Imagine experiencing a piece of Indigenous history through virtual reality with songs, sounds and detailed graphics, but it was all within a blanket.
Multi-disciplinary Indigenous artist Carey Newman (Hayalthkain’gene) and his team at Camosun College are developing just that.
In 2014, Newman designed an art piece called the Witness Blanket, which was made of objects gathered from residential schools, churches, government buildings and cultural structures. His role in this most recent project is “to maintain the tangibility and the context of the physical blanket in this VR version of it.”
Now, the original Witness Blanket has got a digital update as a new VR version is in the works.
“One thing I thought that would be really interesting and that you can’t do on the other installations of the blanket is to bring in sound,” said Newman. “Eventually we landed on a process where we’re inviting people to contribute what sounds of a culture mean to them, in the same way we ask for an object to be contributed to the original blanket.”
His idea to bring the sense of sound into the project has opened many possibilities, including adding the sounds of languages being spoken that were lost or almost lost in residential schools.
“I kind of wanted to bring into the conversation another element of cultures that were targeted by residential schools. Those languages that were lost or at risk, the different ceremonies that might of been harmed through residential schools.” Newman and his team at Camosun College are asking Indigenous communities nationally to bring sounds that represent their own unique culture.
Camosun College lead on the project Matt Zeleny has helped graphically designed the project. With more then 700 unique elements to the original Witness Blanket there were so many details he says they needed to, “remodel the exhibit from starch.”
The extra challenge with remodelling from going off nothing was not only to get the exact colours of the elements right, but correctly show how the pieces of the blanket look in different types of light.
Kirk McNally, another contributor to the project, mentioned already receiving a song that can be used in the interactive blanket.
“We had a submission from a woman in the Ottawa area. It was a song that was being sung, bringing in the first grandchild. All of the matriarchies in the family were present for that.”
This project is still far out from being completed, and as right now they’re waiting for more songs and sounds to be submitted for use.
ALSO READ: New Canada Post stamp honours first Indigenous woman to lead a Canadian government
