Cole Pauls - Dakwäkãda Warriors

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Cole Pauls, "Dakwäkãda Warriors," 2019

published by Conundrum Press. Courtesy of the artist.

Gallery 1C03 is pleased to present excerpts from the Indigenous graphic novel Dakwäkãda Warriors by Cole Pauls in the public foyer area of Gallery 1C03 in conjunction with our main exhibit When Raven Became Spider and the 1Book UWinnipeg campus-wide initiative.

As a young person growing up in Haines Junction YT, artist Cole Pauls performed in a traditional song and dance group called the Dakwäkãda Dancers. During that time, Pauls encountered the ancestral language of Southern Tutchone. Driven by a desire to help revitalize the language, he created Dakwäkãda Warriors, a bilingual comic about two earth protectors saving the world from evil pioneers and cyborg sasquatches. Pauls’ Elders supported him throughout the creation process by offering consultation and translation. The resulting work is a whimsical young adult graphic novel that offers an accessible allegory of colonialism. 

About Cole Pauls

Cole Pauls is a Tahltan comic artist, illustrator and printmaker hailing from Haines Junction (Yukon Territory) with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Illustration from Emily Carr University. Residing in Vancouver, Pauls focuses on his two comic series, the first being Pizza Punks, a self-contained comic strip about punks eating pizza, the other being Dakwäkãda Warriors. In 2017, Pauls won Broken Pencil magazine’s Best Comic and Best Zine of the Year Award for Dakwäkãda Warriors II.

Cole Pauls will be at The University of Winnipeg to give a talk about his creative practice on November 26 at 10:30 am. He will also lead a week-long graphic novel workshop for youth at nearby Art City. Selected pieces created during this workshop will be displayed in the Gallery 1C03 foyer alongside Pauls’ art.