UMD Libraries hosts “Living Memory: Honoring Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives” an Indigenous Futures Lab Pop-Up exhibition in McKeldin Library

On May 5, 2025, in honor of the National Day of Awareness for Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives (MMIR),  the Living Memory: Honoring Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives installation will open in the Portico Room on the second floor of McKeldin Library. The exhibition was curated by Britney Bibeault, Assistant Director, Indigenous Futures Lab (IFL) and PhD candidate, Information Studies

This installation is a collective act of remembrance, resistance, and love. Created by students in the Indigenous Feminisms course (WGSS397i), these mixed media artworks honor our missing and murdered Indigenous relatives.  The art centers the lives they lived rather than reducing them to their disappearances. Each piece reflects the student artist’s engagement with the person they honor—what they loved, how they moved through the world, and the deep, enduring connections they left behind.

"Through painting, collage, poetry, and mixed media, the artists reckon with systemic violence while holding space for joy, care, and resilience", says Dr. Meissner, IFL Director and professor of WGSS397i. "The students’ works are informed by conversations with the families of those honored, as well as archival research, personal reflection, and Indigenous feminist methodologies of storytelling and remembrance."

The installation does not seek closure—there is no justice without the return of stolen relatives. Instead, it insists on presence: these individuals are not forgotten, their lives mattered, and their stories continue to shape the world. The students’ works are acts of ongoing witnessing, refusing erasure and demanding recognition of the violence that disproportionately affects Indigenous women, girls, Two-Spirit, and transgender relatives. Each piece in this installation is an invocation: a call to remember, to listen, and to act.  

"The Living Memory installation is the inaugural exhibit organized by a collaboration between the University Libraries and the Indigenous Future Lab of the College of Arts and Humanities in order to promote awareness of Indigenous topics being studied on campus, especially within the kinship of the IFL," said Indigenous Studies Librarian Patti Cossard.

This new Pop-up Installation Program is co-sponsored by the Libraries' Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Access (IDEA) Committee.  "Future installations will pop-up in various spaces in McKeldin Library during the coming academic years," said Cossard.

The exhibition will be available through summer 2025. The Portico Room is open to Library patrons during McKeldin Libraries hours of operation.  Thanks go out to Sharona Ginsburg, Head of Student Engagement Services, Kevin Hammitt, TLC Operations Coordinator, Victoria Quartey, IT & Facilities Operations, and Marcus Ortiz, Library Fellow, Inclusive Excellence for their assistance in making this inaugural pop-up a success.