The Graphic Novel has grown rapidly in popularity and the medium provides an appealing space in which readers engage interactively with complex themes and visual narratives. Diverse, imbued with cross-cultural influences, visually compelling and vibrant; the graphic novel is the literal definition of narrative art and a perfect medium through which to engage youth.

The Power in Pictures exhibition is the culmination of a series of workshops hosted at Glenbow that connected young people from USAY (Urban Society of Aboriginal Youth) with artist Kelly Mellings, illustrator of the graphic novel The Outside Circle by Patti Laboucane-Benson. Participants were encouraged to tap into their own creativity to create comics and masks that drew on their own experiences to tell a story. A shared and collaborative space, the gallery features the art created by the USAY participants hung alongside that of the artist who taught them, creating a space where complex feelings and experiences are explored through art.