Santee Smith is a multidisciplinary artist from the Kahnyen’kehàka Nation, Six Nations of the Grand River. She is the founder of internationally renowned Kaha:wi Dance Theatre that shares Indigenous performance and culture through embodied storytelling. Santee has been appointed as the first Indigenous woman Chancellor of McMaster University. Watch her story here: 

Rematriation is proud to share a preview of Santee’s latest work

In 2050, Onkwe’shón:’a/the people are on the edge of collapse. Yethi’nihsténha tsyonhwentsyà:te/Mother Earth moved, stretched her limbs, shook off the disease and decay. She doesn’t depend on humans…we depend on her.

Post environmental catastrophe, 6 people collide in Kahnyen’kehàka homelands in the Adirondack mountains. Escaping rising and virus-filled waters, they take refuge at a bunker camp; condoling with the land and re-aligning to the newly shifted Earth.

SKéN:NEN premiers July 2021

Learn more at: kahawidance.org

About Santee Smith

Santee Smith, Tekaronhiáhkhwa, “Picking Up The Sky”, is a multidisciplinary artist from the Kahnyen’kehàka Nation, Six Nations of the Grand River. She trained at Canada’s National Ballet School, completed Physical Education and Psychology degrees from McMaster University and a Dance MA from York University. Santee premiered her inaugural work Kaha:wi in 2004 and later founded Kaha:wi Dance Theatre which has grown into an internationally renowned company. Her body of work includes 14 productions and numerous short works and collaborations. She is a sought after teacher and speaker on Indigenous performance and culture. Through embodied storytelling and performance her work speaks to Indigenous identity and continuance. Smith is the 19^th Chancellor of McMaster University.

About Rematriation’s Indigenous Women’s Voices Series

Led by an all women team, director, Michelle Schenandoah (Oneida), producer, Katsitsionni Fox (Mohawk) and cinematographer, Marie Cecile Dietlin.

Funded by Vision Maker Media and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting