BLAKE GOPNIK

"Indian Act," a work finished in 2002 by Nadia Myre, an Anishinaabe Canadian from the Kitigan Zibi First Nation of Quebec.

For "Indian Act," Myre took the printed pages of the law by the same name, which lays down the legal framework within which Canada's native peoples live. She and 200 friends and volunteers then covered those 56 pages with tiny glass beads in red and white -- the colors of the Canadian flag, but also of much native craft.

Some pages of the act are entirely hidden under the beading; others might only lose half or a quarter of their original text, with the rest left visible for the reading. The beadwork more or less respects the format of the original document: the red is the "page," while the white beads crawl across it in broken lines that evoke the broken lines of text in printed matter.

The beading gives some sense of a crossing out, of a denial and repudiation of the content of the act. You could see it almost as a turning back of the clock, transforming a legal document into a traditional decorative textile, and asserting the power of Indian craft over European law. But meticulously decorating the document also evokes a certain sense of respect for it. You tear up a text you hate, you don't spend vast effort making it more beautiful. There's some sense that, in their beautification, Myre and her collaborators have decided to make the Indian Act their own, for better or worse.