Exhibition Guide
Echoes of Ohio's Indigenous Legacy: Bridging Past and Present
January 21 - April 11, 2025
Table of Contents
Introduction 2
Land Acknowledgement 5
Historic Tribes of Ohio 6
Timeline of North America Pre-History to Now 9
History of:
Prehistoric and Indigenous History in Ohio 11
European Contact and Colonial Era 13
Removal and Displacement 14
19th and 20th Century Progress 15
The Ohio Country 16
Artist:
Julie Buffalohead 22,24
Nocona Burgess 25
Kelly Church 26
Gregg Deal 28
Demian DinéYazhi’ 29
Jason Garcia 31
Frank Howell 32
James Lavadour 33
Maria Martinez 34
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith 36
Wendy Red Star 37
Jolene Rickard 39
Eugene Tapahe 40
Marie Watt 42
Will Willson 44
Resource Guide 50
Cover Image: Jaune Quick-to-See Smith
(Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, Métis and Shoshone descent, born 1940) Paint Pots, 1987, Drawing, 30 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the College of Wooster Art Museum
Julie Buffalohead (b.1972), Resurrection, 2023, oil on canvas, 52x124x3in. Art Bridges.
Echoes of Ohio's Indigenous Legacy: Bridging Past and Present
January 21st-April 11th, 2025
This exhibition invites visitors to reflect on the rich, complex history of Indigenous peoples in the Northwest Territory and their enduring connection to the land we now call Ohio. Through the work of contemporary Indigenous artists, including those with ancestral ties to the region, we explore narratives of resilience, displacement, and cultural survival. The exhibition offers a platform for stories often overlooked, weaving together visual art and voices to create a multidimensional experience.
In collaboration with the Eichelberger Center for Community Voices and WYSO Public Radio, the Museum integrates podcasts from "The Ohio Country" series into the exhibition. These podcasts center the perspectives of the Miami, Shawnee, Wyandotte, and other American Indian peoples, providing a vital context for understanding Ohio's past and present. This partnership allows visitors to engage deeply with history and hear directly from those whose stories remain essential to the land’s identity.
The ancient Hopewell culture, recognized with a UNESCO World Heritage designation, transformed the Ohio landscape through monumental earthworks
aligned with celestial movements. Yet, much about these people—including their names—remains unknown. The exhibition acknowledges the weight of these absences while confronting the ongoing legacies of forced removal and erasure of the tribes that once called Ohio home. In doing so, it aims to make visible what history has often obscured.
This is not a definitive narrative but a beginning. Over months of collaboration with scholars, communities, writers, and historians, this project seeks to create a foundation for further exploration and dialogue. By featuring contemporary artists whose work engages with identity, place, and memory, we hope to inspire deeper connections and foster a broader understanding of Ohio’s Indigenous heritage. Looking ahead, the Museum aspires to amplify these efforts by building relationships with more tribal nations and presenting future exhibitions that highlight traditional makers and artisans.
This exhibition is funded in part by the America 250-Ohio Commission. Artwork courtesy of ArtBridges, College of Wooster Art Museum, Hope College Kruizenga Art Museum, Richard M. Ross Art Museum, and The Ohio Country Project.
Special Contributors
Dr. John Bickers (Miami Tribe of Oklahoma), Assistant Professor of History at Case Western Reserve University
Jeff Gill, writer, storyteller, and preacher
Sarah Hinkelman, Historic Site Manager, Newark Earthworks
Neenah Ellis, Senior Producer, The Eichelberger Center for Community Voices at WYKO Public Radio
George Ironstrack (Miami Tribe of Oklahoma), Assistant Director, Myaamia Center, Miami University
Dr. Brad Lepper, Senior Archaeologist, World Heritage Program, Ohio History Connection; Anthropology and Sociology, Denison University.
Dr. John Low (Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians), Professor, Department of Comparative Studies; Director, Newark Earthworks Center, OSU Newark
Linda Pansing, Curator of Archaeology, Ohio History Connection
Talon Silverhorn (Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma), Cultural Programs Manager for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources
Jack Shuler, Professor of English, Denison University.
Carol Thress, Director of Partner Engagement at Explore Licking County
Chris Welter, Managing Editor at The Eichelberger Center for Community Voices at WYKO
Public Radio
Museum Interns
Nora Blount ‘25
Trang Bui ’25
Meredith Klinzing ‘26
Eli Lishack ’26
Josie Pillion-Gardner ‘25
Ana Pineda ’26
Meg Simpson ‘26
Grant Snyder ’27
Land Acknowledgement
The Denison Museum would like to acknowledge our presence on the traditional and unceded territories of the Shawnee, Potawatomi, Delaware, Miami, Peoria, Seneca, Wyandotte, Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), and Chippewa (Ojibwe) Indigenous Nations in what is now the state of Ohio ("Great River"). We present this land acknowledgment and exhibit as a reminder that Indigenous peoples are not a people of the past but are here with us now. While a land acknowledgment is insufficient without sustained action and meaningful support for these communities, it is a critical practice that promotes Indigenous visibility and serves as a reminder that we are on settled Indigenous lands. As a museum, we can share Indigenous history and voices through our exhibits. Let this land acknowledgment open us to contemplate ways we can support Indigenous efforts toward sovereignty and self-determination.
https://qrco.de/landack
Historic Tribes of Ohio
People have been coming in and out of the region we call Ohio for thousands of years, and groups have mingled and combined over time. This list is not definitive, as it is hard to determine which tribes/nations were here and which have ancestral homelands.
According to Vogel & Tanner, Treaty of Greenville 1795, the National Park Service NAGPRA website, and gracious input from Ohio History Connection, Dr. John Bickers, Jeff Gill, Sarah Hinkelman, George Ironstrack, Dr. Brad Lepper, Dr. John Low, and Linda Pansing.
1. Absentee-Shawnee Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma
2. Bad River Band of Lake Superior Tribe of Chippewa Indians, Wisconsin
3. Bay Mills Indian Community
4. Bois Forte Band (Nett Lake) of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, Minnesota
5. Cayuga Nation
6. Chippewa Cree Indians of the Rocky Boys Reservation
7. Chippewa Tribes of Indians
8. Citizen Potawatomi Nation, Oklahoma
9. Delaware Nation, Moraviantown, Canada
10. Delaware Nation, Oklahoma
11. Delaware Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma
12. Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma
13. Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Minnesota
14. Forest County Potawatomi Community, Wisconsin
15. Grand Portage Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe, Minnesota
16. Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians
17. Hannahville Indian Community, Michigan
18. Kaw Nation
19. Keweenaw Bay Indian Community, Michigan
20. Kickapoo Traditional Tribe of Texas
21. Kickapoo Tribe in Kansas
22. Kickapoo Tribe of Oklahoma
23. Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin
24. Lac du Flambeau Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians of the Lac du Flambeau Reservation of Wisconsin
25. Lac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians, Michigan
26. Leech Lake Band of the Minnesota Chippewa (Ojibwe) Tribe, Minnesota
27. Little River Band of Ottawa Indians
28. Little Shell Chippewa Tribe
29. Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians
30. Match-e-be-nash-she-wish Band of Pottawatomi Indians of Michigan
31. Miami Tribe of Oklahoma
32. Mille Lacs Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe
33. Minnesota Chippewa Tribe
34. Nottawaseppi Huron Band of the Potawatomi
35. Omaha Tribe of Nebraska
36. Oneida Tribe
37. Onondaga Nation
38. Ottawa Tribe of Oklahoma
39. Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma
40. Peoria, confederation of the Kaskaskia, Peoria, Piankashaw, and Wea tribes
41. Pokagon Band of Potawatomi Indians, Michigan and Indiana
42. Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma
43. Ponca Tribe of Nebraska
44. Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation
45. Red Cliff Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin
46. Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians, Minnesota
47. Sac and Fox Nation
48. Sac and Fox Nation of Missouri in Kansas and Nebraska
49. Sac and Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa
50. Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan
51. Saint Regis Mohawk Tribe
52. Sault Ste. Marie Tribe of Chippewa Indians, Michigan
53. Seneca Nation of Indians
54. Seneca-Cayuga Tribe of Oklahoma
55. Shawnee Tribe
56. Sokaogon Chippewa Community (Mole Lake Band)
57. St. Croix Chippewa Indians of Wisconsin
58. Stockbridge Munsee Community
59. The Osage Nation
60. Tonawanda Seneca Nation
61. Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa Indians of North Dakota
62. Tuscarora Nation
63. United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians in Oklahoma
64. White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe
Wyandotte Nation
66. Wyandot of Anderdon Nation
67. Wyandotte Nation, Kansas
68. Wyandotte Nation, Oklahoma
Period
18,000 - 13,000 B.C.E.
