Walking With Our Sisters / Presented in partnership with Gallery 101
September 25 - October 16, 2015
Carleton University Art Gallery, 1125 Colonel By Drive
September 25 - October 16, 2015
Carleton University Art Gallery, 1125 Colonel By Drive
Over the last thirty years, more than 1180 Indigenous women, girls and Two-Spirit people have been reported missing or murdered in Canada. Many have vanished without a trace, and their cases have often been inadequately investigated, neglected or ignored.
Walking With Our Sisters is a commemorative art installation that honours and respects the lives of these women, girls and Two-Spirit people. They are sisters, mothers, aunties, daughters, cousins, grandmothers, wives and partners. They are not forgotten.
Walking With Our Sisters presents more than 1800 pairs of moccasin vamps, including children’s vamps dedicated to the memory of children who did not return from residential school, arranged on the floor in a winding path formation. Visitors remove their shoes to walk alongside the vamps, on a pathway of cloth, in symbolic acts of solidarity and respect.
The vamps (or “uppers,” as they are also called) are intentionally not sewn into moccasins in order to represent the unfinished lives of the women and children, whose lives were so tragically cut short. These vamps were created by caring and concerned individuals from across North America, who responded in overwhelming numbers to a public call issued by the Métis artist and activist Christi Belcourt, who initiated the project.
Walking With Our Sisters is a collective, collaborative, community-based memorial that creates a ceremonial public space so that people can come together to honour, to mourn, to remember, and to raise awareness.
The presentation in Ottawa of Walking With Our Sisters is supported by the WWOS Ottawa Committee and many volunteers.
Gallery 101 acknowledges a project grant from the Community Foundation of Ottawa for the presentation in Ottawa of Walking With Our Sisters. Gallery 101 is funded by the City of Ottawa, the Ontario Arts Council (an agency of the Government of Ontario), and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Carleton University Art Gallery is funded by Carleton University, the Ontario Arts Council (an agency of the Government of Ontario), and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Walking With Our Sisters is a commemorative art installation that honours and respects the lives of these women, girls and Two-Spirit people. They are sisters, mothers, aunties, daughters, cousins, grandmothers, wives and partners. They are not forgotten.
Walking With Our Sisters presents more than 1800 pairs of moccasin vamps, including children’s vamps dedicated to the memory of children who did not return from residential school, arranged on the floor in a winding path formation. Visitors remove their shoes to walk alongside the vamps, on a pathway of cloth, in symbolic acts of solidarity and respect.
The vamps (or “uppers,” as they are also called) are intentionally not sewn into moccasins in order to represent the unfinished lives of the women and children, whose lives were so tragically cut short. These vamps were created by caring and concerned individuals from across North America, who responded in overwhelming numbers to a public call issued by the Métis artist and activist Christi Belcourt, who initiated the project.
Walking With Our Sisters is a collective, collaborative, community-based memorial that creates a ceremonial public space so that people can come together to honour, to mourn, to remember, and to raise awareness.
The presentation in Ottawa of Walking With Our Sisters is supported by the WWOS Ottawa Committee and many volunteers.
Gallery 101 acknowledges a project grant from the Community Foundation of Ottawa for the presentation in Ottawa of Walking With Our Sisters. Gallery 101 is funded by the City of Ottawa, the Ontario Arts Council (an agency of the Government of Ontario), and the Canada Council for the Arts.
Carleton University Art Gallery is funded by Carleton University, the Ontario Arts Council (an agency of the Government of Ontario), and the Canada Council for the Arts.