In pictures: The Walking With Our Sisters project
A campaign by artist Christi Belcourt has produced 1,723 pairs of handmade moccasin vamps from craftspeople all over North America. Ms. Belcourt is preparing to launch a six-year, 32-stop exhibition tour that raises awareness of violence against indigenous women
The collaborative art project Walking With Our Sisters consists of 1,723 pairs of moccasin vamps – the top portions of a pair of unfinished moccasins – meant to honour missing or murdered aboriginal women.COURTESY OF WALKING WITH OUR SISTERS
Teresa Burrows, the non-aboriginal artist based in Thompson., Man., who designed these vamps, worries that society pays too much attention to killers and not enough to victims.
Teresa Burrows, the non-aboriginal artist based in Thompson., Man., who designed these vamps, worries that society pays too much attention to killers and not enough to victims.COURTESY OF WALKING WITH OUR SISTERS
Barry Ace, an artist from M’Chigeeng First Nation on Manitoulin Island in Ontario, made beaded vamps with flowers whose petals are transistors and centres are lightbulbs.COURTESY OF WALKING WITH OUR SISTERS
These vamps are by Mary Jane Logan McCallum, an assistant professor at the University of Winnipeg’s history department.
Kary Tsoie:an Robertson’s vamps. Walking With Our Sisters’ vamps are intentionally not sewn into full moccasins, to represent the ‘unfinished life’ of aboriginal victims, says organizer Christi Belcourt.
Tee and Bill Shawnee from Oklahoma City produced vamps that are a combination of beadwork, photo collages and applique stones.
The Walking With Our Sisters collection will be made available to the public on a six-year, 32-stop exhibition tour that begins Wednesday at Edmonton’s Telus Centre. For more information, visit walkingwithoursisters.ca.