Thunder Bay Art Gallery’s showcases interactive educational Indigenous exhibition

By Rick Garrick

THUNDER BAY — The Thunder Bay Art Gallery’s Indigenous Ingenuity exhibition features a quest to collect 26 Indigenous innovations among its 62 challenges using an interactive Radio-frequency identification (RFID) bracelet that triggers mechanical, multimedia and hybrid interactive features.

“The story is the trickster stole all the innovations so you have to go around with your bracelet and collect them,” says Cynthia Nault, community engagement coordinator at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery and Red Rock Indian Band citizen. “By going around with your bracelet, you’re collecting these innovations and getting them back.”

Nault says the bracelet is scanned at each of the different stations in the exhibit, which activates the interactive features.

“Once you activate the activity, you can hear the Elders teaching a youth or speaking about the different things that are going on in their community,” Nault says.

The exhibition also features some of the innovations and approaches to science that Indigenous people developed on Turtle Island.

“There’s a snowshoeing part of the exhibit, there’s a dogsledding VR (virtual reality) component, there’s fishing, there’s bow and arrow hunting and it talks about the different medicines as well,” Nault says. “Some of the components teach about legends and different plants that still are used.”

Nault says several different school groups have toured the exhibition, which runs from Dec. 10-Feb. 21 in all three of the Thunder Bay Art Gallery’s exhibition galleries.

“We can hear all the excitement in there,” Nault says.

Nault says they are also planning some community-based workshops in celebration of Indigenous ingenuity.

“We’ll be doing some fish skin tanning, Woodland painting, ribbon skirt making, making our own charcoal to use to make art, snowshoeing,” Nault says. “One thing I’m really excited about is the Treaty Night that we’re planning for Jan. 20 (from 7-9 p.m.). I’ve got some really awesome speakers lined up to come and talk about the Anishinabe perspective of treaties and specifically the 1850 Robinson Superior Treaty.”

The exhibition is presented by Indigenous Tourism Ontario and Science North in collaboration with the Thunder Bay Art Gallery, supported by the Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation and Ontario Cultural Attractions Fund and developed and produced by the Montreal Science Centre.

“This exhibit is something a little different for the gallery,” says Penelope Smart, curator at the Thunder Bay Art Gallery. “It’s an interactive educational exhibition and it’s full of fun ways to explore all the incredible technology that Indigenous cultures on Turtle Island have brought to modern-day life.”

Smart says the exhibition is geared towards children and families but is open to everyone.

“Because we’re able to have school groups back in the gallery again safely with COVID-19 protocols and everything in place, it’s just been so great to have the gallery full of kids,” Smart says. “It’s very colourful, it’s very engaging, there’s lots to do. Kids are moving through the whole space and really engaging with all the different things. It covers language, it covers activities and culture so it really touches on some interesting things that kids may be familiar with in their studies but also might take them well beyond what they’re learning in school. Because it’s science-based, it’s a really great way to connect science and technology and culture all together.”

Smart says the exhibition also features storytelling, information on plants and place names, and an igloo building activity.

“We have a full-sized igloo here that kids can build up as a collaborative fun thing to do in the exhibition,” Smart says. “That’s a huge highlight here – the igloo is one of the most popular [features].”