b'VOX POPPATRICK HUNTER ART & DESIGN Patrick Hunter, Ownerwww.patrickhunter.caAn art and design studio special-izing in fine and digital artwork and designs immersed in the owners Ojibway roots, with major corporate collaborationsI m an artist and graphic designer whoand Instagram, so I started digitizing aworld and worked on huge projects like kind of found myself in business. I hadlot of my pieces, putting them on T-shirts,goalie masks for the Chicago Blackhawks put my creative work on pause after grad- mugs and other products, and beganor designing blankets for Holt Renfrew.uating from graphic design school, butsending them out. There was never really after working some crappy jobs anda plan to export; that was just a happyOne of the things I do know about getting burned alive by fire grease inbyproduct of what I was trying to do. exporting is that I want to export prod-a restaurant, I realized I needed to getucts that are sustainably sourced. As an back to what I wanted to do and find aItsworked,sofar.Ivebeenself- Indigenous person, there is that drive way to make a living.employed since 2014 and just hired anto control your environmental footprint. assistant in early 2021. I also license myIt comes from that understanding that I already knew people were interestedwork out to a company called Canadianwere supposed to be the keepers of the in the work I was doing because of theArt Prints. Ive shipped off prints andland and that were held to a higher stan-response I was getting through Facebookproducts to many places around thedard regarding the environmental and sustainability aspects of running a busi-ness. For me, that means being more conscious about where Im ordering products from or what Im using to package up my prints and products.I wouldnt say exporting is my main focus; I just send the art where people want it. Its also not my forte, but I dont want to shy away from it. Ive gotten better and better at figuring it out as I go along over the past 10 years, and I know exporting will be a way of garnering a bigger audience. At the end of the day, the whole point of the business is to put more Indigenous iconography into the world, tell a story about our history Playing a vital role in ensuring weand get people asking questions. So if promote sustainable, productiveI can get my pieces out there beyond and fair economic development onCanada on a mug, T-shirt, a cutting board all of our projects. or whatever, and get people engaged and asking questions about Indigenous art, Ill have done my job.44A CCAB PUBLICATION2023'