 tell me about your program we're not so much a program but probably define us as arts programming and creative ship within a art gallery within an interpretive center so we're a department that's part of a larger center which contains visitor services amongst other things so one escape and galleries deals primarily with contemporary indigenous art related arts is there an age group or a target audience no there's no age group mind you a lot of the content is probably above the heads of smaller children so i would say it can range from about maybe grade five and up to elderly and what is like the aim of the program so want to scale in is an interpretive center center so we're interpreting the culture of our people on the northern plains so some of our focuses on interpreting the northern plains cultures as archaeology ethnography traditional ceremony food what have you so a lot of that content is relegated to the past so the goal of the galleries is to feature contemporary narratives of indigenous people so that it complements those past narratives so we're we're focusing on indigenous contemporary worldview through visual culture what are the like i guess you kind of said this but the learning objectives of the galleries well it's just basically to relay indigenous worldview so that can encompass narratives about our history postcolonialism it's just whatever the artist is talking about like for example the show we have now is on indigenous superheroes you know and it's it's about trickster narratives which is a traditional story but it's brought into the contemporary so that it can be relayed to people who are who like comic strips or you know what i mean so how do you measure the success of the gallery it's difficult because galleries are kind of seen as a white cube and a lot of indigenous people often don't feel like they're a part of gallery culture arts culture like they feel like it's kind of a white man institution and so part of our job is to kind of introduce visual culture to our people who are very familiar with it through traditional mediums but the contemporary is sometimes not so familiar a little foreign so that's part of my job is to create that visibility in our community my first and foremost audience is indigenous people and then after that you know tourists and non-indigenous people from the local area but my first and foremost thought is always our own people is there a demand there's a huge art community in Saskatoon and there's a huge indigenous art community in Saskatoon so we're kind of an anomaly in in Canada because a lot of contemporaries actually come out of Saskatchewan so we have a lot of support from the art community so there's a lot of artists that want to show their work here because we're an indigenous institution so in that aspect we're quite successful because it's not we're not like like a white gallery you know where an Indian is trying to get in and get their work and they're just blocked at the door we're like on an indigenous traditional site and we're a beautiful big gallery and so we have a lot of support from our community in that respect in your opinion what is indigenous education indigenous education I see as it's a number of things it's it's our history it's our like I keep saying over and over in our contemporary worldview like because our stories our narratives are need to be disseminated to the wider public so people understand us as a people because we're either looked at as you know not existing and we're kind of like this invisible fantasy race that doesn't exist or else we're this stereotype or what have you so you know that's that's the beauty of visual culture it kind of brings out all those things so indigenous education is you know passed down from our own people you know and taught like for example you know I look with grandparents and they didn't tell me how to do things like make bannock or beadwork or whatever I had to watch and that's how I was taught you know I wasn't told how to do things that's kind of the western way of doing things in schools and stuff so we differ we have our own ways of teaching I guess how would you define the word indigenous is the term you would normally use I have been using it I know it's kind of it changes you know decade to decade for a long time I used that original but I just see it as you know our first peoples but that encompasses to me even you know our Métis people are non-status it's anyone that belongs to this land is how I view indigenous and I think Métis people are a part of that because their first ancestors are our people right so how would you define education from indigenous perspective I don't know like it's like I don't I don't see the western point of view of education you know getting a degree and all that as education I think those things are important because of colonialism and we have to survive and navigate this world and we kind of need to utilize those things to survive because that's the reality right it's almost like we need to overcompensate we need PhDs and masters just to be recognized you know for the work whereas someone who's non-indigenous can get by on a lesser degree in experience you know what I mean so but I think the deficit is when we don't have our elders to teach us or healthy elders to teach us about not I'm not talking about traditional ceremony or anything like that it's like I always go back to how I was raised by old people you know like how to respect each other how to live how to navigate the world in a healthy and good way in a positive way and I think that's that's the deficit our young people have is like they don't have have our old people as much and yeah I think those are skills that we need to pass to our children you know to be respectful to be kind you know like those are the lateral violence that goes on in our communities is colonialism you know it's not that's not who we are so that to me is the education indigenous education what is your vision for the future of indigenous education I think it just goes back to nurturing those those skills that we learned individually like how you know I was taught by old people I have children so I teach them not to lip off and like things that are acceptable in today's culture is not acceptable in my home you know what I mean like so trying to pass on those things to my own kids so that they can pass it on and then with the galleries like I view that as indigenous education in the sense that we're educating the general public about our people on a daily basis and that's super important especially right now with what's been going on because it's it's done in such a way sometimes it's through humor it's a it's a way it's used like strategies indigenous strategies of humor what else is there even traditional stories like you can use visual culture to teach people about hard difficult knowledge you know what I mean things they don't want to hear anymore because it becomes tedious like yes there's violence violence violence and then people just don't want to listen anymore they want to close their ears off but contemporary art has a really kind of sneaky way of still relaying those really difficult stories and knowledges so it's it's very good strategically so aside from the programs in which you are personally involved what information do you have on other indigenous education programs in Canada well I don't know in terms of indigenous programs but like just staying connected with the indigenous art community is really keeping up to speed with cultural practice that's going on in the country and different methodologies that other colleagues are using I have to be always on top of that and even on top of trends you know like there's a lot of trends that go on in the art community so always educating myself through my colleagues and my peers and I have to do the research myself so it's a lot of work