Students explore past through art
Kainai High School students are the stars of their own exhibition at the Galt Museum, which features their personal responses to Canada’s 150th birthday in relation to Blackfoot culture.
Kiipaitapiiyssinnooni: Our Way of Life and Our History opened on Sunday with a celebration for KHS artists and their special guests.
The exhibition is a collaborative effort between Galt Curator Aimee Benoit, guest curator Rob First Charger, and the Kainai High School students under the instruction of Delia Crosschild, their English and Art teacher. Former Galt curator Wendy Aitkens was also involved before she retired earlier this year.
The curators approached the school last November about creating an exhibition that celebrates Indigenous culture and perspectives in response to Canada’s 150th birthday.
“What does that mean to you as First Nations students? This was the question I was posing to them,” said Crosschild. “We had an array of discussions and ideas.”
About 30 students participated from Kainai High School and 18 works of art are now on display. Beside each original piece, the artist has written a personal statement explaining their thoughts behind their work.
“It was so wonderful watching them, to look at their artwork and keep going with it,” said Crosschild. “And then to have a statement that reflects their ideas and what their experience has been as a First Nations student, what it’s like to grow up on the Blood Reserve, and in the surrounding communities what were the influences in their lives?”
While Canada is celebrating its 150th year as a country, the land itself and its relationship with Indigenous people goes back much further. It is this understanding and how relationships have shaped Indigenous history that Crosschild wanted her students to explore.
Much of their experience in school has been the integration of culture and the integration of language, she said.
“I’ve always believed as a parent, as a grandparent, as part of the community, and part of the Treaty 7 area, is that it’s so important for our students to feel good about who they are, know their people, and know where they come from,” said Crosschild. “To know their connection to the land, understand why there is a big gap that exists in the education of their years and what has happened. And trying to understand why things are the way they are because then you’re able to understand where you sit in all of this and that this is a part of you. This is a part of your people’s history.”
“Native history is Canada’s history,” she continued. “And for a long time being raised and going to school in the nearby towns you never learned Native history in Canadian history books. A lot of that, I think, has created a lot of misinformed people out there.”
Many Canadians, for example, still don’t know much about the governmentsponsored residential schools, where about 150,000 Indigenous children were taken from their families and forced to assimilate to EuroCanadian culture.
That gap in mainstream education has led to misunderstanding and racist attitudes, Crosschild said.
“Why do they have to experience that in a country where their ancestors were the first people here? You get into a lot of those conversations, but a lot of it is bringing light to the conversations that need to happen.”
Kiipaitapiiyssinnooni: Our Way of Life and Our History runs until Sept. 17 in the lower level gallery.