Nisayenyiminaan [nih-sa-YAY-nim-i-NAHN] Our Older Brother
In healthy ecosystems, animal and plant communities are in balance, each living being playing a role in maintaining the web of life.
Red Lake Ojibwe artist Jonathan Thunder explores themes of ecological balance (and imbalance) vis-à-vis the upside-down world of concentrating deer in pens where too many become sick with chronic wasting disease, some ultimately escaping into the wild, infecting free-ranging deer.
Framed within an arch, Ma’iingan appears simultaneously within a target, and within a halo—a duality that wolves live and die within the Ojibwe Ceded Territory and beyond.
Aandeg—the Crow—is closely connected with Ma’iingan—four-legged and winged beings operating in tandem to service the ecological needs of wild lands.
The poster title, Nisayenyiminaan, comes by way of Lac Courte Oreilles (LCO) elder Dennis White, an instructor at LCO Ojibwe College. Drawing from Wenabozhoo stories, White sees Ma’iingan as Our Older Brother, Nisayenyiminaan, a relative Anishinaabe people look to as a teacher and companion.
