Joseph Lane is an Ojibwe artist from Thunder Bay, Ontario. Joseph attended the Visual College of Art and Design in Vancouver, British Columbia, where he was able to explore various art mediums including traditional 2D animation, storyboarding, sculpting, 3D modeling, and life drawing. Joseph graduated as a rigger in 2016. A rigger is a professional in charge of creating and configuring the control systems that allow characters and objects to be animated in an animated production. A rigger is essential to bringing characters and objects to life in the animated world, ensuring they can move expressively and believably. Today, Joseph creates art pieces digitally using the ProCreate graphic design software. Throughout his journey, Joseph has discovered the power of art as a critical tool for personal expression, healing, bridging cultures, and as a catalyst for community engagement.

Boozhoo, Joseph Lane nindizhinikaaz, Anemki Wekwedong nindoonjiba. (Greetings, my name is Joseph Lane, I am from Thunder Mountain, also known as Thunder Bay, Ontario.) I am an Anishinaabe artist from Turtle Island. After 33 years with Aki (our Mother Earth), I finally feel like I have gained an identity. And it wasn’t until the night I introduced my artwork in front of a few hundred people —in my language—that I truly met myself. What started as what felt like an empty token gesture became something more. At that moment, I took back my voice. I turned that stage into a spotlight —not for recognition, but for my own breaking free. I stood before a crowd of strangers and reclaimed my identity. And, for the first time, I got to meet me. I never thought that the doodles in my school notebooks would one day lead me to becoming an artist and starting my own studio.

I grew up as an urban youth, born in Brampton, Ontario, on November 2, 1991. From a young age, I moved back and forth between Brampton and Thunder Bay until I eventually settled with my mother in Thunder Bay at the age of 10. Because of this constant movement and my upbringing in an urban setting, I had very little exposure to my Indigenous culture growing up. We didn’t have much. My mom raised my older brother and I as a single mother, which meant she was always working to provide for us. My father was in and out of my life —sometimes because of work, other times because he simply wasn’t around. There were years when I would only see him once or twice, and other years when I didn’t see him at all —or if I did, it was just for a day.

On my father’s side, my Kookum, MaryJane Mainville, was a survivor of the residential school system. But she wasn’t the only one. My family carries deep scars from those institutions. My Kookum’s sister—a published poet, along with her brother and others in my family, also survived the schools.

But, not all of my family made it home. Like so many others, I have family members who never returned. All those children who never made it home deserve to be remembered. Their names, their lives —they were taken, but they are not forgotten. It wasn’t until I sat by my Kookum’s deathbed that I was truly confronted with the weight of those experiences. In those final moments, I heard some of the darkest stories of what they endured. These weren’t just stories that stayed in my mind —they settled into my bones. But in that same moment, I also witnessed something bittersweet. As she spoke, she reverted back —fluent in Anishinaabemowin, as if no time had passed. I couldn’t understand her, but she smiled a lot. I wish I had recorded her words. We didn’t always have a good relationship but, as I grew, I began to understand why.

Because of this, my family has struggled with generational trauma, and as a child, I felt the weight of that history even before I fully understood it. Growing up in Brampton, surrounded by many different cultures but disconnected from my own, I often felt lost. Who was I? Where did I fit in? 

From a young age, I was always told, “Someone has it worse than you.” While this may be true in certain circumstances, it also teaches people to minimize their own struggles, suppress emotions, and live in a cycle of comparison and self-criticism. I spent years carrying burdens in silence, believing my pain didn’t matter because others had it worse.

Art changed that.

I never got to help my Kookum heal. I never got to help the friends and family I lost along the way. So now, I do this for them.

My art is my attempt at helping others find their path to their identity. It’s a conversation piece —something to promote engagement between each other. There’s no “I” in ME, but there is in COMMUNITY.

When I started this art journey, I wasn’t just drawing —I was healing. Each piece became a way to process my pain, to reclaim my identity, and to express the things I never had words for. My healing didn’t just stay with me; it extended outward.

When I heal the ME, I heal the WE.

Me is We.

We are They.

They are Us.

My journey as an artist isn’t just about creating —it’s about reconnecting, healing, and helping others see that they are not alone.

There’s a common belief that you can’t pour into others if your cup isn’t full, emphasizing self-care as a prerequisite for giving. But this view can overlook the truth that, even when we feel broken or only “half-full,” we still have something valuable to offer. A broken glass may not hold as much, but it can still pour in ways that matter. By challenging the idea that we need to be “whole” to make a difference, we recognize that it’s often through our imperfections and struggles that we’re able to connect most deeply. Our own brokenness allows empathy, resilience, and understanding to flow outward, reaching others in ways that a perfect, unbroken vessel might not.

Sometimes, helping others isn’t about overflow but about showing up as we are —cracks and all. It’s a reminder that our worth lies not in how “full” we are, but in our willingness to share what we can, even if it’s less conventional or limited. We don’t need to be complete to be impactful; the most genuine forms of compassion and support come from those who’ve had to put themselves back together.