Meryl McMaster (born 1988) is a Canadian and Plains Cree photographer whose best-known work explores her Indigenous heritage, often using portraiture to explore cultural identity.

Early life and education

Meryl McMaster was born in 1988,

Ottawa Ottawa is the capital city of Canada. It is located in the southern Ontario, southern portion of the province of Ontario, at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the cor ...

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

, Canada.Jasmine Inglis, Acquisition Proposal for Meryl McMaster's ''Edge of a Moment'', accession #48508, Curatorial File, National Gallery of Canada. She is a Cree woman of the

Siksika Nation The Siksika Nation (; syllabics , ) is a First Nation in southern Alberta, Canada. The name ''Siksiká'' comes from the Blackfoot words ''sik'' (black) and ''iká'' (foot), with a connector ''s'' between the two words. The plural form of ''S ...

. She studied photography at the Ontario College of Art and Design University, graduating in 2010.

Work

McMaster frequently practices

self-portrait Self-portraits are Portrait painting, portraits artists make of themselves. Although self-portraits have been made since the earliest times, the practice of self-portraiture only gaining momentum in the Early Renaissance in the mid-15th century ...

ure and portraiture to explore themes of First Nations peoples and cultural identity, and incorporates elements of performance and installation to preserve her mixed heritage and sites of cultural history in the Canadian landscape. In her work, McMaster explores "tensions surrounding understanding one's personal identity and heritage, especially her own as a woman of Indigenous ( Plains Cree) and European (British/Dutch) descent." She adopts a performative approach in which she blurs the boundaries between performance, sculpture, and photography by incorporating elaborate costumes and props in order to create staged images. McMaster considers these elements to be tools of personal transformation that become extensions of her body. McMaster's first major series, ''Ancestral,'' from 2008, "appropriates ethnographic portraits, which she then projects onto her photographic subjects: herself and her father," noted artist and curator Gerald McMaster. She makes use of such elaborate props in works such as ''Winged Callings'' (animal costumes) or ''Aphoristic Currents'' (collar "fashioned out of hundreds of twisted newspapers") in order to examine the tensions between cultural and personal memory as well as how they interact with imagination. Both works are part of her ''In-Between Worlds'' series (2010–2013). With regards to her artistic practice, McMaster states: "I'm really interested in exploring questions of our sense of self and how we really come to construct that sense of self through land and lineage, history and culture". She continues to examine identity,

colonialism Colonialism is the control of another territory, natural resources and people by a foreign group. Colonizers control the political and tribal power of the colonised territory. While frequently an Imperialism, imperialist project, colonialism c ...

, and the environment in her large-scale works.

Recognition and awards

In 2010, McMaster won the Canon Canada Prize, the Ontario College of Art and Design Medal in Photography as well as the Spoke Club Membership Prize and the Vistek Photography Award. In 2013 ,she was a recipient of the Eiteljorg Contemporary Art Fellowship and, in 2016, she was longlisted for the

Sobey Art Award The Sobey Art Award is Canada's largest prize for young Canadian artists. It is named after Canadian businessperson and art collector Frank H. Sobey, who established The Sobey Art Foundation. It is an annual prize given to an artist 40 and under w ...

. In 2017, she was awarded the REVEAL Indigenous Art Award. In 2018, she was one of the three winners of the Scotia Bank New Generation Photography Award In March 2018, she was named one of three inaugural winners of the New Generation Photography Award, which supports the careers of young artists working in lens-based media. Other distinctions she received include the Charles Pachter Prize for Emerging Artists, and the Doris McCarthy Scholarship.

Exhibitions

McMaster's first solo exhibition, ''In-Between Worlds'', opened at Project Space,

Harbourfront Centre Harbourfront Centre is a cultural organization on the waterfront of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, situated at 235 Queens Quay West. Established as a crown corporation in 1972 by the Government of Canada to create a waterfront park, it became a no ...

, in 2010 before traveling to the Station Gallery, the Peterborough Art Gallery, the

Art Gallery of Hamilton The Art Gallery of Hamilton (AGH) is an art museum located in Hamilton, Ontario, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The museum occupies a building on King Street (Hamilton, Ontario), King Street West in downtown Hamilton, designed by Trevor P. Garwood-Jon ...

's Design Annex, and the

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square Mile stretch of Sherbrooke Street west. The MMFA ...

until 2017. By 2015, McMaster had exhibited in more than forty group shows in Canada, the United States, and Italy. A survey of her work was organized by the Carleton University Art Gallery (CUAG) and curated by Heather Anderson. The exhibition was on view at CUAG from May 2 - August 28, 2016 and subsequently travelled to other venues including the Doris McCarthy Gallery, the Richmond Art Gallery (RAG), the Thunder Bay Art Gallery, the Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba, the Lethbridge University Art Gallery, and The Rooms. Her work was prominently featured in ''Every. Now. Then: Reframing Nationhood'' at the

Art Gallery of Ontario The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; ) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located on Dundas Street, Dundas Street West in the Grange Park (neighbourhood), Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, the museum complex takes up of phys ...

during the summer of 2017.

