CANOE STORIES FESTIVAL DAYS AWAY
Next week Canoe Stories Festival (www.canoestoriesfestival.com) begins in the Kichi Sipi (Ottawa River) Watershed area. We look forward to enaging with the Ottawa community and hosting the following events:
- Canoe Journeys Open Studio & Performance with community arts facilitators Penny Couchie and Sid Bobb of Aanmitaagzi
- Light Tipi / Yahkâskwan Mîkiwahp / Tipi De Lumière with artists Cheryl L’Hirondelle and Joseph Naytowhow in partnership with Centre for Indigenous Theatre
- Lands, Waters, and Stories site activations along the Kitchi Sipi with co-creators Jenn Cole and Jaime Morse
- Reflections on Water drop-in art workshop with visual artist Emily Rose Michaud
- Films on Nibi screening curated by Howard Adler of Asinabka Film and Media Arts Festival
- & more to come…!
CSF will also be participating in other events happening around the city of Ottawa.
- The arrival of the canoes for the opening of the National Art Centre’s Indigenous Theatre‘s inaugural season
- The Welcoming of the Mother Earth Water Walkers
- Halifax’s Prismatic Festival on location in Ottawa
MORE ABOUT CANOE STORIES FESTIVAL
Through the sharing of artistic expression and the exchange of cultural knowledge, Canoe Stories Festival (CSF), will renew Indigenous space within the Kichi Sipi (Ottawa River) Watershed on Algonquin Territory.
CSF will highlight relationships to Land and Water with Indigenous art, architecture and the engineering of the vessels that move, carry and connect us.
The festival will gather and present Indigenous narratives by integrating the telling of the stories within and alongside traditional water vessels – chii’mon, kayaks, umiks – of various designs and materials.
Our intention for the Festival will be to illuminate the legacy of First Nations travelling the local waterways and traversing our territories as we originally did. This included harmonious management and conservation of resources. CSF will also illuminate the history of protocol and peace along with ongoing trade amongst First Nations, Inuit and Métis right across Turtle Island from Coast to Coast to Coast.
Using this historical legacy for guiding principles, CSF will offer an opportunity to renew our relationship to the Land and Waterways in the present. We invite our non-Indigenous sisters and brothers to join with us.
Above Art Work: Woodland Style man in canoe by Duncan Nagonigwane Pheasant and Water Molecule series by Emily Rose Michaud. Nya:wen to both artists for their beautiful work.