Artist focuses on telling the truth

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This article was published 10/10/2017 (3212 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A local artist is shining in the spotlight for her award-winning one-woman theatre production.
Darla Contois, from Misipawistik Cree Nation and currently residing in the Earl Grey/Fort Rouge area, won the emerging artist award at the 2017 SummerWorks Performance Festival in Toronto for her play entitled White Man’s Indian, which she wrote and performed herself.

“It’s about a young girl who moves off of the reserve to the city for the first time and her experience going through a white man’s high school, not understanding how to make friends or how to manouevre herself in a world that’s so different from her own,” Contois said.

“It’s sort of based on my own experience when I was younger and I moved into the city, and it’s slightly fictionalized and dramatized from that.”

Still reeling from her recent win, Contois is amazed to earn recognition for her production.

“It really blew my mind when it happened because I wasn’t expecting it. For me, it’s always been about focusing on the work, so it’s a beautiful thing to have something to show for all of your hard work. I really appreciate it,” she said.

“It’s amazing and I can’t even believe that it’s happening to me. Somehow in the back of my head, I still feel like I’m just a little girl from the reserve because that’s where I grew up and I was raised. I do my best to keep myself grounded and humble and remember where I come from.”

Contois got her start at the Manitoba Theatre for Young People as a teenager. Over time, she moved to Toronto where she graduated from a three-year program at the Centre for Indigenous Theatre. Now she’s back in Winnipeg living in the Corydon area.

“The idea was to move home and travel for work wherever I was needed because I appreciate Winnipeg so much for its quiet nature,” she said.

“I’ve been working with the Winnipeg School Division in a program called Engaging Fusion, which weaves drama and performance into curriculum that the students are already learning. So we come in as artists and we work with the teachers to bring arts and performance into their daily school routine.”

At the same time, Contois continues to focus on her own forms of artistic expression.

“I do a lot of work by myself, creating projects on YouTube and film and new media. I do a lot of writing and self-exploration work, and my poetry was recently published in an anthology,” she said.
“I’m a specific kind of artist. I like to focus on telling the truth through an Indigenous perspective.”

Although Contois hasn’t performed White Man’s Indian in Winnipeg so far, she’s open to the idea.

“I haven’t had the opportunity to yet, but I’m hoping that it presents itself one day,” she said.
“I think it’s a magic experience to go to a play and be entranced by this thing that can only happen once. In theatre, people are willing to go on a journey with you. You are completely in the moment with the audience, and I always really loved that about theatre.”