Thicker than Water: Art, Maple Syrup, and Canada (original) (raw)

oh-oh Canada: Sweet Treats for Unsettling Futures

Canadian Theatre Review, 2018

This photo essay offers a brief introduction to the hybrid curatorial/collaborative project oh-oh Canada, which I launched in Ottawa on Canada Day, 2016, as a performance art action at Parliament Hill. oh-oh Canada alludes to the way Canadians enthusiastically consume a set of narratives that characterize the nation as “peaceful, welcoming, and benevolent; a country built through diplomacy” and asks that we/they consider what is missing from these accounts. It does so through the free distribution of a line of “unsettled” maple sugar candies created by artists Adrian Stimson, Cecily Nicolson, Lisa Myers, Peter Morin, Cheryl L’Hirondelle, David Garneau, Michael Farnan, and myself. Given away at patriotic celebrations and other community events, the candies inject overlooked narratives into public and domestic spaces, practices selective commemoration, and the individual bodies of members of the public. Through a short description, Artist Statements, and images of the launch and the c...

The Evolution of a Maple Sugaring Landscape on Lake Superior's Grand Island

2003

When examined within their historic context, vernacular landscapes inform us about the behaviors, beliefs, and interrelationships of ordinary people and their surroundings. Through the integration of historical research with a landscape archaeology approach, this paper examines the evolution and abandonment of a landscape of maple sugar and syrup production in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, USA. Beginning with Native American occupation, through early Euro-American settlement, to commercial and corporate expansion by the Cleveland Cliffs Iron Company, the history and landscape evolution of the Grand Island maple sugarbush refl ect changing cultural practices, settlement patterns, land use, and land tenure in a portion of the Lake Superior region. Like much of rural America, continued changes in the technology and organization of the maple sugaring industry over the last fi fty years are resulting in an increasingly rapid loss or replacement of the landscape and material record of ...

Canada's Forests, a History. By Ken Drushka. Forest History Society Issuesseries. Illustrations, tables, maps, bibliography, index. Feds, Forests and Fire. A Century of Canadian Forestry Innovation. By Richard A. Rajala. Transformation series Illustrations, notes, bibliography,index and Up-Coast:...

Environmental History, 2007