{"id":7442,"date":"2017-09-29T16:01:15","date_gmt":"2017-09-29T20:01:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsroom.carleton.ca\/?post_type=cu_story&p=7442"},"modified":"2025-10-18T16:54:02","modified_gmt":"2025-10-18T20:54:02","slug":"symbols-of-reconciliation","status":"publish","type":"cu_story","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/story\/symbols-of-reconciliation\/","title":{"rendered":"Symbols of Reconciliation"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n Symbols of Reconciliation\n <\/h1>\n \n <\/header>\n <\/div>\n\n \n <\/path>\n <\/path>\n <\/svg>\n <\/div>\n\n \n\n <\/div>\n<\/section>\n\n

When Summer-Harmony Twenish walked into the Carleton University Art Gallery last winter to join a group of students who were starting to build a birchbark canoe using traditional materials and methods, she was flooded with childhood memories of her late grandmother who had taught her how to scale fish and skin hides.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt was like stepping into my grandmother\u2019s bathroom,\u201d said Twenish, who is from the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation<\/a> about two hours north of Ottawa, recalling how her grandmother used to soak birchbark in the bathtub. \u201cThe materials around me in the gallery were like little pieces of home.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Wood shavings fall to the ground as part of the traditional methods used to build the canoe.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

For three months<\/a>, Twenish, a second-year Art History student minoring in Indigenous Studies, worked on the wigw\u00e0s chimam<\/em> with 11 other Carleton students under the guidance of Daniel \u201cPinock\u201d Smith<\/a>, an internationally-renowned Algonquin craftsman from Kitigan Zibi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The result of their handiwork \u2014 a beautiful eight-foot-long canoe held together by cedar strips, spruce roots and spruce gum \u2014 was unveiled on Sept. 28 at its new permanent home just inside the main doors of the MacOdrum Library<\/a>, one of the busiest entranceways on campus with about a million and a half people using the building each year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Participating in the project was both a personal healing journey and a way to create community for Twenish, who spoke at the unveiling ceremony. But even though the canoe is now finished and on display \u2014 an affirmation that there is a place for Indigenous students in an institution that stands on unceded Algonquin territory \u2014 it\u2019s a reminder of how much work remains ahead on the path to reconciliation.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cCarleton has a duty to create space for Indigenous students,\u201d said Twenish.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

\u201cThis canoe is a symbol of the ongoing reciprocal relationship between the university and Indigenous communities.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Learning, Accountability and Responsibility<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The birchbark canoe project was organized by Carleton\u2019s Centre for Indigenous Initiatives<\/a> (formerly the Centre for Aboriginal Culture and Education) and the Carleton University Art Gallery (CUAG<\/a>) to help mark the university\u2019s 75th<\/sup> anniversary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CUAG Director Sandra Dyck opened the event at the MacOdrum Library by calling the collaboration part of \u201can evolving process of learning, accountability and responsibility.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Benny Michaud, an Indigenous Liaison Officer with the Centre for Indigenous Initiatives who recruited the Indigenous and non-Indigenous students who joined the project, noted that the canoe is a \u201cvery powerful symbol of sovereignty.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Benny Michaud, Indigenous Liaison Officer with the Centre for Indigenous Initiatives, speaks at the unveiling of the canoe.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome may think of Indigenous cultures as being part of a distant past with no contemporary presence,\u201d she had said when the project was just starting.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cBut our cultures are alive. These types of projects demonstrate the resilience we have, and our intrinsic and intimate relationship with the land.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

While we hear the term \u201creconciliation\u201d a lot these days, Michaud added, projects like this one \u201ccreate opportunities to come together and open our hearts and listen to each other.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gabby Richichi-Fried, one of the non-Indigenous students who helped build the canoe, noted that her participation in the project as a \u201csettler and uninvited guest\u201d on Algonquin land is inherently contentious because many Indigenous youth don\u2019t have an opportunity to get involved in traditional learning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy fragile white city hands are blistered and splintered,\u201d she said, grateful for the opportunity to have participated in a relationship-building experience that centralizes Indigenous knowledge in the academy. \u201cReconciliation is as hard, messy and uncomfortable as building a canoe from scratch.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Sharing Laughter, Labour and Dialogue on the Path to Reconciliation<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

From the boiling of sap to make spruce gum to the carving of paddles and a successful water test at a Kitigan Zibi lake in mid-September, the canoe project participants shared laughter, labour and dialogue.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s not really making the canoe that\u2019s important,\u201d Pinock told the group. \u201cIt\u2019s learning how to communicate with each other.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

To Carleton\u2019s Interim Provost and Vice-President (Academic), Jerry Tomberlin, this teamwork and camaraderie is an excellent example of experiential learning. \u201cMaybe we should all get our hands dirty and make a canoe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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President Alastair Summerlee<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

