Mohawk Rebel

An in-depth exploration of the photograph and film works of Mohawk artist Shelley Niro as they connect to New York State.

An in-depth exploration of the photograph and film works of Mohawk artist Shelley Niro as they connect to New York State.

Mohawk Rebel is an in-depth exploration of one of North America's most important Indigenous artists. Claire Raymond's compelling and well-researched book connects Niro's lineage as a Turtle Clan woman to the artist's oeuvre that evokes and represents the Mohawk people's memory of and continuing relationship to the land now called New York State. With profound allegorical and metaphorical power, Niro's virtuosic photographic and filmic works create layered temporal tapestries that weave the past and present in a new vision. The book offers fresh interpretations of many of Niro's best-known works and brings into view some of her earlier lesser-known works. Raymond's sensitive and nuanced interpretations of Niro's art ultimately contend that Niro's work agitates subtly but unmistakably for the ethical rightness of the land-back movement. Raymond eloquently argues that this Mohawk artist's relationship to New York State is one of rightful claim.

Claire Raymond is Assistant Professor of Art History in the University of Maine system. They are the author of Photography and Resistance: Anticolonialist Photography of the Americas and The Selfie, Temporality, and Contemporary Photography.

Claire Raymond is Assistant Professor of Art History in the University of Maine system. They are the author of Photography and Resistance: Anticolonialist Photography of the Americas and The Selfie, Temporality, and Contemporary Photography.

"In this book, Claire Raymond dives deep into the history, context, and cultural traditions of the Haudenausonee, whose territory in New York State was stolen, forcing them into exile in Canada. This is an important addition to the understanding of the lens-based work by Mohawk artist Shelley Niro. Niro has created over forty years of practice, a body of work that challenges persistent images of First Nations people while bringing to light Indigenous-centered histories. Niro photographs and films also denaturalize western notions of sexuality and gender, shuttling between family and pop culture to create narratives and images that embody Indigenous women's subjectivity. Niro's work is humorous, deeply researched, and intuitively futurist, denying the limiting framework of Indigenous art.

Raymond 'weaves between history and contemporaneity, following Niro's lead,' taking her readers to the land now called New York, the homeland of the Mohawk. Raymond shows how this history so widely unknown in America is a formative and formidable aspect of Niro's oeuvre. You will learn the Haudenasonee as masters of diplomacy, you will find figures like Sky Woman and the Peacemaker reframed in Niro's practice. This book realizes Niro's feminist practice in telling the stories of a contemporary matriarchy still being imagined.

For Niro, New York lies in the way a land exists in memory and imagination born of love and intergenerational storytelling. Readers will never look at contemporary photography, Indigenous art or the history of America the same way again." — Wanda Nanibush, curator, writer, and image-maker from Beausoliel First Nation

"Mohawk Rebel is a new and valuable approach to the art of Shelley Niro. Raymond's careful unpacking of Niro's works' meaning involves discussions of the history of the Haudenosaunee settlements in NY State. That we are shown this reality through Niro's eyes, as she reflects on the original homes of her ancestors, is especially moving. Raymond engages effectively with Niro, capturing the intelligence and thoughtfulness of the artist, as well as her sense of humor." — Dr. Madeline Lennon, Professor Emerita, Department of Visual Arts, Western University, Canada

"Shelley Niro's visual art introduces many important critical topics on Indigenous histories, and Claire Raymond has taken years to gather historical and contemporary perspectives to expound on those and to better share the information—ultimately increasing the reader's knowledge of complex Indigenous histories and making a solid advancement to decolonize our understanding of the past." — Melissa Bennett, Senior Curator, Art Gallery of Hamilton, Ontario