This Ojibwe artist recruited 120 people to help paint a mural at an Ontario university
Another interactive painting session is scheduled for next month
A new mural that celebrates Indigenous art and culture is currently in the works for the library at Wilfrid Laurier University's Waterloo, Ont., campus.
On Thursday, a group of 120 people volunteered to help paint the mural which was created by Ojibwe artist Mike Cywink, who grew up on Whitefish River First Nation, south of Espanola, Ont., where he is a member.
"There is a lot of representative pieces within it," Cywink said of the symbolism in his design.
"I have three different bear cubs and behind them are seven trees. Those seven trees represent the the seven generations," he said.
"We have an elder kind of passing on some some some teachings to a youth and they're feeding those bears some blueberries. Blueberries are considered one of our traditional medicines."
The mural also features Turtle Island, the Dish with One Spoon and other symbols like eagles, strawberries and geese.
'Using art to build community'
Darren Thomas, Laurier's associate vice president of Indigenous initiatives, said the mural is meant to be a meaningful step toward community building and reconciliation.
"The idea of using art to build community is such a tremendous idea and to centre Indigenous placemaking as part of that is really helping to demonstrate beyond preformative actions like land acknowledgements to this massive mural that's going to go on our library tower," Thomas said.
He said community involvement is a huge part of the project.
"The vision and hope for this wasn't just to commission an artist to do the design and the whole project itself. It was always the intent of building community," he said.
"Reconciliation is about building relationships and so bringing folks together that can have these kind of conversations and bringing their spirit and their energy to life through art is a real victory for this project."
The second half of the mural will be painted by another team of volunteers next month. The finished mural will be 40 feet by 16 feet and it will be unveiled in September.
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