Prehistoric and Indigenous History in Ohio
Humans Migrate to North America
10,000 B.C.E. Ice Age Ends
10,000 B.C.E.Paleo-Indians reach Ohio
10,000- 8,000
B.C.E Megafaunal Extinction
9,000- 5,000 B.C.E Domestication of corn, squash, and beans in Mexico
8,000 - 1,000 B.C.E. The Archaic Period
3,000 B.C.E Caral-Supe Civilization
1,500 - 1,000 B.C.E. Glacial Kame Culture
1,000 B.C.E - 900 C.E. The Woodland Period
1000 B.C.E - 500 C.E. Adena Culture
c.200 B.C.E. - 500 C.E. Hopewell Culture
c.200 - 500 Great Circle and Octagon Earthworks
Humans may have entered the Americas via the Bering land bridge or through Pacific coastal routes during this time. Some evidence suggests earlier migrations, including the “kelp highway hypothesis.” *
The most recent Glacial Period (or “Ice Age”) lasted from approximately 115,000 years ago to about 11,700 years ago.
As glaciers began to melt, groups of paleo-Indians moved North into the Ohio River valley. *
This was a period of widespread extinction of large animals, or “megafauna,” including the woolly mammoth, saber-toothed cats, mastodons, giant ground sloths, and giant beavers.
This transformative period marked the beginnings of agriculture in the Americas and laid the foundation for complex civilizations.
This period marks the start of plant domestication, beginnings of horticulture and burial rituals.
One of the oldest known civilizations in the Americas, flourishing along the central coast of Peru between approximately 3000 and 1800 BCE.
A culture in the area around the Great Lakes which buried their dead in natural hills and glacial gravel.
A period of increased food cultivation, as well as the development of early ‘mound builder’ societies.
The Adena culture emerges, known for earthworks and burial mounds.
The Hopewell culture flourishes, marked by elaborate earthworks, complex trade networks, and artistic achievements.
The Great Circle and Octagon Earthworks in Newark, Ohio, constructed during the Hopewell period, serves as a significant ceremonial and astronomical site.
c.800 - 1,600 Fort Ancient Culture
The Fort Ancient culture develops, characterized by usage of the bow and arrow, earthworks, and agricultural practices, including the cultivation of maize.
Prehistoric and Indigenous History in Ohio
c.1,000 Serpent Mound Built
1492 - 1504 Columbian Expeditions
1492 - 1650 The ‘Great Dying’
*Humans Migrate to North America
The Serpent Mound in Peebles, Ohio, constructed during the late pre-contact period, serves as a significant testament to the ability of the Fort Ancient peoples.
Christopher Columbus successfully sails from Europe to the Americas, making European powers aware of their existence.
Due to the introduction of new diseases from Europeans, 90-95% of Native Americans die.
While the land-bridge theory is the most widely accepted and believed hypothesis on how human beings got to the Americas, there co-exists several other theories, many of which have archaeological evidence to back them up. As such, one should additionally think of the other possibilities, such as the Kelp Highway Hypothesis, which postulates that early humans sailed using the directions of kelp forests as early as 18,000 years ago, leading them along an aquatic route similar to that of the Beringia land bridge, but without needing to walk across the land to reach the Americas. There is also the possibilitiy of use of other sea routes, as evidenced by possible Polynesian contact with South America in the 12th or 13th century.
*Paleo-Indians reach Ohio
Due to the nature of modern historical naming being predominantly Western, most of the names attributed to Indigenous American culture (Palaeo-Indian, Hopewell, Fort Ancient, etc.) are Western in nature and not the names that the indigeonous people would have prescribed to themselves. However, as we unfortunately do not know what names they called themselves, we use these Western attributions instead.
European Contact and Colonial Era
1500s - 1600sEuropean Contact
1754 - 1763French and Indian War
1763 Proclamation Line
1782 Gnadenhutten Massacre
1786-1795Northwest Indian War
1787 Northwest Ordinance
1791 Battle of Wabash
Early European explorers begin making contact with indigenous tribes in Ohio, including the Shawnee, Miami, and Delaware.*
War between France and Britain over the upper Ohio River valley, many indigenous allies of the French and British fought.
The British Crown prohibits colonial expansion west of the Appalachian Mountains, affecting indigenous lands.
96 christian converts of the Delaware tribe massacred in Ohio by a Revolutionary American militia.
War between the United States (with the support of the Chickasaw and Choctaw tribes) and the Northwestern Confederacy, a confederacy consisting of the Huron, Iroquois Shawnee, Delaware, Miami, Odawa, Potawatomi, and Ojibwe tribes, supported by the British. *
Establishes governance in the Northwest Territory, including Ohio, laying the groundwork for statehood, even though most of the land is still inhabited by native peoples and tribal nations.
A battle during the Northwest Indian War that is considered by many to be the largest Indigenous success over the American military and by some to be the most decisive defeat in the history of the American military.
*European Contact
While Europeans first made contact with indigenous peoples during this time, the tribes had been established in these regions for an unknown amount of time. Many nations in Ohio did not originate in the region and instead migrated from elsewhere - usually somewhere else on the Great Lakes - and we therefore do not know exactly when/where many of these nations were founded.
*Northwest Indian War
The Northwest Indian War is a single war in a larger series of “Indian Wars” spanning from 1609-1924. However, it is the only one that was fought in the modern state of Ohio. Viewers should be aware, however, that various colonial governments and their subsequent independent counterparts fought indigenous peoples for long before and after the Northwest Indian War.
Removal and Displacement
1794Battle of Fallen Timbers
1795Treaty of Greenville
1819 Indian Civilization Act
A decisive battle between the U.S. Army and Native American tribes, leading to the Treaty of Greenville (1795)
A treaty ceding land that constituted most of modern Ohio to the United States.
An act passed to encourage benevolent societies to educate Native Americans, in order to ‘civilize’ them. This act would later be used to introduce and sustain residential schools.
1830 Indian Removal Act
18311837 Removal of Tribes from Ohio
18381839 Trail of Tears
1842 Last Tribal Nation removed from Ohio
U.S. government policy mandates the relocation of Native American tribes from their ancestral lands to designated territories.
Various tribes, including the Delaware and Shawnee, begin relocating to areas in present-day Kansas and Oklahoma.
The forced removal of the Cherokee Nation, with many tribes experiencing similar fates during this period.
The Wyandot Nation is the last tribal nation to be forcibly removed from Ohio. After this removal, no tribal nations remained within the state. (They were forced to Kansas, then subsequently Oklahoma.)
18691960s Indian Boarding Schools
1871 Establishment of Reservations
1887 Dawes Act Passed
Indigenous children would be forced to attend national boarding schools throughout this period. With dubious morals and rampant corruption, abuses were extremely common.
Some Ohio tribes, such as the Wyandot, are relocated to reservations in Indian Territory (now Oklahoma).
Permitted Federal Government to break up tribal lands for settlers. Tribes who had land broken would be given citizenship, which was supposed to assimilate them.
1889Oklahoma Land Run
Land in Oklahoma now open to Homestead Act, settlers rushed in and claimed former reservation land, affecting many indigenous that had been moved there.
1891
1923
19th and 20th Century
Progress
Fort Ancient Designated as State Park
Hopewell Culture
National Historical Park Designated
1924 Indian Citizenship Act
1956 Indian Relocation Act
1960s
1964
Civil Rights Movement
Fort Ancient and Newark Earthworks Designated
1975 Indian SelfDetermination and Education Assistance Act
1978
Fort Ancient (named for the culture of the same name) is designated as Ohio’s first State Park.
