Mural by Indigenous artist unites peace, friendship and respect

Over the past 25 years, Perimeter Institute has become hallowed ground in a sense, admired globally for its exploration of humanity’s biggest questions and the underlying foundations of nature. But that revered ground extends below the concrete, glass and steel of the building. It is burrowed deep and continues from there to the grassy banks of the winding Grand River.

Jay Havens (they/them) is a 2Spirit artist, educator, and collaborator of Mohawk (Kanien’keha’ka) and Scottish Canadian ancestry. Havens was born on the Six Nations of the Grand River, located southeast of Brantford and home to the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, comprised of Mohawk, Cayuga, Onondaga, Oneida, Seneca and Tuscarora First Nations people. The original land granted to the Haudenosaunee extended from the headwaters of the Grand River in the north to its mouth at Lake Erie, including the land Perimeter Institute sits on. 

Through a grant from the Musagetes Fund held at Waterloo Region Community Foundation, Havens was commissioned to produce an installation that is now on display along the high windows of the Institute’s bright atrium. The mural is hard to miss with its spectrum of colours and geometric lines framing a diverse group of people. Created in the Indigenous Woodland Style, brush strokes expand and contract like a river. Havens says the mural depicts the diversity of humanity, but leaves interpretation to the viewer.

“There’s a family in the middle of the mural, but not necessarily one family and they’re not all necessarily Indigenous people.” says Havens. “There are youth and elders. There is a person with a disability. There are parents or middle-aged people and there are the colours of the rainbow that represent any nationality or identity. But the principles that unite these people, just like the principles of a treaty, are peace, friendship and respect.”

When it came to naming the mural, Havens wanted it to illustrate those values and something more that intrinsically bound it to Perimeter Institute.

"I call it Ka'satsténhsera, which translates to unity of hearts and minds,” says Havens. “Ka'satsténhsera is an important Haudenosaunee principle used when people gather, particularly when gathering to discuss ideas and make agreements. I think it’s a relevant principle to employ in a space like a research institute.”

Bringing a sense of unity to truth and reconciliation is paramount to Leanne Mendonsa, Perimeter’s Coordinator of Engagement & Inclusion. She was instrumental in bringing Havens’ work to the Institute.

“In celebrating 25 years, we understood it was important to do something that works toward and fosters reconciliation,” says Mendonsa. “We thought that an art piece would be a great way to connect Perimeter to the land and the idea of inclusion and community, which, I believe, is the biggest advantage that Perimeter gives to its physicists.”

Just as physicists pursue truth in exploration, Havens’ drive to learn and discover shapes their craft. Havens travelled North America for two years seeking out Indigenous art, from tourist shops and pow-wows to art galleries and museums. 

“I wanted to discover the kind of narrative that was being said in and about Indigenous cultures and see how Indigenous arts were being represented at all levels,” says Havens. “It's an Indigenous way of learning to travel the world and gather information, and then you come back to the institution or the village and report your findings.”

Havens discovered that the unification of peace, friendship and respect are key tenets of many Indigenous cultures, which they have conveyed in their work over the past 20 years. Havens’ work includes theatre sets and costume design, projection mapping animations on Stratford City Hall, a floating art piece in Toronto harbour called The Peacemaker’s Canoe, and a mural on the windows of the Vancouver Opera house. Their work is also displayed in the U.S. with sculptures and weavings at the New York State Museum. Havens is currently an assistant professor at the University of Waterloo, teaching scenography and design thinking courses.

Havens says that the idea of unifying peace, friendship and respect is at the very core of Haudenosaunee culture and represented in the framing of the mural.

“The black and the white arches that enclose the people are inspired by Haudenosaunee pottery patterns, which are found where there are Haudenosaunee people,” says Havens. “There were also people here along the Grand River before the Haudenosaunee some 4,000 years ago, and they were also pottery makers, so it's a long-standing tradition in the area.”

Havens says that the mural’s black and white frame around the community of people symbolizes the Haudenosaunee creation story. 

“You can't have life without darkness,” says Havens. “As the creation story tells us, two twins came out of sky woman. There was a right-handed twin, and a left-handed twin and, as an example, the right-handed twin created a river and the left-handed twin put bends in the river. The right-handed twin created flowers and the left-handed twin put thorns on the stems. So, there are two sides, where one made life difficult and one made life sweet. It's a Haudenosaunee way of thinking of balance.”

For physicists, the black and white metaphor can be extended to the blackboards throughout the Institute and the white chalk that brings light, inspiration and discovery. 

Lucien Hardy, an Institute senior faculty member specializing in quantum foundations, was a panellist that helped select Havens’ proposal. He sees the mural as an expression of reconciliation that also reflects the Institute’s work that is grounded in peace, friendship, and like the Haudenosaunee, a deep respect for nature and the land.

“Physics has this very strongly collaborative aspect and, ultimately, it’s about communicating with people and respect for the world. A physicist must have a deep respect for nature itself because you can't impose on it. Nature tells you the way it is and it's our job to listen carefully enough so that we can understand it.”

Art teaches us. It can be a metaphor for life and so can the ways of the Haudenosaunee.

“We eat from the same territory, it feeds us,” says Havens. “There’s a Haudenosaunee story of the one pot and single spoon. The pot is shared space and there’s one spoon to share among everyone. And the idea is, you eat what you need and then you pass the spoon to the next person who will take what they need. And the rule is, you keep the spoon clean, you keep the pot clean. As a metaphor for territory, it's a beautiful way of saying, ‘let's care for the land. Let's be peaceful about the land.’ These are standards that the Haudenosaunee use in their treaty making, and it's also our way of walking in the world in peace, friendship and respect.”

For Perimeter Institute, the maxims of peace, friendship and respect along with its mission, its purpose, and its people are reflected in Havens’ vision of unity and reconciliation.

Just like the white chalk brings light to a blackboard, Havens’ mural sheds light on each of us as stewards of the land that spans outward from the banks of the gently flowing Grand River.

Jay Havens will be giving a public talk at Perimeter Institute on January 21, 2025. For more information or to get tickets, visit the event page. 

Ka'satsténhsera is supported by The Musagetes Fund held at Waterloo Region Community Foundation.