Tom Wilson Tehoháhake. Photograph by Gary Furniss. Reproduced from Mohawk Warriors, Hunters & Chiefs: The Art of Tom Wilson Tehoháhake | Kanien’kehá:ka Ronterí:ios, Rontó:rats & Rotiiá:ner: Ne Tom Wilson Tehoháhake rononionniánion by permission of Goose Lane Editions.
Painting his way home: Tom Wilson reckons with his past in art book ‘Mohawk Warriors, Hunters and Chiefs’
The Hamilton musician, storyteller and visual artist discovered he was adopted — and Mohawk — when he was 53. His new book features how, in his painting, he explores his Indigenous identity in order to find a way home.
Tom Wilson Tehoháhake. Photograph by Gary Furniss. Reproduced from Mohawk Warriors, Hunters & Chiefs: The Art of Tom Wilson Tehoháhake | Kanien’kehá:ka Ronterí:ios, Rontó:rats & Rotiiá:ner: Ne Tom Wilson Tehoháhake rononionniánion by permission of Goose Lane Editions.
Tom Wilson discovered, at 53 years of age, that he was adopted and, not only that, he had Mohawk heritage, which had been kept from him. You might know the Hamilton musician and storyteller from any number of his artistic persona: as a musician in the bands Junkhouse, Blackie and the Rodeo Kings and Lee Harvey Osmond; as the author of his memoir ”Beautiful Scars;” or as a painter. In this medium, in particular, he explores and expresses his Indigenous identity, as a way of linking to his past and calling out the injustices Indigenous peoples have experienced in this country. His new book,“Mohawk Warriors, Hunters & Chiefs: The Art of Tom Wilson Tehoháhake,” features his art as Wilson reckons with what it means to be removed from — and then reconnected with — one’s cultural heritage, focusing on the way art is helping him rediscover his roots and find a passage back from where he came.
My real name is Thomas George Lazare,Tehoháhake. I come from a family of Mohawk Chiefs and warriors, peacemakers and peacekeepers, lacrosse magicians and tobaccosalesmen, shamans and shit disturbers,hustlersand survivors. Ididn’tgrow up in Kahnawake. Instead, I grew up in Hamilton, Ontario.I’ma living, breathing lie and an embarrassment. A married man’s mistake and a young girl’s only chance to change the direction of her life and hop a fence to get out of town. I was left off in a white world. I roamed among the settlers in the east Mountain wearing a disguise handed to me when I was too young, unaware that I was wearing it. The Mohawk had been wiped clean from me. With every colour I spread across a surface, I get closer to finding myself.I’mtaking off that colonial disguise.
The truth of who I am was kept from me, but it groaned in agony from inside the walls of my childhood home. The truth, that constant seeker with the tenacity of a travellingsalesman, never came knocking and never made its heavy-hearted delivery to me. The truth was a no-show. It robbed me of my golden heart.
I remember when I was small, the truth was whispered around my kitchen table. I hid under there, collecting clues from the adults. Down in the darkness,I’dhear them shuffling cards, breaking open packs of smokes and the tops of bottles.
Their voices would rise from hushed tones to full skin-poppin’ laughter as the level of the bottles went down. Their conversations took me at the speed of my imagination to the land of my missing family, although Ididn’tknow that at the time.
I heard fantastic stories filled with names that belonged to gangsters and ghosts, Skywalkers and monster slayers. Incredible tales about hoofed women and men who turned into dogs, and burning souls on telephone wires, and the fog coming off the seaway, the bridges, speeding trains, and the shadows that passed below …
Later,I’dlie in my bed with their stories in my head, taking me to times and places I knew were real. I closed my eyes and cruised over the treetops, swooping down the dirt roads below.I’dwalk to the rhythm of broken chains with all the reserve dogs barking behind me as I passed through the deepest blues and greens. Colours alive likeI’dnever seen before.I’dsee the fires of ancestors burning in the distance across the graveyards, andI’dstep into the black shadows cast over the land by the great bridge.
This place they talked about in the remaining hours of the day around the kitchen table took me there. Got me to a place where I thought I was supposed to be. A place where even the ghosts were set free. I was determined to find my way back to that other world, the living mystery. So, I kept looking for an opening, a passage back.
Text and images reproduced from “Mohawk Warriors, Hunters & Chiefs: The Art of Tom Wilson Tehoháhake | Kanien’kehá:ka Ronterí:ios, Rontó:rats & Rotiiá:ner: Ne Tom Wilson Tehoháhake rononionniánion” by permission of Goose Lane Editions.
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