Hear Our Voices: Michel People and Residential Schools is an exhibition that details the horrendous conditions young children and adolescents were forced to live in at residential schools. It also explores how those shocking experiences affected them as adults and changed the trajectory of Michel People’s lives for several generations.
“We wanted to document and be a witness to those Michel People who survived residential school,” said Maureen Callihoo Ligtvoet, Friends of Michel Society. “We also want everyone to understand the impact residential school had not only on survivors, but on Michel People who came after.”
Hear Our Voices quietly debuted Tuesday, July 9 in Musée Heritage Museum’s main gallery, and will be open to the public until Oct. 12. A public grand opening will be held on Saturday, July 13 at 1 p.m.
A simple showcase, the exhibition mainly supports panels, photographs, eight screens, headphones and comfortable seats for watching looping 15-minute interviews of survivors.
The interview subjects range from forced manual labour, lack of education, food insecurity and over-the-top corporal punishment to poor health care, stolen identities, those who mysteriously disappeared or died, and denialists.
But it is the gentle voices and pained facial expressions of each survivor that lends an emotional poignancy to each story. Their tragic stories forces the viewer to ask: Where do we go from here?
“Indigenous and non-Indigenous people alike need to understand the impacts of residential school,” said Dayle Callihoo-Campbell, Friends of Michel Society. “There are those who either downplay or do not believe residential schools happened. As Michel People, we know that so many of us were impacted. Now we have the opportunity to document our truth and have our voices heard.”
For additional information visit artsandheritage.ca.
