Gail Tremblay

{{Infobox artist

| name = Gail Tremblay

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| birth_date = {{birth date|1945|12|15|mf=y}}Vigil, Jennifer C. [http://www.iaia.edu/museum/vision-project/artists/gail-tremblay/ "Gail Tremblay."] Museum of Contemporary Native Arts: Vision Project. (retrieved 10 May 2011)

| birth_place = Buffalo, New York, United States

| death_date = {{death date and age|2023|05|03|1945|12|15}}

| death_place = Olympia, Washington, United States

| nationality = American

| known_for = Installation art, basket weaving, poetry

| training = BA University of New Hampshire, MFA University of Oregon

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Gail Tremblay (December 15, 1945 – May 3, 2023{{Cite web |last=Yeahpau |first=Mandy |date=2023-07-11 |title=Remembering visual artist and writer Gail Tremblay (Mi'kmaq and Onondaga) |url=https://www.nativeartsandcultures.org/remembering_gail_tremblay |access-date=2023-08-03 |website=Native Arts and Cultures Foundation |language=en-US |archive-date=2023-08-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230803161408/https://www.nativeartsandcultures.org/remembering_gail_tremblay |url-status=dead }}) was an American writer and artist from Washington State. She is known for weaving baskets from film footage that depicts Native American people, such as Western movies and anthropological documentaries. She received a Washington State Governor's Arts and Heritage Award in 2001.{{Cite web |title=Artist Collection |url=https://www.arts.wa.gov/artist-collection/ |access-date=2021-05-14 |website=ArtsWA |language=en-US}}

Background

Tremblay was born on December 15, 1945, in Buffalo, New York. She claimed her father was of Mi'kmaq and Onondaga ancestry,{{cite web |title=Gail Tremblay |url=https://artisttrust.org/artists/gail-tremblay/ |website=Artist Trust |access-date=25 April 2023}} and that her great-grandfather once lived in Kahnawake near Montreal. She never offered any documentation of this and the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Indian Arts and Crafts Board determined that she was not Indigenous after a thorough investigation of her claims.{{cite web |title=Gail Trembley |url=https://www.arts.wa.gov/artist-collection/?request=record;id=4806;type=701 |website=Arts WA |publisher=Washington State Arts Commission |quote=For approximately forty years, Tremblay claimed the lineage of the Onondaga, Mi’kmaq, and Mohawk (St. Regis) Nations. Before her death, the U.S. Department of the Interior’s Indian Arts and Crafts Board began an investigation into her claims. With the support of the Nations noted, as well as genealogical research, they determined that Tremblay was not Indigenous. |access-date=8 December 2024}}{{cite web |date=2022-12-05 |title=Daybreakstar Interview with Gail Tremblay |url=https://daybreakstarradio.com/2022/12/gail-tremblay-interview/ |access-date=5 December 2022 |website=Daybreakstar Radio |publisher=United Indians of All Tribes Foundation}} Her father was Roland G. Tremblay (1917–2013), who was born in Somersworth, New Hampshire, to Peter Tremblay and Bernadette Demers Tremblay.{{cite web |title=Obituary |url=https://www.taskerfuneralservice.com/obituaries/Dr-Roland-G-Tremblay?obId=22044353 |website=Tasker Funeral Service |access-date=12 September 2023}}

Gail Tremblay received her BA in theater in 1967 from the University of New Hampshire and an MFA in English (Creative Writing) from the University of Oregon, Eugene in 1969.

Writing and education career

Tremblay was a faculty member at The Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington and taught courses in English, art history, and Native American studies. She began her faculty appointment at Evergreen in 1980{{cite book |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=9eaSAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA317 |title=Native American Women: A Biographical Dictionary |date=2003 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-135-95587-8 |editor1-last=Bataille |editor1-first=Gretchen M. |page=317 |language=en |editor2-last=Lisa |editor2-first=Laurie |access-date=1 May 2020}} and taught her last class in 2018 in the newly finished fiber studio at the Longhouse.{{cite book |last= Tremblay |first= Gail |author-link= |date= October 29, 2021 |title= How I Gained the Skills to Team Teach, Was Asked to Come to Evergreen, Got to Work in the Longhouse, Sit on Its Advisory Board and Teach the First Academic Program in the Paimārire Fiber Arts Studio on the Indigenous Arts Campus |location= Artist Papers, Gail Tremblay Estate |publisher= unfinished and unpublished essay on the history of the Longhouse |pages= 36 }} She was recognized by the Poetry Foundation.{{Cite web |last=Foundation |first=Poetry |date=2023-07-05 |title=Gail Tremblay |url=https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/gail-tremblay |access-date=2023-07-06 |website=Poetry Foundation |language=en}}{{Cite web|title=Gail Tremblay on Native American Authors {{!}} ipl: Information You Can Trust|url=https://www.ipl.org/div/natam/bin/browse.pl/A175|access-date=2021-05-14|language=en-US}} Tremblay also wrote exhibition catalog essays about other artists, including, "Speaking in a Language of Vital Signs," for the 2008 exhibition catalogue, [https://uwapress.uw.edu/book/9780295988603/joe-feddersen/ Joe Feddersen: Vital Signs] at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art at Willamette University.

