Indigenous voices from the Nicola Valley are being called upon to share their stories.

Storyhive, a company that provides production grants to creators in B.C. and Alberta, has announced they are funding 20 short films created by indigenous people. 

The successful projects will be selected by an all-indigenous jury of industry experts and Telus team members, according to a press release issued on behalf of Storyhive.

Creative BC will also offer British Columbia- based projects with up to $5,000 in top-up funding.

The selected teams will receive training as well, and work with mentors to produce a film project three to 10 minutes long. The finished products will be featured on select Telus platforms next fall.

Rylan Friday is a Vancouver-based multimedia storyteller, writer and producer, and is one of the faces on the advisory council, mentoring the chosen storytellers.

The project is particularly important because indigenous filmmakers typically face unique barriers in the industry, Friday explained. Young emerging filmmakers may be unsure about what resources are available to them, or don’t see other indigenous faces on the scene. The obstacles are often socio-economic in nature as well, and rooted in racism.

“There has always been this mindset that if it isn’t white it doesn’t sell,” Friday said. “Being someone who is an emerging content creator and someone who is openly gay and 27, I want to be that person that I needed when I was growing up.”

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Petie Chalifoux is a Merritt resident and Storyhive alumni. Her and her husband Micheal Auger shot their feature length film shedding light on the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women in Canada called River of Silence in Merritt back in 2016. Chalifoux was instrumental in paving the way for this all-indigenous storyteller edition.

Following her experience working with Storyhive on a separate project in 2016, she met with an external consult to discuss the process. The key findings from those conversations were applied to shape a program designed to be culturally safe, empowering and relevant to indigenous creators.

“I think a lot of indigenous people still feel and carry the impact of colonization and oppression. Therefore the confidence in applying for something that would be fairly easy for somebody non-indigenous, it actually becomes a very overwhelming experience,” she said. “So when I was speaking with the consultant I was telling them that it would be very nice to have an indigenous edition where it is only indigenous people applying to give them that platform — to encourage them, to inspire them.”

Friday said he believes this edition of Storyhive will create positive momentum for indigenous creatives.

“It gives a lot of people who are curious in film, new in film or established in film [the knowledge that] their voice is equally as important as any other filmmaker who is non-indigenous in this country,” he said.