Marianne Nicolson’s exhibition, House of Gold, is part of the Or Gallery’s series of collaborations between writers and artists whose work engages with and develops a ‘local’ context for a discussion of the politics of difference. As an artist of Kwa’guitl descent, Marianne Nicolson uses visual arts as a mechanism for de-constructing the historical representations of First Nations People. She tries to break down stereotypes and in doing so create an imagery that reflects both the traditional and contemporary experiences of being native. Nicolson created an installation which references both the conventions of Western photography and the conventions of West-Coast Native art making. The organizing principle at work in the piece is the idea of the longhouse which is in turn juxtaposed with an image of the Presbyterian church. Through this relationship the artist attempts to discover the differences and similarities between two mechanisms of institutionalized power – Native and Western. The work is reconciliatory in nature and suggests the possibility of finding some common ground or threads of common experience.

Catalogue essays by Heesok Chang, Kirsten McAllister, Larissa Lai