woocommerce-shipping-per-product domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /var/www/staging.esse.ca/htdocs/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131complianz-gdpr domain was triggered too early. This is usually an indicator for some code in the plugin or theme running too early. Translations should be loaded at the init action or later. Please see Debugging in WordPress for more information. (This message was added in version 6.7.0.) in /var/www/staging.esse.ca/htdocs/wp-includes/functions.php on line 6131Jean-Philippe Uzel : <\/strong>Why organize a discussion on artistic appropriation when everyone is talking about cultural appropriation? The subject might seem a bit odd, or even suspect. Is there a \u201chidden agenda\u201d here? Isn\u2019t the goal of artistic appropriation ultimately to justify cultural appropriation? I think it\u2019s important to respond to these questions briefly, and, in the process, explain why we\u2019re having this panel. First, it seems regrettable that \u201cappropriation\u201d has become such a loaded word, with \u201cnegative\u201d connotations. Artistic appropriation is a sort of collateral victim of debates on cultural appropriation. That\u2019s a pity, because the technique of appropriation in art, or what is also known as \u201cappropriationism,\u201d permeates all of modern and contemporary art and is central to understanding today\u2019s art practices. So, it seems important to revisit the gesture of appropriation in the context of the art world. What is particularly interesting is that the artists who use appropriation embrace the subversive aspect of their gesture. They appropriate something that doesn\u2019t belong to them\u200a\u2014\u200agenerally an image made by another artist, advertising creative, or designer\u200a\u2014\u200aand assume the consequences, often legal, of this violent act. Yet, when it comes to artists who are accused of cultural appropriation, the violent aspect of their gesture is totally denied. I find this contrast significant, and I\u2019d like to launch the debate with this idea: on the one hand, appropriation artists who take responsibility for their transgressive gestures and, on the other hand, artists who adopt an ethical stance by presenting themselves as allies of the cultures that they highlight, even when members of these minority cultures contradict them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n St\u00e9phane Martelly :<\/strong> I could add to that right away. In fact, I was wondering about the relevance of connecting these two notions, which seem quite remote from one another. But at the same time, I think it\u2019s interesting to bring them together. Also, to start, I\u2019d like to propose a definition of cultural appropriation. I see cultural appropriation as the transformation of a culture that had previously been free to circulate as an object\u200a\u2014\u200aa consumable, sellable, reproducible object. For me, it\u2019s actually a reification of the cultural object. Cultural appropriation takes place because a cultural trait, practice, or object is used in a way that decontextualizes instead of making it more complex, that simplifies instead of enriching it; ultimately, it\u2019s an act of power. An object that once had multiple ramifications and many layers of meaning is deconsecrated and decontextualized, simplified and reduced to a single thing. The act of power is intrinsically connected to the very notion of cultural appropriation: it isn\u2019t just a sort of game of identity, musical chairs; cultural appropriation is a violent gesture that is made in the act of taking something from the other, of simplifying it and steering it back to oneself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU : <\/strong>In a sort of decontextualization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong> In an extremely violent decontextualization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Caroline Monnet :<\/strong> I wanted to add that appropriation is also an act of \u201ctaking something for granted.\u201d It\u2019s impossible to have a dialogue when there\u2019s a total deadlock, when one person takes their relationship with the other for granted. It\u2019s often easier to play dumb than to really make an effort and get to know the other, to go toward them and find out about them. It\u2019s easier not to ask permission and to apologize after the fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Johanne Lamoureux :<\/strong> When I was invited to be on this panel, I saw the importance of discussing artistic appropriation at a time when its meaning and value have been challenged by recent controversies over cultural appropriation. It gave me a chance to reconsider different angles from which to approach the question of appropriation and of appropriation art. As an art historian, of course, I think first of appropriation in terms of the formation of avant-gardes, which appropriated fragments of the real or forms that came from elsewhere, as occurred in Dada practices. It\u2019s clear that if these acts were welcomed, and retrospectively we\u2019ve called them appropriations, it\u2019s because they brought the real into the artwork. These fragments of the real were a way of challenging the autarchy and self-referentiality of the art world, and so they offered an opening. Appropriation reached a peak during the 1980s, and it was probably the most radical form of artistic appropriation. I\u2019m thinking, for example, of the images by Sherrie Levine, who made identical reproductions of Walker Evans\u2019s photographs, but also of all the objects that critically revisited the notion of the readymade. It was an attack against American formalism, the historicism of American formalism, which fetishized firsts\u200a\u2014\u200athe first this, the first