Swiss museum exhibit features 1820s Mtis saddle alongside modern beaded items

A Mtissaddle from the early 1800s is at the centre of an exhibit that opened last month at a Swiss museum, along withcontemporary beadwork created by other Red RiverMtis artists.

Earlier this year, David Heinrichs visited the saddle at the Cantonal Museum of Archaeology and History in Lausanne, Switzerland, when he wasdelivering the piece he made for the exhibit, called Autobiography of a Mtis saddle.

"When we walked into the room where [the saddle] was, I got chills in a way that I wasn't expecting," said Heinrichs.

"It wasn't until that evening when I was back at the hotel that I was kind of reflecting on why I was more emotional than I normally am, and I realized [the saddle] was so far from home.It's been potentially 200 years since a Mtis person has interacted with that piece and seen it."

How the saddle made its way to Switzerland is unknownbut it is believed to have been givenor sold to a Swiss settler in the Red River settlement in the early 1800s.

At that time Europeans were being recruited to move to the settlement.

"The Earl of Selkirk had an agent working for himrecruiting Swiss settlerswho I must say had no idea what they were getting into," said Sherry FarrellRacette, a Mtis art specialist from the University of Regina who worked on the exhibit.

Swiss settlers landed in York Factory, Man. in the early 1820s, and in a few years most of them had left, mostly travelling south to the United States.

"[The saddle] was collected in 1820, so it's really old there's a lot of wool fabric on it, and the moths had kind of a heyday," said FarrellRacette.

The saddle isone of the oldest examples of a Mtis pad saddleand it's likely the best preserved.

"There's actually only three of them that I'm aware of that are in that particular style, and it's really exciting because it has so much provenance," said FarrellRacette.

She saidthe others are in museums in St. Louis, Mo.,and New York.

What makes this saddleunique is the materials usedand the design.

"The early First Nations saddles tended to be chunks of buffalo hide and [they] also had larger saddles that were made out of wood that were quite structural," said FarrellRacette.

But this style of pad saddle, she says, was uniquely Mtis until it came into popularity in the 1850s.

FarrellRacette said the beadwork design was influenced byFirst Nations beaders living near the settlement.

"Most of the motifs were geometric, very influenced from the Cree grandmothers that came down from the Bay and settled in the Red River settlement," said FarrellRacette.

"Most of the saddles and there's an abundance of them are quill work rosettes, but these ones are cloth rosettes."

Before floral designs

Today, Mtis beadwork is known for its distinctive floral patternsbut the saddle in Switzerlandshows that it wasn't always that way.

"[The saddle is] such an early example of our beadwork that it's kind of like before our beadwork became really floral," said Heinrichs.

The saddle has four red and black rosettes on itand attached to themis a red and black diamond.

He saidover timepatterns morphed into the florals now synonymous with Mtis beadwork.

"You can see how eventually that rosette starts to turn into a flower and that diamond shape starts to become a leaf," said Heinrichs.

He saida pillow on display at the Seven Oaks House Museumin Winnipeg shows transformation in Mtis floral designs, and was his inspiration for what he created for the exhibit.

"Seeing that flower and how it kind of moved along and transformed, I included [it] in a wall pocket with some of the other flowers and leaves inspired by that pillow," said Heinrichs.

He saida wall pocket is exactly as it sounds.

"It's just a little pocket that could then be hung on a wall," said Heinrichs.

Modern spins

When FarrellRacette reached out to Manitoba beaders to contribute to the exhibit, she wanted modern pieces that drew inspiration from the saddle.

"[The pieces] really are in dialogue with the saddle and they're very much contemporary Red River Mtis folks," said FarrellRacette.

Winnipeg artist Jennine Krauchi, known for making elaborate three dimensional beaded artwork, created a purse.

"It was as if you took that saddle and kind of folded it into a little purse and put a little handle on it,"said FarrellRacette.

Other artists, FarrellRacette said, took a more cheeky approach to their designs.

"Vi Houssin decided to have fun, so she took one look at the saddle and these circles with fringe coming out, and she just went 'pasties,'" said FarrellRacette.

"So I'm like, well, they're going to find out all about Mtis humour."

Heinrichs saidwhen he and FarrellRacette got to lay all the new beadwork next to the saddle, it was a special momentthat bridged Mtis beadworkcreated centuries apart.

"To lay them out together not behind glass or anything like that, just kind of have them visiting," said Heinrichs.

The exhibit runs until April 13, 2025.