First American Art Magazine No. 6, Spring 2015

FırstAmericanArt MAGAZINE

Art of Indigenous Peoples of the Americas

No. 6, Spring 2015

Judith Lowry Nadia Myre Alex J. Peña Troy Sice

Grupo Sotz’il Maya Theater Storming Canada: Carl Ray Art of the Tarahumara Hoop Dancing

Shan Goshorn www.shangoshorn.com Heard Fair Phoenix, AZ March 7 & 8 Booth D-25

INTERTWINED: Stories of a Splintered Past Shan Goshorn & Sarah Sense at the Tulsa Arts & Humanities Council, Hardesty Arts Center (AHHA), May 1–July 5, 2015

Reclaiming Our Power, double-woven paper basket addressing VAWA (Violence Against Women Act)

WORKSHOPS AND FESTIVAL

First American Art Magazine, LLC Issue No. 6, Spring 2015 ISSN 2333-5548 (Print) • ISSN 2333-5556 (Online) Publishing Editor: America Meredith (Cherokee Nation) Literary Editor: Reid Gómez (Navajo Nation) Marketing Director: Barbara Harjo Copy Editors: Rebecca Hammer, Samonia Byford (Cherokee Nation), Rosa Cays (Chicana) Proofreader: Rosa Cays (Chicana) Layout and Design: America Meredith (Cherokee Nation) Editorial Advisory Board: heather ahtone (Chickasaw-Choctaw) Emily Haozous, PhD, RN (Chiricahua Fort Sill Apache) Linda Lomahaftewa (Hopi-Choctaw) Maggie Ohnesorgen (Mestiza) Paula Rivera (Taos Pueblo) Mary Jo Watson, PhD (Seminole) Ken Williams Jr. (Northern Arapaho-Seneca) Advertising Representatives, ads@firstamericanartmagazine.com Barbara Harjo, Oklahoma and West Coast Nancy Strickland Fields (Lumbee), Midwest and East Alex Ponca Stock (Osage Nation), Southwest and Great Plains Social Media: Jacquie Archambeau (Cherokee Nation), Staci Golar (Cornish-Welsh-American), America Meredith (Cherokee Nation) Thanks to: Jeri Ah-Be-Hill (Kiowa), Krystle Brewer, Kelly Church (OdawaOjibwe-Potawatomi), Holly Coonsis (Zuni), Sterling J. Cosper (Muscogee Creek), Ric Denney (Muscogee Creek), Karl Duncan (San Carlos ApacheArikara-Hidatsa-Mandan), Ryan Flahive, Jane Fried, David Gaertner, Teri Greeves (Kiowa), Heather Gross, Grace Horne, Topaz Jones (ShoshoneLummi-Kalapuya-Molalla), Amanda Hodges, Colleen Lucero (Hopi), Tricia Milford-Hoyt, Jason Ordaz, Mike Patten (Cree), Denise Phetteplace, Lisa Quirion, Erica Rasmussen, Joseph Sanchez (Mestizo), Heather A. Shannon, Jamey Shelton, Tatiana Lomahaftewa Singer (Hopi-Choctaw), Neebinnaukzhik Southall (Rama Chippewa), Yvonne Stokes, Melissa Talachy (Pojoaque), Dyani White Hawk (Sicangu Lakota), and Cease Wyss (Skwxwu7mesh-Sto:Lo-Métis-Hawaiian-Swiss).

For subscription services, changes of address, and wholesale inquiries, please email circulation@firstamericanartmagazine.com First American Art Magazine is not responsible for the content of any article or for the statements of any advertiser. First American Art Magazine welcomes queries about editorial submissions. The magazine is not responsible for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs, or artwork.

Idyllwild Arts Summer Program - The summer tradition that began in 1950 to bring the best artists in their fields to teach under the pines continues today. Intensive hands-on workshops in Native American Arts such as Hopi Jewelry, Navajo Weaving, Cahuilla Pottery, and Native Plants; as well as music, dance, theater, visual arts, writing and filmmaking are offered to students from age 5 to 105. Each year more than 1,800 adults and children attend the Idyllwild Arts Summer Program.

Registration begins Feb 2, 2015 summer@idyllwildarts.org 951.468.7265

idyllwildarts.org #iamtheIdyllwild

First American Art Magazine 3334 W. Main St. #442 Norman, OK 73072 www.firstamericanartmagazine.com info@firstamericanartmagazine.com Copyright © 2015 by First American Art Magazine, LLC. Cover and contents are fully protected by copyright and may not be reproduced in whole or part by any method without written permission, except those specific images listed with Creative Commons licenses. All reasonable efforts have been made to identify and contact copyright holders, but in some cases these could not be traced. If you hold or administer rights for materials published here, please contact us. Any errors or omissions will be corrected in subsequent editions.

Letters to the editor are welcome and may be mailed to: First American Art Magazine Attention: Editor 3334 W. Main St. #442 Norman, OK 73072 or emailed to info@firstamericanartmagazine.com.

First American Art Magazine is a Papyrus font-free publication.

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ISSUE NO. 6, SPRING 2015 FEATURES Dancing with Fire: The Majestic and Dangerous Work of Grupo Sotz’il Heidi McKinnon

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Storming Canada: 24 Carl Ray, Indigenous Representation, and the Sacred Legends Matthew Ryan Smith, PhD Tarahumara People and Their Art: When the Ordinary Becomes Unique Cathy Short (Citizen Potawatomi)

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Through the Sacred Circle A Brief History of the Hoop Dance in North America RoseMary Diaz (Santa Clara Pueblo)

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ARTIST PROFILES Judith Lowry (Mountain 50 Maidu-Pit River-Washoe) Melissa Melero (Northern Paiute-Modoc) 56

Alex J. Peña (Comanche-Pawnee-San Ildefonso) Suzanne Newman Fricke, PhD

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Troy Sice (Zuni) America Meredith (Cherokee Nation)

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Recent Developments

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Seven Directions : Gloria Bell (Métis)

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Exploring Native Graphic Design Byting Willows Katja Lehmann (German)

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In Memoriam: Gina Gray (Osage Nation) Louis Gray (Osage Nation) 56

Nadia Myre (Kitigan Zibi Algonquin) Matthew Ryan Smith, PhD

DEPARTMENTS

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Bob Hicks (Muscogee Creek) Joseph Erb (Cherokee Nation)

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Josephine Wapp (Comanche) Ed Wapp Jr. (Comanche-Sac and Fox)

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Art + Literature: Interview with and poetry by Cedar Sigo (Suquamish)

by Reid Gómez (Navajo Nation) Images: Topaz Jones (ShoshoneLummi-Kalapuya-Molalla)

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REVIEWS Art Exhibit Reviews

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Book Reviews

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Show Report

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COVER: Alex J. Peña (Comanche-PawneeSan Ildefonso), detail of Remnants of Certainty #1, 2013, acrylic with mixed media on panel, 14 × 11 in. Photo: Alex J. Peña.

Image courtesy of the artist.

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Editor’s Greetings

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NTERING OUR THIRD YEAR of publication, First American Art Magazine took a huge leap of faith on the part of everyone who made it possible. An anonymous writer suggests, “To expose your ideas, your dreams before a crowd is to risk their loss. But risks must be taken because the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.”

Grupo Sotz’il, a Kaqchikel Maya theater troupe in Guatemala, has taken the greatest risks. By breathing life into ancient Maya stories, members of the troupe have been attacked by those loyal to a political culture and colonial-era ideology considered to be one of the most oppressive toward Indigenous peoples in the Western Hemisphere. The bravery of Grupo Sotz’il is awe-inspiring, as is their commitment to sharing the philosophy and cosmology of their ancestors to audiences today.

The late Carl Ray (Cree, 1943–1978) was a member of the Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc., also known as the “Indian Group of Seven.” Now the group is celebrated, but at the time, the artists’ dealers warned them joining this group would harm their careers. According to fellow member Joseph Sanchez (Tewa descent), Ray took risks in that “he embodied himself in his work.

He communicated with animals in the manner he painted. He didn’t just paint the legends; he became the legend.”1 Tarahumara people have risked poverty and isolation to live on their ancestral lands. The tourist trade that commodifies artwork is often denigrated; however, selling their basketry, weaving, woodcarving, and other artistic expressions enables the Tarahumara to participate in the cash economy and remain on their lands. Art making should not be a vocation reserved only for the independently wealthy.

In hoop dance competitions, dancers compete against each other, but more importantly, they challenge themselves. Watching the Pojoaque Youth Hoop Dancers perform at Buffalo Thunder Resort, I was moved by seeing young children performing extraordinary athletic feats but also making mistakes on stage, in front of a large audience, only to recover and keep dancing.

A gamble can result in failure, but finding the strength and confidence to keep going is powerful.

Our profiled artists are chosen for their challenging, complex, and culturally engaged work. The art market does not always reward these traits. Troy Sice is evolving and exploring new expressions in Zuni carving, marrying precontact materials with exotic stones. Alex J. Peña is driven by his passion for mark making and complex printmaking processes, instead of giving the public the overtly Native themes it expects. Nadia Myre is willing to criticize the Canadian government and allow others to speak about their trauma in her art projects. Judith Lowry took time from a successful painting career to educate her community about an unrecognized tribe.

I’m profoundly grateful to all the artists, curators, and writers throughout this issue who venture into the world, try new approaches, stumble, rise up, and ultimately prevail in their commitment to their vision and that of their peoples.

—America Meredith 1. Joseph Sanchez in discussion with the author, January 15, 2015.

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Letters to FAAM Dear Lara and America, Thank you both so much for all of your accommodations.

Larry and I appreciate all the extra measures you both took all along the way … and we look forward to working with you again soon!

Debi McNeil Boise, ID Congrats on your work with First American Art Magazine. Keep up the good work, and have many years of success.

George Longfish South Berwick, ME

Mapuche Silverwork Greetings from Oklahoma. I wanted to commend FAAM for another great issue! The article on Mapuche silver was amazing.

I am always impressed with the artworks of our Brothers and Sisters of South America. Oftentimes Indigenous peoples are separated by the false boundaries imposed upon us by outsiders, and this article helps to tear down those boundaries. I am dually impressed with the attention to the amazing creativity of the women and men featured in the issue. It strikes a great (and modern) balance between the two. This publication also does a great job of presenting contemporary Native culture and art, as well as putting these concepts and ideas into a context that goes beyond what other magazines provide! On a final note, it was awesome to come across copies of the Winter 2014 issue in the Hastings in Norman, Oklahoma. Huge thanks goes out to the individuals who gather together to make this wonderful magazine. I am looking forward to an excellent 2015 for FAAM. Hoka Skenandore Shawnee, OK

Fish Skin as a Textile Material Thanks to Nadia Sethi, PhD, for her fascinating article about the wide array of uses for fish skin. I always enjoy articles written about traditional methods of making clothing, as they explain how they were made, what they were used for, the revival of a utilitarian form of creating before it is lost to time, and the availability of contemporary clothing today. In the fish skin article, Sethi explains everything that came from the land and water is to be respected, used to protect a person, and to be most useful against the harsh environment. Not only for clothing, fish skins were used for containers, storage, food, and shelters.

Thank you for a well-written article and the knowledge that educators are willing to pass this knowledge on to both Native and non-Native students.

Mike Taylor Oklahoma City, OK

Debra Villa and Jessica Clark After a long perusal of Issue No. 5 of First American Art Magazine, I came away feeling justified in my beliefs concerning the Indian art of our hemisphere. Although there are historic themes in Indian art, there has to be a point where you, as the artist, go beyond the bounds of history. There are points where history meets the future on a regular basis, and it must occur in order to propagate the artistic impressions and interpretations.

Two articles especially caught my eye and made rereading a necessity. The story of a Native graphic designer, Deborah Villa, was a spot of inspiration for those of us who look forward to a new wave of expressions and media. On the other end of the spectrum is Jessica Clark, a Lumbee painter whose art is expansive, vivid, and narrative.

First, the article about Deborah Villa’s work spoke to me of a person’s determination to find her niche in art, while not discounting all the experiences that brought her to where she is today. When she became disillusioned with the fine art world and rebelled, I smiled, remembering a young lady close to me that did the same thing. So much in her experience that contributes to who she is and what she does today. She has gone outside the box of the traditional and connects to the present and the future.

Secondly, the young Lumbee painter Jessica Clark, whose work has been described as “nostalgic themes of idyllic Americana through a Native lens” by Nancy Strickland Fields. I was particularly impressed that she went outside the box to express what was in her head and her heart. Her colors flow together to present a beautiful story on canvas. The best part is she is teaching the next generation, but has not stopped exhibiting her work to a larger audience.

This magazine has opened my mind and perspective concerning media and expressions of any art. I did not realize how eclectic my tastes really are. My mother attended the Santa Fe Indian School in the 1930s, was proficient in weaving, and greatly appreciated her time there. I was always a great fan of Southwest art, especially pottery, because of her influence. As beautiful as that is, there is a whole world of ideas and art where there are Native people.

Thank you for the production of this “work of art” magazine, and I look forward to following issues to follow the evolution of Native arts in all media.

Carol J. Swindell Anadarko, OK We welcome letters to the editor! If we print your letter, we will send you a free copy of that issue of the magazine.

Please email your letters to us at: info@firstamericanartmagazine.com or­mail letters to: First American Art Magazine Attention: Editor 3334 W. Main St. #442 Norman, OK 73072 SPR I NG 2 0 1 5

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Contributing Writers ROSEMARY DIAZ (Santa Clara Pueblo) is a freelance

writer based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Her work has been widely published over the last 20 years, appearing in such periodicals as Beadwork, Collector’s Guide, Native Peoples, New Mexico Magazine, North Dakota Quarterly, and Santa Fean. She writes an original, online series, Native Foodways: New Seasons for Indian Country Today Media Network.

JOSEPH ERB (Cherokee Nation) is a computer animator,

film producer, educator, language technologist, and artist.

He earned his MFA degree in sculpture from the University of Pennsylvania. Erb created the first computer animation in the Cherokee language, The Beginning They Told. He has taught Muscogee Creek and Cherokee students how to animate traditional stories. Erb works for the Cherokee Nation Education Service in Tahlequah, Oklahoma.

SUZANNE NEWMAN FRICKE, PhD (Ashkenazic-

American), wrote her dissertation in art history on 20thcentury Native American pottery at the University of New Mexico. She teaches art history at the Santa Fe University of Art and Design. In 2012, along with Beverly Morris (Aleut) and Charlie James, Fricke co-curated the exhibit Octopus Dreams: Works on Paper by Contemporary Native American Artists, which traveled to six sites in Russia and to 516 ARTS in Albuquerque. In 2014, two museums in Russia displayed another show, As We See It: Photography by Contemporary Native American Artists, curated by Dr. Fricke and India Young, who are preparing an accompanying catalogue. She is currently organizing a third show, which will also travel to Russia.

REID GÓMEZ, PhD (Navajo Nation), is the Mellon

Visiting Assistant Professor of Ethnic Studies at Kalamazoo College. She is currently working on The Navajo Slave Project and finishing her fourth novel. Her work addresses extermination and slavery in the borderlands and bloodlands and language revitalization.

LOUIS GRAY (Osage) is the former coordinator of the

Primary Residential Treatment Center in the Osage Nation.

From 2002 to 2014, he managed Native American Times, a weekly newspaper. Gray has won numerous awards, including the Charles Chibitty Community Service Award, as an individual (2002) and as a member of family (2003); the Williams Companies Diversity Award (2004); Best Straight Dancer in Indian Country (2001), and Best Editorial from the Oklahoma Press Association (1991).

SCOTT W. HALE is an adviser and accredited art appraiser for Native American Art Appraisals, Inc., with offices in Los Angeles, Santa Fe, Tulsa, and New York City. He pursued his master’s and doctoral studies at the University of Oklahoma, where he taught in the Native American Studies program and 8 | WWW.FIRSTAMERICANARTMAGAZINE.COM

lectured in the School of Art and Art History. Hale is a former curator of private, corporate, and nonprofit art collections and has written and lectured for several publications and museums.

ANNA HOOVER (Unangax̂) earned both her master

of arts degree in Native American art history and master of communications degree in Indigenous documentary filmmaking from the University of Washington. She is an artist, curator, filmmaker, educator, and community organizer, based in Anchorage, Alaska. Hoover is the daughter of the widely respected late sculptor John Hoover.

KATJA LEHMANN, PhD (German), is a curator,

writer, archaeologist, and collector of contemporary Native American art, including Hopi katsinam. She earned her doctoral degree in Egyptology, classics, and European prehistory from Ruprechts-Karls-Universität Heidelberg in 2001 and had multiple museum internships at the Staatliches Museum Ägyptischer Kunst, Munich; Rem Reiss-EngelhornMuseen, Mannheim, and the Egyptian Department of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Lehmann served as curator and collections manager at Mitchell Museum of the American Indian in Evanston, Illinois (2006–2008), and editor-atlarge for CNAM Magazine (2013–2014). Beginning in 2009, Lehmann has traveled the world as a Lean Six Sigma Consultant of the Global Marketing Team for the Women’s Health and Cancer Division of Becton Dickinson.

HEIDI McKINNON is the executive director of Curators Without Borders, a nonprofit that designs exhibitions and educational programming for international development projects and underserved communities in conjunction with museum partners, government agencies, and NGO partners. She concurrently serves as director of exhibitions and community programs at the Sandy Spring Museum in Maryland. McKinnon’s career focuses on historical memory, human rights, and Indigenous communities in the Americas, to which she brings over a decade of experience in developing collaborative museum exhibitions, at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian, at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, and independently.

MELISSA MELERO (NOrthern Paiute-Modoc) is a mixed media artist living in Hungro Valley, Nevada. She is currently a full-time artist and co-founder of the art group Great Basin Native Artists in Reno, Nevada. Melero has a bachelor of fine arts degree from the Institute of American Indian Arts and a bachelor of science degree from Portland State University in Oregon. She exhibits her art throughout the United States.

