An Indigenous-led mobile museum experience that brings truth-telling, youth-created art, and community healing directly to public spaces across Colorado.
The Truth About 250-150 Mobile Tour
is an Indigenous-led initiative designed to foster truth, healing, and community connection by confronting Colorado’s colonial history and amplifying Native voices through artistic and educational programming. Created by Denver area organizations Wakáška Yuza and Control Group Productions, this project is a truth-telling intervention to challenge official state narratives around Colorado’s 150th anniversary and the nation’s 250th. The Truth About 250-150 Mobile Tour confronts the state’s legacy of violence, land dispossession, and systemic injustice against Native peoples.
An immersive gallery experience created as a ‘mobile monument’ inside a renovated school bus, a cargo trailer, a tipi, and a shade tent, its contents – murals, interactive installations, a zine, youth art, audio, and video – combine education, artistry, and embodied somatic practice to confront this history and its impacts today, inviting guests into healing and reparation.
Event Schedule
Throughout Summer of 2026, The Truth About 250-150 will reach communities across the state, sharing its experience and cultivating connections between disparate rural and urban locations. The mobile exhibit is designed to pop up at community convenings in partnership with local hosts and sponsors, creating accessible spaces for truth-telling where people already gather.
April 24th, 4:30-7 pm: Preview for press and public - RSVP Here
Opportunity to experience the exhibit and meet the artists.
Sloan’s Lake Park, south side central parking lot: 1700 Utica Street, Denver CO 80212May 9th, 9 am-4 pm: Grand Opening
Missing and Murdered Indigenous Relatives Day of Prayer
Sky Ute Casino Conference Center: 14324 CO-172, Ignacio, CO 81137
May 30th: Ute Indian Museum, Montrose, CO
June 26th-27th: Santa Fe Trail Days, Trinidad, CO
July 3rd: Carbondale, CO
August 14th: San Luis Valley Indian Center, Center, CO
September 8th-12th: Dots Days Community Festival, Colorado Springs, CO
Additional dates and locations TBA.
The Experience
The Truth About 250-150 is a museum-style immersive exhibit installed into a renovated school bus, a cargo trailer, and a shade pavilion.
The 30-45 minute experience is free to the public and available during open hours, no need for tickets or RSVP. Guests are guided through the experience with an audio tour that can be played through personal devices and headphones or with equipment provided by exhibit staff. The audio guide is tailored to three separate identity categories: Turtle Island Natives, European Descendants, and Other Uninvited Guests on this Land. Spanish versions and printed scripts are available upon request.
The exhibit is appropriate for people 12 years of age or older, and for younger people with caregiver accompaniment. It is conscientiously designed to offer a clear-eyed address of difficult and potentially triggering histories of violence and oppression, combined with invitations to contemplate and digest within a safe and supportive space where truth and healing can co-exist.
The exhibit has several stairs. Guests with limited mobility may view all aspects of the cargo trailer installation through the doorway, and a powered lift provides access to the bus interior.
Interested in bringing the The Truth about 250/150 to your community or event?
We are currently seeking local partners interested in hosting or supporting public sharings of The Truth About 250-150 in their areas.
This partnership is crucial for the exhibit to connect with local communities. Partners may be non-profits, museums, art festivals, community groups, or local businesses interested in bringing The Truth About 250-150 to their community. Depending on the context, partners may help with event planning, funding, and hosting our team while we’re there. We don’t expect partners to figure everything out – we’re excited to start the conversation and build a plan together!
Leadership and Collaboration
The Truth About 250-150 is a project initiated and directed by Wakáška Yuza, an Indigenous youth leadership development organization led by Terri Bissonette (Anishinaabe). In collaboration with Create áyA, eight16Creative, and Lighthouse Writers Workshop, Wakáška Yuza is engaging Native youth from the Denver and Four Corners regions to express their lived experiences through spoken word and photo murals. This modern form of storytelling will be a central theme of the upcoming statewide tour. Whisper Bissonette (Anishinaabe/Lakota) serves as the overall project coordinator.
