The following is a painting created by Steve Maracle, a status Mohawk from the Bay of Quinte who has lived in London his whole life. His work is available at Another Maracle Creation.
The Thunderbird
The Thunderbird is a protector. They lay eggs. They protect. They nurture the young. They watch over all of the spirits that are on Turtle Island. As you see, there’s a turtle. That represents the island that he’s watching. The eagle is the messenger for the people to the Creator. A lot of times when people are smudging or the smoke goes up, it’s always the eagle that captures it and takes it all the way up.
Then within the island, you have all the different colours. There’s colours for two-spirit people. Pink represents breast cancer for women. Then we have spring, summer, and fall coming. Then the different shades of water. If you go and stand by the [Antler/Thames] river, it never looks blue. If you go to Grand Bend, it’s green. If you go to Fanshawe, it’s darker brown.
[Top left and right]: The moon and the sun represent that he’s watching night and day. Not just a little bit of the time. He’s always watching.
[Top right]: A coyote. A lot of people don’t think much of coyotes, but honest to God, they are pretty smart. I once heard they don’t ever travel the same way twice. It’s hard to track them.
[Bottom middle]: The medicine wheel. We always have a medicine wheel. It represents the four seasons.
[Background]: I got onto the [Every Child Matters] theme where I had a hard time sometimes thinking about what kind of background I should do. Then that orange theme came out. I didn’t want to just paint t-shirts. I painted orange. I have lots of tubes of orange now. I plan to keep doing it because he’s protecting all the children. It doesn’t matter if it’s a Native child or if it’s a white guy or if it’s a German. He’s going to protect everybody.
— Steve Maracle
©Steve Maracle, 2022. All rights reserved.