol i know shit I didn't even realize
yea
audio and music
soundtrack
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Travis
19:08
haha, nice.
you're in the groove
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Terrance
19:09
I kind of had my head down in my work
and then the Plug in Gallery asked me to do a solo
show and show my work and next thing Anthony Kiendl
asked for everything
I guess I just committed to art
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Travis
19:11
is it just that? or is there, looking
back on the last five years, a bigger overarching
theme/message to all the pieces?
I know the overt subject matter, but
is there an underlying position that you want to
take?
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Terrance
19:11
well I guess it would be this kind of
Identity around Contemporary First Nations
perceptive
like who's perspective is the First
Nations Identity coming from
like history from a colonial view
point or a first nations view point or the view
point of First Nations people who have been impacted
by colonialism
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Travis
19:13
do you think it would be fair for
anyone other than a First National to tackle the
issue?
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Terrance
19:13
like are we as first nations falling
into the perception people have of us
I think it would be fair if they did
their research
first nations not first
national....sorry just a correction
lol
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Travis
19:15
sorry about that
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Terrance
19:15
no its ok
look at the German Indians in Eastern
Europe
they have taken on the identity of
the Indian or Native American
I think its hilarious
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Travis
19:16
even though that identity is not
accurate to them as a people?
why would they do that?
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Terrance
19:16
they must be in an identity crisis
themselves
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Travis
19:17
haha
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Terrance
19:17
the sympathy for the noble savage
the pure man
freedom
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Travis
19:17
what do you think about spaghetti
westerns?
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Terrance
19:17
oh and Karl may
I love em
I think that those films of the old
west created another part of First Nations identity
nations
something that is a perception
Hollywood Indians
and even till this day there are
people (native Americans) that still give into that
stereotype
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Travis
19:19
its such a strange concept
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Terrance
19:19
yea I know
here is a kicker in some movies
like John Wayne ones
the actors were British or African
American
the directors would have real apache
or Navajo people just off camera
throwing lines to the main Indian
characters
but the words were all dirty and such
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Travis
19:21
ha!
that seems utterly pointless and
wasteful... to have someone on set who is actually
living the role others are pretending to be
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Terrance
19:19
I guess for me that would be a good
explanation of my humor and what I like
exactly
that's probably the whole concept of
Native people in Canada
always having others speak for them
lol
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Travis
19:23
I'm glad you can find the humor in it,
it makes the impact of it so much more memorable
I think Im going to end the interview
on your last statement
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Terrance
19:24
hahah awesome
no problem
Indian Humor
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http://www.terrancehoule.com
http://www.plugin.org/exhibits/39
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