Cloak unveiled in P.E.I. helps families of missing, murdered Indigenous women and girls heal

A P.E.I.-based work of art that honours and remembers missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people was unveiled Saturday, but its organizers say it sadly may never be complete. 

The Silent Jingle project is a cloak adorned with traditional Mi'kmaw cones, each bearing the name of a missing or murdered person. 

The jingle of the cones gives voice to the voiceless, said project creator Lox MacMillan-Metatawabin. 

"We worked so many hours just to make sure it's exactly as we want it … [and] making sure we're always connecting with the families that are sending us names," she said.

"This isn't about our team … it's about what the jingle dress represents and it's about bringing awareness and healing."  

MacMillan-Metatawabin, who is originally from White Bear First Nation in Saskatchewan, came up with the concept for the hooded cloak in the fall of 2024 while working at Mi'kmaq Printing and Design in Charlottetown. 

She gathered a team of more than a dozen people to get the project off the ground, and started putting out calls for names of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls and two-spirit people on social media in March. 

As of Saturday's unveiling at the Indigenous PEI art gallery, over 100 names had been collected from across Canada and the U.S. 

'An honour'

The task of creating the cloak fell to Indigenous PEI's store manager, Yvette McKenna — though she doesn't describe it as work. 

"To take each cone and apply it respectfully on the cape, to be trusted with that, is an honour," McKenna said. "Each cone is special to somebody — to their families, to their friends." 

The issue of missing and murdered Indigenous people holds a personal meaning for MacMillan-Metatawabin. Her grandmother was a Sixties Scoop survivor and her father was a federal Indian day school survivor. 

While the cloak is meant to be a physical representation of how heavy the topic is, she said, the jingles are also a healing sound to the Indigenous community. 

"It was just a dream and finally today it's coming to reality," she said. 

"Where it really hits me every time is when I get an email saying 'thank you so much for allowing us to do this for one of [our] family members who went missing.'"

The cloak is meant to be a living art piece. McKenna added a train that can accommodate more names. 

She said she felt the presence of each of the names on the jingle cones, and believes it helped her through the process. 

But the fact that there are more names to add also makes her emotional. 

"My heart hurts, because every time we put a person's name on, we know it's somebody that's not here," McKenna said. 

"When I get to share the connection through this live art piece … that's what brings me comfort."