Matrix Sneak-up- archival prints

Matrix sneak-up prints: 9×12, 12×16, 18×24

Against a black field, green code falls in cascading columns, the digital rain made famous by the film The Matrix: a world that looks like reality but is not. In front of it, an Ojibwe dancer in full regalia holds the crouched pose of the sneak-up, the moment in the men’s traditional dance when a dancer scouts for an enemy’s tracks before rising to face him.

In The Matrix, people live inside a constructed reality they have been taught to accept as truth. I draw a parallel between this idea and the reality the empire has constructed and presented to us. The histories, borders, institutions, and beliefs we have been taught to accept as truth are part of a much larger system of control. The empire has attempted to define who we are, where we belong, what our history means, and whose version of the truth deserves to be heard. It has tried to erase our identities, assimilate our people, and replace our cultures and ways of life with its own. It does not encourage free thinkers or people who question the reality placed before them. It depends on acceptance, obedience, and the silence of those whose voices challenge its authority.

But we are still here.

Despite generations of forced assimilation and every attempt to separate us from our identity, our people have retained our cultures, traditions, languages, knowledge, and ways of life. Our survival is not simply a reminder of the past; it is an ongoing act of resistance. Our cultures remain alive, even as they continue to face threats. Seen through my Ojibwe perspective, the code is not the real world. It is the illusion the empire has laid over it.

The dancer does not retreat. In the sneak-up, the dancer never moves backward, because that would mean retreat. He moves toward what he is tracking, which here is the lie itself. He is not simply watching or hiding from the enemy; he is preparing to confront it. His regalia, a living inheritance carried through generations, stands before the code as a testament to the strength, continuity, and resilience of our people. The empire may attempt to rewrite our story, but it cannot erase who we are.

Matrix Sneak Up has a companion painting, Ojibwe Matrix (oil on canvas, 36 × 36 inches, [YEAR]). There, three jingle dress dancers move through the same cascade of the empire’s code, while traditional Ojibwe symbols pulse beneath the surface, reclaiming the language of the unseen. Each dancer carries an archetype: awakening, guidance, and balance. The jingle dress tradition has deep roots in healing, and I use that connection to represent the knowledge and strength our people carry forward. Where the sneak-up dancer tracks the false reality, the jingle dress dancers embody the cultural knowledge and spiritual strength that help us navigate it.

Together, these paintings speak to resistance, ancestral knowledge, and cultural continuity across generations. They challenge us to question what we have been taught, recognize the difference between truth and the stories created by those in power, and remember that our survival is not an accident.

We are still here. We have not disappeared. And we are still dancing.

archival hahnemuhle rag paper