Original Art Piece

Unmarked 2021,
Accordion-fold Artist book, graphite drawings on cotton rag paper,
3 3/8 x 3 3/8” x 1” closed,
3 3/8” x 40” open (variable)
7” - in the round
2023

Unmarked 2021, is an accordion-fold artist book of graphite drawings on cotton rag paper commemorating the unmarked graves of children discovered at a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C. The circumstances surrounding their deaths came as a deep shock to non-indigenous Canadians, although the story was well known to First Nations peoples. It was our communal awakening to one of the darkest times in Canadian history. Unmarked 2021 explores the scars, memory and tension hidden just beneath the surface of our land. It is a tiny book, but like repeated revelations of our First Nations people, each bend and fold reveal a new discovery. Appropriately the palette is muted and simple. The once proud maple key is frayed and torn, a reference to the tiny people buried without regard, hidden in the space between the visible and invisible.