On top of the current EARTHFest activities and pride month, June is also National Indigenous History Month in Canada. So it feels fitting to take the opportunity to share a queer indigenous artist I’ve started following, Melcolm Beaulieu.
I came across Mel Beaulieu’s work while looking for New Brunswick artists who engage with scale and it immediately prompted the question: scale in relation to what? The default tends to be scale in relation to the body—understandably, since that’s how we physically experience the world. But that perspective is also human-centric and, in many ways, limiting.
We might also consider scale in relation to material—like the tiny seed beads Beaulieu uses in their work. While their practice doesn’t center on scale per se, the way they merge traditional beadwork with digital spaces and virtual reality adds an interesting complication to the idea I was exploring. It’s a way of thinking about physical scale within a non-physical, digital context, while also reasserting a living, contemporary Indigenous culture.
On a more immediate level, it invites us to encounter their materials differently—take, for example, the tire-sized beads in the first image of the virtual gallery. These shifts in scale open up new ways of engaging with both craft and cultural meaning.
And of course, this move between physical and digital spaces and play with transformation and perspectives is a common theme in queer art. I recommend this CBC article that digs into Beaulieu’s identity and how politics are addressed in their work as well as the video where Beaulieu speaks on the painful history of religion and colonialism in relation to their work and their own experiences.
Image 1: Virtual Reality Beadwork by Melcolm Beaulier from artist’s website
Image 2: Portrait of Melcolm Beaulier, photo from CBC article (Sam Evans/Submitted by Mel Beaulieu)
-Kate Giles
