Walking With Our Sisters pays homage to missing and murdered Indigenous women

David DahmsJanuary 7, 20170

Moccasin vamps by by Elena Abel, Photo via Walking With Our Sisters

More than 1,180 Indigenous women and girls were reported murdered or missing in the past three decades. Walking With Our Sisters pays homage to these lives lost with a commemorative art project, featuring over 1,700 pairs of moccasin vamps (tops)and over 100 pairs of children’s vamps.

Community members created and donated each of the vamps, to honour each individual life lost. “They are sisters, mothers, aunties, daughters, cousins, grandmothers, wives and partners. They have been cared for, they have been loved, they are missing and they are not forgotten,” writes Walking With Our Sisters.

David Dahms sits down with Catherine Martin, the Nancy’s Chair in Women’s Studies at Mount Saint Vincent University, and Michelle Graveline, a Halifax Regional School Board Aboriginal Student Support Worker, both of whom are key players in the touring exhibition’s stop at Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery (January 14-February 1). They discuss the impact of these lives lost on communities, the lack of justice for many of these victims and why it’s about time Canadians start taking the issue of missing and murdered Indigenous women more seriously.