Blackfoot artist Kristy North Peigan is the creative mind behind many Indigenous artworks at the Calgary Stampede, including the 'Yahoo' sign at Elbow River Camp, illustrations on the First Nations Princess's GMC truck, and artwork on rodeo barriers for the inaugural First Nations Rodeo and Relay. For two years, her illustrations have also been featured in the nightly drone show during the Grandstand Show.
Drone show imagery
North Peigan designed two key frames for the 2026 drone show, which follows an agriculture and rodeo theme: bison in the Blackfoot pictograph style and a relay horse featuring designs from the Old Sun Relay team's horse paint. The drone show runs nightly during the Stampede.
Background and inspiration
Raised in the Elbow River Camp community, North Peigan shares First Nations culture through murals and digital art. She worked as an interpretive guide at the camp, learning Stampede history, and now teaches children in Stampede School and mentors youth artists in the annual poster contest. 'The Stampede Foundation has really supported my artist practice ever since I graduated and became a professional,' she said.
Her involvement with the drone show began about nine months before the 2025 Stampede, when she created illustrations for headliner Carolyn Dawn Johnson's performance. 'One of the songs she was singing, it was just this beautiful, very touching, emotional moment in connection with land, so they thought that it would be good for me to make that connection to the Alberta landscape,' North Peigan said.
2025 drone show details
The 2025 drone show featured a golden eagle, a friendship dance group, and teepees with designs reflecting Alberta's landscape—shifting from mountains to foothills to plains. 'You would see the land on the teepee designs shift from the mountains to the foothills to the plains, just like our own biome and landscape here,' she said. After illustrating keyframes, she obtained approval from teepee owners and knowledge keepers before drone programmers produced the final display.
