This week I decided to look into discussions around tattoos and cultural appropriation. This is a very relevant topic to our current culture and I felt it was a very important topic to look into for my free inquiry. This is also very relevant to Canada as part of ongoing issues with Indigenous art being used without permission or in some cases the art style being used without respect or permission.
One of the most prominent cases of this within Canada is probably the controversy surrounding Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s tattoo. The prime minister’s tattoo is part of this issue as it is based off of a painting by Robert Davidson a Haida artist and it was done so without his permission.
“Appropriation of Indigenous designs by non-Indigenous artists is another form of genocide. You’re actually taking someone’s identity and placing it upon your body.”
Dion Kaszas
This quote is from an Interior Salish tattoo artist named Dion Kaszas, and the quote comes from an article in the Canadian press that was exploring the issue surrounding the Prime Minister’s tattoo. As a settler I don’t feel that my opinion is what really matters here, but I think Kaszas makes an extremely powerful point with this statement. I also think that for this issue of cultural appropriation and tattoos what we should actually be doing is talking to artists and people of these diverse cultures. I think its great that the article I read actually spoke to an Indigenous artist. The article didn’t interview Robert Davidson directly, but they did quote his response to the tattoo design as “a familiar disappointment” (Bresge,2018). This speaks volumes to how this is not a new issue or injustice.
A local example of this kind of cultural appropriation can be seen here on Vancouver Island with artist Sue Coleman. Coleman is well known for incorporating Indigenous imagery into her paintings stating that she is a “translator” of indigenous art (Tymchuk, 2017). Reading that phrase in the article and typing it out made me feel very uncomfortable, as it is such an out of date and ignorant sounding statement. In an open letter Coleman received from several local Indigenous artists, including George Littlechild, Roy Henry Vickers and Richard Hunt, they stated “we don’t need you or anyone else to ‘translate’ our art form” (Tymchuk, 2017).
Now hopefully none of these people ever meant to bring harm to these cultures or people, but the fact remains that harm has been done and we should not let it continue. Like most issues I think the one of cultural appropriation and tattoos is rooted in privilege and ignorance. People from a settler background come from a place of privilege and the legacy of colonization, not always realizing the effects that last to this day. That is why it is so important to spread information and education on these sorts of topics so we can prevent the damage being done to both people and cultures.
Like with my previous blog posts this is a deep topic with much more that could be said and researched. For my next blog post I think I might look into modern/present tattooing practices and the culture surrounding it. I’ve attached the articles I looked at this week below.
Resources
Bresge, A. (2018, Feb 15). Indigenous tattoo revival renews cultural appropriation concerns. The Canadian Press Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.library.uvic.ca/wire-feeds/indigenous-tattoo-revival-renews-cultural/docview/2002681922/se-2?accountid=14846
Tymchuk, M. (2017, Dec 8). Open letter accuses non-Indigenous artist of cultural appropriation. CBC. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/newman-coleman-artists-open-letter-indigenous-appropriation-1.4437958
