Woodlands in an urban centre – new mural in Sudbury celebrates Mother Nature, Seven Grandfathers teachings

SUDBURY –Well, this is one way to get rid of a chainlink fence.

Thanks to a creative community effort, Sudbury’s Better Beginnings Better Futures (BBBF) and Myths and Mirrors Community Arts celebrated the reveal of a community mural on their new wooden fence on Oct. 13.

Mino-bimaadiziwin (the good life) is a wooden mural reflecting key themes of Nature and the Seven Grandfather Teachings through the Woodland Style or School of Art, which the late Norval Morrisseau so championed. The fence is located at the organization’s base at 450 Morin Avenue, in Sudbury’s central core neighbourhoods.

The Woodlands form of Anishinaabe painting hails from the Great Lakes region and includes other renowned painters like Blake Debassige and the late Daphne Odjig.

Two of the artists involved in this new Sudbury mural have ties to Odjig and Debassige.

Adrienne Assinewai, who designed the overall mural concept, met Odjig on Manitoulin Island. Raven Debassige, who completed the painting with muralist Wallace Gillard, has family ties on her father Blair’s side.

Assinewai met Odjig many years ago during an informal visit.

“At the time, it was just a visit. Now I’m able to look back and bask in that moment and realize how powerful that was. It still inspires me to that day.”

She would have painted in the Woodland tradition, regardless, she says. She feels a strong connection to traditional Ojibwe teachings on her father’s side.

It’s a style that needs to be shown more in the mainstream, she adds.

“Not as a novelty gift shop piece. That’s one of the biggest things for me. It needs to be normalized as an art form that’s been here for a long time and it’s a legitimate art form.”

Raven Debassige, an emerging Indigenous artist based in Sudbury, did the actual painting on the Better Beginnings fence mural.

“This mural was more than just another mural to me,” adds Debassige, who is also an art director with Live Love Louder.

“It’s an Indigenous mural, something that I haven’t noticed much around [Sudbury] for representation, or even just Woodland Art. I’m very passionate about that.”

Outdoor play and land-based learning have been on-going themes behind the work Better Beginnings has been doing for nearly 30 years in Sudbury, says Jim Eshkawkogan, Indigenous services manager.

They wanted to pull all those ideas together when they replaced the fence on their property this past summer.

Through community consultation, surveys and online meetings, members said they wanted the fence to reflect a connection with nature and the theme of outdoor play, adds Eshkawkogan.

The mural was a true collaboration, says Cora-Rae Silk, artistic director at Myths & Mirrors.

Despite the COVID-19 lockdown, they looked to see what people really valued in Better Beginnings, and how they saw it as part of the community, says Silk.

“The things that came out of that were community connections. Sharing food is a big part of the culture at Better Beginnings.”

Silk is happy the mural is visible from the street.

“It’s nice as an Indigenous person to have the representation somewhere that’s visible to everybody. It’s not inside behind closed doors.”

BBBF is proud that many partners came together to make it happen, Eshkawkogan adds.

It took him back to the early days, when the organization was first launched.

“It’s a whole generation at least. Those themes are still important and the ways of bringing those messages out are still as important as they were 30 years ago.”

Financial support came through operating funds from the City of Greater Sudbury and the Ontario Arts Council, Silk says.

Links: https://www.ravenstarstudio.ca/about

Better Beginnings Better Futures: https://betterbeginningssudbury.ca/