City as an Advocate

Dawn Marie Marchand // 2019

Acrylic Paint and Mixed media collage
City Hall

"City as an Advocate" by Dawn Marie Marchand. Photo by Dwayne Martineau.

About

City as an Advocate is a mixed media painting. The overall theme of advocacy illustrates steps the City can take to live out the Framework.

Several symbols such as horses and hoof prints symbolize concerns and barriers brought forward by Indigenous community members like financial support and sustainable funding. The movement of horses, for example, represents how the City must collaborate with Indigenous communities in Edmonton to ensure actions reflect diverse voices and perspectives.

Other symbols like the circles represent the need for continuous education and training and self-reflection of personal beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions leading to action against racism towards Indigenous Peoples. The intent of the artwork is for City staff to put these teachings into practice in the workplace.

For a detailed guide to the artwork, please visit the guide on the City’s Indigenous Framework webpage.

Dawn Marie Marchand

Dawn Marie Marchand is a member of Cold Lake First Nation in Treaty Six territory. cîpêhcakwawêw-iskwêw (Blue Horse Spirit Woman) is a Cree and Métis artist, educator, advocate, author, writer, speaker, and mother. Her many noted accomplishments include Circle of Courage Coordinator for the Alberta Indigenous Games in 2011, Co-founder and lead organizer of Cree8 Success Conference in 2012, art installations for the Edmonton Folk Festival in 2013 called “Monto”; Edmonton City Hall in 2014 during the Truth and Reconciliation Gathering “A Place to Hang your Stories”; co-producing the Walrus Talks-Aboriginal City art components in 2015, “Edmonton Treaty 6 Soccer ball”; and Redx Talk “Art is the Medicine” in 2016; and an installation called “The Longest Journey” as part of the Nuit Blanche Festival in 2018. She received an Aboriginal Role Model Award for Art in 2017, during her term as the First Indigenous Artist In Residence for the City of Edmonton, facilitated the Indigenous Artist Market Collective engagement and launch in 2018. In mid 2019, she relocated to Smoky Lake, AB. Since then she has had work installed in Concordia College, Indigenous Knowledge and Research Centre, Stanley Milner EPL, PÎYÊSÎW WÂSKÂHIKAN. She has had her work projected as part of Dreamspeakers Light Strikes in numerous locations including Dubai and has recently had work projected as part of the Land Acknowledgment during the Junos celebrations in 2023. She was the artist consultant for Punctuate! Theatre’s “First Métis Man of Odessa” which is currently touring nationwide. She continues to advocate for removing systemic barriers for Indigenous artists across Canada.