Group exhibitions

*''Spirit in the Land'',

Pérez Art Museum Miami Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM)—officially known as the Jorge M. Pérez Art Museum of Miami-Dade County—is a contemporary art museum that relocated in 2013 to the Maurice A. Ferré Park in Downtown Miami, Florida. Founded in 1984 as the Cent ...

, 2024; and

Nasher Museum of Art The Nasher Museum of Art (previously the Duke University Museum of Art) is the art museum of Duke University, and is located on Duke's campus in Durham, North Carolina, United States. History In 1936, art collector William Hayes Ackland wro ...

at Duke University, 2023 *''Native Portraiture: Power and Perception'',

Tacoma Art Museum The Tacoma Art Museum (TAM) is an art museum in Tacoma, Washington, United States. It focuses primarily on the art and artists from the Pacific Northwest and broader western region of the U.S. Founded in 1935, the museum has strong roots in the ...

, February 10, 2018- February 10, 2019 *''Niigaanikwewag'',

Art Gallery of Mississauga The Art Gallery of Mississauga (AGM) is a public, not-for-profit art gallery in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. It is located at the Mississauga Civic Centre right on Celebration Square across from Square One Mall. The Gallery is open six days per w ...

, February 22 - April 15, 2018 * ''Recover All That Is Ours,'' Campbell River Art Gallery, March 1 - April 25, 2018 * ''ÀDISÒKÀMAGAN/NOUS CONNAÎTRE UN PEU NOUS-MÊMES/ WE’LL ALL BECOME STORIES'',

Ottawa Art Gallery The Ottawa Art Gallery (OAG) is a municipal gallery in Ottawa, Ontario that opened in 1988 at Arts Court. The gallery has a permanent collection of over one thousand works, houses the City of Ottawa-owned Firestone Collection of Canadian Art, and ...

, April 28 - September 16, 2018 *''Embodiment,''

Museum London Museum London is an art and history museum located in London, Ontario, Canada. It is located near the forks of the Thames River. It started its operations in 1940 with London Public Library and amalgamated with London Regional Art Gallery and Lon ...

, December 23, 2017 - April 1, 2018 *''New Generation Photography Award Exhibition'',

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's National museums of Canada, national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the List of large ...

and Onsite Gallery, 2018 *''Every. Now. Then: Reframing Nationhood'', Art Gallery of Ontario, summer 2017 *''The Sublunary World'', Baldwin Gallery, 2017 *''My Spirit Is Strong'',

Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada Indigenous may refer to: *Indigenous peoples *Indigenous (ecology), presence in a region as the result of only natural processes, with no human intervention *Indigenous (band), an American blues-rock band *Indigenous (horse), a Hong Kong racehorse ...

Art Gallery, 2016 *''Back Where They Came From'', Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art, 2016 *''Fifth World'',

Mendel Art Gallery The Mendel Art Gallery was a major creative cultural centre in City Park, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Operating from 1964 to 2015, it housed a permanent collection of more than 7,500 works of art. The gallery was managed by the city-owned Saskatoon ...

, 2015 * ''Identity (Material Self: Performing the Other Within)'', MOCCA Toronto, part of CONTACT Photography Festival, 2014 *''In the Flesh'',

, 2013 *''1812–2012: A Contemporary Perspective'',

, 2012

Solo exhibitions

* ''Confluence,'' University of Lethbridge Art Gallery, January 18 - March 15, 2018 ouring exhibition * ''In Between Worlds,''

, September 8 - December 3, 2017 ouring exhibition* ''The Fifth World,''

, April 3 - June 7, 2015 * ''Second Self,'' Latcham Gallery, 2011

Collections

McMaster's work has been acquired by various public collections within Canada and the United States, including the

Canadian Museum of History The Canadian Museum of History () is a national museum on anthropology, Canadian history, cultural studies, and ethnology in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. The purpose of the museum is to promote the heritage of Canada, as well as support related res ...

, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Canada Council Art Bank, the

Eiteljorg Museum The Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art is an art museum in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, United States. The Eiteljorg houses an extensive collection of visual arts by indigenous peoples of the Americas as well as Western Amer ...

, the

National Museum of the American Indian The National Museum of the American Indian is a museum in the United States devoted to the culture of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. It is part of the Smithsonian Institution group of museums and research centers. The museum has three ...

, the

Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is an art gallery, art museum in Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas City, Missouri, known for its encyclopedic collection of art from nearly every continent and culture, and especially for its extensive collection of A ...

and the

Art Gallery of Greater Victoria The Art Gallery of Greater Victoria (AGGV) is an art museum located in Victoria, British Columbia, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. Situated in Rockland, Greater Victoria, Rockland, Victoria, the museum occupies a building complex; made up of ...

as well as by