Tina Fontaine's school honours her with mural 4 years after her death

The school where Tina Fontaine spent much of her youth has memorialized her with a mural, four years after the 15-year-old was found dead in the Red River in Winnipeg.

The painting in a hallway at Powerview School showsTina standing in a long red dress. She's surrounded by a golden glow, with a lakeshore and a flock of birds in flight at her side.

The teen was raised for most of her life byThelma Favel, her great-aunt.Favel was in awe of how well the mural represented Tina.

"Tina's looking at youshe can see through you.That's what it seems," she said.

"She's ready to jump out of that wall and ready to come talk to you."

Favel shared a hug at the school in Powerview-Pine Falls on Wednesday with Hollow Water First Nation artist Shawna Grapentine,thanking her repeatedly.

Larry Sharpe, the vice-principal of the school, said Grapentine's muralwas a way to honourTina, who came from nearby Sagkeeng First Nation, and all other missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

"I think it's important that, if we want people to acknowledge something as important as missing and murdered Indigenous women, that we have to do [it] at the school level. We have to do at the community level," Sharpe said.

"And so I thought here would be a good place to start."

Grapentine called the challenge of memorializing Tinaone of the toughest she's had to face in her professional career.

"It's very dark, it's very sad. I wanted to bring beauty to it, to honour the ladies and the women of the Indigenous culture," she said.

She wanted to remember not only Tina, but the other missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.

"The birds represent the soul of Tina and the other lost ones," said Grapentine.

"I wanted to have them in the mural, show them."

Tina Fontaine's body was pulled from the Red Riveron Aug. 17, 2014,wrapped inside a duvet cover and weighed down with rocks.

Raymond Cormier was charged with second-degree murderin 2015 and found not guilty in February.

Sharpe said her death, which galvanized calls for a national inquiry into the plight of murdered and missing Indigenous women, was also a blow to the school and its community.

"It's just really tragic, and quite the ordeal. You don't expect it to happen in your own community, right? You hear it on the news in other provinces, in other towns, cities," said Joiee Guimond, a Grade 10 student at Powerview School.

She said she remembers growing up with Tina in her neighbourhood. The mural serves as a reminderto be kind to people, she said.

"It reminds you," she said. "When you walk by it and you see it, it just reminds you to treat everybody nicely and respectfully."

Sharpe said the mural wasn't immediately universally supported when he proposed it. Some staff members at the kindergarten to Grade 12 school were concerned about talking to children about what happened to Tina, and worried it would be a constant reminder of sad memories.

But Sharpe said to him, the mural's not about sadness. It's about honouring and remembering Tina and other women and girls who went missing or have been murdered.

Favel believes Tina would have graduated from the school where the mural is now displayedif she'd hadthe opportunity.

"She was going to succeed no matter what," said Favel.

"Her picture will never be on the graduation picture wall, but part of her will always be there."

The school already talks to young children about issues like residential schools through initiatives like Orange Shirt Day, Sharpe said. The same approach can be applied to talking about missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls, by introducing topics like personal safety with the youngest children and then building up to more in-depth discussions as they get older.

"I think that it's important to have uncomfortable conversations," Sharpe said. "If we want to see changes happen, we have to have those uncomfortable conversations."

Out of tragedy, goodness

A CBC analysis from 2017 found that Sagkeeng, roughly 100 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg,has the highest number of unsolved cases of missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls from a single community in all of Canada.

"I think it's important that we don't just walk down the hallway every day and not acknowledge that," Sharpe said.

"And I think as a nation, we need to acknowledge these things so there's changes that are made so that we have less people that go missing."

He pointed to other efforts, like a new24/7 refuge for Winnipeg teens named after Fontaine, as examples of how her memory can be honoured positively.

"I'm hoping that out of the tragedy, some goodness comes," Sharpe said.

"And that's why I'm hoping that our our mural just helps educate people and keep the conversation going."

Remembering Tina Fontaine

6 years ago

Duration 2:20

A mural honouring Tina Fontaine is dedicated at Powerview School.