Marianne Nicolson is a Dzawada’enuxw (Kwakwaka’wakw) artist based in Victoria. She works in a variety of media to express Kwakwaka’wakw concepts both in traditional forms (such as painted dance screens and sewn dance aprons, made to function in ceremony and other community contexts) and in mixed media works and installations meant for public spaces and art institutions. Her work addresses the boundaries she acknowledges and seeks to create in her own practice. Committed to community cultural practice as well as making space within international art venues for Indigenous knowledge and values, she truly explores the border zones between these arenas and the possibilities for translation each implies.

For the exhibition, she investigates questions about the sharing and protection of cultural knowledge. Referencing the permanent installation of bentwood storage boxes in MOA’s Great Hall, she has created an installation of glass boxes whose etched and photographic images become most visible from the inside, rather than on the surface alone.

When asked by the curator how she would describe Wanx’id: to hide, to be hidden in terms of a question it asks, Marianne answered, “What do you see? Look deeper…"