At Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival, Honouring Our Grandmothers keeps the fires burning
Through arts and ceremony, the Healing Journey brings together family and residents who work to restore relationships between generations and communities
Honouring Our Grandmothers. Photo by Nadine Spence
Honouring Our Grandmothers Healing Journey is a multi-year (2021-2026), multi-community, multi-generational movement connecting communities of Interior Salish and Coast Salish peoples with neighbouring nations connected to the Fraser and Thompson rivers, mountains, and salmon.
During the 19th annual Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival (October 26 to November 6), two weeks of art, ceremony, teachings, and storytelling will honour lived experiences and legacies of grandmothers past and present.
Fire has been used by Indigenous cultures for thousands of years in ceremony and land management. Culturally managed, low intensity land fires cleared away debris, restored habitat and vegetation, and made for safer communities. Cultural burning practices have been passed down from generation to generation in a process guided by Elders and knowledge-keepers.
In this second year of Honouring Our Grandmothers Healing Journey, partners are centering on keeping the fires burning: fires that burn in ourselves and in the hearts of our communities to inspire growth and renewal.
“Honouring Our Grandmothers Healing Journey originated from the Interior Salish Matriarchs and peoples of Nlaka’pamux and Secwépemc,” says Nadine Spence. “We’re people who’ve lived with fire since time immemorial with traditional firekeepers who maintained the lands with fire for protection, warmth, and health with the natural cycle of all things. We were taught very young to respect fire through traditional teachings passed down from generations of Indigenous tribes, and Grandmothers whose spirits guide and protect us to this day.”
Honouring Our Grandmothers. Photo by Nadine Spence
Through arts and ceremony, Honouring Our Grandmothers brings together families and residents who work to restore relationships between generations and communities. This fall’s journey is produced by Further We Rise Indigenous Arts Collective/Sacred Rock in partnership with Vancouver Moving Theatre/Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival, along with Massy Arts Society, VALU CO-OP Community Projects/Love Intersections, and Carnegie Centre/Oppenheimer Park.
“We’re acknowledging Grandmothers who traveled to the Downtown Eastside, Grandmas who’ve passed on and Grandmas who are with us now,” says Spence. “We’re honouring their lived experiences, stories and legacies left for us to discover and share. Destroyed connections to grandmothers have torn apart families. Many don’t know the stories of entire generations before.”
At the heart of the journey are histories told through visual art on travelling chests that visit different communities and collect messages. Artwork on a community Elements message chest is created by artists of different nationalities with historical relationships with Indigenous Peoples.
Spence’s painted cedar chest honours her Nlaka’pamux and Secwépemc grandmothers who lived and died in the Downtown Eastside. Nadine’s chest is the first of 13 bentwood cedar chests that will be adorned and presented over the multi-year healing journey by Ed Archie Noisecat, Mike Alexander and other contributing chest artists.
This year’s residency includes Inherent Responsibility, a cultural protocol talk with guests including David Ng and Jen Sungshine. An arriving ceremony for the community Elements chest takes place on the land in Oppenheimer Park. All are invited to contribute messages for their Grandmothers, families, lands and waters: to help celebrate, bring closure, and guide spirits home to lay to rest in ceremony at journey’s end. A collaboratively designed window display, inspired by the community Elements message chest, will be installed in Chinatown, with artwork by visual artists Odera Igbokwe with Lydia Brown, and poetry by Stephen Lytton, Savannah Walling, and Rita Wong.
More information is at https://www.heartofthecityfestival.com/.
Post sponsored by Downtown Eastside Heart of the City Festival.