The site, only including Mound City in Chillicothe, Ohio, is designated as a National Monument.
Granted citizenship and voting rights to all indigenous peoples born in the U.S.
An act encouraging indigenous peoples to move from reservation lands into various cities, such as Cleveland, with the belief that they would be easier to assimilate them in urban environments.
Indigenous rights movements gain momentum, advocating for sovereignty and recognition.
These sites, both representations of indigenous culture, are designated as National Historic Landmarks.
Among many other things, permitted tribal families to decide whether to send their children to residential schools or not.
American Indian Religious Freedom Act
Enacted to protect the religious practices of Native Americans.
1990
2000
Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA)
U.S. Census Bureau
2022 Great Council State Park Established
Hopewell Culture
2023
National Historical Park Designated as a UNESCO Heritage Site
A law requiring federal agencies and institutions to return Native American cultural items to their respective tribes.
For the first time, allows individuals to identify as Native American alone or in combination with other races.
A new state park dedicated to honoring Ohio’s indigenous history and the Great Council of the Ohio River Valley, promoting education and preservation of Native American culture.
This site, composed of the Great Circle, Octagon, Hopeton and Seip Earthworks, as well as Mound City, Fort Ancient, the High Bank Works, and the Hopewell Mound Group, are inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
Among the tribes that called Ohio home are the Shawnee, Delaware, Wyandot, and Miami. They continue to advocate for rights, recognition, and preservation of cultural heritage, with many maintaining connections to their ancestral lands.
The Ohio Country
Hosted by Neenah Ellis,Chris Welter
This 12-episode series provides a perspective on the history of the region we now call Ohio that very few of us learned in school. It puts the experiences of Miami, Shawnee, Wyandotte, and other American Indian people at the center of a refreshed version of the state’s complicated past and undecided future.
This in-depth podcast from WYSO Public Radio is the result of more than a year of reporting, made possible with support from Ohio Humanities.
Credits
The Ohio Country is written by Neenah Ellis and Chris Welter.
The series editor of The Ohio Country is Samantha Sommer. The cultural adviser is Dr. John Bickers, assistant professor at Case Western University in Cleveland and a citizen of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma. The digital producers are Mary Evans and Kaitlin Schroeder.
Flawn Williams is the audio mixer and the composer is Evan Miller. Our logo was designed by Lela Troyer, a citizen of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma.
https://qrco.de/bfSNez
Episode One: Still here
Before Ohio became a state, The so-called Ohio Country was home to Shawnee, Miami, Seneca-Cayuga, Lenape (Delaware) and Wyandot people (among others) but after generations of broken treaties and deadly conflict with settlers and colonists, the tribes were forcibly removed by the US government so their homelands could be sold and settled. Those Tribal Nations still exist, and many are headquartered in northeastern Oklahoma. As they expand their economies and citizenship numbers and revive their languages and cultures, they are also reconnecting to their homelands in the Ohio River Valley. We meet Glenna Wallace, visionary Chief of the Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma, who has developed a working relationship with the state of Ohio to provide opportunities for her fellow Shawnee people to reconnect with their Ohio homelands. Episode available July 9, 2024
Episode Two: Rewriting the Narrative
Shawnee people and their ancestors have lived in what we now call southwest Ohio for thousands of years, but since they and their governments were removed in the mid-1800s, their story has been largely replaced and reduced by a heroic narrative about white settlement. We meet Catherine Wilson, director of the Greene County Historical Society, who’s related to the famous settler and land speculator Daniel Boone. Wilson feels a pressing need to make sure Shawnee history is told in their homelands, and told by them. Available July 16, 2024
Episode Three: The Shawnee Life on the Land
Shawnee people have a sophisticated and collaborative involvement with other-than-human beings, water, and soil. Shawnee Tribe citizen and Indiana farmer Jeremy Turner and Eastern Shawnee citizen Talon Silverhorn describe Shawnee hunting and farming practices, which sustained their people for thousands of years in the Ohio River Valley, until the disruption brought to North America by European traders, settlers, and colonists. Silverhorn and Turner are both professional historical interpreters who are popular speakers at conferences, museums, and historic sites in Ohio and the Midwest. Available July
Episode Four: Fire
The Shawnee and Miami practice of intentionally burning land creates a diverse and sustainable mosaic of ecosystems in the Ohio River Valley but those practices were outlawed and rejected by settlers and colonizers who brought a different approach to land ownership and the agricultural economy.. In the twentieth century, the US Forest Service vilified fire and told Americans repeatedly, “only you can prevent forest fires,” but some conservationists and American Indian people today say the practice of burning should be revived to improve Ohio’s soil health and ecological diversity.. We meet local botanist Dave Nolin, a conservationist who’s in favor of bringing back fire and from Miami Tribe of Oklahoma citizens George Ironstrack and Dani Tippman about what fire means to Myaamia people today.
Episode Five: The Fort Ancient Culture
Prehistoric people in the Ohio River valley have been grouped into the Adena, Hopewell, and Fort Ancient eras. The most recent of the three cultures, the Fort Ancient, thrived for 700 years before Europeans came to North America, bringing new trade opportunities but also disease, guns, and terror. We meet fourth graders learning about Ohio’s prehistoric tribes for the first time at Lincoln Elementary in Springfield, Ohio. We also talk to University of Iowa historian Dr. Stephen Warren, who’s spent more than 20 years working collaboratively with the Shawnee tribes in Oklahoma, to describe details of the highly successful Fort Ancient culture in his book, “ The Worlds the Shawnee Made.”
Episode Six: The 1700s in the Ohio Country
The Ohio Country’s population and economy were transformed in the 1700s as the Shawnee, Miami, and others returned to the region, and European traders, settlers, and colonists arrived by the thousands. Many colonists traveled on foot, over the Appalachians, and came in canoes or flatboats
down the Ohio River. It was a century of both creative peace with mutually beneficial trade but also deadly conflict, and the century ended with the Northwest Indian War, when nations like the Miami, Shawnee, and others, and the new US government went to war over the right to settle the land. Miami University historian Dr. Cameron Shriver says the new United States was built on that idea that so-called Indian land was needed even if it wasn’t easy to take.
Episode Seven: Tecumseh’s legacy
At the end of the 1700s, a confederation of Shawnee, Miami, Wyandotte, and other nations trounced two American generals in two years. To vanquish them and ensure that American settlers could live north of the Ohio River, the controversial General “Mad” Anthony Wayne was sent to The Ohio County by American leaders on the east coast. His military campaign took three years, and after the Confederacy's defeat at The Battle of Fallen Timbers near modern-day Toledo, Wayne negotiated the Treaty of Greenville, in which the tribes ceded most of their land in what we now call Ohio. Eighteen years later, the Shawnee leader Tecumseh and his brother Tenskwatawa organized another pan-tribal alliance to stop America's western expansion. Eastern Shawnee historic interpreter Talon Silverhorn talks about Tecumseh’s legacy in Ohio and amongst the Shawnee in Oklahoma.
Episode Eight – The Removals
You may never have heard this tragic story, even if you grew up in Ohio. President Andrew Jackson pushed the Indian Removal Act through Congress in 1830, which resulted in the forced removal of tens of thousands of people in the southern and northern US. “The Other Trail of Tears” by Ohio historian Dr. Mary Stockwell, describes the removal process in Ohio that resulted in a chaotic and deadly experience for Shawnee, Miami, Wyandotte, and other people. Eastern Shawnee citizen and poet Laura Da’ recounts the suffering of her ancestors as they were marched west hundreds of miles and across the Mississippi River to Indian Territory, present-day Kansas. Her poetry collection, “Tributaries, ” is a vivid account with a family perspective, indelibly told by a young Shawnee named “Lazarus Shale.”