MARY ELLEN MEREDITH (Cherokee Nation) owns

Meredith Interests and Noksi Press, a Cherokee-language publishing company based in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. She

is a board member and past president of the Cherokee National Historical Society and served as interim director of the Cherokee Heritage Center (1999–2004). She also serves on the boards of the Oklahoma Humanities Council and Association of Tribal Archives, Libraries, and Museums (ATALM). She has curated art shows at the Center of the American Indian and is an avid collector of Native American art.

JEAN MERZ-EDWARDS has studied and taught art history since 2000, when she attended her first art history classes at Hunter College in New York. She recently earned her master’s degree in art history from the University of Oklahoma, where she was awarded a certificate in women’s and gender studies and received the Alice Mary Robertson Award for her scholarship on the life and art of Linda Lomahaftewa (Hopi-Choctaw). Merz-Edwards teaches art history and English at Kansas Wesleyan University in Salina, Kansas.

MASON RIDDLE is a critic based in Saint Paul, Minnesota, who writes about visual arts, architecture, and design. She was the director of the former Two Rivers Gallery at the Minneapolis American Indian Center, where she curated multiple exhibitions. Riddle has written about numerous Native artists. Previously, she was the director of the Goldstein Museum of Design and the Minnesota Percent for Art in Public Places program. Riddle holds a master’s degree in art history and museum practice from the University of Minnesota and has taught art history at the college level.

MICHAEL SHEYAHSHE (Caddo Nation of Oklahoma) is the author of Native Americans in Comic Books: A Critical Study (McFarland Publishing, 2008). He has also written for Illusions, Trauma Magazine, Native Peoples, and Games for Windows: The Official Magazine. Sheyahshe earned two bachelor of art degrees in Native American studies and film and video studies, both cum laude from the University of Oklahoma in Norman, Oklahoma. He earned his master of fine arts degree in 3D modeling from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco.

CATHY SHORT (Citizen Potawatomi Nation) is a professional photographer and textile designer. With her husband Hank and son Christopher, she owns Lizard Light Productions, specializing in fine art photography, video production, laser art, and Native-designed clothing and accessories. Short serves on the board of Wings of America.

She is based in Goodyear, Arizona, and exhibits throughout the Southwest United States.

Detail of the tonsured Maya maize god as patron of the scribes, Unknown Maya artist, codex-style ceramic jar, 550-850 CE. Image from Wikimedia Commons.

MATTHEW RYAN SMITH, PhD, is a freelance writer,

independent curator, and sessional professor based in London, Ontario. His current research addresses contemporary Indigenous art, cultural loss, and strategies of survivance.

Smith has written extensively on art and visual culture in publications including Canadian Art, Prefix Photo, ESSE, Briarpatch, Blackflash, C Magazine, Alternatives Journal, Magenta, artUS, Visual Arts News, FUSE, and Afterimage: The Journal of Media Arts and Criticism. He has also been published in several academic journals academic journals including Yishu: Journal of Contemporary Chinese Art, The Senses and Society, TOPIA: Canadian Journal of Cultural Studies, and the Canadian Journal of Native Studies. He has forthcoming writing to be published in Biography: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly, Journal of Curatorial Studies, Photography and Culture, Intersections: Canadian Journal of Music, and Canadian Journal of Film Studies.

EDWARD WAPP JR. (Comanche-Sac and Fox) taught

music and Indigenous studies courses at the Institute of American Indian Arts (1970–1973, 1990–2009), until he retired emeritus. He served as the chairman of the Indigenous studies department. Wapp is an ethnomusicologist, pianist, harpsichordist, and Native American flute player. Presently, he is writing a book, The History of the “49”: A Native American Social Event. He currently resides in Lawton, Oklahoma.

TANIA WILLARD (Secwepemc Nation), artist and curator, is currently Aboriginal curator-in-residence at Kamloops Art Gallery. Previously, as curator-in-residence with grunt gallery, she co-curated Beat Nation, which later showed at the Vancouver Art Gallery and toured to other major cities in Canada. Willard is based in Secwpemculecw, on reserve in her home territory. Her recent work includes the land-based, Indigenous-knowledge-led conceptual space of BUSH gallery and the public art project, Rule of the Trees.

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Recent Developments MUSEUMS The Gilcrease Museum in Tulsa appointed Jim Pepper Henry (Kaw/Muscogee) as its new executive director. Henry was the founding director of the Kanza Museum, a tribal museum in Kaw City, Oklahoma; associate director of the National Museum of the American Indian; director and CEO of the Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center; and most recently, the executive director and CEO of the Heard Museum.

GALLERIES Vancouver’s Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art appointed Alexandra Montgomery as its new CEO. Previously Montgomery served as executive director of the Gardiner Museum in Toronto. Michael Robinson, who served as CEO of the Bill Reid Gallery since 2009, will serve as the president of the nonprofit Bill Reid Foundation.

Judy Kardosh, director of Marion Scott Gallery in Vancouver, passed away on November 30, 2014. In 1975 Kardosh’s mother, Marion Scott, founded the gallery, the first to feature Inuit art on the West Coast. Judy Kardosh fought for recognition of Inuit artists, particularly women artists.

ART FAIRS The Autry National Center held its 24th annual American Indian Arts Marketplace in Los Angeles. Best of Show winner was Melissa Cody (Navajo). Dyanni Hamilton-Youngbird (Navajo) won the Jackie Autry Purchase Award. The category winners were John Spotted Eagle Bradley (Cherokee-Comanche), basketry; Glenda McKay (Ingalik Athabascan), beadwork and quillwork; Sho Sho Esquiro (Kaska Dene), clothing and personal attire; Glenda McKay, diverse arts; Victoria Adams (Southern Cheyenne), jewelry; Ryan Lee Smith (Cherokee Nation-Choctaw), painting and mixed media; Tedra Begay (Navajo), photography; Wallace Nez (Navajo), pottery; Raymond M. Chee Sr. (Navajo), sculpture; Etta C. Peacock (Navajo), textiles; and Eric Kayquaptewa (Hopi), woodcarving.

The chief financial officer of the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts (SWAIA) Charlene Porsild resigned and will move to Montana. SWAIA organizes the annual Santa Fe Indian Market.

PROJECTS Eighty Quechua youth, aged 15 to 25, in Pilahuín, Tungurahua, Ecuador, produced short films in a project funded by the Ecuadorian Culture Center of Tungurahua and the Savings and Credit Cooperative Chibuleo. Wayra Films of Peru provided technical assistance. Participating director Curicama Llanganate (Quechua), directed Yawar’ (“Blood”) and was named a cultural ambassador by Mushuk Nina, a nonprofit.

Light in the Attic Records, based in Seattle, released Native North America (Vol. 1): Aboriginal Folk, Rock, and Country 1966–1985. This 34-song anthology features rare tracks by Indigenous musicians from Canada, the United States, and Mexico.

The City of Kamloops, British Columbia, commissioned Haida artist Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas to create a monumental public sculpture at Riverside Park, near the confluence of the North and South Thompson Rivers. His aluminum and steel sculpture Rivers stands over ten meters tall.

AWARDS AND HONORS The 2014 Sobey Art Award, one of Canada’s most prestigious art awards, went to Nadia Myre (Kitigan Zibi Algonquin) of Montreal. The Sobey Art Foundation and the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia administer the annual award, which celebrates emerging Canadian contemporary artists under 40 years old with a $50,000 honorarium. Myre is interviewed in this issue; see page 54.

The National Endowment for the Arts provided Shan Goshorn (Eastern Band Cherokee), Sarah Sense (ChitimachaChoctaw), and the Arts and Humanities Council of Tulsa a $40,000 grant to curate the show Intertwined: Stories of a Splintered Past and residency for the two artists at the Hardesty Arts Center (AHHA) in Tulsa.

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Dyani White Hawk (Sicangu Lakota) and Donald M. Varnell (Haida) were awarded Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters and Sculptors Grants. The foundation gave unrestricted grants of $25,000 to 25 American artists for career support. White Hawk is a painter from St. Paul, Minnesota, and Varnell is woodcarver and cedar-bark weaver from Ketchikan, Alaska.

The 2015 Eiteljorg Contemporary Art Fellows are Luzene Hill (Eastern Band Cherokee), Brenda Mallory (Cherokee Nation), Mario Martinez (Pascua Yaqui), Da-ka-xeen Mehner (Tlingit-Nisga’a), and Holly Wilson (Delaware Nation-Cherokee).

Since 1999 the Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art, located in Indianapolis, awards the fellowships on alternating years. These include a $25,000 grant, an exhibition, and catalogue.

This year’s winners of the Master Artist Initiative grant programs, administered by the Longhouse Education and Cultural Center at Evergreen State College, were David Boxley (Tsimshian), Marvin Oliver (Quinault), Paul Rowley (Tlingit-Haida), Sara Siestreem (Hanis Coos), and Dawn Walden (Ojibwe). The Native Creative Development winners were Gary Bigbear (Ho-Chunk), Shawn Brigman (Spokane), Neeka Cook (Tlingit-Haida), Kunu Dittmer-Bearchum (Northern Cheyenne), Nahaan Eide (Tlingit), Denise Emerson (Skokomish), Vicky Engel (Squaxin Island Tribe), Kaila Farrell-Smith (Klamath), Roger Fernandes (Lower Elwha Klallam), Spayne Martinez (Warm Springs), Emma Noyes (Colville), Paul Rowley (TlingitHaida), and Demian DinéYazhi’ (Diné).

On the 102nd anniversary of its founding, Quitilipi, Argentina, was named the provincial capital of Indigenous art by Argentina’s Chamber of Deputies. The first Sunday of December will now mark celebrations of Quitilipi’s role in promoting Indigenous arts. Quitilipi is in the Chaco Province, home to Chorote, Mocoví, Pilagá, Qom, Vilela, and Wichí peoples.

Haida Raid, a video by brothers Jaalen and Gwaai Edenshaw (both Haida) and Ken Raj Leslie, won the grand prize of the People on the Pipeline Video Contest, sponsored by the University of British Columbia’s Eco Art Incubator. Director Helen Haig-Brown (Tsilhqot’in) judged the contest. Haida Raid is a series of three stop-motion videos

PREHISTORIC ARTIFACTS AND SITES The Quileute Tribe moved a boulder covered with petroglyphs from the Calawah River, near Forks, Washington, to the A-Ka-Lat Center in La Push for safekeeping. Centuries-old carvings on the half-ton, metamorphic rock describe a primeval battle between K’wati, a Quileute hero, and the monstrous Red Lizard. In December 2013, Erik Wasankari and his son Reid, from Gig Harbor, discovered the boulder. The tribe performed a ceremony at the riverbank and another at the cultural center, the boulder’s new home.

Brent Greenwood (Chickasaw-Ponca), Native Sisters, 2014, acrylic, elks’ teeth, and artificial sinew on canvas, 24 × 30 in. Image courtesy of the artist.

incorporating woodcarvings, music, and Haida language.

The Junta Abya Yala por los Pueblos Libres ( JAPL) presented Felix Diaz (Qom) and his community of Potae Napocna Navogoh with the 2014 Abya Yala Awareness Award. JAPL is an organization of artists, educators, activists, and scholars, based in Paraná, Entre Ríos, Argentina.

Christopher Short (Citizen Potawatomi) won first, second, and third places in the abstract category of 2014 International Laser Display Association (ILDA) Laser and Multimedia Show. Trophies were presented at the 2014 ILDA Conference in Las Vegas, Nevada. ILDA Executive Director Patrick Murphy said an individual member has never previously won an entire awards category.

Washington State Governor Jay Inslee presented the 2014 Governor’s Arts and Heritage Award to the Longhouse Education and Cultural Center at Evergreen College in Olympia. The governor presented Johnpaul Jones (Cherokee-Choctaw), an architect, with the Heritage Individual Award. The Young Arts Leadership Award was presented to Earl Davis (Shoalwater Bay Tribe) for his work in reviving southwest coastal arts.

Sisters Keri Ataumbi and Teri Greeves (both Kiowa-Comanche-Italian) were named Living Treasures of the 2015 Native Treasures Indian Arts Festival, held annually over Memorial Day weekend to benefit the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture (MIAC) in Santa Fe. The Best of Show winner of the Coors Western Art Exhibit in Denver was Brent Greenwood (Chickasaw-Ponca) of Edmond, Oklahoma. The Coors Western Art Exhibit features contemporary realist work of the Western United States by Canadian, American, and European artists.

REPATRIATION The Navajo Nation purchased seven Navajo ceremonial masks back from Drouot, a French auction house. Navajo Nation vice president and medicine man Rex Lee Jim traveled to Paris, where he outbid a private French collector to bring the Nightway Chant masks home. The US Embassy to France had asked the auction house to halt the auction so the provenance of the masks and other Native cultural items could be determined, but Alain Leroy, owner of Drouot, refused.

New studies using analytical scanning electron microscopes reveal that stone mask effigies from Teotihuacan (ca. 200– 600 CE) were carved in remote workshops, possibly located in Pueblo, Mexico. A Smithsonian research team, including geologist Timothy Rose and anthropologist Jane Walsh, used low-vacuum microscopes to examine silicone molds of approximately 150 Teotihuacan masks, discovering only three to be fakes.

High winds revealed new geoglyphs near the Nazca Lines in the Ica Region of Peru.

Eduardo Herrán Gómez de la Torre noticed the newly visible formations while flying over El Ingenio Valley. These geoglyphs include bird and camelid shapes, a zigzag, and a 60-meter long snake. The Nazca Lines date from 200 BCE to 500 CE. These newly rediscovered lines are thought to date back 2,000 years, when Paracas culture was transitioning to Nazca culture.

LEGAL ISSUES The Nazca Lines were irreparably damaged by Greenpeace activists performing a publicity stunt. During the United Nations climate summit in Peru, the activists spread out a giant cloth banner next to the hummingbird glyph, leaving permanent tracks to and from the glyph. Peru is seeking criminal changes against the activists. Due to the fragile nature of the Nazca Lines, the public is not allowed to walk near them. Individuals authorized to be in the area must wear special footwear. In Peru, vandalizing archaeological monuments is punishable by up to six years in prison.

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Seven Directions: Gloria Bell

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LORIA JANE BELL is a writer and researcher based in Vancouver, British Columbia. She is currently pursuing her doctoral degree in art history, visual art, and theory. Her current research interests include Indigenous body arts and cultural encounters, First Nations experiences abroad, and the theorizing of Indigenous studies. She has Métis, Cree, and Euro-Canadian ancestry. Her writing has appeared in First American Art Magazine, Canadian Art, Wicazo Sa Review, and the anthology Métis in Canada. For further information, visit her blog at metisramblings.blogspot.com.

Gloria shares her top seven favorites in the Native art world with First American Art Magazine.

CYBERSPACE David Gaertner’s research on Indigenous new media and cyberspace is opening up new ways of thinking about Aboriginal identity and technology. Based on a literary analysis of sci-fi novel Neuromancer and historical research on the Navajo

Gloria Bell (Métis) at the Apartment Gallery, Vancouver.

women’s design of circuit boards, Gaertner argues that Indigenous peoples are integral to developments in new media technology and are using a variety of multimedia and multisensory ways to tell Native stories in the 21st century, part of the wave of Indigenous futurisms.

WALKABOUT Chris Ofili (Anglo-Trinidadian).

Nomading my way through NYC, I came across the multilayered works of Chris Ofili at the New Museum. His vibrant, large-scale paintings (often layering glitter, dung, charcoal, and resin) sensually evoke a variety of source points including hip-hop music, Zimbabwean cave paintings, and the illustrations of William Blake. The retrospective exhibition also features drawings and sculpture.

CENTER

David Gaertner, PhD, author and educator.

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Tattooing and Body Modification.

I am currently researching interpretations of Indigenous bodies within colonial encounters in the Americas, past and present. Based on a reworking of Victor Turner’s scholarship on liminal spaces of

New Museum, New York, New York. Photo: Nick-D (CC BY-SA 3.0).

performance, I am interested in how tattooing and other body modification, such as labret wearing for First Nations women on the Northwest Coast, can connect ancestral practices and contemporary body art movements.

NORTH Hands of Time: Bush Women on the Land is a virtual exhibition curated

by Jennifer Bowen-Allen (Dene) that explores the importance of bush women’s relationships with

Aboriginal territories and traditional practices on the land. The show features a diverse group of female, multimedia, Indigenous artists who work predominantly in the Yukon.

The exhibit presents a fresh approach to Kahnawake Mohawk educator and activist Gerald Taiaiake Alfred’s call to connect with ancestral knowledge while forging new pathways to freedom. www.bushwomenontheland.com.

SOUTH

Cease Wyss (Skwxwu7mesh Uximixw-Sto:LoHawaiian-Swiss), the Indigenous Plant Diva.

A virtual Indigenous medicine walk with Cease Wyss (Skwxwu7mesh Uximixw-Sto:Lo-Hawaiian-Swiss).

On a rainy day in Vancouver, unceded territory of the Salish peoples, I learned about Indigenous plants on the Northwest Coast and their important, but often forgotten, role in holistic approaches to well-being. Check out Wyss’ blog full of Native plants, harvesting techniques, and tea recipes at indigenousplantdiva.wordpress.com.

EAST INAATE / SE (it shines a certain way.to a certain place./it flies.falls./).

Adam Khalil and Zack Khalil (both Ojibwe) provide a raw take on their ancestral community within the Sault Ste. Marie area—the harmony

Philip Georg Friedrich von Reck (German, 1710–1798), detail of a Yuchi woman with tattoos in The Georgia Indians in Their Natural Habit, 1736, watercolor and pencil on paper, collection of the Royal Library of Denmark, NKS 4°, page 20 recto.

Dolores Scheffen (Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in), Dancing with Beads, 2009, stroud, glass seed beads, and felt, part of Hands of Time: Bush Women on the Land.

and debauchery of the Indigenous experience today. This experimental film, now in the works, juxtaposes the voice of a romanticizing settler with contemporary Ojibwe perspectives.

