Culture Saves Lives: Behind the Scenes of Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week by Alec Jacobson

Public Project

Culture Saves Lives: Behind the Scenes of Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week

Copyright Alec Jacobson 2024

Date of Work Oct 2019 - Ongoing

Updated Dec 2019

Location Vancouver

Topics Activism, Arts, Beauty, Celebrations, Editorial, Essays, Fashion, Happiness, Homelessness, Human Rights, Joy, Minority, Oppression, Parenting & Family, Photography, Photojournalism, Racism, Spotlight, Teens, Theater

Joleen Mitton grew up in Vancouver's Downtown East Side, surrounded by poverty, addiction and other signs of the trauma accumulated by generations of indigenous people in a colonized land. When she was 15, she was scouted as a model and escaped, spending the next decade working around the world. When she came home, she set about trying to repair the fabric of her community by working with indigenous youth in the foster care system. Joleen hoped to create new, intergenerational bonds to pass on traditional knowledge. But after seeing many of the children she worked with stumble into homelessness and drugs after graduating from foster care, she realized that she needed to raise the bar. So, she started Vancouver Indigenous Fashion Week to provide inspiration, empowerment and employment opportunities for her the children she was mentoring.

VIFW 2019 took place November 18-23. This project is ongoing and I am actively seeking a place to publish it.

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Alec Jacobson

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