This MMFA exhibition
revisits our History

Kent Monkman’s landmark retrospective celebrating Indigenous voices

September 23, 2025

A highlight of Montréal’s cultural season, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) presents the Canadian premiere of Kent Monkman: History Is Painted by the Victors. The exhibition, one of the most ambitious ever dedicated to the artist, brings together nearly 40 monumental canvases—works that impress not only by their scale, but above all by their power to rewrite and challenge the narratives of History.

Through a bold and subversive lens, Kent Monkman revisits history painting, transforming it into a critical tool. By deconstructing colonial narratives, he opens a striking dialogue between past and present, inviting visitors to reconsider their relationship with History.

The exhibition, one of the most ambitious ever dedicated to the artist, brings together nearly 40 monumental canvases.

What makes the selection remarkable is both its scope and diversity: prestigious loans from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art, major Canadian and American institutions, private collectors, as well as works from the MMFA’s own collection. It is a rare opportunity to fully immerse oneself in the artist’s expansive and vibrant universe, all in one place.

Kent Monkman (1965-), mistikôsiwak (Wooden Boat People): Welcoming the Newcomers, 2019 • The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

History Is Painted by the Victors pays tribute to the peoples and territories at the origin of Turtle Island, the Indigenous name for North America. Drawing on the legacy of history painting, as defined in the 17th century by the French Royal Academy of Painting, Monkman subverts and reinvents this classical pictorial language through flamboyant imagination and sharp humour.

‘The works are spectacular in scale but above all striking in their ability to rewrite and challenge historical narratives.’

On his monumental canvases, precise details and dramatic intensity blend with touches of irony, with a clear goal: to restore to the narrative figures who have long been erased, namely those from Indigenous and queer communities. His work, epic in scope, moves from scenes of violence and oppression to moments of memory, pride, and celebration.

Kent Monkman (1965-), mistikôsiwak (Wooden Boat People): Resurgence of the People, 2019. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

As the artist points out: “The Montréal Museum was one of the first to support my work, acquiring my painting Trappers of Men in 2006. Presenting a mid-career retrospective in Montréal today, covering over twenty years of creation, feels like a homecoming, even though I’ve never lived here. It’s a meaningful recognition in a city that has accompanied and supported my artistic journey.”

‘[Monkman]’s work, epic in scope, moves from scenes of violence and oppression to moments of memory, pride, and celebration.’

The exhibition also marks a historic milestone for the MMFA. For the first time, the Museum is dedicating a major exhibition to a living Indigenous artist, presented in the Michal and Renata Hornstein Pavilion. Léuli Eshrāghi, Curator of Indigenous Practices and co-curator of the exhibition, underlines its significance: “The stories Monkman tells offer crucial insights into contemporary realities for Indigenous peoples, while questioning dominant culture and society as a whole.”

Organized in collaboration with the Denver Art Museum, the exhibition is co‑curated by Léuli Eshrāghi, Curator of Indigenous Practices at the MMFA, and John Lukavic, Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Native Arts at the Denver Art Museum.

About Kent Monkman

Kent Monkman stands out today as one of the most powerful voices on the contemporary art scene. Through his monumental canvases, he brilliantly subverts the conventions of history painting to bring back narratives and identities that official histories have long erased: those of Indigenous peoples and queer communities.

The artist’s universe combines allegory, metaphor, and precise art historical references, all handled with irony and sharp critical insight, to deconstruct dominant colonial narratives. Yet Monkman’s work is not just about rewriting the past—it also challenges us in the present, prompting reflection on the stories we tell and how they shape identity and society. Blending humour, pain, and celebration, his spectacular visual language is both unsettling and captivating. In this way, Monkman succeeds in fostering a vital dialogue between memory, resistance, and imagination, blurring the lines between classical heritage and contemporary approaches.

Kent Monkman
History Is Painted by the Victors

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts
September 27, 2025 – March 8, 2026

Header images: Courtesy of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts

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