WEST Aboriginal Digital Access Project. Vtape, an artist-run center in Toronto, Ontario, has a great archive for artists, curators, and other cultural arts workers. The Aboriginal Digital Access Project is currently digitizing over 400 films and videos

by Indigenous artists, and they are available for consultation online through a secure server. Films by artists such as Kent Monkman (Cree), Ariel Smith (Cree-Ojibwe), and Marnie Parrell (Métis) are available. www.vtape.org.

Zachary Khalil and Adam Khalil (both Ojibwe), INAATE/SE/ (it shines in a certain way. to a certain place./it flies. falls./), 2014, video still.

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Exploring Native Graphic Design

Byting Willows

Showcasing Excellence in Diné Basket Designs

By Katja Lehmann

T

HE BYTING WILLOWS PROJECT, based on a catalogue of designs created by graphic designer Damian Jim (Diné), documents the transformation of Diné baskets into new media used to educate a broader audience about Diné stories.

Creating an all-encompassing experience for the basket collector as well as interested graphic designers, the strongest compositions are presented in a book, whereas the entire catalogue is available as a tablet application.

The culmination will be an exhibit presenting the design process as well as collaborations with contemporary master artists.

The book Byting Willows follows the evolution of Diné basket weaving in Douglas Mesa, Utah, over the course of 30 years to the present day. The main focus is the 1990s, the pivotal decade when the weavings transformed into media for expression and experimentation and were sold to collectors and museums across the United States.

Historically, only women wove Diné baskets, which were used for ceremonies with many associated taboos. Over time, Diné people shifted their focus to rug weaving and outsourced the creation of ceremonial baskets to the neighboring Utes.

However, matriarch Mary Holiday Black, who learned to weave baskets at the age of 11, emerged as one of the most prominent basket weavers from Douglas Mesa. She preserved the art of basket weaving and taught it to those

Damian chose to include animals with stigmas attached to them, such as snakes and bears.

Damian Jim (Diné) and Barry Simpson, Cyclone, Wind, and Stars, 1996, digital image, courtesy of Blue Mountain Trading Post / Twin Rocks Trading Post. Image: Damian Jim.

family members who were willing to learn. She was among the first weavers from her community to consider creating and selling baskets to the collectors’ market.

Barry Simpson from Blue Mountain Trading Post in Blanding, Utah, discovered the incredible talent and innovation that the Diné basket weavers from the Douglas Mesa area used to experiment and modernize their basket designs. As a result, Barry hired Damian Jim, a young Diné graphic designer to collaborate with this group of weavers and transform their ceremonial baskets into a changing art form reflecting Diné stories.

Over the course of the next six years, Damian created a catalogue of over 1,500 contemporary basket designs, which were inspired by Diné legends and stories as well as influences from petroglyphs, ancient pottery, and contemporary painters such as Ed Mell. Not shy to tackle taboo topics,

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Damian’s creative process entailed the extraction of historical Diné design elements and their abstraction, transformation, and rearrangement in new compositions, using the shape and material of the basket. The weavers embraced the ideas the project sparked and the freedom to alter designs. It was not uncommon for them to sit beside the computer and ask for specific themes to be expressed, such as designs inspired by the geography of the land.

Some designs proved more popular with weavers and collectors alike, resulting in several varied renditions imparting the entire bandwidth of creativity by different artists. One example is the design Cyclone, Wind, and Stars, which was also transformed into a vessel. As the project progressed, so did the complexity of the designs, which evolved from storyteller baskets to more abstract designs.

A revolution was well on its way, embraced by art judges of major

Sara Siestreem (Hanis Coos), Hundred-Year Growth, 2014, spruce root and bear grass basket cup. Photo: Sara Siestreem.

Native art shows across the country and culminating in award-winning baskets by various weavers, amongst them Sally Black, who won second place and honorable mention for two of her baskets at the Navajo Nation Fair in 2012. Major collections acquired baskets for their permanent collections, such as the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Overland Park, Kansas, and the National History Museum of Utah in Salt Lake City, which also celebrated the weavers of the Douglas Mesa area in a special exhibit and major publication in 2013.

Currently, Twin Rocks Trading Post in Bluff, Utah is the main hub for contemporary Diné baskets. Even though Damian has moved on to focus on his own art and run 1Spot Gallery in Phoenix, Arizona, the weavers continue to produce extraordinary baskets based on the project’s designs, as well as keeping their creative spirit alive by pushing the limits of possible design and color choices to the next level.

To this day, only a fraction of Damian’s designs have been published. The Byting Willows Project closes this knowledge gap by accompanying the book with a tablet application featuring the images of the entire design catalogue. The app includes keyword queries that will allow users to easily access categories within this corpus.

Descriptions associated with each design provide background information on its content and elements.

The Spring 2015 exhibit at Damian’s 1Spot Gallery will create a more personal experience and showcase the quality and diversity of the designs.

Thirteen master artists have agreed to interpret selected designs and create collaborative works in their preferred media. Among the exhibited works will be rug weavings, glass and wood sculptures, ceramics, printmaking, and paintings.

Jamison Chas Banks (Seneca-Cayuga-Cherokee), Neighborhood, 2014, serigraph on vintage advertisement and Arches paper. Photo: Jamison Chas Banks.

Two projects collaborators are Sara Siestreem (Hanis Coos) and Jamison Chas Banks (Cherokee-Seneca-Cayuga).

Sara created Hundred-Year Growth, a contemporary spruce root and bear grass storyteller basket cup that tells the story of the change in logging practices in the Pacific Northwest and integrates a Diné Spider Woman design element to ward off negative influences.

Jamison’s serigraph Neighborhood

incorporates an abstract basket design into a mixed media piece about cultural appropriation and misrepresentation.

1Spot Gallery is exhibiting all collaboration works from February 20 through April 17, 2015. For more information on the Byting Willow Project, please visit the Byting Willows blog (bytingwillows.com), Facebook page (facebook.com/BytingWillows), or email bytingwillows@gmail.com.

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Dancing with Fire The Majestic and Dangerous Work of Grupo Sotz’il

By Heidi McKinnon

Tz’i’th, the dog who foretells coming environmental destruction, played by Juan Carlos Yaxón Chiyal (Maya), from Uk’u’x Ulew. Photo: Victorino Tejaxún (Maya), 2013–14.

I

T WAS THE RAINY SEASON. Two young Kaqchikel men led me down a narrow, muddy path through a cornfield toward a house I could not see. After a few minutes, the rows of ten-foot stalks abruptly ended. In the distance stood the Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, a white adobe compound nestled in a fertile hillside far above Lake Atitlán. Here was the home of a profoundly innovative Indigenous theater company, Grupo Sotz’il.

Grupo Sotz’il is a Kaqchikel Maya theater and arts collective based in the village of El Tablón, Sololá, in the Guatemalan Highlands. The collective’s members, who are mostly relatives, formed the group in 2000 to investigate and revitalize Maya culture, arts, and spirituality, and empower Indigenous youth to explore, embrace, and defend their deep history as a people.

The Sotz’il, bat, is the nawal, or totem of the Kaqchikel people.

Sotz’il Jay means the “Home of the Bat.”1Ajposotz’il Jay refers to the Kaqchikel lineage that historically governed the community’s prominent city-fortress in the western highlands at Iximche’ until the Spanish invasion in 1524.2

Looking Back to Look Forward We don’t do art for art’s sake; we do it to recover the dignity of our people.

—Lisandro Guarcax3 For members of Grupo Sotz’il, being an artist is part of their patän, commitment to this life, and to their tinamït , their people.

“Being Ajchowen, an Artist, is our means of living a connection with the Cosmos, with Nature. It connects us to Life through sound, corporal movement, imagery, words, and stories.”4 When Sotz’il first began in 2000, the brothers and cousins spent years studying classic Maya texts: the Popol Wuj, The Annals of the Cakchiquels, Chilam Balam, the Memorial of Sololá, the Dresden and Madrid Codices, and the Rabinal Achí. They visited archaeological sites such as nearby Iximche’, as well as Tikal, and Copán in Honduras. They meticulously studied the murals of Bonampak and other classical Maya art and hieroglyphics.

1. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013), 7.

2. Iximché is now a well-known Maya archaeological site, dating from 1470 to 1524 CE, in the town of Tecpán in Guatemala.

3. Czarina Aggabao Thelen, “The significance and brilliance of Sotz’il: Embodying Maya Liberation,” Network in Solidarity with the People of Guatemala (NISGUA): Themes & Campaigns, last modified September 1, 2010, web.

4. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013), 10.

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Members of Sotz’il learned from their pixa’, the elders of the community, about music, dance, textiles, and traditional instruments. The group trained physically and taught themselves how to move by studying local dance and imitating scenes in the codices and Bonampak murals. They learned traditional music, made wind and percussion instruments based on their research, and asked family members to weave intricate costumes inspired by Kaqchikel textiles as well as historical codices and murals.

They studied Maya spirituality and ceremony to inform their work. Some members joined the local cofradía, or syncretic Roman Catholic and Indigenous religious brotherhood, or studied to become guías espirituales, Maya spiritual guides.

Often Sotz’il faced roadblocks to their work. When the group’s founder and director Lisandro Guarcax tried to gain access to Guatemalan museums to study musical instruments, textiles, and archaeological collections, the experience became a lesson in discrimination, as he explained: This was a long process to be able to enter the museums and inspect the objects. It is sad, but they are frozen there and out of reach of the Indigenous people, although they are our roots. You need to be a student of anthropology or archaeology, because they don’t believe you.

One wonders why they don’t believe us and come to the determination that, well, we are Indigenous.5

ABOVE: Tukur, the owl nawal of the underworld, played by Marcelino Chiyal Yaxón (Maya), from Oxlajuj B’ak’tun.

BELOW: Tukur, the owl, and Yaxb’alamkej, the jaguar, played by César Augusto Guarcax Chopén (Maya), from Oxlajuj B’ak’tun. Both photos: Victorino Tejaxún (Maya), 2011–12.

In developing their unique vision and form of expression, which they call “scenic arts,” Sotz’il began to undertake the dangerous task of recuperating cultural traditions, material culture, and spiritual and artistic practices that were either hidden out of fear during the years of genocide,6 were largely repressed or physically burned by religious authorities, or were lost during the centurieslong campaign of colonial assimilation.

Historical Context From the first wave of Spanish conquistador Pedro de Alvarado’s invasion in 1524, Kaqchikels experienced more direct and protracted confrontations and interactions with the Spanish than other Maya communities. Spain founded the administrative seat of government for Central America at Iximche’ in Kaqchikel territory. Kaqchikels aided the Spanish in conquering their enemies in the K’iche’ kingdom and subsequently spent nearly ten years resisting their own conquest.

Due to constant Kaqchikel incursions, the colonial capital was moved in 1527 to nearby Tecpán, still within Kaqchikel territory.

As major travel and trade routes through the western highlands crossed Kaqchikel land, the Kaqchikel were subjugated to an intensity of oppression and assimilationist practices that more remote Maya communities did not experience as consistently. As a result, Kaqchikels lost or sublimated more cultural traditions and religious ceremonies over the centuries that other Maya communities in Guatemala managed to maintain.7

A Family Legacy We felt the discrimination, and, beyond that, the oppression during this whole period of the conflict, as well as the repression, and directly the assimilation.

—Lisandro Guarcax8 The research begun by Grupo Sotz’il began in those early years had its foundations in generations of family who were part of the Pan-Maya Movement during the decades-long Guatemalan conflict. They fought diligently through social activism to assert the dignity, political autonomy, and cultural agency denied to them as a people.

Lisandro once reflected that his parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles who were part of the Maya Movement were like the “first front” of community activism “because they were under severe, constant repression. This ‘front’—these organizations—opened many spaces, and the new generations are occupying them. Now we can project a vision of the future.”9

5. “Xajoj Maya Kaqchikel, Conferencia de Lisandro Guarcax,” Vimeo: Editorial Tuk Tuk, October 12, 2014, web.

6. The decades during which over 250,000 Guatemalans were disappeared or murdered is often called La Violencia, or “The Violence.”

7. Robert Carlsen, “Kaqchikel,” in Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures, ed. David Carrasco (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), 85–86.

8. “Xajoj Maya Kaqchikel, Conferencia de Lisandro Guarcax,” Vimeo: Editorial Tuk Tuk, October 12, 2014, web.

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Maya Scenic Arts vs. Folklore Our intention as Ajchowen is social, political, and spiritual: to stimulate emotions and sensations, to provoke a definitive experience.

—Grupo Sotz’il10 The Sotz’il vision of the future is expansive, kinesthetic, autochthonous, and sovereign. They call their work “scenic arts,” which they define as: ... integrated expression and experience through music, dance, song, theater, cosmovision, and spirituality based in the theatrical productions of our ancestors where the expression of art is holistic. Cultural principles and values inform a totally original theatrical language, technique, and platform in Guatemala and Mesoamerica.”11 Through this model, Grupo Sotz’il offers a clearly articulated Maya worldview, disentangled from the folklorized, dominant narrative of a colorful, subjugated Indigenous culture that exists in Guatemala today. As Daniel Guarcax writes, “There are groups that only perform for entertainment. In Guatemala, they are called folklorists, and they perform shows [of Maya arts] for purely commercial means, often promoted by the state.” As a

collective, Sotz’il distances itself from what they consider to be illegitimate folklore whose only end is economic prosperity.

Säq B’ey: A Clear Path The Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay has a presence. The whitewashed house and interior courtyard resonate with life, intention, and dimensionality. Amidst the joking and banter, everything has weight. Every person’s energy is important. Each musical instrument and costume is afforded reverence. When I visited in 2011, the space was so clearly filled with what Sotz’il members call ruk’u’x — the life force of all things possessing energy in the cosmos.12 The development of Grupo Sotz’il’s work has a clear path, Säq B’ey.

It starts with spirituality, honoring the ruk’u’x, the essence of all energy, including the people, artistic disciplines, cultural traditions, and material objects involved in the creation of their theatrical presentations.13 The next step involves consulting the elders and the energy of the ancestors, pixa’, through ceremony and fire. Then they construct a collective set of values, paq’u’ch, based on what unites the group and keeps them in balance and harmony. Building on the values, the group comes to a consensus and agreement on their aspirations and future actions, rujunamil, and defines a work plan, rub’eyal samaj, that will offer a clear path, Säq B’ey.14

Performance To convert oneself into an animal is to transcend, to visualize another world.15 Maya ceremonial and spiritual practice form the cornerstone of Sotz’il’s work. Reverence for cosmological cycles and sacred time, natural cycles and elements, such as rain, wind, fire, earth, and water, all have their place. Grupo Sotz’il performs in Kaqchikel, not in Spanish. The narrative structure of their work is Mayan.

They create a theater-in-the-round where directionality is fundamental, and q’aq’, or fire, feeds into the action and is a character unto itself at the heart of the performance, allowing the performers to connect with the energies in the cosmos. Incense and fire are placed at the cardinal direction points where spiritual guides assist cast members in tending the fires during a play. Pine needles may be strewn around the edge of the scene to connote a shift in time and space from the everyday to the ceremonial.

Time itself is not confined to a prescribed notion of performance length. Each piece begins and ends at the right time.

Brothers Daniel Guarcax, left, and Lisandro Guarcax, right (both Maya).

A Sotz’il performance has a kinesthetic vibrancy. Nawales, animal spirit guides, play a central role. Sotz’il actors move with intention and force as they evoke an owl or bat, a jaguar or parrot. Their uncanny ability to corporeally translate the spirit of each animal bears a strong resemblance to the power and grace of Pueblo animal dancers. Through their precise intensity of movement, Sotz’il performers embody a concept the late scholar

9. Czarina Aggabao Thelen, “Our Ancestors Danced Like This: Maya Youth Respond to Genocide Through the Ancestral Arts,” in Telling Stories to Change the World: Global Voices on the Power of Narrative to Build Community and Make Social Justice Claims, eds. Rickie Solinger, Madeline Fox, and Kayhan Irani (New York: Routledge, 2008), 48.

10. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013), 10.

11. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Arte Escenico Maya Sotz’il” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2014), 1.

12. This means “consulting the fire.” Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013).

13. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013).

14. Martes, “Qué es el Movimiento de Artistas Mayas ‘Ruk’u’x’,” Artistas Mayas Ruk’u’x, last updated September 22, 2014, web.

15. Czarina Aggabao Thelen, “Lisandro Guarcax and the Dance of the Nawales: In Memoriam (1978–2010),” Hemispheric Institute: Decolonial Gesture 11, no. 1 (2014), web.

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Ulew, the representation of Earth, played by Mercedes Francisca García (Maya), from Uk’u’x Ulew. Photo: Victorino Tejaxún (Maya), 2013-14.

Alfonso Ortiz (Ohkay Owingeh, 1939–1997) was fond of saying, whenever we spoke of dance, “Animals are good to feel.”

The actors bring the essence of each nawal to life. They draw the audience in to understand the dignity and allegorical role of each animal spirit or sacred being portrayed in the play, in ceremony, spirituality, and in life. Layers of historical reference from the group’s years of research come to life in every performance. In this sense, Sotz’il is recovering the original use of Maya codices and other texts as mnemonic devices brought alive when the stories are enacted, what Dylan Miner (Métis) describes as “knowledge emerged through the dialogic space activated by ceremonial performance.”16

Three Plays We realized that one of the functions of art is to declare our vision and protest.

—Lisandro Guarcax17

Kaji’ Imox Grupo Sotz’il has produced four major theatrical works to date: Kaji’ Imox, Ajchowen, Oxlajuj B’ak’tun, and Uk’u’x Ulew.

I will discuss three. Their first work, Kaji’ Imox, comes from the Annals of the Kaqchikels, which Lisandro studied closely and

inspired him to found Grupo Sotz’il. The play tells the story of the last Kaqchikel ruler Kaji’ Imox and the bravery he showed in sacrificing his life so that his people could survive in the face of the Spanish invasion. It is the only Sotz’il play that references European contact or the presence of a colonial power in the Kaqchikel Maya world.

