Resilience
Painting of many Indigenous women wearing colourful dresses outside

Sherry Farrell Racette, Ancestral Women Taking Back Their Dresses, gouache and watercolour on paper, 50 x 61.7 cm, 1990

Resilience: 50 Indigenous Art Cards and Teaching Guide

Resilience: 50 Indigenous Art Cards and Teaching Guide is a boxed set that contains 50 full-colour, 8" x 10" reproductions of contemporary Indigenous art and a bilingual (English/French) teaching guide, full of ideas on how to use the art cards to animate discussions and inspire activities in all subjects, from kindergarten to grade 12. It is based on the exhibition curated by Lee-Ann Martin, with teaching guide developed by Yvette Cenerini, Lita Fontaine, Dawn Knight and Albert McLeod.

Images by 50 First Nations, Inuit and Métis women artists embody the multitude of connections and contradictions that constitute contemporary Indigenous identities. This project is a physicalized reminder of buried histories and diverse contemporary perspectives. Most often, resilience is narrowly defined in the dictionary as the ability to recover from and cope with adversity. However, long before the European invasion of the continent, resilience was a central tenet within Indigenous traditional knowledge and customary practices, and it still is. For these Indigenous women artists, resilience is embodied as endurance, adaptability and sovereignty.

The media used and intent of the artworks are complex and diverse, like the artists themselves. This large, multi-vocal national project considers the relationships of First Nations, Inuit and Métis women with land, place, customary practices and contemporary issues, and opens new perspectives on unexamined and often overlooked histories, places and ideas. For further context, please see the essay by curator Lee-Ann Martin.

Purchase the Boxed Set

Order the complete package including the 50 art cards and teaching guide from MAWA.

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Download the PDF

The complete document is available free of charge.

Teaching Guide Project Templates

Artist Videos

Making Talking

Guests

Want to invite one of the Resilience artists to speak with your class? Bring the art to life! The following artists are available for a $328 half-day artist fee:

Rebecca Baird, Jaime Black, Heather Campbell, Teresa Marshall, Meryl McMaster, Nadia Myre, Jessie Short, Skawennati and Jacqueline Traverse.

To contact an artist, please email Yvette Cenerini at [email protected]. If you are a member of the Manitoba Association for Art Education, there may be funding available.