Additionally, the Truth About 250-150 is being developed in partnership with Breathing Healing into the Banks of Sand Creek, which is a program of Control Group Productions, an arts and social justice organization based in Denver. This initiative is led by Cinnamon Kills First (Cheyenne), Bill TallBull (Cheyenne), and their Euro-descent allies Patrick Mueller, Kristine Whittle, and Laurie Rugenstein. Since 2021, the Breathing Healing program has facilitated a series of community dialogues, staged an immersive theatre production, and conducted preliminary sessions featuring the Breathing Healing Bus.
People
Project concept: Terri Bissonette, Wakáška Yuza
Leadership Circle: Terri Bissonette (Gnoozhekaaning Anishinaabe), Whisper Bissonette (Anishinaabe/Lakota), Patrick Mueller, Kristine Whittle
Vision & Values Advisors: Cinnamon Kills First (Northern Cheyenne, Breaths Together for Change), Laurie Rugenstein (Right Relationship Boulder), Bill TallBull (Northern Cheyenne, TallBull Memorial Council), Rick Williams (Lakota/Cheyenne, People of the Sacred Land), Kristina Maldonado Bad Hand (Lakota/Cherokee, Create ayA), and Sid Whiting (Lakota, Create ayA).
Lead Artists: Whisper Bissonette (Lakota/Anishinaabe; installation), Jason & Dewi Houston, eight16 creative (video), Diego Florez-Arroyo (Teocali; murals), Cinnamon Kills First (Northern Cheyenne, audio, healing elements), Hannah Lucero (Mexica; installation), Mona Magno (Mexica, audio/video support), Nazhone Morgan (Dineh/Crow/Blackfoot; installation), Kristine Whittle (installation, healing elements).
Youth Artists: Elizabeth Tafoya (Jicarilla Apache), Jera Bagola (Lakota/Cheyenne), Brielle Patillo (Northern Arapaho), Tatum Lang (Southern Ute), Georgia Porter (Cheyenne Arapaho), Roslyn Paz (P’urehepecha), Mia Madalena (Dineh/Zia/Jemez/CochitiPueblo), Justice Maldonado (Northern Arapaho), Breanna Tafoya (Jicarilla Apache), Andrea Windy Boy (Ute Mountain Ute/Chippewa Cree), Cassy Windy Boy (Ute Mountain Ute/Chippewa Cree)
Project History
Begun in 2021, Control Group’s Breathing Healing Program centers Indigenous leaders and emerging voices, using immersive and innovative artistic practices to advance education, healing, and justice initiatives. Guided by Cinnamon Kills First and Bill TallBull in collaboration with Control Group staff members Patrick Mueller and Kristine Whittle, the program has explored potent integrations of immersive arts and somatic healing. Program activities aim to confront and heal inherited and ongoing traumas inflicted by invading settlers and the U.S. government on this land and its First Peoples.
In 2022-23 the program hosted public dialogues sharing history and healing, leading to the 2024 immersive performance Breathing Healing into the Banks of Sand Creek, addressing non-Native audiences with the White history of the 1864 Sand Creek Massacre. In 2025 we translated the research and practices grounding that production into an immersive exhibit housed in Control Group’s event bus. The Breathing Healing Bus toured the Denver-Boulder metro area in 2025, and forms the backbone of the 2026 statewide tour as part of The Truth About 250-150, a project envisioned by Wakáška Yuza and created in collaboration with Control Group staff and program artists.
Press
"Breathing healing into the banks of Sand Creek" by Desiree Mathurin, Denverite, May 6, 2024
"Facing the truth, damn the consequences" by John Moore, Denver Gazette, May 7, 2024
"Feeling the Past to Heal It: Breathing Healing into the Banks of Sand Creek (Review)" by Kirsten Carey, No Proscenium, May 12, 2024
"Immersive theater production grapples with history of Sand Creek Massacre" by PBS, May 15, 2024
Our Sponsors
The Truth About 250-150 has received support from the Scientific & Cultural Facilities District (SCFD), Colorado Health Foundation, Bonfils-Stanton Foundation, Wilhelm Family Foundation, People of the Sacred Land, the 250-150 Commission, Chinook Foundation, City and County of Denver, and is a recipient of a 2026 Arts in Society award.
