Nigamon/Tunai – plateforme

Since 2010, Nigamon/Tunai has been a platform for artistic exchanges and collaborations between Indigenous communities in Canada and Colombia as well as between artists from these two countries.

In the spring of 2024, Nigamon/Tunai will take the stage, performed by Émilie Monnet and Waira Nina. A work-in-progress is presented on June 3-4, 2023 as part of Festival TransAmériques (Montreal).

Discover the interview given by Émilie Monnet about the creation process.

Anishnaabe/French interdisciplinary artist Emilie Monnet works with Inga sound artist and storyteller Waira Nina, from the Amazon in Colombia, to bring forth… At the intersection between performance and sound installation, the artistic development of NIGAMON/TUNAI integrates sound, voice, video, movement, theatre and light.

Emilie and Waira are inspired by their respective encounters as women from opposite territories, by their inherent knowledge of the snow and the humidity of the jungle, by their cultures and personal legacies, by the world of colors and their experiences in ceremony. Together they elaborate a body of work around the theme of the silenced song, as a response to violence against indigenous women and Mother Earth.

‘Nigamon’ and ‘tunai’ are words in Anishnabemowin and Inga for ‘song’. A full-length production is planned for 2016. Meanwhile, it is our wish that the project become a continuum for many exchanges between indigenous communities of Canada and Colombia, and for artistic collaborations between Colombian and Canadian artists, in the hope of finding innovative ways to communicate and transform.

Project history

– August 2010: Emilie Monnet’s participates in the Arte y Agua para Vivir Festival, Amazons, Colombia. Genesis of the project between Emilie and Waira.

– Oct-Dec 2011: Studio-residency with the CALQ at the National University of Colombia in Bogota, in partnership with the Colombian Ministry of Culture. Beginning of an artistic collaboration between Emilie and Waira.

– Sept 2012: Artistic workshops offered to Inga children at the Yaichaikuri School, Columbia. Visual art workshop facilitated by Anishinabe artist Glenna Matoush. Musical instruments creation workshop facilitated by Colombian artist Beto Villada.

– Feb-March 2013: Six week artistic residency in Montreal in collaboration with artists André Pappathomas (voice), Leticia Vera and Sarah Williams (movement), Dominique Leduc (theatre), Stéphane Claude (sound) and Glenna Matoush (Visual Art). Public presentation at the end.

– Jan 2014: Sound and performance workshop facilitated with Colombian artists Leonel Vasquez and Esmeralda Ramirez. Los Andes University, Bogota.
Description of the workshop

– March 2014: presentation of work-in-progress at PanAmerican Routes Festival, Toronto. Collaboration with artists Leticia Vera (movement and external eye), Brandon Valdivia & Alex McKenzie (sound), and Frances Adair McKenzie (animation & video projections).

– June-July 2014: Participation to the Encuentro Hemisferico, Montreal. Participation to the working group Sovereignty of Indigenous Aesthetics and Bodies. Three-day workshop at Oboro on collaborative interdisciplinary creation methodology for the creation of Nigamon / Tunai, in collaboration with Stéphane Claude, Leonel Vasquez and Sarah Williams. Two week artistic residency at Oboro, in collaboration with Leonel Vasquez (sound), Stéphane Claude (sound), Sarah Williams (movement and external eye) and Lucie Bazzo (lighting). Public presentation at Oboro.

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