Wearable art by Métis designer from Sask. spotted at Indigenous talks with Pope in Rome

A Métis-Ukrainian visual artist from Saskatchewan is elated to see photos of her wearable art — a deep periwinkle blue cape adorned with flowers and leaves — worn by a member of the Métis delegation involved in talks with the Pope in Rome this week

Regina-based Melanie Monique Rose said the Métis Nation-Saskatchewan commissioned the piece as a retirement gift for Louise Simard, its government's former chief administrative officer.

Simard told Rose last year that she intended to wear it to Rome when delegations of Indigenous people from Canada sought a papal apology for church-run residential schools. That trip was postponed in December 2021 due to rising COVID-19 cases and later rescheduled for March.

Since then, Rose had forgotten about it until she saw photos of Simard wrapped in the wool cape decorated with vines and colourful, stylized flowers created with barbed needles using a technique called felting.

 "Louise Simard is definitely a matriarch that is someone that I would look up to," said Rose.

"Her deciding, 'Okay, I'm going to get my [time] in front of the Pope and this is what I'm going to wear,' is emotional."

The cape is called Solstice Star Bird but she calls it her flower child, as she does other artworks. 

She said the process of needle felting is very slow and meditative and she often spends the time listening to stories. Rose said the loving and healing energy she experiences during the process is stitched into her artwork.

Rose's artwork is informed by her Métis-Ukrainian upbringing including felting wool blankets.

She said she was honoured when the MN-S commissioned the piece. 

"Definitely having that community support me felt amazing," Rose said.

In an emailed statement, a spokesperson from MN-S said, "It is an important part of the visit that the Pope understand complexity and history of Métis culture, and the cape by Melanie Monique Rose that Louise Simard is wearing is an expression of this."

Simard was sent to the Vatican as one of the eight members of the Metis National Council's delegation.

LISTEN | Metis National Council President says Pope did not offer apology for Catholic-run residential schools

Pope Francis listened to three Métis survivors of residential schools at the Vatican on Monday.

"Our survivors did an incredible job in that meeting of standing up and telling their truths. They were so brave and so courageous, and we wanted to make sure we elevated their voices, and that's exactly what we did today," said Métis National Council president Cassidy Caron.

The Pope didn't offer an apology for the abuses that Indigenous children endured while at Catholic-run, government-funded schools, Caron said, but did talk about "truth, justice and healing."