Visual art

File:Gail Tremblay artwork.jpg]]

Tremblay described her work as combining historical Native American techniques and materials with mainstream artistic expression.{{Cite web |url=http://www.froelickgallery.com/Artist-Detail.cfm?ArtistsID=282 |title=Froelick Gallery |access-date=2008-06-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170726145512/http://www.froelickgallery.com/Artist-Detail.cfm?ArtistsID=282 |archive-date=2017-07-26 |url-status=dead }}{{Cite web |title=Gail Tremblay {{!}} When There Is No Category for a Film in a Native American Language on Oscar Night, Clearly It Is in a League of Its Own {{!}} American |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/874932 |access-date=2023-07-06 |website=The Metropolitan Museum of Art |language=en}} Her poetry and art were inspired by the cultures of Indigenous peoples of the Northeastern Woodlands.

Tremblay says she learned basketry from her aunts, but "update[d] them for a contemporary audience" through the use of modern materials such as film stock and film leader. Tremblay's art draws from Native American history, Indigenous cosmologies, along with literature, Western movies, and other pop culture references. She created a basket using red and white film leader entitled, And Then There's the Business of Fancydancing, inspired by Sherman Alexie's film, The Business of Fancydancing (2002), in which the main character, a Spokane man, is lovers with a white man. Tremblay describes the work, saying, "I chose to use Porcupine Stitch because there are so many difficult and prickly relationships between characters in this film.”{{Cite web|title=The Arkansas Arts Center|url=https://www.incollect.com/articles/the-arkansas-arts-center|access-date=2021-04-23|website=InCollect|language=en}} The film influence on her baskets also includes When will the Red Leader Overshadow Images of the 19th Century Noble Savage in Hollywood Films that Some Think are Sympathetic to American Indians (2018), a basket woven using 35mm movie film from the movie Windwalker (1981), which was acquired by the Smithsonian American Art Museum in 2021.{{cite web |title=When will the Red Leader Overshadow Images of the 19th Century Noble Savage in Hollywood Films that Some Think are Sympathetic to American Indians |url=https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/when-will-red-leader-overshadow-images-19th-century-noble-savage-hollywood-films-some-think |website=SAAM |publisher=Smithsonian American Art Museum |access-date=14 May 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220514180757/https://americanart.si.edu/artwork/when-will-red-leader-overshadow-images-19th-century-noble-savage-hollywood-films-some-think |archive-date=14 May 2022 |url-status=live}}

Artweek reviewer Marcia Morse writes, “And Then There is The Hollywood Indian Princess (2002). Using the Northeastern Woodlands fancy-stick basket weaving, Tremblay wove with, not brown ash and sweetgrass used by Northeastern tribes, but recycled 16 mm leader and film on sexually transmitted diseases, elegantly subverting multiple stereotypes.”{{Cite journal |last=Morse |first=Marcia |date=2008 |title='Tattered Cultures' at the Academy Art Center |journal=Artweek |volume= 39 | issue = 9 |pages=29}}

Exhibitions

Tremblay'sy solo exhibitions and group shows include Gail Tremblay: Fiber, Metal, Wood (1988), Museum of the Plains Indian, Browning, Montana;{{cite web |title=Gail Tremblay CV |url=https://froelickgallery.com/usr/library/documents/main/artists/53/tremblaycv2022.pdf |website=Froelick Gallery |access-date=15 November 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115060909/https://froelickgallery.com/usr/library/documents/main/artists/53/tremblaycv2022.pdf |archive-date=15 November 2022 |url-status=live}} The Empty Fish Trap Installation (2004), Evergreen State College Gallery, Olympia, Washington; Gail Tremblay: Twenty Years of Making (2002), Daybreak Star Cultural Center, Seattle; Reframing Images, Conceptualizing Indigenous Art (2013), Froelick Gallery, Portland, Oregon;{{better source needed|date=June 2023}}and Art of Gail Tremblay (2017), Eastern Washington University Downtown Gallery, Cheney, Washington.{{cite web |last1=Pohl |first1=Grace |title=Eastern Washington Downtown Gallery hosts EWU Student Bazaar |url=https://www.cheneyfreepress.com/story/2017/11/09/education/eastern-washington-downtown-gallery-hosts-ewu-student-bazaar/21697.html |website=Cheney Free Press |access-date=15 November 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115060721/https://www.cheneyfreepress.com/story/2017/11/09/education/eastern-washington-downtown-gallery-hosts-ewu-student-bazaar/21697.html |archive-date=15 November 2022 |date=9 November 2017 |url-status=live}}

