Kluane National Park art installation startles camper

An art installation in Kluane National Park and Reserve is taking hikers and campers by surprise and being hailed asa "perfect symbolism of the Yukon irony."

In an oldminer's cabin near theTachalDhl(Sheep Mountain) VisitorCentre, amannequin dressed as an elder is propped in front of acomputer.On the computer, aWindows message reads "Error: Cultural identity not found."

The elder caneither "accept changes" or"try again."

MurrayLundbergrecently stumbled across the artwork while camping.

"All of a sudden I saw this woman, in shadow, half-hidden by the trees. It's quite startling because you're there by yourself," he says.

Lundbergpeered closer and saw the computer.He says he appreciates the artist'smessage.

"I find it intriguing," he says.

"I posted the picture onFacebookand one of the comments was that it's the perfect symbolism of the Yukon irony. The traditional and the modern. I think it's brilliant."

Yukon artistKelly Wrootis behind the installation.

"I've always beena fan of street art and wanted tohavesomething to do with street art," he says.

"Ihappened to come across the ingredients for this installation."

Hesays the plaster-and-rebar mannequin wasoriginally commissioned for the Kluane Museum of Natural History in the 1980s.All faces were cast from community members.

They were taken down in the late 1990s since they had become damagedby weather.

"I was thinking a lot about the struggle of the native community to integrate culture into technologyand vice-versa," Wroot says.

"It kind of happened that she ended up in the park, which I thought was fitting. There's the same struggle to integrate culture into the park and integrate the park into the First Nation lifestyle and do that with technology."

Wroot says he's got five of the old museum mannequins at his home.

"There are others and they might pop up," he says.