Kaji’ Imox ruled from the city of Iximche’. When the Spanish invaded, the warriors fled to the mountains and used guerrilla warfare to fight off the Spanish for nearly a decade. In the play, warriors are seen perched in trees in the forest, looking out for Pedro de Alvarado’s men. When Alvarado gave Kaji’ Imox an ultimatum to turn himself in or see his entire community perish, he chose to sacrifice himself for the good of the people and was hanged. At the end of the play, Kaji’ Imox cuts the noose around his neck in an expression of his lucid, fulminating rejection of the hegemonic power structures it represents.

Oxlajuj B’ak’tun On the night of March 21, 2011, I attended a performance of Grupo Sotz’il’s third work, Oxlajuj B’ak’tun, held on an exterior patio of the National Theater in Guatemala City. It was a singular experience to sit in the round with one hundred people on a cold, windy night under a nearly full moon and experience a play

16. Dylan A. T. Miner, “ ‘When They Awaken’: Indigeneity, Miscegenation, and Anti-Colonial Visuality,” in Rhetorics of the Américas: 3114 BCE to 2012 CE, eds.

Damián Baca and Victor Villanueva (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2010), 179.

17. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013).

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about the changing of the Maya calendar in 2012 to the thirteenth B’ak’tun, Oxlajuj B’ak’tun. A B’ak’tun is a time period 20 katun cycles or 394.26 years.

As the program states, the play is about time and energy and the conflict of opposing forces that are necessary for life to exist.

The question is whether we can honor both positive and negative energies to reach harmony. Seven characters are portrayed: Tukur, the owl of the underworld; Yaxb’alamkej, the jaguar; Q’uq’umatz, the universal grandmother; Wuqu’ Kaqix, Seven Macaw, the dark side of man and a force of disruption; Jun Ajpu’, Jaguar’s human twin brother; Rejqalem, the bearer of time; and Kame’, the lord of Xib’alb’a’, the Underworld.

The performance begins with the lighting of the q’aq’, the central fire, and a portrayal of balance through a ceremonial game in which the grandmother’s staff, which represents power, is tossed from one player to another until it is stolen by Seven Macaw, beginning an era of conflict. Seven Macaw strikes down Jun Ajpu’, who represents man, with an obsidian blade. As he suffers, Seven Macaw subsequently offers him the staff and other enticements that alter the balance of power present in the beginning. Jun Ajpu’ is a prisoner wearing a black mask, who cannot see for most of the play. His brother, Yaxb’alamkej, the jaguar, is captured and

tortured by Seven Macaw and Kame’, the lord of Xib’alb’a’, while Jun Ajpu’ can only listen to him scream.

All the while, Q’uq’umatz, the grandmother of all, and Rejqalem, the bearer of time, are moving around the circle as the era of a B’ak’tun might unfold. They light incense in each of the cardinal directions as Q’uq’umatz prays until they return to their point of origin. She makes her way to the center of the circle to heal Jun Ajpu’ and retrieve her staff. As Seven Macaw and Kame’ lose their power over the other characters, order is restored and the play ends with the group dancing out of the circle to the sound of the tecomate marimba, receiving a ritual water blessing by Jun Ajpu’ as they leave.

One performer offered closing remarks in Kaqchikel and Spanish to encourage those present to look at the beginning of a new cycle, the Oxlajuj B’ak’tun, as an opportunity to find balance in every aspect of our lives.

Uk’u’x Ulew In 2013, Grupo Sotz’il premiered Uk’u’x Ulew, “Essence of the

Earth,” an environmental wake-up call in the form of an allegory inspired by nature. The work was a community effort, with the support of many artists, farmers, health practitioners, and spiritual leaders called ajq’ija’, or day counters.

Through the main characters, Wind, Earth, Fire, and Water, the natural elements express their energy and the essence of Mother Earth through song, music, and movement to the rhythm of Grandmother Moon. Their movements become cautious, as the barking of the Dog foretells the coming of negative forces in the world that interrupt their dance.

Sotz’il’s latest work asks viewers to conserve the earth while it denounces environmental pollution and all acts that harm the cosmos. The work is an allegorical response to the unending transnational industrial and extractive activities that affect Maya communities and the Guatemalan environment, the least of which is rampant gold, silver, and nickel extraction.

Losses This system was not made for us Mayas. —Grupo Sotz’il Grupo Sotz’il’s theater is profoundly political in nature, for the simple reason that it refuses to legitimate, or, I would argue, even acknowledge the existence of the dominant sociopolitical paradigm in contemporary Guatemala. The power and the inherent danger of Sotz’il’s work is that it draws the visitor into a liminal space that embodies a world where nothing exists outside of the context of a Maya cosmovision.

Dancing musician from Kaji’ Imox. Photo: Victorino Tejaxún, 2004–06.

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As a friend of Lisandro’s and student of Sotz’il’s work, Czarina Aggabao Thelen considers Sotz’il’s theatrical performances to create “sovereign spaces” in time where Kaqchikel cultural and religious autonomy is exercised.18 As well as creating sovereign spaces, Sotz’il offers Maya youth a vision of a parallel world in which the legacy of contact is placed within a broader framework of calendrical time, where colonial processes hold no importance

Kaq’iq’, the representation of Wind, played by Daniel Guarcax González (Maya), from Uk’u’x Ulew. Photo: Victorino Tejaxún (Maya), 2013–14.

or legitimacy as a frame of reference, and may as well never have even happened.

Watching Sotz’il’s work, one feels the Spanish invasion and colonization of Maya peoples is about as statistically significant an event in Maya cosmology and sacred time as the emergence of Homo sapiens is within the geological record. In other words, it barely registers. And that is politically disrupting to the power structures that have dominated the country for the 1.26 B’ak’tun Long Count cycles that have unfolded since 1524.

Tu Corazón Florece One must have even deeper feelings about the injustice to protest through art.

—Lisandro Guarcax19

the role of the church in Maya spiritual life, Lisandro later became a teacher and principal at a local bilingual Kaqchikel school while directing Grupo Sotz’il. He traveled nationally and internationally with Sotz’il, sharing their work and offering workshops to youth and adults alike. On August 25, 2010, Lisandro Guarcax was kidnapped on his way to work at the Kaqchikel school. His body appeared the following morning in a nearby town with signs of severe torture. Three days before his disappearance, Lisandro’s wife gave birth to their second child. He had not yet finished work on Sotz’il’s third play, Oxlajuj B’ak’tun.

The men who were most likely contracted to commit the murder have been charged and jailed, but the intellectual authors of the atrocity have yet to be identified or prosecuted.

For daring to reclaim previously repressed aspects of Maya performative arts and present the public with a Kaqchikel identity that disassociates itself from the history of colonization and repression, Grupo Sotz’il has paid dearly. Several members of the collective have been murdered since 2009. Out of respect for the wishes of the family, I will write about Leonardo Lisandro Guarcax González, the founder and co-director of Sotz’il.

Ruk’u’x, A New Movement

After being expelled from Roman Catholic school for questioning

The Ruk’u’x movement looks to “unify cultures, thought, and

Almost immediately following the murder of Lisandro in 2010, Sotz’il and other Maya artists formed the movement Ruk’u’x and organized an art and music festival in his honor with the assistance of the Embassy of Norway, one of the staunchest supporters of Grupo Sotz’il since its beginnings.

18. Czarina Aggabao Thelen, “Lisandro Guarcax and the Dance of the Nawales: In Memoriam (1978-2010),” Hemispheric Institute: Decolonial Gesture 11 no. 1 (2014), web.

19. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Säq B’ey/Clear Path,” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2013).

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the ruk’u’x, essence of peoples around the world, as art and culture is the heart of every society.”20 In November 2014, they held their second annual festival for Indigenous arts in Guatemala, which is generating broader support and respect for Indigenous arts in the country.

As a member of Grupo Sotz’il and Ruk’u’x, Daniel Guarcax sees the founding of the organization as a necessity in the face of so much institutional injustice and neglect of the Indigenous context within Guatemala. He articulates the vision of the organization founded to honor the memory and intention of his brother Lisandro as an Ajchowen.

Art [in a contemporary context], aside from being a distraction and a spiritual and emotional pleasure, is also reflection, information, education, politics, science, mathematics, language. This is what Sotz’il seeks, what contemporary Mayan artists are seeking, and it is what this artists’ movement Ruk’u’x seeks.21

Looking Forward The work of an artist adjusts to present time and space.

–Daniel Guarcax22 There is grace in the world: justice, balance, and truth. I see all of those things manifest when watching the members of Grupo Sotz’il perform. Since the premier of their first major theatrical production, Kaji’ Imox, Sotz’il has emerged as a prominent cultural arts and social justice organization in Guatemala, in the forefront of a second wave of the Maya Movement.

and consider what they do to be a form of artistic expression that is not so much reacting to a systematized oppression as much as rejecting it as a legitimate system to reference within their own lives and artistic context. On one level, creating sovereign spaces through theater arts is a decolonizing act for which Sotz’il has shed much blood. In another sense, recovering a visual expression of these millennia-old cultural and philosophical concepts that exist outside the short-term context of the last five hundred years is something quite different.

Walking away from Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay through the cornfields that summer day, I understood Sotz’il’s mission more clearly than ever. Art must not be separated from our social or spiritual struggles in life.

Art is always present in the struggles of the people as it is in the different stages of life and existence. Art will always accompany the social processes of the people just as it does the spiritual processes of life.

—Daniel Guarcax25

Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay www.gruposotzil.org Movimiento de Artistas Mayas Ruk’u’x www.artistasriakux.org

During the summer of 2011, Grupo Sotz’il performed at the opening of an exhibition I was touring in the rural Department of Quiché with the Academy of Mayan Languages. While it still had not been a year since the loss of Lisandro, Sotz’il’s performance was strong and its members energized. I could see firsthand the impact of their music and message on rural Maya youth, who were somewhat awed by their talent and invigorated by their message of pride and renewal.

Today, Daniel Guarcax sees the future of Sotz’il full of possibility.

“We want to see Sotz’il as a center of investigation, creation, and promotion of Maya arts in all of its dimensions. We want to see the making of art as a profession that is fundamental and indispensable for cultural, social, and economic development as well as the strengthening of life, which is most important of all.”23 Sotz’il’s scenic arts exemplify what Dylan Miner refers to as “anti-colonial visuality.”24 Members of the group might agree 20. Daniel Guarcax in discussion with the author, 2014.

21. Ibid.

22. Ibid.

23. Ibid.

24. Dylan A. T. Miner, “‘When They Awaken’: Indigeneity, Miscegenation, and Anti-Colonial Visuality,” in Rhetorics of the Américas: 3114 BCE to 2012 CE, eds. Damián Baca and Victor Villanueva (New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2010), 179.

25. Daniel Guarcax in discussion with the author, 2014.

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K’aslemal, the representation of Life, played by Cesar Augusto Guarcax Chopén (Maya), from Uk’u’x Ulew. Photo: Victorino Tejaxún, 2013–14.

The Musical Instruments

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RUPO SOTZ’IL’S MUSICAL REPERTORY is a legacy of the first fathers and teachers of music, Jun B’atz’ and Jun Chowen. The natural world is their primary inspiration, allowing them to create songs based on “cosmological sounds of nature and everyday life at home, guttural sounds, and the sound of Maya languages like Mam and Kaqchikel. All the songs tell a story or simply harmonize and connect with the universe.”26 Musical instruments are nawales or living things that sing, cry, shout, whisper, laugh, and speak. Gatekeepers of silence, sonority, and the essence of the cosmos, part of the ancestral knowledge that reminds us that everything is holistic and integrated into a connection with everything in the universe.27 Members of Grupo Sotz’il make all of their own instruments out of natural materials like clay, cane, bamboo, wood,

Two chirimias from Guatemala. Top one is from Antigua, Guatemala; bottom is from Jacaltenango.

Photo: Carol Ventura, PhD (CC BY-SA 3.0).

palm, beeswax, gourds, bones, shells, and many other materials. Some instruments are new designs. Others are recreated from historic codices, or reproduced from private Kaqchikel collections, creating a range of unique animal and organic sounds from the natural world, as well as traditional sounds associated with wind and string instruments that were adapted from ancestral designs.

To create an instrument, one must first understand its energy and purpose.

Sotz’il members select materials in accordance with the calendar and phases of the moon. The materials are prayed over throughout the process of making an instrument, as well as when it is finished, and also after each use.

An important instrument called K’an Q’ojomab’äl or roq’ roq’, is a stringed percussion instrument recreated from an image found on an archaeological ceramic vessel, as well as seen in a Bonampak mural of two musicians with their instruments and a dancer.

TOP: Unknown Maya artists, detail of Bonampak Mural, 790 CE, fresco on lime plaster, Chiapas, Mexico. Detail featuring two musicians, a string percussion instrument, and a dancer.

BOTTOM: K’an Q’ojomab’äl, rope percussion instrument adapted from a Bonampak mural.

Photo: Grupo Sotz’il, 2014.

Xul kej, a deer-shaped ocarina, or ceramic flute.

Photo: Grupo Sotz’il, 2014.

ABOVE and BELOW: Wind and percussion instruments. Photo: Grupo Sotz’il, 2014.

After much experimentation, Sotz’il members found that a ceramic body made the most sonorous instrument.

The body of the drum is covered in cowhide with a three-foot long, handwoven string made of maguey fibers (Agave americana) emerging from its center. The string is attached to a round wooden stick, and the instrument is played with a second carved wooden stick serving as a bow.

26. Centro Cultural Sotz’il Jay, “Arte Escenico Maya Sotz’il” (Sololá: Guatemala, 2014), 2–3.

27. Ibid.

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Storming Canada Carl Ray, Indigenous Representation, and the Sacred Legends

By Matthew Ryan Smith

INSET: Sandy Lake First Nation Reserve, Ontario. Photo: Morgan Bentham (CC BY-SA 3.0). BACKGROUND: Photo: Nathan Kostegian (CC BY 2.0)

What you are looking at is ancient and sacred. In fact, what you see could be described as a part of my soul. —Carl Ray1

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ARL RAY EXISTS IN A CONTRADICTION; a somewhere place where many recognize his name but don’t know who he is, where the events of his life tend to overshadow the work he left behind. It seems no longer enough to talk around Ray, the Canadian Cree artist who passed on in 1978, as he continues to face the threat of falling into relative obscurity—this while many of his closest friends and colleagues encounter success and anchor their legacies. Ray deserves more than a passing reference in books or exhibition catalogues or during conversation. His work is among the most inventive and poignant of that generation of First Nations artists who fought against the designation of handicraft, wanting instead to be considered contemporary artists in their own right, and doing so while facing an unceasing tide of racism, stereotyping, and pigeonholing.2 Ray’s deconstruction of sacred stories and legends transforms traditional histories into fantastical and hyperrealistic imagescapes, which not only reenergized Indigenous visual culture but Indigenous communities as well.

Born on Sandy Lake Reserve in Northeastern Ontario in 1943, Ray was sent to attend McIntosh Indian Residential School near Kenora, Ontario, at age seven. Although it is believed that instructors encouraged him to paint and draw, Ray was also privy to the colonial project of cultural assimilation endorsed by the Canadian government. His experience at McIntosh during the 1950s ignited a political acumen that later influenced his approach to art making and educational work. Ray was forced to leave the residential school at age 15 due to the death of his father and returned to Sandy Lake to provide for his mother by trapping animals for fur.

During this time, Ray listened to stories and legends told by the elders of Sandy Lake. These encounters were foundational in Ray’s development as a visual artist and as a young man—not only did the elders inform Ray about his Cree ancestry, but they also provided source material for his work. While details are uncertain, apparently word spread throughout Sandy Lake that Ray based his paintings

1. James R. Stevens and Carl Ray, Sacred Legends of the Sandy Lake Cree (Toronto, ON: McClelland and Stewart Ltd., 1971), xi.

2. Michelle LaVallee, telephone conversation with author, October 10, 2014.

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and drawings on these sacred stories and legends, which was condemned as sacrilegious by members of the community who perceived the act as an assault on tradition and the spirits themselves. Even Ray’s grandfather, a respected medicine man, was unable to alleviate the intensity of the repercussion.

Ostracized by his community, Ray was more or less driven out. At first he abandoned a career in visual art to work in physical labor—initially as a logger, next a commercial fisherman, then as a gold miner in Red Lake, Ontario— despite the fact that he remained creatively unfulfilled.

Reflecting on these years, Ray commented, “I am a person who must be free in order to live. I am a good worker so they say. I used to work in logging and I’ve worked in the gold mines. But I could not accept a foreman standing behind my back. I guess I have always been searching for what I am doing today.”3 At Red Lake, working conditions combined with drinking contributed to a steady decline in Ray’s health, and he was diagnosed with tuberculosis. During recuperation he picked up the brush and pen to reintroduce himself to art making, but this time for the sake of meaningful self-employment.

He worked feverishly, so much so that at the height of his production he completed a painting a night.4 When Ray finally returned to Sandy Lake following his convalescence, seminal Ojibwe artist Norval Morrisseau visited the reserve.

Morrisseau nearly exhausted the taboo of depicting sacred stories and legends.5 Freed to reexamine the oral history of the Sandy Lake Cree in visual form, Ray soon gained a reputation as a “Legend Painter,”6 but this moniker consequently pigeonholed the eclecticism of his practice and marginalized him outside the sphere of contemporary art. Ultimately, Ray did not appropriate sacred imagery but instead sought to reclaim it as an ancient form of visual storytelling.7 Morrisseau’s friendship with and mentorship of Ray achieved mythical proportions, though unfortunately it has yet to yield a sustained academic study. On the one hand, Morrisseau helped to reconcile Ray’s fascination of sacred stories and legends with developing an identity and style as an artist. Morrisseau also represented a strong and formidable figure that Ray, having lost his father at a young age, could look to for counsel, to the extent that Morrisseau addressed Ray as his “little brother.”8 And, finally, Morrisseau demonstrated that rule breaking could become the status quo (albeit Ray lacked Morrisseau’s self-assurance). On the other hand, Morrisseau’s affiliation with Ray may have stripped the

Carl Ray (Cree). Image courtesy of Joseph Sanchez (Tewa descent).

latter of some of the critical and institutional attention he deserves.