that, the first to\u200a\u2014\u200aand these firsts created, or fabricated, ingenuity. It was an attack against the construction of artistic singularity. When it comes to cultural appropriation, the visual art milieu has been extremely vigilant about it since the 2000s. For example, in 2006, when the National Gallery of Canada held the exhibition Emily Carr: New Perspectives on a Canadian Icon, of which I was co-curator, it started the season by programming Norval Morrisseau. The Gallery had consulted independent Indigenous curators to see if the initiative of the Carr exhibition seemed acceptable, and they were able to carry it off without major controversy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It seems to me, in light of recent controversies in the theatre that I found really surprising, that one of the big distinctions from the visual arts is that we don\u2019t really talk about appropriation of content. I think the real issue in theatre is that it\u2019s the usurpation of place, rather than content, that\u2019s being denounced. \u201cSomeone spoke in my place,\u201d and it\u2019s not so much what is said as the position, the privilege of being able to denounce what seems problematic. I hear Ariane Mnouchkine when she says, \u201cBut what are they saying to us? They\u2019re actors: by definition, they take the place of\u200a\u2014\u200athey embody someone else.\u201d I\u2019m very much in favour of theatre continuing to stick to this, but the situation must be reversible. Yet, as we can see, this isn\u2019t the case: only white people can play everyone, all the time. True parity, true reversibility, would be the day when the roles for whites could be played by anyone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I think that we have to distinguish and try to articulate and treat differently the issues of appropriation of content and appropriation of place, which goes beyond the problem of cultural appropriation in the sense that it\u2019s really a problem of representation. Cultural appropriation also seems to me to be related to a general crisis of representation in society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong> I\u2019m very sensitive to what you said, Johanne, with regard to the fact that the visual arts scene has already been having this discussion for some fifteen years, and the Qu\u00e9bec theatre scene doesn\u2019t yet seem ready for it. I\u2019ll return to the question of place that you mentioned, the question of representation, because it\u2019s very important. It brings to light the question of the audience: \u201cWho are the narratives that are produced addressed to?\u201d But also: \u201cWho are the people who have access to the places that would permit them to construct these representations?\u201d For me, the question of place is indissociable from that of content. Because, of course, if the person who speaks is not one who can claim this history, the content produced won\u2019t be the same either. And, in fact, that was the reaction of Indigenous theatre people who saw the play Kanata in Paris; they said that an Indigenous person would never have produced that narrative, which is precisely the narrative of someone who is not Indigenous. I wanted to interweave these notions of content and place because they seem to me truly inseparable. That brings me back to this idea of simplification, because I believe that we can\u2019t talk about cultural appropriation without raising the question of influence and absence. And so, I return to the audience. Cultural appropriation is possible only in the absence of people directly connected to the story or the cultural origin. It presumes that this absence is taken for granted. And that\u2019s why, for example, you have some cultural content that is manipulated so carelessly, precisely because it is presumed, in the case of theatre, that there will be no black person in the room to say, \u201cBut no, in fact, that\u2019s not my experience.\u201d We presume that we are producing a cultural object already destined for an audience that is not involved, that is not racialized, and that doesn\u2019t belong to or know about the culture being appropriated. JPU :<\/strong>\u2002We were just talking about Ariane Mnouchkine, who feels that cultures belong to everyone. This is a form of absolute negation\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002An absolute negation of the power relationship! But it is precisely the prerogative of power to exercise power while masking it at the same time. The metaphor of the mask is interesting here because the appropriative gesture needs to be denied in order to exist. It needs to say, \u201cOh no, that\u2019s not what I\u2019m doing! I\u2019m doing something else. In fact, I\u2019m in the process of giving you a place, but without you. And if you have something to say in response, it\u2019s not legitimate\u200a\u2014\u200ayour words are not legitimate. You are necessarily outside of art and creativity. You are censors.\u201d Whereas censorship, real censorship, is based on a power relationship. You have to be in a position of power to exercise censorship, in an institution that gags subversive and contesting voices. So, reversing the very meaning of censorship to say that minority or dominated voices are the ones exercising it\u200a\u2014\u200aand to say this, paradoxically, from every platform\u200a\u2014\u200ais a powerful gesture of denial.