Cousins and Kin: Special Edition
A Conversation with Shelley Niro
interviewed by Adam Piron and Fox Maxy
technical support for this livestream provided by
Shapeshifters Cinema
www.shapeshifterscinema.com
Shelley Niro is a multi-disciplinary artist who lives and works in Brantford, Ontario. She is a member of the Six Nations Reserve, Bay of Quinte Kanien’kehaka (Mohawk) Nation, Turtle Clan. Her practice consists of a range of media, including photography, beadwork, film, installation and painting. Her work challenges the expectations and stereotypes of Indigenous peoples, often using friends and family as subjects in order to celebrate and highlight the resiliency and individuality of the Indigenous women surrounding her.
A prolific filmmaker and video artist, Niro’s work and life have been deeply influential on subsequent generations of artists. Her film Honey Moccasin (1998) is presented by San Francisco Cinematheque through June 16 as part of Cousins and Kin, a survey of contemporary and historic film/video works by artists Indigenous to the North American continent. On the occasion of this online screening, Niro appears live in conversation with series co-curator Adam Piron and filmmaker Fox Maxy.
PLEASE NOTE!
Tonight’s artist talk will be live and will not be recorded!
Please join us June 14, 2021 (on this page!) for this special one-time-only event!
About Honey Moccasin: Whether it’s jumping from performance art sequences to a mock-cable access show to a tongue-in-cheek crime mystery, Shelley Niro’s rarely-screened Honey Moccasin (1998) melds irreverent cinematic language from elements of pop culture and a distinct brand of Native humor. Niro finds both an inviting exuberance and a playfulness in its experimental approach to questions of identity. Taking no no authoritative stance on delivering any kind of thesis on Indigeneity, the film seamlessly weaves its way through a multitude of approaches to present a surreal spectrum of subjective meaning. In its own open-endedness and the resulting nuance of this approach, Niro’s film has cemented its reputation as an underground classic of ‘90s Indigenous Cinema. (Adam Piron) View the film (through June 15) here.
Shelley Niro is a multi-disciplinary artist who lives and works in Brantford, Ontario. She is a member of the Six Nations Reserve, Bay of Quinte Kanien’kehaka (Mohawk) Nation, Turtle Clan. Her practice consists of a range of media, including photography, beadwork, film, installation and painting. Her work challenges the expectations and stereotypes of Indigenous peoples, often using friends and family as subjects in order to celebrate and highlight the resiliency and individuality of the Indigenous women surrounding her.
Adam Piron is a filmmaker and film programmer based in Southern California. He’s a member of the Kiowa Tribe of Oklahoma and a Kanienʼkehá꞉ka (Mohawk) descendant. He is also a co-founder of COUSIN, a collective supporting Indigenous artists expanding the form of film. Piron is a member of the Sundance Film Festival’s short film programming team and currently serves as the Associate Director of Sundance Institute’s Indigenous Program. He was formerly the Film Curator for the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and also programmed for AFI Docs and AFI Fest. His films have played in The New Yorker’s Documentary Series, Camden International Film Festival, Indie Grits, Seattle International Film Festival, MoMA Doc Fortnight and the San Francisco International Film Festival.
Fox Maxy (Payómkawichum & Kumeyaay) is a filmmaker and artist in San Diego. He makes his own rules. His film company, Civic Films, produces experimental films, documentaries and music videos. He made 2 short films during quarantine in 2020. His work has screened at the International Film Festival Rotterdam, the Museum of Modern Art’s Doc Fortnight, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, AFI Docs, ImagineNative Film Festival and the Camden International Film Festival among others. Fox is currently fundraising to finish his first feature film, Watertight, a hybrid documentary/experimental film that zooms in and out of many issues: mind and body health, pollution, dreams, nightmares, Standing Rock, suicide, traditional ecological knowledge, partying, praying. These series of interconnected vignettes are built on the possibilities of creating your own realities and opportunities. This film is for freaks.
Cousins and Kin is presented with the generous support of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
