By Michael Joel-Hansen

History

New murals celebrate Indigenous history

Feb 19, 2019 | 8:00 AM

Work was underway Monday afternoon at the Prince Albert Historical Museum on what will be its newest exhibit.

The museum invited the community to come down Monday and help local artist, Leah Dorion, colour in murals, which will be displayed in the new Indigenous history room.

“It’s amazing we’ve had a lot of people come and contribute to the new murals,” said Dorion.

The museum has commissioned two sets of murals for the new exhibit. The work being done Monday was on the pieces showing the history of Métis people in the Prince Albert area.

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“The first themed mural is Métis traditional land use in the P.A. area, so we have all the harvesting, the berry picking, the medicine picking,” said Dorion.

Along with showing traditional land use, the first mural showcases important locations like Red Deer Hill, which according to Dorion is a piece of the land many Métis people have connections to. The second piece Dorion has drawn up focuses on the fur trade and the role Métis people played in that industry, including the river highway and the buffalo trade.

The Prince Albert Historical Museum has a number of Métis artifacts as part of its collection, from footwear, to tools that were used as part of the fur trade. Dorion’s works show these artifacts and how they were used by people during the past era.

“They [murals] really cross support what’s on the floor,” she said.

Dorion said having such a visual display adds to the educational component of the exhibit as many of the old artifacts come from a time period before cameras, so there is no visual record of the items being used.

Besides helping to provide visuals, Dorion added the kids who are coming out to help her paint are getting a different kind of learning experience.

“They’re learning through doing,” she said.

A volunteer works on one of the pieces (Michael Joel-Hansen/paNOW Staff)

Both murals were designed with input from elders and traditional knowledge keepers.

Dorion will be helped along in her work on a regular basis by a class from Queen Mary Community School, who will be helping her with cleanup and other work. The class has already helped out by doing some of the preparation work.

“There’s so much work to doing this large of a mural,” said Dorion.

One of the murals which will be displayed in the new exhibit (Michael Joel-Hansen/paNOW Staff)

(Top Photo: Leah Dorion, right, is the artist behind the two new murals at the local historical museum. Michael Joel-Hansen/paNOW Staff)

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MichaelJoel.Hansen@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @mjhskcdn