MOA is their home
By Lori Culbert, Vancouver Sun
January 29, 2010
Pamela Masik began painting portraits of the many women missing from the Downtown Eastside five years ago in a plight to draw attention to the tragic cases. She has painted 69.
Photograph by: Arlen Redekop, PNG, Vancouver Sun
Sixty-nine massive portraits of women missing from Vancouver's Downtown Eastside will be hung in the Museum of Anthropology next year, Mayor Gregor Robertson is expected to announce tonight.
Robertson will join MOA director Anthony Shelton and the artist, Pamela Masik, at her studio at 7 p.m. for the announcement, and for a public viewing of more than a dozen pieces from the series titled The Forgotten. The portraits measure roughly 2.4 metres wide and three metres tall.
Masik began painting the images five years ago as a way to confront society about this tragic case. She plans to open her studio, near the Olympic Village, every Friday afternoon during the Games with the hope it will attract attention from visiting media and tourists.
"This is not a body of work that has to be a negative thing," Masik said. "I think it shows people that there are people in this community and society that care about these issues, and creating this dialogue is the beginning of change."
The police list of missing women contained 69 names a few years ago, but now sits at 64 after the whereabouts of five women were determined.
The DNA of 32 of those women was found on Robert (Willie) Pickton's farm.
© Copyright (c) The Vancouver Sun
THE FORGOTTEN
![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=a6929224-00d5-4533-8858-1e4424c04f22)
