The Four Continents

Book Design

The Four Continents presents in full, with gatefolds, the large-scale works that comprise Kent Monkman’s suite of paintings entitled The Four Continents, a reworking of Tiepolo’s Apollo and the Four Continents.

Monkman’s works examine the way Indigenous American and Canadian history has been presented by nineteenth- and twentieth-century artists. He constructs new stories through images that take into account the missing narratives and perspectives of Aboriginal peoples resulting in a series of tragicomic scenarios that are mythical, graphic, satirical and inherently anti-colonialist. Many feature strong queer or gay male imagery, which has always been a part of Aboriginal culture due to "two-spirit" Indigenous sexualities, yet has rarely been acknowledged as such.