Canadian musician explores Indigenous identity through art

In the indigenous world, I'm considered a 60 scoop kid. The difference between not knowing? What blood runs through you and knowing what blood runs through you changes everything. International Juno award-winning Indigenous Canadian musician Tom Wilson learned he was Mohawk when he was 54 years old. Because I found out who my mother and my father were, because I found out what my territory was gonna wage, Mohawk territory outside Montreal. He turned what he calls the Beautiful Scars project, his search for truth into a novel, a documentary. A stage production and now an album, Story of Identity. It's not only an indigenous story, but it's a story that would resonate with adopted families, adopted people. For me, it changed my creative life and why I was creating it. All of a sudden, the story of identity encompassing everything I did in my art, being able to articulate that in a way for audiences. Is is essential to moving the Indigenous story down the line. He has also expressed his journey through art, using all of his creative outlets to bridge the gap between the Indigenous and non Indigenous. More than the words that I put together for books and more than the melodies, the notes that I put together for songs, the artwork is is a direct gift from from the ancestors to me. Already a companion of the Order of Canada. He will be appointed later this year. I was so moved and I felt really for the first time the two cultures, the culture that my where my blood lives and the culture that I was raised in in Hamilton. I saw them come together and they stood around me and I knew that. I knew that I was I was bringing honor and pride. Well, Tom has several musical performances scheduled for the rest of the year, as well as an upcoming art exhibit in Hamilton Audra Brown City News.