nadyes / you come back, 2022

Bronze, shed moose and elk antlers, acrylic paint

Image Description: A rectangular white platform sits in front of a white gallery wall on a concrete floor. Upon it rests a tableaux of bronze cast hands, shed moose and elk antlers, and a light brown flat brim felt hat such as those worn by the RCMP. The wall behind this assemblage has three colour illustrations on it. From left to right they are: a burgundy-coloured outline of an antler with the word “sonic” written vertically in capital letters on its right side; an apple green outline of a hibiscus flower with the word “vibration” painted above it in lowercase; a cerulean illustration of a hand and wrist with lines demarcating, clockwise from the top, the fingertip of a ring finger, folds and creases of the inside of the palm, and the outermost part of the inner palm. An arrow on the inside of the wrist points upward to the hand’s palm and each of the four lines is labeled with a single word, reading: “show” “me” “a” “sign”.

WORK STATEMENT

With nadyes / you come back, Logan MacDonald uses sculptural installation to lyrically fixate on the learning and communication that exists outside colonial norms and to consider how these colonial mechanisms can be subverted. Presented as a series of arranged sculptural installations and imagery traced on the wall, MacDonald’s work forms a large coded assemblage, with each piece, in some way, gesturing to the embodiment of knowledge — how our bodies learn and teach through movements, vibrations, bodily cues and how these signals have the capacity to transmit and extend between generations. 

Bronze is used here as a symbolic signifier of the colonial narratives and systems imposed on our landscapes and bodies as well as the hierarchical ways in which we are expected to teach and learn. MacDonald employs these bronze pieces in a dismantled/fragmented state to subvert their power, absorbing the structures as aides in forming a tableaux that welcomes new meanings, histories, perspectives, movements, conversations, teachings. This conceptual approach is continued in his use of shed elk and moose antler, a biological material that references the animals’ speculated ability to sonically hear both mates and prey.

An attempt to lyrically highlight our capability to communicate beyond colonial language, nadyes / you come back illustrates how Indigenous, queer, and crip folks continue to strategize to communicate our knowledge, needs, and desires despite living alongside colonial systems designed to ensure our erasure.

Text by Amanda Cashia, edited here by Sarah-Tai Black

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