All written accounts credit Morrisseau with apprenticing Ray, whose international exposure first occurred when Morrisseau was commissioned by the Canadian government to paint murals for the Indians of Canada Pavilion at Expo 67 in Montreal. There, after Morrisseau had completed preliminary sketches, Morrisseau’s “little brother” stepped in to complete the mural for him. Expo 67 was not only a turning point in Ray’s career, but a critical moment for Indigenous art and visual culture in Canada, because it afforded Indigenous peoples a venue to present autonomous, political critiques of colonialism, rights, and government.

Several years later, in 1971, Ray teamed up with writer James R. Stevens to co-author the book Sacred Legends of the Sandy Lake Cree. In the celebrated book, Ray provides narrative accounts of ancient oral histories with accompanying

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

Beth Southcott, The Sound of the Drum: The Sacred Art of the Anishnabec (Erin, ON: Boston Mills Press, 1984), 21.

Ibid., 18.

Elizabeth McLuhan, Tom Hill, and Norval Morrisseau, Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers (Toronto, ON: Art Gallery of Ontario, 1984), 84.

Ibid.

Sherry Farrell Racette, “Algonkian Pictographic Imagery,” in Selected Proceedings of Witness: A Symposium on the Woodland School of Painters, ed. Bonnie Devine (Sudbury, ON: Aboriginal Curatorial Collective and Witness, 2009), 45.

8. Carl Schubring, “Carl Ray: Library Now Displays His Pen-Ink Sketches,” in 7: Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc., ed. Michelle LaVallee (Regina, SK: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 101.

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somewhat misleading and necessitates a rethinking because it conflates artists whose intentions and concerns remain heterogeneous, at times even oppositional. For curator Michelle LaVallee (Ojibwe), artists such as Ray have “been lumped together or mislabeled [a member of ] the ‘Woodland School’ or misinterpreted or misidentified that they all do the same thing, but if you look at what they produce, particularly at that time period, all their works are very distinct […] There’s probably more closeness between Carl Ray and Norval Morrisseau’s work because they worked so closely together, but even if you look at Norval’s work and Carl Ray’s work […] what they were doing was very individual.”12

drawings used to provide visual cues. These tiny illustrations remain among the most refined, spirited, and truncated of Ray’s oeuvre. The result is a captivating record of the Sandy Lake Cree’s complex spiritual practices, honor, and survivance. However, what also stands out from its pages is Ray’s dedication that reads, “TO MY PEOPLE,” followed by “Their stories are recorded in this book before all is lost in the void of the white man’s civilization.”9 Historian Mary E. Southcott observes that during the 1960s and 1970s, there existed (and still exists) an urgent impulse to document and publish Indigenous histories. “When it appeared that their culture was on the verge of being extinguished by the onslaught of ‘white’ civilization, there was a move by several individuals to preserve the ancient oral traditions by recording them in writing and art.”10 It is clear from Ray’s dedication in Sacred Legends of the Sandy Lake Cree that Ray became increasingly disturbed by the intrusion of colonialism and Western religion on the Sandy Lake Cree, specifically as it related to increasing disenfranchisement and cultural loss. By writing and illustrating the oral histories of his community, Ray could resist their disappearance forever.

A self-taught painter, draftsman, and illustrator, Ray worked predominantly in acrylics on paper. He was a dedicated colorist, concerning himself with the play of color on figuration, while his two-tone, blue-and-black and brownand-black palette is among the strongest painting produced by an Indigenous contemporary artist. These two veins of Ray’s work tend to engage a pictographic visual language, which leads many critics and scholars to attribute his work to the Woodland Style school;11 however, this connection is

Indeed, Ray’s work lacks a polished finish, yet this is due to an inherent pictorial tension therein—most of his paintings and illustrations reconcile story with form, line, and color.

For instance, in Spirit Fish (1975), Ray sweeps the body of the open-mouthed creature from right-to-left-to-right to produce a C-shaped composition, which consequently envelops the image in a dynamic impression of movement comparable to that of a thrashing fish. In the background, thick strokes of phthalo blue advance to a lighter tint that frames the fish’s form as it lunges toward the viewer. The fish’s heart radiates arteries with a quivering line—the same quivering line that runs through a vast majority of Ray’s work and is used to express spontaneous movement. Scales, fins, and teeth are rendered in heavy black line, while organs are demarcated in blocks of framed color. As a colorist, Ray reveled in acute contrasts between light and dark while employing complementary colors to generate luminosity.

Ray likened painting with an expression of his people and the blood of his soul, instead of drawing connections to beauty, which he associated with an event or place happening in real time. “Beauty to me is a cry of a loon in the evening. The quietness and peace of my surroundings at Sandy Lake.”13 For Ray, beauty was an experiential quality rather than a pictorial one, closely tied to the comfort of community and place.

Windigo (1972) represents a quintessential example of Ray’s two-tone work because it oscillates between utter flatness and three-dimensionality while never resolving it fully.

For the Cree and Ojibwe, the Windigo Spirit was once a human who became possessed and now terrorizes through cannibalism during the five moons of winter. According to Stevens and Ray, “When a human is possessed by Windigo, ice forms inside the human body, hair grows profusely

9. James R. Stevens and Carl Ray, Sacred Legends of the Sandy Lake Cree (Toronto, ON: McClelland and Stewart Ltd., 1971), vi.

10. Beth Southcott, The Sound of the Drum: The Sacred Art of the Anishnabec (Erin, ON: Boston Mills Press, 1984), 9.

11. The brochure accompanying the exhibition From Wigwas to Canvas: Generations of Woodland Art describes the Woodland School as follows: “Sometimes referred to as the x-ray style, legend painting, or pictographic style, Woodland art resists such confining labels and instead engages viewers with its contemporary artistic expression. Mythological and secular images combine with a rich colour palette to convey narration, and themes of resistance, emancipation, and prophecy.” Carmen Robertson, ed., Wigwas to Canvas: Generations of Woodland Art (Regina, SK: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2002), 2.

12. Michelle LaVallee, telephone interview with author, October 10, 2014.

13. Beth Southcott, The Sound of the Drum: The Sacred Art of the Anishnabec (Erin, ON: Boston Mills Press, 1984), 24.

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from the face, arms, and legs and an insatiable craving for human flesh develops.”14 In Ray’s anthropomorphic representation of Windigo, it is clear that the Spirit has consumed a figure and its tipi; they reside trapped in the belly of the creature. The figure stands frozen, a victim of the Windigo’s scream, which immediately paralyzes a human being. The Windigo reaches upwards as snow (or ice) hangs from its arms, and the Spirit’s claws curl inwards toward its human-like head.

Ray’s quivering black line appears again, this time to accentuate dynamic, vertical movement. His two-tone color palette—black to demarcate line and brown to suggest form—is used sparingly in order to emphasize pictographic qualities. The x-ray aesthetic is not only a means of rendering the interior and exterior transparent, but capturing the Windigo’s inner character as well.

In effect, what paintings such as Spirit Fish and Windigo do is reenergize ancient oral histories while transforming each into idiosyncratic visions. Likewise, for

Elizabeth McLuhan and Tom Hill, “Ray’s painting confirms the fact that traditional Cree myths can be updated as powerful contemporary allegories, and can generate broad universal response.”15 For other theorists, such as Bruce Bernstein, Indigenous visual art and material culture must change to develop, grow, and prosper: As a form of communication, art must and does change. This is as true for Native art as for other arts, despite the fact that an overemphasis on ethnographic purity with its corollary that therefore the art itself is immutable has generated restrictions both internally and externally. Tradition and traditional art can be seen as restrictive and stultifying concepts, but this is to misunderstand the service they can render to creativity. For Native people and their art, tradition is not a stagnant set of rules and practices but rather a set of principles and values that provide a foundation for change—a wonderful and vital part of art-making, a strength of Native communities.16

By changing, evolving, and updating the traditional stories and legends of their people, Ray and Morrisseau were among the first generation of First Nation visual artists to not only evoke backlash from their own communities through the depiction of such subject matter,17 but also from non-Indigenous communities as well; namely, through their steady incursion into the Eurocentric world of 1960s and ‘70s contemporary art. As a strange paradox, breaking the art rules of Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities alike became a means for Ray and other artists of garnering appreciation and respect,18 not only for their work but for all Indigenous artists.

Another critical moment in the history of Indigenous art in Canada came when Ray and Morrisseau attended informal meetings with several of their colleagues and friends with the specific purpose of redefining the future trajectory of contemporary Indigenous art. According to LaVallee, the time period when this group of artists were operating was contentious:

14. James R. Stevens and Carl Ray, Sacred Legends of the Sandy Lake Cree (Toronto, ON: McClelland and Stewart Ltd., 1971), 122.

15. McLuhan and Hill, Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers, 91-92.

16. Bruce Bernstein, Shapeshifting: Transformation in Native American Art (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2012), 30.

17. According to Michelle LaVallee, “Both Norval and Carl Ray, probably the most within that group, definitely did venture into documenting sacred imagery and stories that pushed boundaries, not just within the non-Indigenous community but within the Indigenous community. So I think that was important; I think it was something that the artists were doing for themselves, but it also had a [purpose] beyond the self-intent to it as well.” Telephone interview with the author, October 10, 2014.

18. This legacy has been reevaluated by LaVallee in the recent exhibition 7: Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc. at the MacKenzie Art Gallery in Regina, Saskatchewan (September 21, 2013 to January 12, 2014). The exhibition is also touring the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Kelowna Art Gallery, and the McMichael Art Gallery.

OPPOSITE and ABOVE: Invitation to a 1975 group show by the Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc., at the Art Emporium, Vancouver, British Columbia. Images courtesy of Joseph Sanchez (Tewa descent).

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Indian Artists, Inc., included Jackson Beardy (Anishinini, 1944–1984), Eddy Cobiness (Ojibwe, 1933–1996), Alex Janvier (Dene Suline–Saulteaux, b. 1935), Daphne Odjig (OdawaPotawatomi, b. 1919), Joseph Sanchez (Tewa descent, b. 1948), and, of course, Morrisseau and Ray. They joined forces soon after Expo 67 and the 1969 release of the Statement of the Government of Canada on Indian policy, which was criticized by Indigenous communities for its blatant support of colonial projects in addition to its suppression of Aboriginal rights and freedoms.

In 1973, members Beardy, Janvier, and Odjig were included in the group exhibition at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, Treaty Numbers 23, 287, 1171, a title referring to the numbered treaties of their bands. The exhibition was successful and helped to establish other Aboriginal artists in contemporary art from Canada. Essentially, this group of artists sought to rupture cultural and political stereotypes by demanding recognition as professional artists, by challenging established meanings of contemporary Indigenous art, and reconsidering social relationships for Aboriginal peoples. They fundamentally helped to change the preconceived Western notion that Indigenous artists were preoccupied with handicraft as opposed to “fine art.”20

Joseph Sanchez (Mestizo), detail of Long Tall Poplar, 1980, oil on linen, 24 × 20. A portrait of Carl Ray and part of the Ghost Dance series. Image courtesy of the artist.

There was extreme racism; they were definitely battling for not just mainstream acceptance but even just recognition as contemporary artists. There were a lot of doors closed to them; there were a lot of pigeonholing, or stereotyped expectations around what Indigenous artists should be

doing or not doing. These seven artists, but many of the artists who were operating during the late sixties and early seventies, were not being recognized by mainstream art institutions.19 Members of this group, who would become the Professional Native

According to Odjig, Carl Ray was the first to joke about becoming a “group of seven,”21 a reference to Canada’s “Group of Seven,” a collective of Canadian painters—including Lawren Harris, A. Y. Jackson, Frederick Varley, and A. J. Casson—who idealized the Canadian landscape during the 1920s and 1930s.22 An article in the Winnipeg Free Press announced the group’s first exhibition, June 18–22, 1974, on the eighth floor of Eaton’s department store in Winnipeg.23 Reporter Gary Scherbain described the group as “The

19. Michelle LaVallee, telephone interview with the author, October 10, 2014. Matthew Ryan Smith, “Indian Group of Seven,” in Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism (New York: Routledge, forthcoming).

20. Matthew Ryan Smith, “Indian Group of Seven,” in Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism (New York: Routledge, forthcoming).

21. Michelle LaVallee, ed. 7: Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc. (Regina, SK: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 51.

22. The “Group of Seven” have since become scrutinized by contemporary Indigenous artists including Kent Monkman (Cree) for presenting the Canadian landscape as one completely void of Indigenous peoples and culture.

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Indian Group of Seven” in order to distinguish it from the original. The appellation “The Indian Group of Seven” is evidence of a continuing tendency to marginalize Indigenous artists as Other. It wasn’t until April 1, 1975, that the group was officially incorporated as the Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc. (PNIAI), solidifying their place in the canon of art history. Though they did not release an official manifesto, PNIAI was primarily concerned with supporting Indigenous artists and their communities through advisement, discussion, and teaching.24 Historians and artists often view Ray as the leader of a younger generation of Indigenous painting in Canada, a bridge between Morrisseau and the next wave of artists.25 The observation is warranted. In 1971, Ray and Morrisseau were hired by the Ontario government’s Ministry of Education to instruct and inform Aboriginal youth of their cultural heritage. Together, Ray and Morrisseau traversed Ontario, from north to south, visiting destinations such as Timmins, Wawa, Bruce Mines, Elliot Lake, Sudbury, North Bay, Bracebridge, Whitby, and Oshawa. Later the same year, Ray taught at the influential Manitou Arts Foundation on Schreiber Island in Ontario, where he advised students including, Shirley Cheechoo (Cree), Randy C. Trudeau (Odawa-Ojibwe), Blake Debassige (M’Chigeeng Ojibwe), Leland Bell (Wikwemikong Ojibwe), and Martin Panamick (M’Chigeeng Ojibwe).26 In 1972, the Department of Indian Affairs (now the Department of Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development) sponsored a second educational tour through northern communities and reserves.27 Under Ray’s teaching and leadership, students learned Anishinaabe stories and visual languages, the same stories and languages now being reinterpreted and renewed more than a generation later by artists such as Robert Houle (Saulteaux), Keesic Douglas (Mnjikaning Ojibwe), Bonnie Devine (Serpent River Ojibwe), and Michael Belmore (Ojibwe).

In his seminal work Conflict Between Good and Evil (1975), Ray’s aesthetic sensibility confronts his personal life. The two-toned, blue-and-black painting on paper of a water spirit and a thunderbird embroiled in battle represents a universal moral conundrum that Ray himself was not exempt from.

For those who knew him well, Ray fought against good or evil at one time or another; nevertheless, critics and historians are guilty of sensationalizing Ray’s death and

the circumstances surrounding it rather than preoccupying themselves with critiquing the body of work he left behind.

As a consequence, whether they know it or not, they help perpetuate the myth of Ray as an archetype of the “tragic artist.” It was little surprise to his friends and peers that he suffered from demons and attempted to confront them through his work. Ray’s close friend, the Anishinaabe poet and playwright George Kenny, addresses Ray’s suffering in an open poem that reads as a personal letter: I wonder if those paintings you painted ever satisfied your demons that drove you to paint as you did paint, Carl.

Didn’t you realize that fame only comes at the meeting of one of those demons – DEATH? Fame as in the sudden rush to buy all and any paintings you created.

Now we’ll never know the extent of your greatness.

For of this there was no question – you were the best of your kind.

Some artists know about the proper mixtures of oils on a canvas after a lifetime and even then there is no greatness to their finished canvases but you, Carl, though it’s a cliche, it seemed that you were born to paint, to create that hard fine line of art in each and every Cree legend you gave to the goddamn world. Carl, you were born to greatness, though some people said that you were ‘mad as the night-owls’ but then the same was said of Van Gogh.28 In 1978, Ray’s body was found dead and frozen in the snow outside a bar in Sioux Lookout, Ontario, after a violent encounter. Since 1978, we have been left in that liminal space between what could have been and what is—much like Ray and his work, it too cannot be fully resolved.

What we can say for certain is that his short life was more than enough time to cement a legacy, change the status of Indigenous art in Canada, and influence generations of Indigenous artists—not a tall order for the man nicknamed in his Cree community as Tall Straight Poplar. My writing, like Ray’s own, moves against forgetting. He, too, was deeply invested in the transcription of oral histories into visual ones, recording the stories and legends when the threat to them was so real.

23. Michelle LaVallee, ed. 7: Professional Native Indian Artists, Inc. (Regina, SK: MacKenzie Art Gallery, 2014), 55.

24. Matthew Ryan Smith, “Indian Group of Seven,” in Routledge Encyclopedia of Modernism (New York: Routledge, forthcoming).

25. David T. McNab, “Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers,” Canadian Journal of Native Studies 4 no. 1 (1984): 162.

26. Teresa Jones, “Manitou: Celebrating the Spirit of the People,” WKP Kennedy Gallery, November 4, 2014, s.

27. Elizabeth McLuhan, Tom Hill, and Norval Morrisseau, Norval Morrisseau and the Emergence of the Image Makers (Toronto, ON: Art Gallery of Ontario, 1984), 86.

28. George Kenny, “Note to Carl Ray from George Kenny,” in The Sound Of The Drum: The Sacred Art of the Anishnabec, ed. Beth Southcott (Erin, ON: Boston Mills Press, 1984), 17.

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Tarahumara People and Their Art

When the Ordinary Becomes Unique

By Cathy Short

T

HE RARÁMURI, OR TARAHUMARA as the Spanish called them, are one of the largest groups of Indigenous peoples in Western Mexico. They consider their culture and lifeways, in harmony with their environment, their ancestors’ most important legacy.1 Characterized as reserved and committed to shared labor and community, and as swift and tireless runners, the Tarahumara have survived Spanish invasion, missionary zeal, mining and timber industries, drug smuggling, and drought.