Episode Nine: Renewing a Shawnee Identity
Artist and Ohio resident Suzanne Chouteau discovered her Shawnee citizenship as an adult. Professor Chouteau recently retired from teaching printmaking, design, and art history at Xavier University in Cincinnati, and her art reflects her appreciation for the brilliance and struggles of her Shawnee ancestors. Reported by WYSO’s Community Voices producer Susan Byrnes.
Episode Ten – Renewing the Miami Tribe
The Miami Tribe of Oklahoma and Miami University have had a partnership since the 1970s. In the last twenty years, the Myaamia Center, a research and education initiative of the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma housed in Oxford, Ohio, has come out of this relationship. Cincinnati Public Radio senior reporter Tana Weingartner attended a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the partnership between the Miami Tribe and Miami University at the tribe’s annual Winter Gathering, which brought together generations of Miami citizens at a social stomp dance in northeastern Oklahoma. They describe why the Miami Tribe’s renewal is important to them and what they want the world to know about their tribe.
Episode Eleven: Why Tribal Citizenship Matters
From 1850 until 2000, Ohio was home to relatively few citizens of federally recognized tribes, especially citizens from the nations removed from the state in the 19th century (Shawnee, Miami, Wyandotte). That absence led to dozens of so-called “remnant tribes” popping up in the state whose members claim to have American Indian ancestry. Some academics have called the people in these unrecognized groups “Pretendians.” While it may seem innocuous, pretendians in Ohio have, based on their unverified or non-existent identity, made money, accessed ancestral funerary objects and remains, and spread false and harmful information about American Indian people. In this episode, we define tribal citizenship, look at the damage done by pretendians in the last 225 years in Ohio, and highlight the work of the citizens of federally recognized tribes to correct those situations.
Episode Twelve: Great Council State Park
Great Council State Park, a Shawnee interpretative center, opens in Greene County near the location of a known eighteenth-century Shawnee village. The State Park has been a long time coming and resulted from a collaboration between Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and the three federally recognized Shawnee Tribes. Eastern Shawnee Chief Glenna Wallace has been pushing for a space like Great Council for decades. Wallace talks about her dreams for the future of Shawnee people in Ohio.
Artist
Julie Buffalohead (Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma, born 1972)
ToneDeaf,2021
Lithograph, screenprint, and collage
34 ⅝” x 61 ½”
Courtesy of The College of Wooster Art Museum
Julie Buffalohead’s work describes the native experience through metaphors from her personal life. Buffalohead is a member of the Ponca Tribe. Originally from Nebraska, in 1876, the Ponca Tribe was forcibly relocated to Oklahoma. Her works grapple with this history in her art, with themes of conflict and missing a part of oneself. Buffalohead’s work is often mixed media, using a bright color palette. She frequently portrays personified animals to comment on the commercialization of Native culture.
Buffalohead created Tone Deaf as a reaction to the COVID-19 pandemic and its disproportionately adverse effect on Native communities.
Fromtheartist:
“Thepiecestemsfromrecentevents,specificallytheCovidpandemicandthepoliticizationof theepidemic.Thetwocoyotefiguresexistinasuspendedspaceinwhichtheyaremirroring eachother,sentientandvulnerable.TheyarerepresentativeofgroupspolarizedintheUnited States,validatingtheirownworldviewsinsideanarrowvacuum.
OneCoyoteholdsupamaskthatstates"help"–asymbolofthedisproportionatenumbers ofAmericanIndianpeopledyingfromCOVID-19.SmallAmericanflagsblankettheopposing Coyoteandholdasigntitled"ToneDeaf,"anotherassociatedsemaphore.
Thesefiguresareverysimilar,likeamirrorimage.ThisspeakstothepolarizationofAmerican politicalviews.Thepiecespecificallyaddressesthepoliticizationofmask-wearingandthe phenomenonthatexistswithinAmericanpatriotismandvariousdemographicswhorefute masks.Whataretheconsequencesofthat?
Iwasinterestedinexploringthislackofconscientiousnesstowardotherpeoplewhoareat risk.Framingthisintomyowncontextandsettingupadramaofflag-likeproportions,I referencethecartoonanticsofWileE.CoyoteoftheLooneyTunestoholdupasign provokingconsciousactionliterally.Thepandemichasdemonstratedthatnooneisimmune;
-Julie Buffalohead
Nora Blount ‘25
Highpoint Center for Printmaking| Artist Statement
Julie Buffalohead (Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma, born 1972)
Resurrection,2023
Oil on canvas
52 x 124 x 3 in. (132.1 x 315 x 7.6 cm)
Courtesy of Art Bridges
Julie Buffalohead’s work describes the native experience through metaphors from her personal life. Buffalohead is a member of the Ponca Tribe. Originally from Nebraska, the Ponca Tribe was forcibly relocated to Oklahoma in 1876. Her works grapple with this history in her art with themes of conflict and missing a part of one's self. Buffalohead’s work is often mixed media; using a bright color palette, she often portrays personified animals to comment on the commercialization of Native culture. Her work includes patterns reminiscent of indigenous textiles to organize the space and punctuate divisions.
“In Resurrection, she separates these characters by using different Ponca patterns, placing them into two worlds: the underground, an allusion to Mississippian serpent effigy mounds, and the overarching tree, a representation of the present. The snakes illustrate the buried and forcibly erased memories of Native life while trickster coyotes attempt to weave them back into the branches above. A raccoon stands in between, holding a red, white, and blue popsicle as a pointed symbol of the United States.
Resurrection specifically examines the systemic eradication and burial of Native cultural and linguistic practices in boarding schools. Still, despite the presence of the raccoon, the snakes continue to be resurrected, symbolizing the resilience of Native futurity.“
-Art Bridges
Nora Blount ‘25
Nocona Burgess (Comanche Nation of Oklahoma, born 1969)
EkaNumu,RedComanche, 2014
Oil on canvas, 12 x 12 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“Burgess is a member of the Comanche Nation of Oklahoma. He is the son of a former tribal chief and the great-great-grandson of one of the most revered Native American leaders, Chief Quanah Parker. Burgess grew up surrounded by art. His father attended art school to focus on drawing and painting, and his grandmothers made quilts and beadwork from their designs. Nocona received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma and a Masters in Art Education from the University of New Mexico. Nocona Burgess’ paintings have received numerous awards and have appeared in many publications. He exhibits throughout Australia, England, South Africa, and Sweden throughout the USA and beyond. The Smithsonian Institute’s National Museum of the American Indian, Bristol Museum, American Museum, and many more have included his art in their permanent collections.”*
“Artist Nocona Burgess is an enrolled member of the Comanche Nation of Oklahoma. Descended from a prominent family of chiefs and artists, Burgess is interested in finding contemporary ways to portray the enduring strength and vitality of Native American culture. He often bases his paintings on historical photographs, which he recreates using bold colors and forceful brushwork to give the subjects greater power and presence. This painting is inspired by a 19th-century portrait of an as-yet-unidentified Comanche subject. The term “Eka” used in the painting’s title is the Comanche word for “red,” while the word “Numu” is derived from the Comanche name for themselves. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the Comanche ranked among the most powerful indigenous tribes in the Southern Plains region of North America. They still exist there as a proud nation today.”**
-Ana Pineda ‘26
*Nonoca Burgess | **Hope College
Kelly Church (Potawatomi, Chippewa (Ojibwe), Odawa Tribes, born 1967)
TraditionalTransformations, 2019
Black ash, sweetgrass, copper, Rit dye, velvet, glass vial, Emerald Ash Borer Beetle 8 3/4 x 4 3/4 x 4 3/4 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“For centuries, the Chippewa (Ojibwe), Odawa, Potawatomi, and other Indigenous peoples of the Great Lakes region used black ash wood to make baskets, fish traps, snowshoes, lacrosse sticks, and various other woven and bentwood objects. Although Indigenous peoples can make all of those objects from other materials, black ash weaving remains an important tradition that helps many Native American individuals and communities maintain a sense of connection to their cultural heritage. That heritage is threatened, however, by an invasive insect, the Emerald Ash Borer, which was inadvertently brought to the Great Lakes region from Asia in the 1990s and is now killing large numbers of black ash trees throughout the area. Michigan artist Kelly Church draws attention to this danger by making black ash baskets, some of which are woven with materials other than wood to signify the disappearance of black ash trees. For this basket, Church dyed the ash wood green and used copper as the replacement material to mimic the natural coloring of the Emerald Ash Borer. The inside of the basket is lined with velvet and contains a specimen of the invasive beetle preserved in a glass vial. Church is a fifth-generation black ash basket maker of mixed Potawatomi, Ojibwe, Odawa, and European heritage and is an enrolled member of the Match-E-Be-Nash-She-Wish Band of Potawatomi Indians in Allegan County, Michigan.” -Hope College
Artist bio/Website
‘Kelly Church is an Ottawa/Pottawatomi black ash basket maker, fiber artist, educator, activist, and culture keeper. A member of the Gun Lake Band in Michigan and a Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Ojibwe descendent, she comes from an unbroken line of black ash basket makers and the largest black ash weaving family in the Great Lakes region.” Church spent her childhood in Michigan learning the Odawa language and ash basket weaving from her family. After graduating from college, Church moved back to help care for her grandparents; Church said, “She remembers
her grandfather saying, “We need to make that person a basket,” and realized it was his way of showing gratitude to someone. This moment prompted Church to ask her father to teach her how to harvest material from the black ash tree to make baskets, and her life as a black ash and fiber artist began.” Finding the best ash trees to construct the baskets was just as important as the weaving process, so when Church learned about the Emerald Ash Borer, The beetle is an invasive species brought over from Asia with no known predators in the Americas. It has been causing the death and destruction of Ash trees across the continent. Church has made it her mission to spread awareness of the disappearance of these trees and teach how to harvest and weave the Ash trees. “To date, she has taught over 1300 people from 18 different tribes and in universities nationwide. She has also passed her knowledge on to her daughter, Cherish Parrish, who is now a renowned weaver and artist in her own right. Church’s journey as an advocate for the survival of Native traditions and the black ash tree has involved many national and international art programs, exhibitions, and partnerships with government agencies such as tribal offices and the US Forest Service. She has received multiple honors and awards, including being named a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellow and earning a Native Arts and Cultures Foundation’s National Artist Fellowship. She has been a four-time Artist Leadership Program participant at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. Her artwork has been exhibited and purchased by both public and private collectors worldwide.”
