The epidemic of violence against Indigenous women and girls has raged in the United States, with those outside of Native populations largely downplaying and ignoring the issue.
According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Indigenous women face murder rates at 10 times the national average, and four out of five Indigenous women are affected by violence. Each year, more than 5,000 cases of murdered and missing, Indigenous women and girls (MMIWG) are reported, but only about 2 percent of those cases are investigated by the Department of Justice. Danielle SeeWalker, a Húŋkpapȟa Lakȟóta and citizen of the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe in North Dakota, told OFM that, “We hear about our women and girls turning up missing every day.”
SeeWalker’s infectious passion for art and activism can only be matched by her talent and impressive resume. SeeWalker is a multi-media artist, muralist, writer, activist, and “most importantly, a mother to two sons.” She also serves as a co-chair for the Denver American Indian Commission and has established the Red Road Project to “document, through words and photographs, what it means to be Native American in the 21st century by capturing inspiring and positive stories of people and communities within Indian Country.” She is also the visual arts co-curator at the Dairy Arts Center, where Sing our Rivers Red, an exhibition aimed at garnering awareness around MMIWG, is being held.
Starting May and running until July 2021, the Sing Our Rivers Red exhibition in Boulder will feature art elevating the voices of MMIWG. The Sing Our Rivers Red event was created in 2015, and “the intention behind it was to collect one-sided earrings to display in honor of our MMIWG—each earring representing an MMIWG case,” SeeWalker explains. This year, the exhibit looks a little different. “We brought in visual artists, muralists, graphic designers, singers, dancers, and fashion designers to display their work and honor the opening of this exhibit. Hundreds of letters, notes, and photographs of loved ones were sent in with the earrings, and so we also have a special wall honoring those very personal messages because we want people to realize just how serious the MMIW+ epidemic is.”
SeeWalker has two paintings featured in the exhibit. “One is called ‘MMIW,’ and the other is called ‘Iná na čhiŋčá,’ which means ‘mother and child’ in Lakota. I painted the MMIW piece after visiting my family back home on the Standing Rock Indian Reservation. While visiting my aunt’s home, I saw yellow, crime-scene tape across the street. When I asked what happened, I was told that they found the body of a woman who appeared to be murdered, and they were investigating it. The next day, another woman was found killed down the street. These women are mothers, daughters, aunties, sisters, and friends. They are somebody and need to not just become another statistic.”
Raising awareness to create positive change through art and media is important for any social movement. SeeWalker suggests that those interested in helping with the MMIWG epidemic should “reach out to local Native American people in your own communities and see how you can be an advocate. You can start your own, grassroots campaigns, reach out to your state senators and representatives about taking legislative action. You can even research organizations and other nationwide centers to see how you can get involved. Organizations like Sovereign Bodies Institute or Urban Indian Health Institute are two leading organizations dedicating time and data collection to the MMIW epidemic.”
What SeeWalker and the other organizers of the Sing Our Rivers Red event hope to accomplish with the exhibit is to bring awareness to the issue of MMIWG to a wider population and to honor all MMIWG. “Our hope is that if even one person is moved by this issue and tells someone else about it, our goal is accomplished. We need more awareness and people that will want to help be a voice to those that no longer have one.” The event runs Wednesday-Saturday from May-July. You can reserve a time to visit the exhibit through thedairy.org
photographs by Lauren Clink
