Kwakwaka'wakw Artist Represents Campbell River with "Shop Local, Support Local" Graphic!

Sonny Assu has been announced as the winner of the Campbell River Chamber of Commerce's artist call to visualize the "Shop Local, Support Local" campaign graphic!

The Raven is partnering with the Campbell River Chamber of Commerce on our “Shop Local, Support Local, Experience Local” campaign right now with the winner being announced by Matt in the Morning one week today. 

We reached Mary Ruth Snyder yesterday, Executive Director of the Campbell River Chamber of Commerce, to tell us the exciting news this week about their graphic design contest winner!

“We partnered with the Campbell River Arts Council, and they helped us put out an artists call for a brand new graphic that depicts ‘Shop Local, Support Local’” She said.

The prize offered was $1500, which is sure to have inspired applicants. 

Snyder told us excitedly how much interest the artist call elicited, “We had 32 submissions! We gathered about 9 community members to look them over, and we have chosen the winning design. The artist is Sonny Assu!”

Assu, a member of the Kwakwaka'wakw nation, raised in North Delta, away from his ancestral home on Vancouver Island, didn’t discover his Kwakwaka'wakw heritage until he was eight years old. Later in life, this discovery would be the conceptual focal point that helped launch his unique art practice.

Assu explores multiple mediums and materials to negotiate western and Kwakwaka'wakw principles of art-making. Often autobiographical, humorous, solemn and/or political, his diverse practice deals with the realities of being indigenous in the colonial state of Canada.

Assu graduated with a bachelor of fine arts degree from Emily Carr University in 2002 and was given a distinguished alumni award from the university in 2006.

He received a B.C. ­Creative Achievement Award in First Nations Art in 2011 and in 2017 became a laureate for the ­Hnatyshyn Foundation’s Indigenous Art Awards. He is also an Eiteljorg Contemporary Arts Fellowship recipient for 2021.

Assu’s work has been accepted into the National Gallery of Canada, Vancouver Art Gallery and Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, among others across Canada, the United States and United Kingdom.

After living and working in Vancouver and Montreal, he and his family settled in Campbell River.

So be sure to check out the Campbell River and District Chamber of Commerce’s "Shop Local, Support Local" Campaign!