Caitlyn Bird, the recipient of the fourth annual Barbara Laronde Award, is an Anishinaabe artist from Noatkamegwanning First Nation.
Caitlyn Bird grew up in Thunder Bay, Ontario and is passionate about the traditional arts; beading. She utilizes traditional techniques and methods as well allows herself to explore in a contemporary setting through color, design, and methods. She obtained a lot of knowledge from her grandparents and Women within her community. In ensuring the survival of knowledge, she continues to share many teachings and hopes to inspire others to be creative and allow that creativeness to guide them through life. Her dreams are to explore the material culture of her people and showcase it where others learn and are encouraged to explore and learn about their history.
She currently goes back in forth to school from Thunder Bay, Ontario to Santa Fe, NM to attend the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in obtaining her BFA in Museum Studies. She hopes to become a curator and allow access to the community to come into the collections and learn through the elder objects (artifacts) by touching, feeling, smelling, and talking with the item. She hopes through this, Indigenous methodology will be applied within institutions such as museums, art galleries and allow the story of Indigenous people to told by the communities that these elder objects belong to. With attending she also is continuing to network and allow her dreams to become a reality. She shares a lot of her culture wherever she goes but more importantly through her art and the significance it holds to her people and home.