Ariane (Min Kyung) is a senior at Hong Kong International School. Since learning about the Inuit in third grade, she has been long enthralled by the culture and art of indigenous people.

In 2023, she started her research on leveraging Aboriginal arts as collateral as a part of her Advanced Research class at school. She flew to Sydney and Darwin to interview 14 Aboriginal art gallery owners & artists, and conduct 40 in person surveys.

During her trip, she was awestruck by the cultural richness of Aboriginal art and philosophies, but also returned with a greater sense of gravity for voice in indigenous issues. She created Indigenous Vine in hopes for it to serve as a “vine” to connect non-indigenous and indigenous communities together through discussion of indigenous cultural assets for economic and social empowerment.