A new mural has been unveiled at Kitchener’s Victoria Park Pavilion, with the artwork created by a youth Indigenous program in collaboration with Family and Children’s Services of Waterloo Region.
Released on Wednesday, the program connects young people with elders and knowledge keepers to pass down lessons on culture, art and care for the land.
The artist behind the mural said he worked with the young people in the program to come up with the concept of the mural.
“I’m the one who kind of led the project, everyone helped paint it,” said Michael Cywink, Indigenous cultural arts educator and curator.
The mural was created by participants in the Land-Based Indigenous Pride Group.
“It was a collaborative effort, what happened at the bringing is I came in, met with the group, and did a couple art workshops to generate some ideas, and we wanted to do something that represented the group and a lot of experiences they had,” said Cywink.
"A big thing with art is representation. So if we talk about things like community and the importance of family and those types of things, how are we going to show that visually in a piece of art?"
With all the ideas out in the open, Cywink put them together into one image.
“That’s where I come in, I bring my ideas as an artist, and we work through it together,” said Cywink.