President Alastair Summerlee, whose predecessor Roseann O\u2019Reilly Runte was a major supporter of the project, said the canoe is more than a testament to the 12 remarkable students who built it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s the beginning of a journey in which we as a community have to work better together and learn from each other \u2014  to share our stories, our successes, our failures and our abilities to be more than the sum of our parts,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor me, this is a very public declaration that the university will do more and better in terms of relating to, working with and, most importantly, listening to and responding to the voices of the people of the Indigenous community and communities in and around Carleton.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMetaphorically,\u201d he added, \u201cI\u2019m going be taking a trip in the canoe over the next several months as we try to find a way to work together more effectively. This canoe is a wonderful and enduring symbol of that commitment.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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New Murals at Ojigkwanong<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Two hours after the canoe event, a trio of new murals and a ceiling installation were formally unveiled at the Ojigkwanong Centre<\/a>, a home away from home for Indigenous students in Paterson Hall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The ceremony was opened by Haida Elder John Kelly, an adjunct research professor in Carleton\u2019s School of Journalism and Communication, who smudged the paintings with sweetgrass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Created over the summer by three artists representing a range of Indigenous roots \u2014 M\u00e9tis\/Cree Jaime Koebel<\/a>, Anishinabeg\/Haudenausanee Simon Brascoup\u00e9<\/a> and Nunatsiavut Inuit Heather Campbell<\/a> \u2014 the murals include a cross-section of abstract natural imagery: a Manitoba crocus, the first flower to bloom in spring; an aerial view of land and water; northern lights; moose; deer; jellyfish; sea urchins; and more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Indigenous Liaison Officer Irvin Hill with the Centre for Indigenous Initiatives, speaks at Ojigkwanong.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt came together through a very organic process,\u201d said Koebel, an Indigenous programs and outreach educator at the National Gallery of Canada and a Carleton alumna.<\/p>\n\n\n

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\u201cWe wanted people to look at the paintings and figure out for themselves what they represent.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Each artist worked on each of the three canvases, using buckets of water and mops for paintbrushes to create a flowing look. Serendipity played a role, too \u2014 a water spill formed the shape of Sedna, the Inuit sea goddess, and raccoon tracks are visible where one of the critters scampered across a panel as it lay on the ground to dry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although Campbell knows Koebel and Brascoup\u00e9 well, she had no idea how their collaboration would turn out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like when your best friends say: \u2018Let\u2019s move in together,\u2019\u201d said Campbell. \u201cYou never know how it\u2019s going to go.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

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Unveiling Light Keeper<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The results, however, are striking and beautiful, as is the ceiling installation \u201cLight Keeper,\u201d<\/a> created by Carleton Architecture Prof. Manuel B\u00e1ez in consultation with Ojigkwanong designer Douglas Cardinal<\/a> and a multicultural group of students.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although it was installed last year, \u201cLight Keeper\u201d was officially unveiled on Sept. 28. B\u00e1ez, an artist, designer and licensed architect in New York, explained how he cut five-foot by five-foot birch plywood panels intro strips and bolted each strip into a malleable circle, allowing him and the students to fashion them into a whirl of braded shapes that represent the fluidity of air, water and fire.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Light Keeper adorns the ceiling at Ojigkwanong.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Above the ceremonial section of Ojigkwanong, where the new murals are displayed on a curved wall, B\u00e1ez\u2019s installation is organized and orderly, with a glowing sun-like light shining through from the ceiling. This \u201cmorning star,\u201d like the artwork itself, is a tribute to the late Anishinabe elder William Commanda, in whose honour the Ojigkwanong Centre is named.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Beyond this space, the birch strips look more turbulent \u2014 a metaphor for the natural systems and processes that influence B\u00e1ez\u2019s work, and for the non-linear path toward reconciliation upon which we all tread.<\/p>\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Summer-Harmony Twenish walked into the Carleton University Art Gallery last winter to join a group of students who were starting to build a birchbark canoe using traditional materials and methods, she was flooded with childhood memories of her late grandmother who had taught her how to scale fish and skin hides. \u201cIt was like […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":410,"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_story_type":[28,25],"cu_story_tag":[1920,1927,1929],"class_list":["post-7442","cu_story","type-cu_story","status-publish","hentry","cu_story_type-community-partnerships","cu_story_type-student-experience","cu_story_tag-faculty-of-arts-and-social-sciences","cu_story_tag-indigenous","cu_story_tag-president"],"acf":{"cu_post_thumbnail":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/7442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/cu_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/410"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/7442\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97649,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story\/7442\/revisions\/97649"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_story_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_type?post=7442"},{"taxonomy":"cu_story_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_story_tag?post=7442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}