The course of their history changed with the opening of Chihuahua al Pacífico Railway, or El Chepe, in the 1960s when tourism reached their home in the Copper Canyon region of Chihuahua. Appreciation for Tarahumara folk art

has developed over time and continues to grow today. Their artwork is now sold along the railway line, in regional shops, around tourist facilities, along hiking trails, in stores, and on the Internet.

Mexico began actively promoting its cultural arts in the 1920s and 1930s.2 Museums in Mexico and the United States exhibited Mexican folk art, stimulating its collection. Items made for everyday use, festivals, and religious ceremonies, as well as those made strictly for sale, are important Indigenous art, collectively referred to as artesanía.3 While Tarahumara art is rooted in shared cultural traditions, it has evolved over time. Textiles, pottery, woodcarvings, musical

1. “Artesanías Tarahumaras: Cuando lo Cotidiano se Convierte en Arte,” Revista Ñ, last modified May 21, 2013, web.

2. Nicole Mullen, Mexican Folk Art (Berkeley, CA: Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology, 2004), PDF. 3. “Mexican Handcrafts and Folk Art,” Wikipedia, accessed July 19, 2014, web.

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instruments, weavings, and more are currently produced for the art market, as Tarahumara folk art evolved from a utilitarian role to a mercantile one. Creating art was a means of survival and is now the Tarahumara’s main source of income.

The scant archaeological findings reveal that the Tarahumara have lived in Chihuahua for at least 2,000 years.4 They lived across central and southern Chihuahua, but this changed when the Spanish settled in the region in the 16th century after discovering rich gold and silver deposits. They brought with them Roman Catholic missionaries, steel tools, domesticated animals, fruit trees, and new musical instruments. By the mid-17th century, both the Spanish and the mine owners tried to coerce the Tarahumara to live in compact villages. The colonizers wanted to make it easier to organize the Tarahumara into a labor force.5 Most Tarahumara strongly resisted this and eventually split into two factions, the baptizados (Christians) and the gentiles (unconverted). The baptizados lived in the missions while the gentiles blamed the Spanish God for the widespread epidemics and withdrew into the rugged terrain of the Copper Canyon area. Later, Spanish troops brutally suppressed the rebellious gentiles, forcing them to retreat even farther.

More outsiders, including miners and loggers, moved into the region by the late 19th century, pushing the Tarahumara into deeper, more isolated areas in the canyon. After the Mexican Revolution in 1910, Jesuits established schools and production workshops, with the explicit goal of assimilating 4. William Merrill, “Tarahumara,” Encyclopedia of World Cultures, 1996, web.

5. “The Settlement Patterns of the Tarahumara in Mexico’s Copper Canyon Region,” Geo-Mexico, the Geography and Dynamics of Modern Mexico, last modified August 13, 2012, web.

All photos in this article are by Cathy Short (Citizen Nation Potawatomi).

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the Tarahumara through immersion. They taught most courses in Spanish,6 but in the 1970s, the Mexican government changed its position and worked to preserve Tarahumara culture.7 In many ways, the Spanish influence expanded the traditional culture of the Tarahumara, rather than substantively changed it. The baptizados and gentiles continue to have different lifeways.8 The baptizados live in mission villages with mestizos and in homes built close to the church and farmland. The gentiles remain restricted to the marginal land in the canyon, where in their isolation,they maintain more cultural traditions.

Life and Language The homeland of the Tarahumara is one of the most biologically diverse regions in the world. Many plant and animal species live in Copper Canyon in the eastern Sierra Madres of Chihuahua, which actually consists of six canyons.

Combined, they are four times larger than the Grand Canyon and in some places deeper. Six rivers in the canyon converge into the Fuerte River, which flows into the Sea of Cortez.

Climates in the Copper Canyon range from desert and semitropical at the base, through piñon-juniper-madrone forests to temperate pine-oak upland forests at the higher elevations.9 Few pockets of land are arable, resulting in small, dispersed settlements.

Tarahumara “pueblos” are not like typical Mexican or Southwest Indian villages.10 Instead, a group of extended families inhabit a particular valley or other defined region, with a church serving as the social, religious, and political center.

Homes are scattered over mountain slopes, sometimes at great distances from each other. Many families have multiple plots of land, several hours apart on foot. Historically, Tarahumara lived in stone and mud huts or caves in the canyon walls. After the Spanish introduction of the steel axe, their houses and other structures were almost entirely built of wood. Seasonal movement between summer and winter residences is common, and caves are still inhabited part of the year.

While 40,000 Tarahumara live around urban areas outside the Sierra Madre,11 approximately 60,000 continue to live in the Copper Canyon region.12 Many still speak the Tarahumara 6. Thennilapuram P. Ramamoorthy et al., eds., Biological Diversity of Mexico: Origins and Distribution (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993).

7. Juan Luis Sariego Rodríguez, El Indigenismo en Chihuahua: Antología de Textos (Chihuahua, Chihuahua: Escuela Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Unidad Chihuahua, 1998).

8. “The Settlement Patterns of the Tarahumara in Mexico’s Copper Canyon Region,” Geo-Mexico, the Geography and Dynamics of Modern Mexico, last modified August 13, 2012, web.

9. Jeffrey Smith, “Barranca del Cobre: North America’s Other Majestic Canyon,” Focus on Geography 51, no. 3 (2008): 1-10.

10. “Blending Tarahumara and Western Culture,” Academia.edu, uploaded by Jeremiah Davis, web.

11. William Merrill, “Tarahumara,” Encyclopedia of World Cultures, 1996, web.

12. Enrique Salmón, “Kincentric Energy: Indigenous Perceptions of the HumanNature Relationship.” Ecological Applications 10, no. 5 (2000): 1,327–1,332.

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language, made up of five dialects that belong to the UtoAztecan language family found from Utah to Central America.13 The Tarahumara are one of the tribes, along with the Zuni and others, thought to descend from the Mimbres and Paquimé cultures of Mogollon people.14 The term Tarahumara is thought to be a Hispanicized version of their own name for themselves, Rarámuri, often translated as “foot runner” or “they who walk well.”15 Traditionally dry-land farmers, the Tarahumara grow corn, beans, and squash, and harvest wild plants. Daily and ceremonial life revolves around corn. When communal work is needed, a tesgüinada is held. These festive occasions are celebrated with tesgüino, a fermented corn drink offered to friends and family in thanks for their help. These social occasions foster reciprocal relationships.

The Tarahumara are an integral part of their environment.

Their wellbeing depends on living harmoniously with the surrounding natural world. They believe health reflects an individual’s relationships with other beings in the universe, which can protect or damage them. A person has a body and one or multiple souls, and serious diseases can cause the loss of souls. Common illnesses are treated at home, while more severe ones are taken to a medicine man, both healer and ritualist, who protects the old ways and the community.

Religion, Clothing, and Running Religion for the Tarahumara is a blend of Christian and traditional cosmology. Although Jesuit Catholicism has influenced their spirituality, the rituals, ceremonies, and ways of giving thanks to the land have remained primarily preColumbian.16 The principal gods are Our Father and Our Mother, respectively associated with the Sun and Moon, while the Christian God and Virgin Mary have been assimilated into these deities in many communities.17 The devil is considered the older brother of Our Father—and his opponent—as well as the father of non-Indians. Rituals heal the sick, and promote good health in people, livestock, and crops. Offerings are sent to the dead and to deities through rituals. The most elaborate of the ceremonies are held at the mission churches during Christmas and Easter seasons and include matachines dances with elaborately dressed performers and lively music.

breechcloths around the waist. A tunic or short poncho, along with a blanket, might be added when going to a feast or dance.

Woven ribbon or cotton cloth rolled into a band is still used today to hold long hair, when it is not worn loose or gathered at the back of the head. Today, many Tarahumara men wear Western clothing, including denim jeans and pointed-toe cowboy boots. Women used to wear short tunics and woven skirts with girdles around the waist. Today, typical women’s clothing includes brightly colored, layered skirts, wool belts, shawls, head scarves, and full-sleeved blouses—heavily pleated at the shoulder and wrists and loose at the waist. Clothing is still sewn and embroidered by hand with trade-cloth cotton calicoes in bright colors.

Traditional clothing for men included coarsely woven, agavefiber breechcloths. These breechcloths were made of wool once the Spanish introduced sheep, and later were made of cotton.

Girdles woven with characteristic geometric designs hold the

In cool weather, both men and women wear woven wool blankets, usually six feet long to wrap comfortably around them. Women traditionally wear glass bead necklaces and ear ornaments made of triangular pieces of shell attached to bead

13. M. Paul Lewis, Gary F. Simons, and Charles D. Fennig, eds., “Tarahumara,” Ethnologue: Languages of the World, 17th edition (Dallas, TX: SIL International, 2014), web.

14. Michelle Hegmon and Wenda R. Trevathan, “Gender, Anatomical Knowledge, and Pottery Production: Implications of an Anatomically Unusual Birth Depicted on Mimbres Pottery from Southwestern New Mexico,” American Antiquity 61, no. 4 (October 1996): 747–754.

15. Jenna Zbichorski and Rebekah Ryan, “The Tarahumara,” Milwaukee Public Museum, last updated 2014, web.

16. Enrique Salmón, “Kincentric Energy: Indigenous Perceptions of the Human-Nature Relationship.” Ecological Applications 10, no. 5 (2000): 1,327–1,332.

17. James Clad, “Conservation and Indigenous Peoples: A Study of Convergent Interests,” Cultural Survival Quarterly 8, no. 4 (Winter 1984): 68–73.

18. Campbell W. Pennington, “Tarahumara,” in Handbook of North American Indians, Volume 10: Southwest, vol. ed. Alfonso Ortiz (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1983): 285.

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Folk Art: Vessels Tarahumara folk art has continually evolved, reflecting longstanding traditions, personal creativity, and Spanish influence.

While some items are made for everyday use, others are made specifically for the art market. Artists use locally available raw materials, as well as purchased items, to make everything from baskets and pottery to masks and toys. Many of their geometric designs are pre-Hispanic.21 Baskets. The Tarahumara are known for their twilled, singleand double-weave baskets. The basket’s weft is passed over multiple warp elements to create a diagonal pattern or twill plaiting. Similarities to twill work by Akimel and Tohono O’odham basket weavers suggests a historical affiliation with the Tarahumara, strengthened by the linguistic relationships and proximity of the tribes.22

strings.18 Women, men, and even children wear necklaces made from Job’s-tears seeds (Coix lacryma-jobi), chiefly for medicinal purposes. Sandals were originally woven from agave fiber, later from rawhide.19 Today’s sandals are made from worn-out tires with leather straps around the ankles. Many Tarahumara walk barefoot.

The leaves of Dasylirion wheeleri, locally called sotol, are a common material for weaving baskets. The Tarahumara use their hands, teeth, and stones to dull the leaves’ sharp edges before weaving. Pine-needle baskets come from the higher elevations and tend to be smaller and more delicate, take longer to make, and command higher prices. Typical baskets are round or square, with or without lids, and may be of graduating sizes that can be nested when stored. Tarahumara baskets are known for their durability and unique style. Although coiled baskets have been found in the oldest archaeological sites in the region, the Tarahumara no longer make them.23 Pottery is one of the oldest forms of art in Mexico, and Tarahumara pottery is very similar to much of the prehistoric pottery found in the Southwest.24 The potter might make a trip of several miles to gather the clay, which is ground on a stone metate and mixed with sand or ground pottery shards for

No description of the Tarahumara would be complete without recognizing them as some of the world’s greatest long-distance runners. Living within deep canyons in scattered groups, running is the simplest form of transportation. Men and women run multi-day competitions, often barefoot.

Some men and women foot racers wear special racing belts, known as a somáka, wekosáka, or okosáka, made of hide, reeds, and deer dewclaws.20 The rhythmic rattling of the dewclaws helps keep runners awake during arduous, multiday races.

Besides running for transportation and recreation, Tarahumara catch game through persistence hunting, in which they chase their prey until it succumbs to heat exhaustion. Well-grooved footpaths link the Tarahumara together and give them access to the visitors who support their folk art.

19. Wendell Bennett and Robert Zingg, The Tarahumara: An Indian Tribe of Northern Mexico (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1935).

20. Jenna Zbichorski and Rebekah Ryan, “The Tarahumara,” Milwaukee Public Museum, last updated 2014, web.

21. “Mexican Handcrafts and Folk Art,” Wikipedia, accessed July 19, 2014, web.

22. Lynn S. Teague, “Textiles and Identities in Prehistoric Southwestern North America” (presentation at the “Textiles in Daily Life,” third biennial symposium of the Textile Society of America, Seattle, WA, September 24–26, 1992): 56.

23. Ibid.

24. “Blending Tarahumara and Western Culture,” Academia.edu, uploaded by Jeremiah Davis, web.

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temper. The potter adds water and kneads the mixture until it reaches the desired consistency, then forms the base and builds the sides up with coils of clay. Using a piece of gourd on the outside and a small stone on the inside, the potter smooths out the coils and finger marks. Pots are dried in the shade and then fired in a shallow pit with large pieces of thick pine, oak, or dry manure. Tarahumara pottery tends to be simple and functional, although human and animal figures are sometimes made for sale. Sizes vary from large pots up to three feet high to tiny pots used for cooking greens. They commonly have small handles, like ears, on opposite sides of the neck. Fiber, threaded through holes in each handle, makes the vessel easier to carry. Potters sometimes embellish their pots with red ocher slip applied with their fingers or a stick wrapped in wool or cotton. Pots are also often wrapped in goatskin or placed on a tripod wooden base.

Musical Instruments Music and dance have long been a part of Tarahumara religious ceremonies to ensure the world does not end.25 Ceremonies often start with a simple beat on a single drum. Other drummers come in over time with their own individual beats

until there is a rich, rhythmic ensemble. This transitions into an even more structured tempo as guitars, flutes, and violins join in.

Romayne Wheeler, a musician and advocate for the tribe, writes, “Music sanctifies the moment in the life of all the Tarahumaras.

Our dances permeate our daily lives with joy, courage, and trust in Our Creator. Our songs and dances are like prayers of thanks to bless the sick, our fields, and our crops. Even the most common tasks have a higher meaning when music is in the air . . .

All of our actions have musical meaning.”26 Drums. Oral history suggests drums are ancient in the Sierra Madres region and were once made from two-foot segments cut from hollow pine trees, thinned until the walls were no more than one inch thick.27 Today’s snare drums are favored because they can be beaten faster and are light enough to be carried along the trail.

Tarahumara hoop or aro drums are made by stretching damp goat or sheep hides over both sides of a native yellow pine or ash frame, which is shaved to a flexible thinness that can be bent into a drum ring. Traditionally, a single string and bead resonator is passed over one head.28 Geometric designs,

25. Cristian Dominguez, “The Use of Drums: A Material Culture Study of the Tarahumara” (presentation, annual conference for the Southwestern Anthropological Association, Garden Grove, CA, April 24–26, 2014).

26. Romayne Wheeler, Life Through the Eyes of a Tarahumara (Chihuahua, Chihuahua: Editorial Camino, 1993).

27. Wendell Bennett and Robert Zingg, The Tarahumara: An Indian Tribe of Northern Mexico (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1935).

28. Ibid.

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similar to those seen in Tarahumara rock art, are painted on the drumhead with crushed iron oxide applied with a stick wrapped in wool. Hoop drums are held vertically by a rawhide handle when played. They have a great voice and are beaten at the beginning of a ceremony to call people together from their remote locations.

A handful of blue corn inside the drum represents the harmony between rain and corn.29 Corn is a food staple and a symbol of life for the Tarahumara. Rain must come early in the life of the young plants to avoid a lost crop. Corn kernels vibrate against the sides when the drum is played in a vertical position, making a distinctive sound. When the drum is held horizontally and hit on the top or bottom, the corn makes a sound like rain.

When the drum is tipped from side to side, the sound resembles flowing water.

Flutes. Tarahumara flutes are made of a single joint of river cane, about eight inches long and an inch in diameter, shaped to control the pitch. Three finger holes in the tube vary the pitch, producing an uncanny, piercing sound. Reed flutes are paired with drums only for the Fiesta de los Tres Reyes, which begins in January, goes through Holy Week, and ends with Easter.

Rattles. The Tarahumara make ceremonial shakers by attaching a wooden handle made of pine to a gourd with its end cut off and capped.30 These rattles are used during Semana Santa, or Holy Week.

Musical Bow. The musical bow is an ancient musical instrument of the Tarahumara,31 still made, although rarely.

The unique instrument is made from a stalk of reed about eighteen inches long. On one end, two small holes at each side hold pegs to tighten strings of sheep gut that run the length of the bow. The musician plays the bow by holding the stalk of reed in his mouth and twanging the strings in the manner of a jaw harp. The sound is subtle.

Notched Rasping Stick. Increasingly rare, the notched rasping stick has always been associated with curing feasts, when it is played by the peyote doctor.32 The rasping stick, about eighteen inches long, is played with an ordinary stick while held on a vessel or gourd as a resonator.

Violins. Found in most homes throughout the Sierra Tarahumara, violins are played whenever the spirit strikes.

Adapted from the Spanish in the 16th century, they are now an integral part of every festival, celebration, and community gathering. Although not considered fine violins by modern standards, they represent a hybrid of Indigenous American and European craftwork. This is folk art in the truest sense of the word, taking something introduced and making it one’s own.

Due to its flexibility, ash wood is valuable for violin making.33 Small ash boards are shaved down to thicknesses no more than 1/16th inch and then bent into the curve of the sides of the sound box. The top of the sound box is made from ash, cedar, or pine. The violin is held together by glue made from the juice of an orchid plant.

29. “History & Culture of the Tarahumara Indians,” Mission Del Rey Southwest Decor, web.

30. Ibid.

31. Wendell Bennett and Robert Zingg, The Tarahumara: An Indian Tribe of Northern Mexico (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1935).

32. Ibid.

33. Ibid.

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Scroll designs are individual to the maker of the violin and are often elaborate and beautiful. When the scroll is a human figure, the head is made first—true to the belief that the human face is what makes music come from the violin. Strings once were goat or sheep gut, but now steel strings are preferred. The violin’s bow is made from an ash limb and horsehair.

