Fearless Sisters Rising Mural now permanently exhibited at the University of Victoria!
Kinship Rising is proud to announce the unveiling of “Fearless Sisters”, a powerful mural honouring the fearless, healing medicine of Indigenous bodies and land relations. The mural was created in a partnership between Kinship Rising, the Innovative Young Indigenous Leaders Forum (IYILS) and the Fearless Collective. It was collectively envisioned and painted over several months by a group of BIPOC young people, students and mentors. The design and project were conceptualized by lead artists Brianna Bear and Nicole Neidhardt. More information about the mural artists can be found below.
The mural was completed and unveiled in 2018 at Kinship Rising’s international forum on Indigenous gender wellbeing that brought together over 150 Indigenous youth and community members from Indigenous nations across BC, Canada and South Africa, as well as researchers, students and policy and practice stakeholders involved in gender-based violence prevention. The mural design speaks to the healing spirit of kinship and our relations with our land and water relatives. The red wings contain hand-written messages of good medicine and transformation written by forum participants from Canada and South Africa.
The mural is now permanently exhibited at the McPherson Library at the University of Victoria, which occupies lək̓ʷəŋən and W̱SÁNEĆ homelands. It will be stewarded by library staff and visited by thousands of visitors each year. To promote knowledge mobilization, the mural includes an explanatory plaque with a scannable digital QR code that links to our website and other projects.
Funding for the creation and exposition of the mural was provided by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR #158385), the Canet Foundation, Dr. Charlotte Loppie, and the Faculty of Human and Social Development (University of Victoria).