Works in public collections

Basket (c. 1990), Portland Art Museum, Oregon{{cite web |title=Basket |url=http://www.portlandartmuseum.us/mwebcgi/mweb.exe?request=record;id=30250;type=101 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=PAM |publisher=Portland Art Museum}}
Strawberry and Chocolate (2000), National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.{{cite web |title=Strawberry and Chocolate |url=https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/objects/NMAI_273177? |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115051708/https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/objects/NMAI_273177? |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=NMAI |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}
In the World of White Line Fever... (2001), Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, Oregon{{cite web |title=In the World of White Line Fever... |url=http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/56C84FE8-A248-4C81-B7BC-498517454145 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115050849/http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/56C84FE8-A248-4C81-B7BC-498517454145 |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=WillametteArt |publisher=Willamette University}}
And Then There is the Hollywood Indian Princess (2002), Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, Oregon{{cite web |title=And Then There is the Hollywood Indian Princess |url=http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/1DC46E79-0447-453C-90D1-234879406252 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115050751/http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/1DC46E79-0447-453C-90D1-234879406252 |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=WillametteArt |publisher=Willamette University}}
Waiting for the Return: 5 Fish Traps (2002-2003), Marian Gould Gallagher Law Library, University of Washington School of Law, Seattle (Washington State Arts Commission){{cite web |title=Contemporary Native American Art In The Gallagher Law Library |url=https://lib.law.uw.edu/services/artwalk.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115052841/https://lib.law.uw.edu/services/artwalk.html |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=UW Law |publisher=University of Washington}}
A Note to Lewis and Clark's Ghosts (2004), Hallie Ford Museum of Art, Salem, Oregon;{{cite web |title=A Note to Lewis and Clark's Ghosts |url=http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/A709FC74-47CF-4FF3-AD69-314392373282 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115050933/http://willametteart.pastperfectonline.com/Webobject/A709FC74-47CF-4FF3-AD69-314392373282 |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=WillametteArt |publisher=Willamette University}} and National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.{{cite web |title=A Note to Lewis and Clark's Ghosts |url=https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/objects/NMAI_282291? |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115051036/https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/objects/NMAI_282291? |archive-date=2022-11-15 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=NMAI |publisher=Smithsonian Institution}}
The Ghost of Salmon (2004), from Canopy End Structures (with Rick Bartow, Ken Mackintosh, and Lillian Pitt), Rosa Parks Station, TriMet, Portland, Oregon{{cite web |title=Trimet Public Art Database |url=https://publicart.trimet.org/Trimet_Argusnet_Final/portal/portal.aspx?lang=en-US |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=PublicArt.Trimet |publisher=TriMet}}
Hunting for the Red Queen on the Big Night Out (2008), Evergreen State College, Olympia, Washington (Washington State Arts Commission){{cite web |title=Hunting for the Red Queen on the Big Night out |url=https://www.arts.wa.gov/artwork/?request=record;id=12088;type=101 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115052118/https://www.arts.wa.gov/artwork/?request=record;id=12088;type=101 |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=Arts.WA}}
An Iroquois Dreams That the Tribes of the Middle East Will Take the Message of Deganawida to Heart and Make Peace (2009), Whatcom Museum, Bellingham, Washington{{cite web |date=22 March 2019 |title=Five Women Artists in the Whatcom Collection |url=https://www.whatcommuseum.org/five-women-artists-in-the-collection-gail-tremblay/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115051802/https://www.whatcommuseum.org/five-women-artists-in-the-collection-gail-tremblay/ |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=Whatcom |publisher=Whatcom Museum}}
And Then There's the Business of Fancy Dancing... (2011), Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts, Little Rock{{cite web |title=And Then There's the Business of Fancy Dancing... |url=https://collection.arkmfa.org/objects/13207/and-then-theres-the-business-of-fancy-dancing? |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115050615/https://collection.arkmfa.org/objects/13207/and-then-theres-the-business-of-fancy-dancing? |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=ArkMFA |publisher=Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts}}
In Great Expectations, There is no Red Leader (2011), Portland Art Museum, Oregon{{cite web |title=In Great Expectations, There is No Red Leader |url=http://www.portlandartmuseum.us/mwebcgi/mweb.exe?request=record;id=66806;type=101 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=PAM |publisher=Portland Art Museum}}
It Was Never About Playing Cowboys and Indians (2012), Denver Art Museum{{cite web |title=It Was Never About Playing Cowboys and Indians |url=https://www.denverartmuseum.org/en/object/2017.1 |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221115050654/https://www.denverartmuseum.org/en/object/2017.1 |archive-date=15 November 2022 |access-date=15 November 2022 |website=DAM |publisher=Denver Art Museum}}
When Ice Stretched on for Miles (2017), Brooklyn Museum, New York{{Cite web |title=Brooklyn Museum |url=https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/opencollection/objects/224454 |access-date=2023-07-09 |website=www.brooklynmuseum.org}}
When will the Red Leader Overshadow Images of the 19th Century Noble Savage in Hollywood Films that Some Think are Sympathetic to American Indians (2018), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.
When There Is No Category for a Film in a Native American Language on Oscar Night, Clearly It Is in a League of Its Own (2021), Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York{{Cite web |title=Gail Tremblay {{!}} When There Is No Category for a Film in a Native American Language on Oscar Night, Clearly It Is in a League of Its Own {{!}} American |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/874932 |access-date=2023-07-09 |website=The Metropolitan Museum of Art |language=en}}