<\/p>\n\n\n\n CM :<\/strong> I have the feeling that the debate is taking place on two levels: there\u2019s the symbolic debate and the political one. Indigenous People became the property of the queen, the king, and the Canadian government. They were dispossessed of their lands, languages, cultures, and freedom of expression. The entire debate is extremely political because we\u2019re talking about claims that affect every sector of society. Of course, on the cultural level, we are more present\u200a\u2014\u200athat\u2019s where we can be heard talking about it the most\u200a\u2014\u200abut the work of emancipation and self-determination really takes place at every level. Today, we are still a minority in decision making, in discussions, so it is hard to have a real dialogue, an egalitarian dialogue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong> What is also interesting to see, in the end\u200a\u2014\u200amaybe that\u2019s the position you touched upon in our discussion and that I want to make clear here\u200a\u2014\u200ais the point to which cultural appropriation is not subversive at all. It\u2019s really the contrary of subversion, as it returns the dominant to their place of dominance, while the dominated remain dominated, and so power relationships are not challenged at all\u2026 It\u2019s the repetition of power relations..<\/p>\n\n\n\n Today, we are still a minority in decision making, in discussions, so it is hard to have a real dialogue, an egalitarian dialogue.<\/p>\u2014 Caroline Monnet<\/cite><\/blockquote><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong> Power relations hidden behind an ethical relationship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong> Always!<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002In the visual arts, the main defence of artists who are accused is to say, \u201cBut I\u2019m an ally of the cultural minorities that I represent. I\u2019m their spokesperson, I\u2019m helping them, so I\u2019m being put on trial falsely. In fact, I even consulted them when I made my artwork,\u201d etc. This is a troubling ethical posture.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002It isn\u2019t truly ethical, in fact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002No, it pretends to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002Yes, of course, it\u2019s a pretense, so we mustn\u2019t embark on this discourse. That is why it\u2019s very interesting to truly understand the meaning of words. It\u2019s not an \u201cethical relationship\u201d when we speak of in the place of\u200a\u2014\u200ait\u2019s impossible. \u201cSpeaking in the place of\u201d necessarily implies that you do not recognize the other\u2019s place as subject. That is not an ethical relationship. True subjects have the right to express themselves about themselves. If you put forth a proposition and the subject resists it, that\u2019s their role\u200a\u2014\u200athey\u2019re affirming their place as subject. And so, to challenge this contestation on the pretext of ethics is yet again a curious form of doublespeak in which words mean their opposite.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JL :<\/strong>\u2002But doesn\u2019t that also create a paradoxical situation? I agree that it\u2019s an act of power\u200a\u2014\u200aI don\u2019t think there\u2019s any doubt about that\u200a\u2014\u200aand yet it\u2019s authors and cultural actors who are interested in the fact that there is a problem of non-visibility, that there is a story to tell there. At the same time, most people continue to act as if there were no problem, as if there were no \u201cothers\u201d to embody.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002We must resist this idea that the choice we have is between the worst and the less bad. That can\u2019t be. We can\u2019t have only this choice. There is another option: that people can represent themselves\u200a\u2014\u200athat they\u2019re capable of doing so and have the skills to do it. To understand that there are voices that aren\u2019t getting their say, that certain subjects are missing from the discussion, is not to take the place of, it\u2019s to give place to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JL :<\/strong>\u2002The time when people can represent themselves has not yet arrived, obviously. In the current situation, the absence of symmetry predominates, but Mnouchkine\u2019s position, in which everyone could represent everyone, remains an ideal worth achieving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002We agree on this, because in fact, in a truly postcolonial and post-racial society\u200a\u2014\u200awhich is not the case in the West, far from it\u200a\u2014\u200aeveryone would be able to do everything. But in the current context, marked by deep inequalities that destabilize the scene of representations, we\u2019re not in a situation in which the body is not already marked. The great social narrative, the great cultural narrative, has already marked bodies and it\u2019s impossible to act as if that weren\u2019t so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n CM :<\/strong>\u2002We talk a lot about appropriation, but we forget the notion of responsibility. The artist\u2019s responsibility is to look at the world, of course, to instigate dialogue and reflection\u200a\u2014\u200athat\u2019s central to the artist\u2019s approach. But we should also ask about how to do things right. Perhaps my good intentions, unbeknownst to me, reproduce colonial powers or forms of oppression. Today, Indigenous Peoples have the means and the tools to be present, to be part of society, so it\u2019s no longer possible today to say, \u201cOh! Sorry, we forgot you this time, but we\u2019ll include you the next time.\u201d There must be a true change, and institutions and artists must do real work so that inclusion takes place in a respectful and egalitarian way.