The Pen Pal Travelling Art Exhibit

The Pen Pal Travelling Art Exhibit emerged from a shared activity between students on Six Nations of the Grand River Territory and students off Territory to create an image of peace and friendship between communities. An aspect of narrative therapy and community work is to find ways to circulate preferred stories. We seek to identify appropriate audiences and invite responses to the shared preferred story as a means to make visible what has been made invisible. From over 600 pieces of art we selected 96 to display as a travelling art exhibit to share the story of relationship between the communities following divide and conflict due to land rights dispute. This exhibit, curated by Anuva Swift, travelled to schools throughout both communities, museums, arenas, conferences, and even to the general meeting of the Ministry of Aboriginal Affairs (in 2016, the ministry changed its name to the Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation).