A visit to the Siksika Nation — the Blackfoot of Alberta – is a journey that tells us much about how the “sense of place” of the Aboriginal, or First Nation, peoples of Canada.

The event was a community affair; we had been invited to attend the unofficial inauguration of the magnificent Siksika Nation-Blackfoot Crossing Historical Park Interpretive Centre. In many respects it was like an enormous family picnic during which a great deal of inter-generational bonding was going on.

On another level, it was a soft-spoken but triumphant celebration of thousands of years of Siksika history; a validation and reconfirmation of the soul of a people. It was a day for reconnecting through low-key speeches, exhibits, various cultural demonstrations and displays, a focus on eldership and storytelling, visits to the strategic moments in time nearby, and a traditional feast. This was a day on which the Siksika would quietly assume ownership once again of their heritage.

We had made our way to the Siksika Nation across very windy and rather damp grasslands. Dark theatrical clouds formed, reformed, and shifted across the vast prairie sky. On this day, nature seemed to be cautioning us to take care, and to be prepared to take shelter if necessary.

Turning south from the Transcanada Highway, we entered the Siksika Nation reservation and followed a road, along which there were few of the usual indicators that mark the route being followed. And yet there was a subtle sense of direction as if the slightly rolling landscape was gently urging us onward. We went with the flow until up ahead there appeared an apparition, at an indeterminate distance. Initially it looked like sailing ships about to slip over the horizon. And then as we came closer, the lofty, tent-like structures defined themselves, and stood out starkly against the moody sky. I was reminded of the approach to the great Gothic cathedral of Chartres across the pastoral countryside of rural France.

The emblem of the Siksika

As we pulled into the parking lot, I was drawn to the sight of three traditional tepees standing self-assured on a low hill, somewhat of an anomaly itself in the flat prairie landscape we had just traversed. Behind them the Siksika had erected a long white dining tent of modern materials and design but with a sculptured look that provided a perfect contrasting background. This initial “visual” also established what would be a key theme for the day, the artful blend of time past and time present.

As we reached the top of the low-rising hill, we looked out over a magnificent landscape, one small part of the ancestral lands of the Siksika. The panoramic view is of the Blackfoot Crossing, a low-lying valley and wooded area that embraces the gently meandering Bow River.

This was also a transit area for Aboriginal hunters and their prey (primarily the great buffalo herds) for thousands of years. Later it was a crucial crossing point for explorers as they began to open the West to the European newcomers.

Looking to our left, we saw for the first time, the new Interpretive Centre. Its design is a masterful combination of structural configurations and architectural themes that embody the traditional and the futuristic. Facing westward over the valley, its prominence in the landscape is striking but not overwhelming. The symmetry of this state-of-the-art structure creates a very successful blend with the natural environment of the prairie that surrounds it, and the valley over which it presides.

The Interpretive Centre is an architectural tour de force that personifies the Siksika culture and ethos. It is a conceptual building that also embodies in its physical structure the ancient stories and metaphors of the nation it celebrates. It is a highly integrated structure that “flows”, following the patterns inherent in the landscape.

Not only does the new centre look over an important historic site, it is also a window onto a remarkable environmental site; the largest prairie riverbank ecosystem still in existence on the planet. The centre is also a complex iconic structure, a testament to the Aboriginal way of life in which the interconnectedness and interdependence of all things are understood on a profound (often non-verbal) level.

In integrating the theme and metaphor of the tepee in the design of the Centre, the architects (and the Siksika elders who advised them and contributed their inherited wisdom) did indeed risk creating an imitation of a cultural and geographical heritage. However, because the process was a truly shared experience, what they have produced is true to the Siksika consciousness, and at the same time innovative. The building is a living metaphor for the natural balance that is at the core of the Siksika belief system; and it is also successful in leaving a soft footprint on the land.

The approach to the Centre up an S-curved lane sets the tone of following the landscape. To the left of the entranceway are a series of Buffalo rub rocks, highly polished boulders that bison over the millennia have used to rub against in an attempt to remove mosquitoes and other insects. These rub rocks are in a way touchstones to the past when the great herds of bison roamed these grasslands, and were hunted by the forbears of the Siksika and other nations. The bison that is part of the coat of arms of the Siksika is representative of this animal which is sacred to them given that it sustained their ancestors in many ways.

The overall spoke-like design of the building too is a link to the past, and representative of the medicine wheels; large stone circles still found throughout Alberta which confirm the existence of some of the earliest peoples on the Great Plains of North America.

You enter the Centre under a feature that I particularly admired, a luminous glass eagle feather fan. The eagle is sacred to the Siksika; and this luminosity is a central motif in the Centre. The seven sacred tepees on the roof are also skylights; and they are also connected to a central tepee “Sundance Arbour” which allows the prairie light to permeate the structure. The enormous windows that look out to the west are covered with an energy-efficient reflective gold and blue glass curtain. In telescope-fashion, the great wall of glass brings the panorama to the viewer. If you were an eagle, this would be the place from which you would launch yourself and soar over the landscape, confident and free.

When a member of the Siksika creates his or her own tepee, it is painted with symbols and images that come to the individual in the form of a vision or a dream. This new Centre is part of a visionary 21st-century dream of creating a place where travellers can come from all over the world to learn about the great stories this land has to tell. It is also, of course, a new and dramatic focal point for the members of the Siksika Nation.

But the Centre and the Blackfoot Historical Crossing Heritage Park are also part of a strategic business plan on the part of the Siksika. This is a travel and tourism initiative that will attract especially those who value the kind of historical-cultural travel that informs and enlightens.

And this Centre will be the entry point, for non-Aboriginal people especially, into a history that pre-dates that on which people of European descent often base their frame of reference.

The Siksika Nation has approximately 6,000 members and is part of the much larger Blackfoot Confederacy whose ancestral lands (approximately 113,000 square kilometres) once spread over most of southern Alberta and into what today is Montana. Their history adds 10,000 years onto what is usually considered the span of Canadian history.

Treaty 7, signed by the Siksika Nation and the Crown, is considered one of the most “defining” of the so-called “numbered treaties” under which the Aboriginal peoples surrendered parts of their land in return for direct payments and other promises on the part of the Crown. It played a crucial role in uniting Canada. Because of Canada’s special geography and the constant fears of expansion northward on the part of the great new republic to the south, the newly formed government of Canada knew it had to acquire full control over the vast lands to the west. The only way to do this was to build a transcontinental railroad — a political unification strategy that took into account the great inland waterway of the St Lawrence River and the Great Lakes, which stops of course at the western end of Lake Superior.

A railroad across the prairies and then through the largest obstacle of all — the Rocky Mountains — became therefore the “national dream” of Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A Macdonald. Such a railroad, however, was also crucial because it was the key “bargaining chip” for bringing British Columbia into Canadian Confederation, which it did in 1870.

Because “Indian lands” were under control of the federal government — as stipulated in the Royal Proclamation of 1763 — the government in Ottawa had to deal with the aboriginal people whose land stood between the onward thrust of the railroad: over 80,000 square kilometres. And a large part of this land was the ancestral homeland of the Siksika Nation. The treaty that allowed the transcontinental railroad to go ahead was Treaty 7. And as you stand looking out the windows of the Interpretive Centre, you can see Blackfoot Crossing, the exact spot on which that treaty was signed.

Were these just real estate deals? What was the spirit and the intent of each party in the negotiations? In one document I was shown by the Siksika, there is the statement: “Siksika has a rich culture that has been eroded and overrun by a Eurocentric view of the Aboriginal role in the development of Canada. Blackfoot Crossing Historical Park will help revive our noble heritage and will add a new dimension to Canadian history. This is our gift to you, an expression of the partnership understood when our ancestors signed Treaty 7.”

Like most indigenous people, the Siksika have invested a great deal of trust in their oral history, a record that has been passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years.

The Blackfoot Crossing Historical Park Interpretive Centre is a collection of stories. And while there is much tangible evidence of the long-term shared knowledge, wisdom, and art of these people to be found in the Centre, the non-Aboriginal visitor would do well to bear in mind the intricate narrative that the Centre and the Blackfoot Crossing Historical Park communicates on many levels, through many layers, and in many ancient forms of “media”. This is grand theatre with all that such historic dramas imply: impressive settings, dynamic characters and characterisation, complex plot lines, crises, and a dénouement.

I am confident that what the Siksika Nation’s new Heritage Centre will achieve is a new level of dialogue between the Siksika and the visitors they welcome to this wonderful site.