Here On Future Earth
Here on Future Earth is a series of photographs by Joi Arcand that replaced English signage with Cree syllabics. Arcand is a photographer and sculptor from the Muskeg Lake Cree Nation, Saskatchewan, Treaty 6 Territory, currently residing in Ottawa, Ontario. The edited images aim to document the “alternative present,” highlighting the impactful role of words, letterforms, and glyphs on the visual landscape.
Through her photography series, Arcand explores the impact of typography and language on the visual landscape. As mentioned in an interview with Canadian Art, she uses color as a “signifier of nostalgia,” asking the viewer to” think back on a future past.”While she is picturing a future reality where Cree syllabics and Indigenous languages are used freely throughout society, she imagines it through the retrospective lens of a society that perhaps never dealt with the erasure from colonialism.