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002As an artist, Caroline, have you been confronted with problems of cultural appropriation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n CM :<\/strong>\u2002It\u2019s a delicate question, even when one is an Indigenous person, because there may be acts of appropriation among nations and even within a single community. I use cultural motifs that were passed down to me by my mother-in-law. Am I appropriating these motifs? In my family, over the years, we have been dispossessed of our culture, our heritage, for four generations by the Indian Act. So, in appropriating traditional knowledge, am I overstepping my rights? If I\u2019m asking myself the question in relation to my own culture and my own nation, it would be important for those who aren\u2019t part of this nation to at least ask themselves the same question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002In fact, it\u2019s paradoxical that you, of Anishinaabe ancestry, ask yourself that question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n CM :<\/strong>\u2002Yes, but that\u2019s because it\u2019s extremely important. You also have to remember, there are fifty different First Nations in Canada. So, I can\u2019t appropriate elements of the Haida Nation or the Inuit on the pretext that we\u2019re all Indigenous. We don\u2019t belong at all to the same culture. Indigenous cultures aren\u2019t one big bag, a cultural melting pot from which we can draw as we wish.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002We saw this debate start up again last week at the Indigenous Music Awards gala, when a Cree singer performed Inuit throat songs. Everyone seemed to say, \u201cBut what is that? \u201d Even Indigenous People are torn about cultural appropriation! But as you\u2019ve just said, they are different nations and cultures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n CM :<\/strong>\u2002Different languages, different values, different ways of doing things, and so on. There\u2019s specific protocol to follow with elders. We have to go and see those who have knowledge, we have to do long and painful work with them. We must have a dialogue, and it\u2019s quite a process. It\u2019s not just saying, \u201cOkay, I\u2019ll do it and then we\u2019ll see what happens afterward.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002Returning to artistic appropriation, what is significant, perhaps, is that artistic appropriation\u200a\u2014\u200aand specifically appropriationism\u200a\u2014\u200ashakes up the notion of authorship. In cultural appropriation, the notion of authorship is strengthened in a way: we sign in someone else\u2019s place and reject all forms of contestation. In appropriationism, however, there\u2019s a sort of awareness or recognition of the parodic or subversive nature of the signature, and that\u2019s completely denied and masked in cultural appropriation. I wanted to underline this contrast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JPU :<\/strong>\u2002And that\u2019s why it\u2019s interesting to challenge cultural appropriation with artistic appropriation. Because it in fact allows us to bring out these differences: the absence, or presence, of critical awareness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JL :\u2002<\/strong>What I find fascinating is why the visual art milieu has a different history. Why is it that different kinds of artistic expressions do not have the same history with regard to questions of appropriation?<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002I don\u2019t have an answer, but I think that the discussion simply started longer ago in the visual arts. And also, I think that the discussion, in the theatre world, isn\u2019t at the same point in every country. I don\u2019t think that the discussion is at the same point in Qu\u00e9bec and the United States, for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n JL :<\/strong>\u2002Is it possible that it\u2019s because the visual arts don\u2019t have the same audience\u200a\u2014\u200athat is, they address an audience that is a bit more closed than that of the theatre world?<\/p>\n\n\n\n SM :<\/strong>\u2002Yes, I think the issue is maybe more important in the theatre because the notion of the subject in relation to speech may be even more acute. It consists directly of the voice\u200a\u2014\u200atruly, directly, the voice. I believe that the issue of the voice is particularly interesting here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Audience member :<\/strong> At what point do you think we can consider something sufficiently representative to say, finally, \u201cI have the right to speak about that\u201d? What are the criteria for saying, \u201cI have enough of that identity to represent so-and-so, or such-and-such content\u201d? SM :<\/strong>\u2002We mustn\u2019t evade the discomfort of that question. In the end, we must also say that perhaps, sometimes, we should be quiet. The voices that have always held the monopoly will have to yield their place. This will be an essential step. I know that my answer is a bit direct, but I think that, necessarily, that\u2019s what it means. It also means that artists will have to challenge themselves on the notion of the place of neutrality. Presuming that we have something to say on every subject is to presume that our position is perfectly neutral, that it isn\u2019t situated in history, that it isn\u2019t racialized. So, we will have to challenge all these assumptions, all these preconceptions. It\u2019s crucial that the landscape change. And that we mourn the idea of occupying every place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Translated from the French by K\u00e4the Roth<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n
That\u2019s why cultural appropriation is a type of cannibalism. There is something profoundly cannibalistic and parodic in the appropriative gesture, inevitably because of this absence and this decontextualization. Hence, cultural appropriation is the very theatre of power relationships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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