ESTEVAN — Cree-Métis artist Geanna Dunbar's two-week residency at the Estevan Art Gallery came to an end with a meet and greet on Friday.
A few dozen people stopped by the gallery to see Reconcil-onialism – a new mural created during the residency and dedicated to the exploration of the idea of reconciliation.
"With reconciliation, it's messy. There's no path to it. It's very hard to even feel like you are an ally; at times you feel helpless, at times you feel like nothing you do works, and it's just step by step in your community first. Reconciliation could be entering spaces by letting Indigenous folks come into spaces to practise their culture, giving them space for storytelling and doing anything small that can bring back traditional teachings," Dunbar said.
"With this residency, I wanted to represent where we are now and what it could look like in the future, show what's it like growing up as an Indigenous person in the 21st century with what we know from the past, what we've been going through over the last decade or so, and what we still are fighting for today.
"And I also wanted to show what it would feel like if we were able to do reconciliation, where we get to demolish those walls that keep us from our natural vibrations. That's the reason why I did the two sides.
"And I wanted to represent women because women are harmed, left and right. As Indigenous women we go missing, we're part of domestic abuse, suicides. And I wanted to have the men on the other side, because with all the community work and volunteering I do, I see spaces that are filling up with volunteers and the majority are Indigenous women ... So, I wanted to really represent that we need men to stand up and take that stand as well, and that we can't have any of it without us coming together."
