Painting a Path to Reconciliation - Thirsty (for Knowledge) Thursday

As an artist, Lisa invokes the Indigenous tradition of image making to disseminate knowledge through generations. For thousands of years, images were used to impart knowledge of tradition, law and ceremony. Visual communication continues to play an important role in Indigenous cultures. Lisa utilizes this artistic medium to understand and assert Indigenous worldviews, which promotes individual and community learning. Lisa reflects upon her personal experience of cultural displacement by confronting the Indian Residential School System, and the Sixties Scoop. She shares her story of healing through cultural reclamation.

Lisa Boivin is a member of the Deninu K’ue First Nation in Northwest Territories. She is an interdisciplinary artist and a bioethics specialist at University of Toronto. Lisa uses digital painting and image-based storytelling to bridge gaps between bioethics and aspects of Indigenous cultures and worldviews. Her academic focuses are: arts-based medical discourse, informed consent, cultural safety and cultural reclamation. Lisa confronts the clinical/colonial gaze of the Indigenous patient while illuminating the resilience of Indigenous peoples. Lisa strives to humanize clinical medicine through image-based storytelling as she situates her art in the Indigenous continuum of passing knowledge through images.