Montreal's First People's Festival began Tuesday night with a film screening at the Monument-National on Saint-Laurent Blvd. and will run until Thursday, Aug. 18, featuring screenings, dance, music and other arts celebrating Indigenous culture.

It is the 32nd edition of the festival (Presence Autochtone), and events range from traditional to modern.

"It's an integrated, multidisciplinary event," said organizer Andre Dudemaine. "When you are a part of it, you are participating in an Indigenous experience... There's a moving history right now and we hope that everybody who comes to the festival will feel that we are all part of that positive change."

WHERE IS IT?

The centre of events is the Place des Festivals on Jeanne Mance St. in downtown Montreal, where the atrium is transformed by Huron-Wendat writer and artist Christine Sioui-Wawanoloath.

Screenings and other events take place at the Grande Biblioteque (BANQ) auditorium, Cinema du Musee, Jardins Gamelin, McCord Museum and elsewhere throughout the city.

Kahnawake will also host events at the 219 Legion Hall.

Most events are free, save for some individual screenings and other events.

HIGHLIGHTS

For a full list of events, visit the festival's site, where programming is listed by day.

The Place des Festivals will feature live music, dance and interactive art programming from Wednesday to Aug. 18.

Film screenings begin at 10 a.m. Wednesday and run through the day, including Kahnawake filmmaker Courtney Montour's documentary about Mary Two-Axe Earley (Mary Two-Axe Earley: I Am Indian Again, 6 p.m., BANQ), the Kahnawake woman who fought for decades to change Canada's legislated sex discrimination that stripped First Nations women of their status if they married a non-Indigenous partner.

After playing on the Plains of Abraham during Pope Francis's visit to Quebec, Inuk singer Beatrice Deer will play at the Place des Festivals at 8:30 p.m.

Dudemaine said the festival has grown, despite having the smallest budget of any Montreal festival, from humble roots to an experience that touches on all aspects of the modern Indigenous artistic experience.

"Somebody who beats correct and beautiful moccasins is, for us, as important as the Avante Garde painters that are shown in the Biennale in Venice," said Dudemaine. "Both are part of the circle and ... they all express the soul of our nations."