-Nora Blount ‘25 from Kelly Church bio https://www.woodlandarts.com/bio
Gregg Deal (Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe in Nevada, American, born 1975)
Friend:MarginalMan, 2020
TheOthersSeries
Acrylic on canvas, 18 x 14 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“In a 2018 TED Talk, Gregg Deal described his work as “honoring Indigenous experiences, challenging stereotypes, and pushing for accurate representations of Indigenous people in art.” It is in these "disruptions" of stereotypes and ahistorical representations in which Deal’s voice as an artist is unmistakable. Gregg Deal has exhibited his work at notable institutions worldwide, including The Smithsonian Institution, the Denver Art Museum, the RedLine Gallery, the Utah Museum of Contemporary Art, and many more.”*
“Colorado-based artist Deal is an enrolled member of the Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe in Nevada. His politically charged art often mixes historical and contemporary imagery to criticize racist stereotypes of Native Americans and to promote Native American pride and empowerment. This painting comes from a series titled TheOthers,in which Deal combines images appropriated from old comic books of the 1940s and 50s with lyrics from punk rock songs of the 1970s and 80s. The words in the caption box of this image come from the song “Friend” by the 1980s-era Washington, DC punk band Marginal Man.”** TheOtherspoint to an ongoing struggle for liberation from white settler colonialism and violence. “Not only is Deal breaking taboos within a hyper-accessible, pop culture medium—the comic—but he is providing the viewer with a unique personal lens, which is both Indigenous and Punk Rock. The work represents a complex Indigenous-born narrative, standing in radical opposition to the illustrations themselves, which purposefully recall racist Indigenous stereotypes in pop culture. Deal’s work goes beyond stylistic representation. It speaks for itself as an act of de-colonial liberation.”***
Ana Pineda ‘26
*Raitman Art Galleries | **Hope College | ***Daria Magazine | Artist website (Gallery)
Demian DinéYazhi’ (Diné (Navajo) Nation, born 1983)
Naasht’ézhíTábąąháGirls, 2017
Lithograph
22 x 30 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“Demian Dinéyazhí is a gender non-binary Native American artist and activist who uses they/them pronouns. Born in Gallup, New Mexico, as a member of the Diné (Navajo) Nation, Dinéyazhí grew up absorbing elements of both Diné and White American culture, and much of their current artistic practice focuses on the survivance of indigenous cultures in the face of pressure to assimilate into mainstream White culture. As the artist explained, “survivance” is more than survival. Rather, it is a form of resistance that encourages cultural resilience by actively continuing native beliefs and practices.”*
This print celebrates the importance of matriarchs in traditional Diné culture and their role in passing on intergenerational knowledge. The title of the print uses the Diné language name for the Zuni People Water’s Edge clan, one of the artist’s ancestral clans.” The words in the center of the piece are also in the Diné language and roughly translate asdzáán to “elderly women” and Hajéí Béédahaniih to “Remembering the Heart.” The artwork features a photograph of their maternal grandmother and a picture of their mother, celebrating the art of weaving their grandmother passed down.
“Thinking of this lithograph of my mother and her mother. Thinking of matriarchy, resilient traditions, and traditions without assimilative culture or ancestral trauma. Think of value systems outside of capitalism or land thieves or greedy tribal relatives and council members, and think of gratitude. The most generous and powerful energies my maternal grandmother passed on were cultural awareness, reverence of creation stories, deities, and ceremonial healing. Awareness does not exploit our own stories in spaces that are not sacred and that have extracted so much to feed colonial values and taking taking taking /// consumption. Even when I didn’t understand, even when I refused out of my intimidation and indoctrination into 90s U.S. culture, even when it seemed impossible, or I felt helpless. I have seen my mother carry the burden of traditional ceremonial knowledge systems and recognize the love and care that extends to her family and beyond - to the land and our people. Even in times of indifference and fear, I would not have walked into my work as an artist, poet, writer, and thinker without the confidence passed on through my mothers and aunt and my
grandmother's stubborn and ferocious love for being Diné.
Thank you for passing on creativity and stubborn courage, even through failure and frustration. Thank you for the determination and drive to weave hózho through my work, even in spaces and materials that have been given colonial definitions like “traditional Native art.” Thank you to all the matriarchs who have walked this brilliant world and blessed our paths with sweet and vibrant tadídíín!