No two Tarahumara violins are alike, although they all tend to be unvarnished. They are played at the shoulder, not the neck, and are made in a range of sizes to match the player. The sound is described as discordant, scratchy, and repetitive when played alone, while large numbers of violins played during festivals produce a powerful sound.

Textiles, Woodcarving, and Other Art Forms Blankets. The Tarahumara once wove with wild plant fibers, but they adopted wool in the early 17th century.34 Caring for the sheep, preparing the wool, and weaving blankets are all tasks of the women. To weave, a woman sits at the end of a broad, horizontal loom, close to the ground. Wool for the warp is generally white and spun much tighter than the weft to make a warm blanket.35 Both men and women wear sheep wool blankets, either the color of the natural wool or a rich, dark brown and yellow, dyed with black walnut husks and a subspecies of sunflower.

Life in the Sierra Tarahumara would be untenable during the cold seasons without warm blankets. Girdles, mantas, and ribbons are also woven on smaller looms. Although weaving with wool continues to be important, the availability of massproduced cloth, clothing, and commercial yarns has resulted in a rapid decline in the art of weaving.

Girdles, worn by men and women, are woven from white and black wool, spun very fine. The traditional design is a running series of large diamonds composed of small black and white triangles.36 The design motif and weaving techniques date from historic times and have swept through northern Mexico and the Southwest. Many modern pueblos have sashes similar to those woven by the Tarahumara. Representing graceful bits of artistry, ribbons are a characteristic form of Tarahumara artistry. Those found in archaeological sites are larger and thicker than those made today. The availability of commercial thread has allowed woven ribbons to become increasingly finer.

Necklaces. Tarahumara women make a variety of necklaces, some religious in nature, with seeds, fruit, stems, wood, and bark.37 Carving, cutting, filing, and dyeing add to the variety.

Necklaces have long been worn for medical or religious reasons, although Tarahumara women prefer ones made with 34. “History & Culture of the Tarahumara Indians,” Mission Del Rey Southwest Decor, web.

35. Wendell Bennett and Robert Zingg, The Tarahumara: An Indian Tribe of Northern Mexico (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1935).

36. Ibid.

37. Karen Adams and Enrique Salmón, “Raramuri Necklaces: A Rapidly Changing Folk-Art Form in the Sierra Madre Occidental of Northern Mexico,” Journal of Ethnobiology 17, no. 1 (1997): 1–16.

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glass beads. Today’s variety of necklaces represents one of the most rapidly changing folk art forms, all in response to a growing art market.

Masks, carved from wood and painted, had been important in Tarahumara culture long before the Spanish arrived.38 Individuals called chapeyokos wear masks during matachines dances at ceremonies and fiestas to signify their role in directing the dancers.

Only a handful of specialized carvers still represent the rich tradition of carving ceremonial masks. Masks produced for the market vary greatly from ceremonial masks. Those made for ceremonies have thinly carved walls, sculptural qualities, and horsehair adornment. Consider the secular masks as decorative wall hangings—they are flat and would never fit over a face or head.

Woodcarvings. Pine bark carvings, figurines, wooden bowls, and spoons are carved by the Tarahumara. Dough bowls, carved from pine, are used to catch stone-ground cornmeal and also commonly sold as decorations. These bowls start from a tree trunk split in half lengthwise and then molded and worked into the desired shape. Tarahumara boys develop their woodcarving skills by starting with pine bark carvings.

38. Nicole Mullen, Mexican Folk Art (Berkeley, CA: Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology, 2004), PDF.

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be preserved–although, in reality, the Tarahumara culture has been changing for centuries.

With its increasing popularity, Tarahumara folk art has drawn the attention of import wholesalers who offer low prices.

To counteract this trend, efforts are being made to identify intermediaries who will pay fair prices and to form cooperatives to collectively market the art. A promising example of this effort is the Tarahumara Artesanías Misión, a program run by Jesuits. Profits above what is paid to the artists supports free medical care and other projects for the Tarahumara.

Bows and Arrows. In 17th-century revolts against the Spanish, Tarahumara warriors used bows and arrows tipped with a small flint or obsidian points.39 The arrow shaft, made from reed or hardwood, such as palo hediondo (Cassia emarginata), was hafted with three feathers. The nock was put into a tube of red dye, resulting in uniquely Tarahumara arrow markings. Bows were typically made from mulberry wood, Morus microphylla, with strings made of deer sinew.

Toys. Made from all kinds of materials and in great variety, toys hold an important role in ceremonies as well as child’s play. They are now popular and highly collectible. Tarahumara toys are generally miniature versions of everyday items and provide an introduction to adulthood. In this way, toys transmit cultural knowledge to children. Their value is often associated with the ingenuity of creating something special from practically nothing. Most toys sold are simplified versions of what is created for Tarahumara children.

While some think their ability to continue their current lifestyle may not last more than another 50 years, others believe the Tarahumara are tough and resilient—with the history to show for it. They have a long record of maintaining their culture in the face of Western religion, Spanish invasion, exploitation, disease, and more. The Norawas de Rarámuri (Friends of the Tarahumara) petitioned UNESCO to designate Tarahumara homelands as a cultural biosphere reserve to be protected by the Mexican government. The Tarahumara would continue to live according to their cultural practices with as little outside interference in their lifestyle as possible.

Online Resources Fundación Tarahumara José A. Llaguno tarahumara.net

Norawas de Rarámuri norawas.org

Gawí Tibusa

misiontarahumara.org/content/tienda-artesanias

Tarahumara Art and the Future Visitors to the Copper Canyon area can still meet the Tarahumara people, a cultural group that has lived in relative isolation and largely resisted assimilation into the outside world for the last 400 years.40 They have maintained their cultural identity by being unified, grounded in mutual traditions and hard work, and sharing common beliefs, customs, and language.41 Mexico is planning to expand the tourist infrastructure. While more visitors mean more economic opportunities, they also bring challenges to the Tarahumara way of life. The market for the folk art helps support their families, and cultural roots will 39. Campbell W. Pennington, “Tarahumara,” in Handbook of North American Indians, Volume 10: Southwest, vol. ed. Alfonso Ortiz (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution, 1983): 280.

40. Jeffrey Smith, “Barranca del Cobre: North America’s Other Majestic Canyon,” Focus on Geography 51, no. 3 (2008): 1-10.

41. “Blending Tarahumara and Western Culture,” Academia.edu, uploaded by Jeremiah Davis, web.

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Through the Sacred Circle A Brief History of the Hoop Dance in North America

L

ONG, LONG AGO, when Creator made the first people and the animals and spirit beings, he sent a manitou to live among them.

Pukawiss, brother to Cheeby-aub-oozoo, Maudjee-kawiss, and Nanabozho, was not like the other boys, for he had little interest in fishing, hunting, running, swimming, or in any of the other things that were considered important for a young man to know. This was of great concern to his father, who tried in vain to teach him the important skills necessary for the survival of his people. Pukawiss remained uninterested in pursuing his father’s teachings and instead spent his time watching the animals and birds. He learned about life by carefully observing their movements and interactions with each other and believed they had much to teach the people about friendship, kindness, and loyalty. Pukawiss decided the best way to bring these lessons to his people was through dance.

By RoseMary Diaz With graceful gestures he imitated the animals’ motions: spinning, as an eagle in flight; hopping, as a rabbit in the grass; bounding, as a young deer on the plains.

Word of Pukawiss’s special gift soon reached the many camps and villages scattered across the land, and he decided to share his knowledge and travel amongst them. Seeing how much the people learned from watching him, Pukawiss, with the help of his brother, Cheeby-auboozoo, added drums and flute to his dance and wove in stories. Finally, he added hoops made of thin, red willow branches and tall reeds that grew near the river’s edge, and clothed himself in fine buckskin leggings and moccasins, decorated with brightly beaded floral patterns, sparkling in the light as he moved.

Pukawiss’s skill at dancing and storytelling and his elaborate dress stirred jealousy in the

hearts of some. Many copied him, attempting to deflate his status. He had become too prideful, mischievously provoking his audiences by teasing and taunting them. This teasing and taunting was also directed at his brothers, who did not understand Pukawiss’s dislike for practical things, or his artistic personality. As his relentless mischief continued, one prank involving the theft of Nanabozho’s prized flock of doves angered Nanabozho so much he razed the mountain under which Pukawiss had been hiding, camouflaged as a serpent. Though his life was spared, Pukawiss was given a new role: to taunt those who are too proud.

And Pukawiss is with us still—in the beautiful dance he created and in gentle breezes that stir the leaves to dance upon the soil.

—Anishinaabe hoop dance origin story1

1. Inspired by several sources, but primarily: Basil Johnston, The Manitous: Supernatural World of the Ojibway (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1995): 27–35.

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HOUGH IT IS VIRTUALLY IMPOSSIBLE to definitively know when, where, why, or by whom the first dances using hoops were performed, ever since humanity took its first steps across the land, mankind has long gravitated toward things circular and has given great significance to the shape’s physical and symbolic representations. Any solipsistic claims of ownership are dissolved by the circle’s universal presence and lack evidence of radial diffusion from any single source of invention. Instead, the circle’s rise to sacred placement within the human experience seems to have occurred simultaneously amongst cultures the world over. The magical and mystical qualities attributed to the circle were a means to return toward the center of something special, rather than away from it.

From ancient Greece to the Anishinaabe to the Ancestral Pueblo, hoops can be found in art and story. Divine Greek hero Ganymede rolled bronze hoops over surfaces of fifth-century vases.

Early Greek physician Hippocrates prescribed exercise with hoops to fortify weak constitutions. Anishinaabe dancing storyteller Pukawiss included hoops in his religious and healing ceremonies. Ancestral Pueblo and other cliff-dwelling societies of the Southwest used hoops to improve dexterity. Over time, the hoop has rolled through multitudinous incarnations, from toys to tools, and much in between. Even designs of our traditional homes and places of worship have been inspired by the circle; architectural reproductions of the shape include the iglu, tipi, yurt, minaret, and kiva.

Considering our vast, varied, and virtually inseparable relationship with the circle, natural extension would dictate its inclusion in the arts. Nowhere is this more brightly evident than in the social and sporting dances of Native America, namely the splendidly colorful,

fast-paced, highly competitive, timingis-everything hoop dance.

Several tribes proudly claim they originated hoop dance. The author does not intend to challenge or dismiss any of those claims. Most accounts suggest the 20th- and 21st-century Native American hoop dance we know is influenced by a variety of sources, and many tribes from throughout North America participate in its present day arena.

“The hoop dance is a sport unique to Indian Country,” offers Debra Krol (Xolon Salinan), director of marketing at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona.

“Many Native communities practiced the hoop dance in precontact times, but even so, it’s difficult to say for sure what its origins are.”

Much of today’s hoop dancing draws inspiration from one of its earliest stars, Tony White Cloud ( Jemez Pueblo).

Widely considered to be the founder of the modern hoop dance, White Cloud popularized the dance in the 1930s and

1940s with his intricate, multi-hoop formations and quick-stepping moves, timed precisely to the drum. His visual storytelling provided the foundation of contemporary hoop dancing.2 White Cloud danced at highly esteemed venues, including the Chicago Railroad Fair, Gallup Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonial, and the Anadarko’s American Indian Exposition. His cameo appearances in the movies Valley of the Sun (1942) and Apache Country (1952) further familiarized audiences with hoop dancing, as did his extensive travel with Gene Autry promoting war bonds throughout the United States and Europe during World War II. The novelty-stricken onlookers apparently drew a sense of patriotic generosity from the experience of watching him move through several 24-inch hoops.

White Cloud’s hoops were made from willow branches, connected at the ends with resin, wax, or sinew and painted with bright, vibrant colors. Some were adorned with delicate feathers that

ABOVE: Tony Duncan (Apache-Mandan-Arikara-Hidatsa) at the Heard, Phoenix, AZ. OPPOSITE: Rito Lopez Jr. (Pima-Apache-Mandan-Arikara-Hidatsa). Both photos at the Heard Museum’s Hoop Dance World Championships, Phoenix, AZ. Both photos: Cathy Short (Citizen Nation Potawatomi).

2. Dennis Zotigh, “History of the Modern Hoop Dance,” Indian Country Today Media Network, May 30, 2007, web.

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over three decades, changed stereotypes and helped spark unprecedented interest in the Native arts. The hoop dance stepped into the limelight and climbed to great heights, admired by Native and non-Native audiences alike to become one of the most popular and wellattended features of the powwow circuit and other intertribal gatherings.

The sixties and seventies brought modest developments to hoop-dancing styles and techniques. Established forms and routines had yet to be standardized by rules and a formal scoring system.

Change was imminent, and the next two decades saw both exuberant innovations in the art form and the implementation of principle guidelines for the hoop dance as a competitive sporting event.

In the eighties and through the early nineties, the American Indian Dance Theater included a meticulously choreographed, techno-infused version of the hoop dance in its repertoire, performing live to sold-out crowds the continent over and beyond. Though this über-glam, ultra-glitz variant of the dance was a glittered and sequined reflection of the flashy times, and perhaps more rendition than tradition, it did showcase the talents of its sizable troupe of Native professional dancers.

The theater kept the art form on the public stage and helped carry hoop dancing around the turn of the century into the new millennium.

tossed about as he moved through the hoops; others with shiny, glass beads that reflected the sunlight just so and scattered tiny spheres of light all around.

TOP: Pojoaque Youth Hoop Dancer Aubrianna Talachy (Pojoaque). Photo: Karl Duncan (San Carlos Apache-Mandan-Arikara-Hidatsa).

BOTTOM: Tony White Cloud (Jemez), dancing with hoops.

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Such expositions of Native culture were novel to mainstream America at that time—American Indian-ness experienced in three-dimensional, living color, with real Indians doing real Indian things. Largely due to White Cloud’s dedication to the art form, the hoop dance became a hallmark of Native American culture. His career, spanning

Today, as the hoop dance continues to evolve, many dancers incorporate elements of hip-hop and other fresh step styles and increasingly complex moves, and, of course, more hoops—as many as 50 hoops. Dance regalia has grown more elaborate, reflecting individual tribal identities. As was not always the case in the earliest days of social hoop dancing, now a dancer’s tribal affiliation can often be learned simply by what the dancers are wearing. Hoop dance attire has become almost as showy and spirited as the dance itself. From broadcloth to buckskin, monk’s cloth to metallic, satin to sinew, contemporary hoop dance

ensembles have a wide range of materials and design techniques and require countless hours of skilled sewing. Each garment is a one-of-a-kind creation, and most feature signs and symbols that are of particular importance to the dancer: family insignia, personal totems, or markings of significant experiences or achievements in the dancer’s life.

Largely due to the efforts of one of its longest and most steadfast supporters, writer and historian Dennis Zotigh (Kiowa-Ohkay Owingeh-Santee Dakota), the hoop dance has the status as the quintessential contemporary Native dance. In 1991, Zotigh’s father Ralph Zotigh served as the New Mexico State Fair’s entertainment director. The elder Zotigh asked his son for ideas to attract visitors to the Indian Village. Dennis suggested a world championship hoop dance contest, “to see, for the first time, who was the best.”3 This was certainly no easy endeavor on the judges’ end of the gallery.

The state fair embraced the idea of the championships, and Dennis spelled out rules and regulations for the competition. He created five categories for scoring each contestant, based on the Olympics’ Likert scale.

Dennis Zotigh’s criteria remains the basis for the contest’s point-keeping and calls for the following areas of expertise to be presented in three rounds of dance, alternating between Southern and Northern drum, with a possible score of 300 nonaccruable points per round. Judges rate dancers on five categories: precision, timing/ rhythm, showmanship, creativity/ originality, and speed.4 Rules forbid the use of props, streamers, tape, clamps, and preset hoop formations.

Due to their sacredness, eagle bone whistles cannot be used in the contest arena, as it has not been designated as a sacred space. Finally, all contestants are required to participate in grand entry.

Derrick Suwaima Davis (Hopi-Choctaw), seven-time world champion, dancing at the Heard Museum’s Hoop Dance World Championships. Photo: Cathy Short (Citizen Nation Potawatomi).

Five divisions are based on age: tiny tot, youth, teen, adult, and senior.

With these principles in place, the World Championship Hoop Dance Contest was founded. Its debut during that summer of 1991 was met with such great success and was so well attended that it necessitated a larger venue. Later that year, Zotigh proposed the idea of hosting the championships permanently at the Heard Museum, and plans for the second bout were set in motion, called the Tony White Cloud Memorial World Championship Hoop Dance Contest, in honor of its namesake’s contributions to the art form.

From that point on, the championships have been an eagerly anticipated annual event, attracting crowds of up to 10,000 awed viewers. This year will mark its 25th consecutive year at the Heard’s Libby Amphitheater, and, as usual, highoctane competition will be in step as contenders vie for 2015’s most prestigious Native American hoop dance honors.

During the championships, dancers move in perfect time with the drum, stepping fast and high with each rise and fall of the drumbeat, twirling and spinning amidst explosions of color, moving gracefully over the just-greening grasses under their feet. Demanding both physical and mental fortitude, the hoop dance requires strength of body and mind and unwavering dedication from its dancers. As a collective group, its dancers have an innate connection to the hoop—some inherent, spiritual knowing that the earthly human experience is somehow exulted when viewed through the sacred circle.

Former powwow dancer Marcus Amerman (Choctaw), who “always wanted to be a hoop dancer,” reflects on it in this way: “If Native dance was an Olympic sport, the hoop dance would be the decathlon. And beyond the physical, it also takes on sculptural forms and concepts, and becomes an extension of ideas and cosmologies being presented three-dimensionally.”5

3. Dennis Zotigh, “History of the Modern Hoop Dance,” Indian Country Today Media Network, May 30, 2007, web.

4. “Official Rules World Championship Hoop Dance Contest,” Heard Museum, no date, web.

5. Marcus Amerman in discussion with the author, December 2014.

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ABOVE: Pojoaque Youth Hoop Dancer Sais Sanchez, performing at the Hoop Dance World Championships.

