The mayor of Chilliwack, B.C., says that one of his city’s most beloved murals will be repaired following a troubling act of vandalism on the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls.
It appears that buckets of black paint were thrown on the mural of Inez, a Stó:lō woman, early on Tuesday morning.
The letters M M I P for Missing and Murdered Indigenous People, or Persons, were also painted on it.
The mural was created in 2020 by Montreal artist Kevin Ledo.
In a Facebook post, the Chilliwack Mural Festival said that Inez is a mother, sister, a daughter, a cousin and an auntie.
“She is loved,” the post reads.
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“This mural is more than a portrait or mural to look at. It is a representation of Stó:lō and Indigenous women in our community. The act of vandalizing it was not just damage to paint on a wall, it is a hurtful statement directed at Indigenous women. We do not take that lightly, and we don’t want it to pass without being named.”
Chief Darcy Paul of the Skowkale First Nation said the mural means so much to everyone.
“Personally, to me, the person in the picture is my sister, but for us as a nation, it represents the missing, murdered women,” he said.
“It represents us as the eighth generation of healing.”
Carrielynn Victor, the Chilliwack Mural Festival curator, said what happened is hateful.
“I feel like it’s vandalism rooted in hate and when we think about who is affected by that kind of hate, we can’t say you shouldn’t feel that way,” she said.
“But if our Stó:lō women and Indigenous women feel that this is a hate crime, then that’s what it is.”
The festival said the mural will be repaired and they are fundraising to bring the artist from Montreal to Chilliwack to restore the work.
A GoFundMe has been set up to raise money.
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