Chiguer art contemporain is pleased to present The Registry, a solo exhibition by Tim Moore. The title refers to the history of Métis Scrip certificates and the bureaucratic systems that were used to define Métis identity. It evokes the ways in which Métis citizenship and belonging were traced through ancestral records, raising questions about identity, lineage, and the authority granted to official documents.
At the heart of the exhibition, the Eraser series brings together wall-based and sculptural works in which the eraser becomes a significant symbol. Carved in wood and stamped with numbers, these works refer to the certificates issued to Métis populations during the creation of Manitoba in 1870. Under the Manitoba Act, numerous families were promised land, but the system was marked by fraud, contributing to the mass dispossession of Métis lands and their erasure in favour of commercial development.
In Tim Moore’s work, the notion of erasure also evokes colonial policies that contributed to the marginalization of Métis identity and weakened the transmission of culture and history from one generation to the next. This dimension resonates particularly strongly with Moore’s family history: his grandfather was sent to a residential school at the age of seven and never returned to his parents. In this context, Moore’s erasers evoke both what was intentionally erased and what had to be concealed in order to survive.
The series on view thus explores the traces left by these processes of dispossession and the possibility of reconstructing a history from fragments. The objects molded, stamped, and assembled by Moore become remnants of both a family and collective history.
