The Witness Blanket Analysis

The colonization create intractable conflict which is found in many areas that were once colonized or controlled by Western European. Many of the prolong conflicts lies in past colonial policies, and especially those regarding territorial boundaries, the treatment of indigenous populations, the privileging of some groups over others, and the uneven distribution of wealth. The witness blanket was created as a consequence of atrocities of residential Schools done to the indigenous children in Canada. People always remember when they are the one who was a victim and constantly reminded of the past experience. The survivor that is directly impact such as student of residential schools, elders, mothers, and fathers struggle hard to overcome their
However, these objects are similarly important piece of history that maybe forgotten or lost, which can also become constant reminder to the future generation as artist suggest:
Strewn in the wake of the Indian Residential Schools are an immeasurable number of broken or damaged pieces. These fragmented cultures, crumbling buildings, segments of language, and grains of diminished pride are often connected only by the common experience that created them. Imagine those pieces, symbolic and tangible, woven together in the form of a blanket. A blanket made from pieces of residential schools, churches, government buildings, and cultural structures. A blanket with the sole purpose of standing in eternal witness to the effects of the Indian Residential School era – the system created and run by churches and the Canadian government to “take the Indian out of the child”.
As artist suggests that “many of us didn’t experience the residential schools firsthand, but are able to witness through learning and active participation in the reconciliation process” which is how future generation will remember and learn the history of how the indigenous people is being treated during residential schools