While the Golden Visitor Centre is for tourists to learn about our town, there is also an opportunity for locals to visit to learn about the rich cultural heritage of the Ktunaxa Nation, the Shuswap Band of the Secwépemc Nation, and the Métis Nation Columbia River Society, through various interpretive displays.
A mural showcasing the vibrant Métis culture along with artwork about their sacred plants were created by local artist Hanako Nagao. Here is what she had to say about the project:
“I completed this mural based on a photo I took at the confluence of the Kicking Horse and Columbia River last fall when the salmon were spawning there. The Métis were known for their beadwork especially the representation of flowers in their beadwork. It was a cultural thing that tied Métis people across Canada together, even though some of them came from different colonial groups or different Indigenous groups, there was still a cultural aspect, an art style and a language that tied everyone together.
So I added in some flower beadwork as well as the spawning salmon in a sort of beadwork style. Lots of flowers had sort of traditional representations like the Wild Rose with the five petals, so I’ve included a few of those as well as a few that I kind of just went with my own ideas of what certain flowers around here looked like.
Then I also completed the sacred plant panels with information written by local elder, Davene Dunn, those can be seen over by the dog run along with the actual sacred plants that they represent. I also included the medicine wheel, both in the sky in the mural itself as well as the background colours in the sacred plant panels.
The medicine wheel represents the balance between emotional, physical, mental and spiritual health, and so each colour and each direction represents a different aspect of that. Many different Indigenous cultures have one of the four sacred plants associated with each direction and each colour of the medicine wheel. That varies slightly by region, but we included it with the information that Davene provided that would be most likely closest to the cultural region here.”
Other displays at the Visitor Centre include a video about the Ktunaxa Nation and an interpretive Métis display featuring a traditional capote.
