Fallon Simard

Fallon Simard is an Anishinaabe-Métis multimedia artist, scholar, and policy research consultant from Couchiching First Nation from the Grand Council of Treaty 3 Territory. Simard's work ranges from memes and visual art to video, sound, and animation pieces, work that "captures the conflicts created by colonialism, land, politics, and capitalism".^[1] He holds a BFA from York University and an MA from the Interdisciplinary Art, Media, and Design Program from OCAD University.

Life and Work

Fallon Simard is an Anishinaabe-Métis interdisciplinary artist from Couchiching First Nation from the Grand Council of Treaty 3 Territory. Fallon completed a Master of Arts from the Interdisciplinary Master's in Art, Media, and Design Program from OCAD University ^[2]. While attending OCAD, Fallon published Bodies that Monetize, a multimedia thesis presentation that “investigates the harms caused to Indigenous bodies and how they address such harms in the Canadian state”, and zeroes in on the TransCanada Mainline in this process. Simard’s way of “resisting this violence includes making memes to utilize their ability to display the intangible and detongue the unspeakable.” ^[3] Working with various media such as video, sound, animation, and memes, Simard guides his artistic and research endeavors with three questions: “ ‘How is a state of grief embodied?’; ‘How is burden and purpose engaged within the Indigenous-Canadian consciousness?’; and ‘Where and what are the threats to the relationship between Indigenous Nations and Canadian-Colonial Governments?’”^[4]. Using Anishinaabe history, cosmology, and epistemologies, Simard is able to explore and answer these questions. Fallon's pieces can be described as experimental and abstract,^[5] as they expose the intense realities of Indigenous peoples in Canada, covering topics such as trauma, land rights, and resistance to a colonial, heteronormative government. There are eleven compositions listed on Simard’s website, with the earliest published in 2011 and the most recent in 2019. Simard's OCAD publication Bodies that Monetize is included on the website and was published in 2017.

Additionally, Simard helps to create policy recommendations for legislatures, services, programs, and organizations focused on human rights and justice for Two-Spirit, Queer, and Trans Indigenous people. Simard also facilitates meme, video, and Two-Spirit LGBTQQIA workshops.^[1]

Works and Publications

Loner Culture (2018) curated by Lindsay Nixon^[2]
End Violence Against Trans Women (2018) for This Magazine^[6]
Been Here So Long (2018) with jes sachse^[7]
IndigiQueer Workshops & Toronto Queer Film Festival (2018)^[8]
Over Researched and Underinvested - Memes Series (2018)^[9]
Bodies that Monetize (2017) - Thesis and exhibition^[10]
Carbon Tax (2017) video^[11]
Womb (2016) video^[12]
Terra Nullius 2000 (2016) video^[13]
Mercury Poisoning (2016)^[14]
Land Becomes Ghost (2016) video^[15]
Connected to Air (2016) video^[16]
Continuous Resistance Remix (2013) video^[17]
Stay Contrary (2018)^[18]
Prayers for Dreamy Boys (2019)^[19]

Collaborations

Fallon Simard has been a part of several artistic collaborations. In 2018, he collaborated with artist, writer, and curator jes sachse on the exhibition Been Here So Long,^[7] on view between January 27, 2018, and April 8, 2018. The exhibition explored "strategies for PTSD and continuance in the struggle of survival".^[7]

Fallon Simard collaborated with artists Thirza Cuthand and Kite (artist) on the exhibition Loner Culture,^[2] which opened in September of 2018. In this exhibition, the artists filled a shared bedroom, representative of the spaces in which artists create their work.^[2] The exhibition was curated by Lindsay Nixon and presented by InterAccess.

In addition, Simard created a variety of visual works as part of a collection entitled End Violence Against Trans Women in September 2018, alongside other artworks and prose by several trans and queer Indigenous creatives, featured in the award-winning This Magazine. ^[6]

Between October 5, 2018, and November 25, 2018, the exhibition On Being Illiberal was presented at the Prefix Institute of Contemporary Art in association with the imagineNATIVE Film and Media Arts Festival. On Being Illiberal was a collaboration between Fallon Simard, Merritt Johnson and Carl Beam, and curated by Suzanne Morrissette. The exhibit proposed "an alternative narrative, one that challenges these perspectives and suggests other possible Indigenous-led futures".^[20]

Awards and Recognition

Simard's audiovisual material and films have been screened at multiple festivals and forums, including the Asinabka Film and Media Arts Festival, One Flaming Arrow: Intertribal Art, Music and Film Festival, Appropriate This! Critical Ethnic Studies Association Conference, and the Toronto Experimental Underground Film Screening.^[20]

As for industry recognition, Simard has been featured in a number of online media and magazines, such as This Magazine^[6], Canadian Art (magazine) ^[5], Esse arts + opinions contemporary art magazine^[21], as well as in physical exhibits on view at the Art Gallery of Peterborough^[7], at the Bi Arts Festival's Shapeshifters exhibition at Beaver Hall Gallery ^[22], and at InterAccess gallery in Toronto, Ontario. ^[2]

References

This article "Fallon Simard" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Fallon Simard. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.

[Main-1] 1.0 ^1.1 https://www.fallonsimard.com/

[LonerCulture2018-2] 2.0 ^2.1 ^2.2 ^2.3 ^2.4 https://interaccess.org/exhibition/loner-culture

[3] ttps://ocad.academia.edu/FallonSimard

[Works-4] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/works

[CadArt-5] 5.0 ^5.1 https://canadianart.ca/reviews/fallon-simard/

[ThisMag2018-6] 6.0 ^6.1 ^6.2 . "https://this.org/2018/09/04/end-violence-against-trans-women/

[BeenHere2018-7] 7.0 ^7.1 ^7.2 ^7.3 https://agp.on.ca/exhibitions/fallon-simard-jes-sachse-long/

[8] ttps://torontoqueerfilmfest.com/tqff-2-spirit-indigiqueer-trans-video-workshop-for-beginners/

[9] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/drawings

[10] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/bodies-that-monetize

[11] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/copy-of-videos-1

[12] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/copy-of-carbon-tax

[13] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/copy-of-womb

[14] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/copy-of-land-becomes-ghost

[15] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/copy-of-videos

[16] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/films

[17] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/on-being-illiberal

[18] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/been-here-so-long

[19] ttps://www.fallonsimard.com/prayers-for-dreamy-boys

[OnBeing2013-20] 20.0 ^20.1 http://www.prefix.ca/exhibitions/on-being-illiberal/

[21] ttps://esse.ca/en/fallon-simard

[22] ttps://disabilityarts.online/magazine/showcase/silence-and-money-fallon-simards-memes-of-two-spirit/

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