This piece, created at Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts (founded by James Lavadour), features a photograph I took of my maternal grandmother and mother. My maternal grandmother was a weaver who passed this creativity down to her children and grandchildren. The design is based on Navajo rug textiles specific to the Chinle area. “
- Demian DinéYazhi’
-*Hope College
Ana Pineda ‘26 and Nora Blount ‘25
Jason Garcia (Tewa Indian from Santa Clara Pueblo, American, born 1973)
CornMaiden#26, 2021
Screenprint
24 x 19 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
Jason Garcia is from the Santa Clara Pueblo Tewa tribe in Northern New Mexico. He also goes by Okuu Pinn, which means “turtle mountain.” Garcia grew up in an artistic family known for their pottery. Influenced by comic imagery, Garcia used traditional Pueblo techniques to create Star Wars and Spiderman images. The work of Pablita Velarde, a well-known Santa Clara Pueblo painter, also greatly influenced Garcia. “Descended from a long line of artists, Garcia explores the continuities and contradictions between historical and contemporary Tewa culture.”*
“CornMaiden#26depicts a young Tewa woman wearing the traditional ceremonial costume for the Corn Dance, an annual harvest festival celebrated in Santa Clara Pueblo for centuries. Rather than showing the young woman dancing, the image shows her taking a selfie with her cell phone, perhaps to share with her friends on social media. The silhouettes of a television antenna and satellite dish visible in the background further remind us that Native Americans are not exotic remnants from a bygone age but are still present, participating in and relevant to 21st-century American culture.”**
-Ana Pineda ‘26
*Wyld Gallery | **Hope College
Frank Howell (Lakota Sioux Tribe, 1937 – 1997)
LakotaSisters,1984
Lithograph, 31 x 20 1/4 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“Frank Howell belonged to a generation of Native American artists who, in the 1970s and 80s, moved beyond popular-culture stereotypes of Indians and sought to capture the beauty, dignity, and complexity of indigenous American peoples and cultures. Of Lakota Sioux ancestry, Howell was born in Sioux City, Iowa, and educated at the University of Northern Iowa”. He was known for his painting and print-making, as well as being a gallery owner. In the late 1960s, he moved briefly to Breckenridge, Colorado, then to Taos, New Mexico, and finally to Santa Fe, where he opened his own gallery. Howell was one of the members of the Southwest Native Art Movement, where he focused on portraying his identity through art. He created a fusion of the physical and spiritual world and called it “The continuum of life.”*
“The figures in Howell’s images often possess a mystical quality as if they are visions or ancestral spirits. This lithograph depicting a Lakota elder with a raven on her head is typical of Howell’s work. Ravens are regarded as sacred birds in traditional Lakota culture, symbolizing wisdom, prophecy, and the triumph of light over darkness.”**
Josie Pillion-Gardner ‘25
Water Street Gallery* | Hope College** | Artist Website
James Lavadour (Walla Walla, born 1951)
TheGhostsofManyThings,2023
Oil on panel
76 x 112 x 2 in. (193 x 284.5 x 5.1 cm)
Courtesy of ArtBridges
James Lavadour is a self-taught artist whose art education hails from the land through endless walking, looking, hearing, and feeling of it for over forty years. The slow and labor-intensive processes Lavadour undertakes in his daily painting practice reflect his connection to this geography. He is a part of the Umatilla Reservation in the northeast corner of Oregon and a member of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Numerous major institutions throughout the United States have shown his paintings, and he has gained more national recognition over the last ten years. Lavadour has exhibited at The Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, The Eiteljorg Museum, the Portland Art Museum, the Heard Museum, and the Institute of American Indian Art, among many others. In 1992, he co-founded the Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts on the Umatilla Indian Reservation near Pendleton, Oregon, and served on its Board for over thirty years. This nonprofit center provides world-class printmaking facilities for visiting artists. It offers training in traditional Indigenous art forms (Including the work on view by Demian DinéYazhi’ in this gallery). *
“James Lavadour, deeply connected to the Blue Mountains on the Umatilla Reservation, closely observes and learns from the earth. He aims to capture the constant dynamic formation of the landscape using painting techniques. Lavadour writes, “In paint, there is hydrology, erosion, mass gravity, mineral deposits, etc.; in me, there is fire, energy, force, movement, dimension, and reflective awareness.”** Using translucent glazes and scraping materials to evoke images that seem to be vibrating, Lavadour uses TheGhostofManyThingsto reflect a deeper network that encompasses nature, humans, and time. He employs vibrant colors to differentiate between the geological layers of the landscape, highlighting the complexity of what Lavadour sees, effectively translating the environment onto a canvas.”
Ana Pineda ‘26 and Meg Simpson ‘26
Left to Right (a. b. c.)
Maria Martinez (Tewa of the San Ildefonso Pueblo, 1887–1980)
a.Untitled,20th century
Vase, Ceramic
2 15/16 x 2 15/16 x 4 3/4 in.
DU1965.42
Gift of Ruth Merhab, Denison University Class of 1931
b.Untitled,20th century
Plate, Ceramic
5 5/16 x 5 5/16 x 1 9/16 in.
DU 1965.43
Gift of Ruth Merhab, Denison University Class of 1931
c.Untitled, 20th Century
Vase, Ceramic
3 9/16 x 3 9/16 x 12 5/8 in.
DU 1966.8
Gift of Henry J. Skipp, Denison University Class of 1904
Maria Poveka Martinez was an internationally celebrated Puebloan ceramicist. Born in the San Ildefonso Pueblo, Martinez quickly learned to make pottery traditionally—watching her aunt and grandmother work. “By age thirteen, she was already celebrated within the tribe for her creative skills. She and her husband, Julian Martinez, revived an ancient local process for making the all-black pottery. Their blackware stood in marked contrast to the all-red or polychrome ware that had dominated the pueblo’s production for generations. By the mid-1920s, Martinez’s blackware had become extremely popular outside the pueblo, thanks to a book published by the Museum of New Mexico director. As her pots began to be regarded as works of art rather than household or ritual vessels, Martinez received encouragement to sign them. Martinez was awarded two honorary doctorates, had her portrait made by the noted American sculptor Malvina Hoffman, and in 1978 was offered a major exhibition by the Smithsonian Institution’s Renwick Gallery." Maria Martinez’s artwork inspired generations of artists, not excluding her own family. The Martinez family still produces pottery today at the San Ildefonso Pueblo.
-National Museum of Women in the Arts
-Meg Simpson ‘26
-Josie Pillion-Gardner ‘25
https://nmwa.org/art/artists/maria-martinez/ https://nmwa.org/exhibitions/new-ground/
The above untitled ceramic plates and vases by Maria Martinez exemplify her signature style through their distinctive matte black-on-black pottery technique and intricate geometric decorations. A careful firing process leaves the polished designs in striking contrast against the matte background, achieving a dramatic black finish. The water motifs prominently featured in these ceramics are prevalent amidst Puebloan art. Historically, Pueblo indigenous peoples relied heavily on unpredictable rainfall to survive their crops and animals and replenish the Rio Grande River and its tributaries. Given water’s importance, associated decorative symbols often serve as prayers and expressions of hope for future rain or the enduring presence of water.
Martinez’s displayed pieces seamlessly combine her artistic freedom and Pueblo cultural patterns and traditions. Encircling the untitled plate on the left is an elegant, symmetrical design featuring tadpoles. A stepped rain cloud motif adorns the ceramic vase in the center. One of water’s other associated symbols is the avanyu, or serpent, that decorates the vase on the left. The avanyu is a Tewa deity and guardian of the water. The pictured avanyu is following or chasing an arrow, possibly representing the serpent’s protection over the water flow.
-Meg Simpson ‘26
-Josie Pillion-Gardner ‘25
ADa_and_Juli%C3%A1n_Martinez_pit_firing_blackware_pottery_(c.1920).jpg
https://www.eyesofthepot.com/designs/index.php#
https://americanart.si.edu/artist/maria-martinez-3142
https://www.denverartmuseum.org/en/edu/object/plate#:~:text=Drawing%20upon%20their%20herit age%2C%20Maria,its%20body%20symbolize%20flowing%20water
Pictured with husband
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith
(Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, Métis and Shoshone descent, born 1940)
Left: PaintPots, 1987
Drawing, 30 x 22 in.
Right: SandiaMoon, 1987
Drawing, 30 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the College of Wooster Art Museum
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith's work addresses the myths of her ancestors in the context of current issues facing Native Americans.
Smith grew up on the Flathead Reservation and maintains a deep connection to her heritage. She creates work that addresses the myths of her ancestors in the context of current issues facing Native Americans. Her inspiration stems from the formal innovations of such artists as Pablo Picasso, Paul Klee, and Robert Rauschenberg, as well as traditional Native American art. PaintPotsdisplays this abstract influence through a clashing composition of shapes with complementary colors. Smith’s use of movement and color brings her works to life and challenges and captivates the viewer. At the same time, the work of SandiaMooncombines recognizable shapes, such as trees, with abstract patterns like zigzags. The artwork combines two very different art techniques to create an abstract convergence.
Smith works with paint, collage, and appropriated imagery. By combining representational and abstract images, she confronts subjects such as the destruction of the environment, governmental oppression of Indigenous cultures, and the pervasive myths of Euro-American cultural hegemony.
