Shelley Niro: 500 Year Itch

by Melissa Bennett, Greg Hill, David W. Penney

Shelley Niro is widely known for her ability to explore Traditional Stories, transgress boundaries, and embody the ethos of her matriarchal culture. A member of the Kanyen’kehaka (Mohawk) Nation, she uses a wide variety of media, including photography, installation, film, and painting to bring greater visibility to Indigenous women and girls. Pushing the limits of photography, Niro incorporates imagery from Traditional Stories to focus on contemporary subjects with wit, irony, and parody. Throughout her work — in her portraiture, sculptures, landscape paintings, photography, and film and video work — Niro challenges common preconceptions about gender, culture, and Indigenous Peoples. Shelley 500 Year Itch brings together 215 reproductions from Niro’s expansive oeuvre, including work published here for the first time. Also included in this career retrospective are three major essays about Niro’s work by Melissa Bennett, Greg Hill, and David W. Penney, as well as texts from seven guest artists, scholars, and curators. Shelley 500 Year Itch accompanies an international touring exhibition organized by the Art Gallery of Hamilton and the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian with the collaboration of the National Gallery of Canada.

304 pages, Hardcover

Published June 6, 2023

Reviews

[shems · Rating 3 out of 5]

wish the essays went in a more in-depth analysis

[LaLa · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an incredible body of work. What an incredible artist.