Kelly Duquette’s award-winning art
Kelly Duquette, the Youth Representative for the MNO Atikokan and Area Métis Council, is in the news again. (She was recently featured in Métis Voyageur 71, page 17.) This time she has placed second in the 2012 Canadian Aboriginal Writing and Arts Challenge sponsored by Enbridge.
Kelly’s winning piece features Poundmaker, the mixed-blood Cree chief who was convicted of treason at Batoche in 1885 because of his connection to Louis Riel. Kelly says she chose Poundmaker because, “He exemplified the teaching of courage by standing up for what he believed was right, despite the overwhelming government forces to create submissiveness.” Her creation not only honours Poundmaker and his values, it also demonstrates the breaking apart and loss of Aboriginal culture.
“Recreating Poundmaker’s image helps us to remember and learn from our past, so that everyone will be encouraged to stand up for what is right and so others will respectfully listen. Then we will be heeding the message of our peacemaker…to walk in the path, instead of sitting beside it,” she says.
For more information on Kelly’s art, see the link below:
http://www.our-story.ca/kelly-duquette.html
The granddaughter of MNO Atikokan and Area Métis Council President, Marlene Davidson, Kelly Duquette plans to attend the University of Ottawa this fall.