-National Museum of Women in the Arts
Wendy Red Star (Apsáalooke Crow Tribe, born 1981)
TheLastThanks, 2006
Archival pigment print, 24 x 36 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“Growing up on Montana's Apsáalooke (Crow) reservation, Wendy Red Star immersed herself in Crow culture and art. Her father was a rock musician, her uncle was a painter, and her grandmother sewed traditional Apsáalooke regalia and beadwork. When reflecting on her childhood, Red Star said that although the reservation may have been poor economically, “culturally, I grew up very rich.”
Today, Red Star explores her cultural heritage and the role of Native women through a variety of media, including photography, sculpture, video, fiber arts, and performance. Galleries and institutions across the globe have showcased her work, ranging from the Metropolitan Museum of Art to the Fondation Cartier pour l’ Art Contemporain in Paris. “*
“TheLastThanksis a display of dark satiric humor to criticize persistent stereotypes of Native Americans and white mythology surrounding America’s first Thanksgiving in 1621. The central figure in the photograph is a self-portrait of the artist wearing a traditional Crow ceremonial costume. She is posed artificially at a long table with skeletons wearing dollar-store feather headdresses. The skeletons remind us that Thanksgiving celebrates the early English colonists’ survival after a difficult first year in a new land. For Native Americans, the arrival and survival of European settlers in North America resulted in millions of Native deaths from disease and white violence over the decades and centuries that followed. In the photograph's background, a cartoonish inflatable turkey looms behind the table while the tabletop displays an array of processed foods, cartons of cigarettes, and piles of money. These visual elements remind us that the legacy of the first Thanksgiving’s abundance has not been passed down equally to everyone and that many Native Americans continue to suffer disproportionately from poverty and ill health as a result of having their lands stolen and their cultures suppressed by numerous governments, corporations, and individuals over the past 400 years. Along with its references to the first Thanksgiving, the title and composition of the photograph also allude to Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous painting of the Last Supper. By injecting this reference to an icon of European Christian art, Red Star reminds us that European colonization of the Americas was driven at least partly by the desire to spread Christianity and that many Christian churches and organizations played a shameful role in efforts to suppress Native American culture and
force the assimilation of Native American people into mainstream white society during the 19th and 20th centuries.”**
Ana Pineda ‘26
*National Endowment for the Arts | **Hope College | Artist Website
Jolene Rickard (Tuscarora Nation, Turtle clan, born 1956)
SeeRedin‘92,Fireball, 1992
Color Photograph
33 x 42 in.
Courtesy of the College of Wooster Art Museum
Jolene Rickard is an artist, curator, and Associate Professor at Cornell University, Department of History of Art and Visual Studies. Rickard co-curated two of the four permanent exhibitions for the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian. She is interested in the intersection of Indigenous art, cultural theory, and the forces of settler colonialism. Her research centers on expressing multiple sovereignties within Indigenous art and culture globally.* SeeRedin‘92,Fireball is a 1992 six-panel photograph series in protest of the quincentenary of Columbus' landing in America.
Her work bridges the fields of Native American and Indigenous Studies, Settler Colonial Studies, and the discipline of Art History. Focused on the complication of sovereignty as a political, theoretical, and activist action, Rickard investigates anti-colonial artistic strategies, place-based knowledge, and ontologies.
-Ana Pineda ‘26
*Cornell Department of History of Art & Visual Studies
Eugene Tapahe (Navajo Tribe, born 1967)
Left: Sisterhood-GrandTetonNationalParkShoshoneBannock,EasternShoshone,Cheyenne, 2020
Art Heals: The Jingle Dress Project
36 x 54 in., Photograph
Right: ProtectorsofOurMother, 2020
Art Heals: The Jingle Dress Project
24 x 16 in., Photograph Courtesy of the College of Wooster Art Museum
“The Ojibwa jingle dress dance originated during the influenza pandemic of 1918-19. It came to a father in a dream when his daughter was sick with the virus. The dream revealed a new dress and dance that had the power to heal. The dresses were made and given to four women to dance. When the little girl heard the sound of the jingles, she became stronger. By the end of the night, she was healed and started to dance.
“Art Heals: The Jingle Dress Project” also started from a dream. The dream told me to take the healing power of the jingle dress to different places and capture a series of images to document the spiritual locations where our ancestors once walked. The goal is to unite and offer hope to the world through art, dance, and culture, helping us heal during the COVID-19 pandemic.
During the project, it was essential to capture the harmony of the land and the girls in their jingle dresses. When on location, I asked the girls to feel the land, to feel the ancestors who once lived there, and to channel this spirit through themselves. When the girls danced, they could feel their ancestors dancing with them spiritually.
The project was challenging. We didn't have days or weeks to travel to our locations and the luxury of doing numerous scouting trips before our photo sessions. In fact, some of the locations were utterly new to me. The miracle of the project is when we had stormy days, we would be blessed with clear skies and beautiful light, and then it would be stormy again.
The images and this project are incredibly powerful and spiritual. I believe this whole experience is larger than me. I hope when people view this documentary, they feel the same way – that we are all blessed to be in the presence of such beauty.”
-Jingle dress project
Art Heals Our Story Website
Video about the Jingle Dress Project
https://qrco.de/jingledress
Eugene Tapahe is a professional photographer and is Diné (Navajo), originally from Window Rock, Arizona. In his childhood, Tapahe lived in the Navajo Nation with his grandmother, and they practiced living off the land and following the traditional ways of their ancestors. Tapahe learned at an early age the importance of respecting, preserving, and protecting what is sacred – the land, water, and nature. Tapahe says he has always loved photography, from the first time he picked up a camera to when he knew he had a special gift for telling stories through his art. The artist desires to continue photographing the lands his ancestors once walked. To create his beautiful images, Tapahe continued his love for nature and culture with his graphic design, journalism, fine arts landscape, and portrait photography education.
Tapahe’s work has focused on his project, The Jingle Dress Project, which aims to create art that heals the past and creates hope for the future. The artist captured this image at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming, the native land of the Shoshone, Bannock, Gros Ventre, and Nez Perce people.
-Nora Blount ‘25
Marie Watt (Seneca Nation of Indians, born 1967)
Top: CompanionSpecies(What'sGoingOn), 2017
Woodcut, 17 1/2 x 18 1/2 in
Bottom: CompanionSpecies(Anthem), 2017
Woodcut, 17 1/2 x 18 1/2 in.
Courtesy of the Kruizenga Art Museum
“Marie Watt (b. 1967) is an American artist. She is a member of the Seneca Nation of Indians and has German-Scot ancestry. Her interdisciplinary work draws from history, biography, Iroquois protofeminism, and Indigenous teachings; Watt explores the intersection of history, community, and storytelling. She served on the Native Advisory Committee at the Portland Art Museum and became a member of the Board of Trustees in 2020. Watt is a fan of Crow’s Shadow, an Indigenous-founded printmaking institute located in the homelands of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla and Portland Community College (founded by James Lavadour in this exhibition). Through collaborative actions, she instigates multigenerational and cross-disciplinary conversations that might create a lens and conversation for understanding connectedness to place, one another, and the universe.”*
Companion species implies a two-way dependent relationship between different species. In Native American culture, it refers to animals as integral to the community they live in, holding deep spiritual significance. Stories depicting wolves and other animals as spiritual guides in many cultures showcase this. CompanionSpecies(Anthem),however, showcases text about sisters, fathers, mothers, war, and love. Watt puts attention to the companionship of the human species, calling attention to the need for love and the abolishment of war while also contributing to the importance of family as companions in an anthem.
“The term “companion species”--used in the title of this print--typically refers narrowly to evolutionary relationships in which different species of animals and plants become interconnected and interdependent. This print and its pair belong to a larger series of artworks by Seneca Nation artist Marie Watt, in which she poses the question: “What would it look like if, as humans, we thought of ourselves as a companion species?” One half of the diptych is a geometric design inspired by the interlocking patterns found in traditional Native American blankets, which Watt often uses in her art to symbolize the importance of social and environmental relationships in Native American culture. The other half of the diptych consists of phrases from Marvin Gaye’s famous 1971 civil rights and anti-war anthem What’sGoingOn. By combining these references to Native American and African American cultural history, Watt makes a powerful statement about the common interests that exist among all marginalized and oppressed peoples in their struggle for dignity, equality, and justice.”**
Pineda ‘26
*Marie Watt Studio | **Hope College | Artist Website
Ana
Will Willson, (Diné (Navajo), born 1969)
Left: InsurgentHopiMaidenMelissaPochoema,acitizenoftheHopiTribe,2016
Archival Pigment print, 17 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the Richard M. Ross Art Museum
For Princess Leia’s famous Star Wars hairstyle, George Lucas was inspired by Hopi styles. Melissa Pochoema reclaims the hairstyle and adopts the role of an insurgent rebel like Princess Leia. In this talking tintype, Pochoema rewrites Leia’s secret message to Obi-Wan Kenobi and instead delivers a message meant for Po’Pay, leader of the 1680 Pueblo Revolt that successfully drove the Spaniards out of New Mexico.
“It's called Insurgent Hopi Maiden, and it's a collaboration with Melissa Pochoema, a Hopi artist and model. I had the opportunity to work for her on an exhibition about Indigenous hairstyles, and I had always thought of that in relation to Princess Leia and that narrative. I talked to Melissa later and said, "I would love to collaborate with you around this idea I've had for a long time."
In that work, a Talking Tintype, Melissa delivers Princess Leia's speech to Obi-Wan Kenobi, but she does it from a Hopi perspective. She's talking to Po'pay, who led the Pueblo Revolt in 1680. Thus, we've reappropriated Lucas' appropriation of Hopi cultural patrimony.
It's also shot in a historic photographic process called wet plate collodion. That was important in forming the image of indigeneity and also maybe the American West or what has become the American West in the 19th century. It was invented in 1850 and was the photographic process until about 1880.
So you think about that timeframe and what that means, particularly from the standpoint of an Indigenous person, colonization, what's happening from my perspective in the American West in particular. Then, as a photographic practitioner, investigating that media to infer that history, I guess, is vital to that practice, which is ongoing, and I love that process and practice.”
-Will Willson
Hopi Girl, from The North American Indian by Edward S. Curtis, was published between 1907 and 1930. The Northwestern University Library, sponsored by the U.S. Library of Congress, digitized this image—credits: Northwestern University Library, "The North American Indian": the Photographic Images, 2001.
Download the Talking Tintype app to your smartphone to activate Pochoema’s Talking Tintype and hear her secret message.
https://qrco.de/talkingtintype
Will Willson, (Diné (Navajo), born 1969)
Top: ZigJackson,acitizenoftheMandan,Hidatsa,andArikaraNation,Professorof Photography,SavannahCollegeofArtandDesign,2012 Photograph, 17 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the Richard M. Ross Art Museum
“The sitter, Zig Jackson, is known for photographing non-Native people taking photographs of American Indians. Here, two Native photographers—Jackson and Wilson—level their cameras at each other, playing on Jackson’s theme of photographing the photographer. Together with the background figure, who jokingly conceals his face from Wilson’s camera, they also poke fun at the historical stereotype that all American Indians believed the camera captured the soul and caused the death of the portrait sitter.”
-Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian https://americanindian.si.edu/indelible/zig-jackson.html
Zig Jackson is a Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara artist and photography professor at Savannah College of Art and Design. He received his primary education from the U.S. Indian boarding school system and then attended Northeastern Oklahoma State University, the University of New Mexico, and the San Francisco Art Institute. Jackson continues to receive prestigious residency fellowships, grants, and recognition, including the Library of Congress's accession of parts of his now vast portfolio. His work commonly addresses the themes of cultural identity, representation, and appropriation.
-Meg Simpson ‘26
https://www.zigjackson.com/about
Will Willson, (Diné (Navajo), born 1969)
Bottom: JoeD.HorseCapture,acitizenoftheA’anininIndiantribeofMontana, associatecuratorofNativeAmericanart,MinneapolisInstituteofArt,2012 Photograph, 17 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the Richard M. Ross Art Museum
“Horse Capture is an enrolled member of the A’aninin tribe of Montana. From 2013-2016, he was a curator for the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian. Before that, he served 15 years as a curator of Native American arts at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. He accepted the position of Director of American Indian Initiatives at the Minnesota Historical Society (MNHS) in December 2016, where he continues to work today.”
-Hood Museum Dartmouth https://hoodmuseum.dartmouth.edu/explore/collection/native-america/search-native-american-art/vi deo-scholars-and-artists/joe-horse
Will Willson, (Diné (Navajo), born 1969)
Right: WilliamWilson,CitizenoftheNavajoNation,Trans-CustomaryDinéArtist, 2012
Archival Pigment Print, 17 x 22 in.
Courtesy of the Richard M. Ross Art Museum
“Will Wilson is a photographer and trans-customary artist who spent his formative years living in the Navajo Nation. His photographic practice centers around the continuation and transformation of customary Indigenous cultural practice, countering the ‘archival impulse’ embedded within the historical imageries of Native peoples. Through various photography methods, Wilson combines digital technology, historical photographic processes, performance, and installation around themes of environmental activism, the impacts of cultural and environmental change on Indigenous peoples, and the possibility of cultural survival and renewal.
Wilson studied photography, sculpture, and art history at the University of New Mexico, where he received his Master’s in Fine Arts. Wilson has been honored with the Eiteljorg Native American Fine Art Fellowship, Joan Mitchell Foundation Award for Sculpture, and Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant for Photography. He was also the Doran Artist in Residence at the Yale University Art Gallery. Wilson has held visiting professorships at the Institute of American Indian Arts, Oberlin College, and the University of Arizona. His work is exhibited and collected internationally, and he is Head of Photography at Santa Fe Community College.” -Native Arts and Culture https://www.nativeartsandcultures.org/will-wilson
Will Wilson
Will Wilson was born in San Francisco and spent his formative years living in the Navajo Nation. He studied photography, sculpture, and art history at the University of New Mexico, where he received his Master’s in Fine Arts. His work focuses on themes of Indigenous identity and archives Indigenous people from across the country.
In 2012, Wilson started The Critical Indigenous Photographic Exchange (CIPX). Through collaboration with his sitters, Will Wilson’s project creates a contemporary vision of Native peoples. The portrait series now comprises the largest single-artist archive of Native peoples since Edward Curtis’s influential 20-volume series, The North American Indian (1907-1930). The four works on view in the gallery are part of the CIPX.
Between 1907 and 1930, Edward Sheriff Curtis traveled throughout the lands west of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers to document the traditions and cultures of Native American peoples. Because Curtis posed and manipulated many of the photographs to eliminate evidence of modern life, he created idealized images of Native Americans frozen in time—an image that continues to define Native peoples today.
Over a century later, Will Wilson resumes the documentary mission of Curtis, but from an Indigenous viewpoint as a Diné (Navajo) photographer. Wilson creates authentic portraits of Native American life rather than trying to make an idealized image. Wilson’s photographs, alongside Curtis’s prints, encourage us to think critically about how Native peoples have been historically portrayed in photography over time. For CIPX, Wilson employs a wet-plate collodion photographic technique based on a nineteenth-century method that involves exposing and then developing a plate coated in light-sensitive chemicals to recreate Curtis's technique and bring new life to the photography style.
“[Edward] Curtis created the most comprehensive archive of Indigenous North Americans, and now contemporary artists want to take that authority back and create archives of who they believe themselves to be.”
- Will Wilson
Wilson’s affirming images attest to the vibrant and varied experiences of Native peoples living in the twenty-first century. Unlike Curtis, who manipulates his photographs to eliminate elements of modern life, Wilson collaborates with his sitters, who determine the pose, clothing, props, and presentation in the picture. As a gesture of reciprocity, Wilson gives the sitters the original photograph while retaining the right to print and use scans for artistic purposes. Wilson’s photographs work toward a re-imagined vision of Native peoples, fully grounded in the present.
Edited by Nora Blount 25’
Resource Guide
For more information about the artists and information in this exhibition, please use the QR code below for our resource guide. Find links to books, articles, videos, interviews, and websites.