OPPOSITE: The Pojoaque Youth Hoop Dancers. Coaches include Steve LaRance (Hopi-Assiniboine), back right, and Nakotah LaRance (Hopi-NavajoTewa-Assiniboine), front right. Both photos: Karl Duncan (San Carlos Apache-Mandan-Arikara-Hidatsa).

As is true with all contemporary Native art and performance, the hoop dance has its share of shining stars, and new ones are rising all the time. Among the brightest of those stars, with one of the most recognizable names in the hoop dance universe, is six-time world champion Nakotah LaRance (HopiNavajo-Tewa-Assiniboine), whose first steps through the hoop at just five years of age were under the guidance of seventime world champion Derrick Suwaima Davis (Hopi-Choctaw). LaRance, for whom the hoop dance represents “the beauty of the world … balance … and Mother Earth,”6 excelled at the art form, to understate things just a bit, and was soon winning virtually every competition he entered.

Through Davis’s instruction, LaRance refined his technique. His dance skills were plain to see, but something else was equally apparent. LaRance possessed a Creator-given gift, one that explained his ability to soar effortlessly through the air, a dozen or more hoops in various degrees of possession, some aloft and some encircling him, then land as surefootedly as if he had been motionless the entire time.

To no one’s surprise, LaRance was soon discovered after a talent scout for Cirque du Soleil saw a YouTube video of his performances. In a quick and much deserved sweep of fate and reward, young LaRance was sought out by the world-renowned circus and

became one of its premier dancers.

This inspired his 2004 appearance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, where he was billed as “The Most Interesting Person in Arizona.” Several acting engagements followed, most memorably in Three Wise Guys (USA), Not Like Everyone Else: The True Story of Brandi Blackbear (Lifetime), and Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (HBO).

Among those inspired by LaRance’s gift was his younger sister, ShanDien LaRance (Hopi-Navajo-Tewa-Assiniboine), who also dances for the Cirque du Soleil.

Presenting lively solo routines with the same hallmark precision as her brother, she has earned her place among the best of the best in contemporary hoop dancing.

6. Joseph Marshall III, “Hoop Dancing: A Conversation with World Champion and Cirque du Soleil Star Nakotah LaRance,” Cowboys & Indians, September 2010, web.

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The kids ... get a sense of self-confidence, self-worth, and cultural pride through dancing.

Many other celebrated dancers have also contributed to the evolution of the contemporary hoop dance, introducing new styles or hoop designs to the genre. These notables include Moontee Sinquah and his sons Scott and Sampson Sinquah (all Hopi-Tewa-Choctaw), Tony Duncan (Apache-Mandan-ArikaraHidatsa), Tommy Draper (Navajo), Jones Benally (Navajo), Ginger Sykes (Navajo), Jasmine Pickner (Lakota), Lisa Odjig (Odawa), Brian Hammill (Ho-Chunk), Eric Hernandez (Lumbee), and Jackie Bird (Hidatsa-Mandan-Santee Dakota).

Hoop dancing is popular among men and women and children of all ages. Pueblo of Pojoaque Youth Hoop Dancers, founded in 2013, has

members ranging from five to 17 years of age. The young dancers are guided

by Nakotah LaRance and his father, drummer and singer Steve LaRance (Hopi-Assiniboine).

The group has already enjoyed great success in the short time since its inception and has traveled abroad to France to perform. The dance has had a remarkable impact on the lives of its young members, giving them a solid cultural expression from which to draw strength and inspiration as they move through their youth into the future.

“The program has been really good for the kids’ self-esteem,” says Steve LaRance. “They get a sense of self-

confidence, self-worth, and cultural pride through dancing.”7 Reflecting back on the story of Pukawiss, one is reminded that beauty and cleverness do not outweigh kindness and integrity, which may be what it’s really all about.

Writer and historian Basil Johnston describes the what-goes-aroundcomes-around symbology of the hoop as “emblematic of the way things are, in that mischief breeds mischief that eventually returns to haunt and plague the inventor.”8 Words of wisdom, indeed. The hoop dance continues to teach us about life.

7. Steve LaRance in discussion with the author, December 2014.

8. Basil H. Johnston, The Manitous: Supernatural World of the Ojibway (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1995): 31.

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Jacki e Sevi e r Northern Plains Studio mixed media, pastel, and embossing Look for new work at the

Heard Museum Guild Fair & Market Phoenix, Arizona

March 7 & 8, 2015 or online at

www.NorthernPlainsStudio.com

Nelda Schrupp Pheasant Rump Nakota Jeweler and Sculptor

will have numerous new works on display and for sale at the following art shows in the Phoenix area in early 2015.

Carefree Indian Market and Cultural Festival Carefree, AZ January 23–25

NECKLACE RATTLE

Wigwam Festival of Fine Art Wigwam Resort Litchfield Park, AZ February 13–15

STERLING SILVER DANCE STICK

Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market Phoenix, AZ March 7–8

www.designsbynelda.com

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“OYATE” BANDOLIER

Sheridan MacKnight

Photo: Rober t I Mesa

Chippewa /Lakota

M O R N I N G S TA R G A L L E RY 513 Canyon Road, Santa Fe, NM 87501 • 505-982-8187 • morningstargallery.com

Kathleen Wall Visual Artist www.kathleen-wall.com

Penny Singer Diné Fashion Designer www.pennysinger.com

Visit us at the Heard Museum Guild Fair, March 7 & 8, in Phoenix, Arizona!

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benjamin harjo jr.

american indian artist a whole lot of bull, 2014, gouache on Arches paper, 17 x 21 inches

www. benjamin harjo jr . com

April Holder, S & F A Ac

ox

rtiSt

Represented by Tribes 131 Indian Art, 131—24th Ave. NW, Norman, OK 73069 (405) 329-4442, www.southwestindianarts.net/April_Holder.php

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PROFILE

Mountain Maidu-Pit River-Washoe Painter

Judith Lowry

By Melissa Melero There is one distinction I have to make. I am not a painter. I paint. I am a storyteller.1

J

UDITH LOWRY, A NATIVE CALIFORNIAN VISUAL ARTIST, activist, and educator, has created art since her earliest days growing up on military bases in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Judith holds a BFA degree from Humboldt State University and an MA from Chico State University in painting. She is one of the few internationally recognized Great Basin artists. Judith has resided in Nevada City, California, since 1996. In Nevada City, Judith is a force, known for exhibiting politically and culturally fueled art and installations. Together with the Nisenan Tribe of the Nevada City Rancheria,2 she cofounded the California Heritage Indigenous Research Project (CHIRP), which creates community awareness of the harsh history and conflict between the early settlers and California Natives of the Sierra foothills.

Judith’s work is a visual storybook of Native stereotypes, historical family figures, and some infamously flamboyant imagery. She has been in many major exhibits at some of the most prestigious institutions in the country, including the Heard Museum, Phoenix, Arizona; National Museum of the American Indian, Washington, DC; Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts; Crocker Museum, Sacramento, California; and the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Please tell me about your beginnings: where you were born, where you are from, your family connections to art, and childhood inspirations.

I was born in Washington, DC, to a young captain in the US Army and an Australian “war bride.” They met during WWII at a USO dance in Sydney. Leonard Lowry,

my father, was born in 1920 in Milford, California, just outside Susanville, California. He was first educated at Fort Bidwell, a notoriously bad government boarding school located near Alturas. He later went to Sherman Indian School in Riverside, California. His summers were spent at home in Susanville, mostly under the care and guidance of his maternal grandmother Wilis-Kol-Kold, a ModocHammawi woman.

Both of my mother’s brothers were killed in that war, and one of them, Jack, as well as my mother’s sister Rita, were very fine sketch artists. I still have some of Jack’s drawings. My Aunt Rita, knowing I was quite a sickly child and that I liked to draw during my many convalescences, sent me tablets filled with drawings of movie stars like Shirley Temple, and on some pages, little art lessons. She would demonstrate techniques for me, such as how to make a thumbnail drawing, how to draw highlights on hair, creating textures, shading, and things like that. She had five kids, but there was no TV in those days, so drawing was one of the ways she relaxed at the end of her busy day. I was always so happy to receive her packages from Australia and the new drawings. She was my first “art teacher” and a good one.

How did you start creating? What were your inspirations?

Initially, I was inspired by my first box of crayons. Lady Gaga has a song, “Born that Way.” That’s how it is with artists. I was inspired by the beauty of European art during the US occupation. It was dazzling ... the cathedrals and palaces we toured, the cities and their amazing architecture.

Sadly, some of it was still in piles of rubble from the bombings. I learned at an early age about the destruction and iconoclasm of war.

Judith Lowry. Image courtesy of the artist.

I started painting as a teenager in Japan.

In my military high school, there were no art classes, only core classes. But a service club for the soldiers was on the post and dependents were allowed to use it. It had a darkroom, where I first learned to print photos and an art studio, where I took classes in the evening with a Japanese artist. He had studied in Berlin when he was young. Mr. Terada was kind and encouraging and made me believe I could be an artist.

After high school, Judith was deciding what school she wanted to go to. Her dad wanted her to go to the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, and her mom was against that idea. Judith chose family, holding many different-fine art-related jobs along the way. She had a projectionist job, captured weddings and newspaper stories as a photographer, designed as a graphic artist, and worked as a photography assistant at Chico State College and Lassen Community College in Susanville, California.

At Nisenan Heritage Days this past year, I heard you talk about your time

1. Frank LaPena and Carla Hills, “Images of Identity: Judith Lowry,” Sacramento State University, 2004, web.

2. Federal recognition for this group was unilaterally terminated by the United States in 1958, under US Termination Policy.

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JUDITH LOWRY

American Tobacco Girl, 1994, oil on canvas, 55 .25 × 69 in., collection of the Peabody Essex Museum, E300428.

in the Bay Area, Richard Oakes, and the American Indian Movement. Could you speak more about that time?

After we moved back to the States from Japan, my father was stationed at the Presidio in San Francisco. My folks had separated by then and I lived in Sunnyvale with my mother. On the weekends, I would go to the city to visit Dad, and it was always an adventure. After he retired, Dad bought a bar in the Mission District called Warren’s. He liked it because it was a place Indians liked to frequent. He only owned it for a year; bartending wasn’t a good fit for him. But during that time, a lot of the Bay Area NDN activists were his customers and he got to know them pretty well. He went to rallies and conferences and sometimes took me along.

He supported the AIM movement, but after the wars, confrontation wasn’t his

thing. He was a worker. So he went home to Susanville after that year in the city and began organizing for our tribes. He earned a teaching credential and taught Native American studies at Lassen College.

He also guest lectured at Feather River College; D-Q University; University of California, Davis; Sacramento State; and numerous other venues. He led the Native American element of the Lassen County fifth graders’ “Day at the Lake,” a learning experience held each year at Eagle Lake.

That whole era was formative. Yes, my dad was outspoken but calm and with great authority. He was a military officer and it always showed, even after he retired.

I was in my early twenties at the time I met Mr. Oakes at the Pit River occupation up near Burney Falls. The civil rights era was in full swing, with minorities, women, and young people demanding equality and fair treatment.

After Humboldt State University, when did you start to seriously paint and exhibit?

Did this era help form the activist you are today? Have you always been so outspoken? Is that from your dad?

In her mid-thirties, Judith enrolled at Humboldt State University in Arcata in Northern California by the suggestion of friends and family to do something she enjoyed. She focused on graphic arts and photography and was considered an outspoken student at the time, with opinions on feminism and cultural identity.

I worked as a graphic artist for a couple of years and realized that if I was to teach, I needed to get an advanced degree, so I applied to Chico State and went there to earn my MA. It was immediately after that I began seriously exhibiting.

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PROFILE

was asked to think of ten stories I would like to tell and then choose one for the book. It did not dawn on me until years after the book was published that it would also be a useful book. I get comments all the time about how it makes that part of Native American history easier to explain to young school children. It was also wonderful to embed an empowering lesson in this little story of two brothers guided by love, who found their way home from a dispassionate institutional environment.

At what point in your career did you get the Joan Mitchell grant?

The Joan Mitchell grant came out of the blue. In 2002, I used it to build my installation for Continuum 12 at the National Museum of the American Indian in Manhattan. It was just post-911 and I needed to say something to the people of NYC from a person of Native heritage.

My roundhouse was filled with sound of a cry song.

Red Ribbons, 1997, acrylic on canvas, 60 × 48 in., collection of the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian. Photo: Neebinnaukzhik Southall (Rama Chippewa).

How did you determine and develop your fantastical, narrative style?

Dugan Aguilar, Harry Fonseca, Frank LaPena, and Alan Wallace.

My style came about by letting go of any preconceived notions about what kind of painter I would be. I was mainly a photographer, and I had painted pictures, but once I started telling stories with paint, I let my inner child take over.

In 1998, Judith illustrated Home to Medicine Mountain, a book about her father and uncle finding their way home on summer break from Riverside Indian Boarding School in the 1930s. Chiori Santiago wrote the text, and Children’s Book Press of San Francisco published the book.

This was also the time when Jean LaMarr (Paiute-Achomawi), a former IAIA professor, approached Judith and stressed how badly serious Native women artists were needed.

Jean LaMarr was one of my first mentors. She used to say, “We need you, it’s just me and the boys.” The boys she was referring to were the male artists,

How did this project come to you?

The publisher had seen my exhibit at the American Indian Contemporary Arts (AICA) show in San Francisco and came to my opening to meet me and invite me to do the book. I thought it might be an interesting way to simply honor my father’s heritage, so I agreed to do it. I

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My public program and talk was about forgiveness. I read Shauna Covey’s poem “The Return of Ishi’s Brain” to the audience at the end, and I think that last line really had an impact. You can tell, you know? A lady came up to me later and asked for a hug and said a friend had told to her come to the exhibit to get her out of the house. She hadn’t wanted to because she was still grieving the loss of her son, a firefighter lost on 9/11. She told me that she felt very affected, in a good way, by what I brought to New York and what I spoke of. That just made me feel all the work was worth it and that I had honored my Joan Mitchell grant in the right way. I had done my job.

Judith’s body of work is rich in narrative as well as color, and she does not shy away from difficult issues like the boarding school experience, California Native history, and Native American stereotypes. Her exhibition in Nevada City, California called Indians, Irony, and Identity is an entire gallery filled with stereotypical items from a time when the romanticized “brave” image was commonplace. The exhibit, curated

by Judith, displays wall-to-wall product labels, romance novels, bottles, and collectibles, which she describes as “kitschy.” The exuberance of ignorance is displayed in a humorous manner.

JUDITH LOWRY

Shopping, 1996, acrylic on canvas, 82 × 68 in., collection of the Peabody Essex Museum, E300526.

I have been collecting NDN kitsch for a few years. Some of it is funny, some not so much. Jean LaMarr also has a large collection of NDN kitsch and for years we often talked about mounting an exhibit of these objects. I hope one day to include Jean’s collection and curate a comprehensive exhibit or permanent museum installation of these cultural novelties.

As with most of what we do at CHIRP, Indians, Irony, and Identity helped us explode some stereotypes of Indian people. We hosted a tour of the exhibit for a Sierra College class, the Nevada County Landmark Commission, our local newspaper, and others, and drew positive responses. Our aim was mainly to provoke thought about the way in which our formative experiences shape the way we

view other cultures. I asked Alan Wallace to take his group of young artists through the exhibit before it opens at the Maidu Museum in Roseville and offer their thoughts and feelings about these items for placement in the interpretive wall text.

spoke of having their eyes opened for the first time to this subject. We think we made a change for the good on our local level. Now we are taking it on the road to the Maidu Museum in Roseville where it will reach an even bigger audience in 2015.

As the curator, what were your intentions? Desired impact on the community?

Judith founded the California Heritage Indigenous Research Project shortly after she moved to Nevada City, California to be close to her father. CHIRP started as an unofficial organization to gather information about the original residents and their history and culture.

The exhibit was all about exposing stereotypes and how they are rooted in common, everyday items we use, like kitsch, clothing, housewares, and entertainment.

It was a great way to connect with our audience, which included a good cross section of the community. The comments were positive, and in many cases people

The research of the area turned into a full-scale unfolding of layers of history and stories of the Nisenan people, who had been nearly forgotten by the current dominant community. It is a hard story to tell, one of much horror and sadness, but Judith has stood up to the locals’ practice of ignoring and whitewashing this history.

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PROFILE

Details of Indians, Irony, and Identity installation view, 2014, found objects, Powell House, Nevada City, CA. Images courtesy of the artist.

Please tell us more about how you founded CHIRP. What is in the works for the future? What do you think the effect has been the community with the advent of CHIRP? I moved to picturesque Nevada City in 1996 hoping for a peaceful and productive artistic life in the Sierra foothills. I was not looking for controversy or drama, but in the way that things sometimes unfold, they simply fell into my lap.

It began when my father asked me what Indian families lived here. He had enjoyed visits with old boarding schoolmates and friends from Sherman at my home in Arcata, so he was interested in who might still be living in this little gold rush town. I couldn’t find anybody. Dad asked me to check for a tribal council or rancheria, or anything that might help me locate the local Indian people who I thought of as Southern Maidu. I had my father’s teaching map and saw that they were referred to as the Nisenan.

I did not know at the time that they

were essentially hiding in plain sight, intimidated into silence by a tribal corporation bent on seizing Nisenan lands and resources in order to bring a gaming facility to our county. This could not have happened except for a perfect storm of circumstances, the opportunity to profit by local developers, coupled with Nevada County’s complete ignorance about the Indigenous history of this region.

For legal reasons, I cannot yet elaborate too much, but I can say that after a great deal of time, effort, and money, that ship has turned around. Of course, this doesn’t make me a very popular person among the white power brokers in this county.

Ask me if I care.

What I have learned from working with the Nisenan is that it takes a steady and concerted effort to prevent a culture from being “disappeared.” Cultural appropriation, stereotyping, and racial bias will always exist. Like rust, they never sleep. Add to that the last 30 years or so of gaming tribes, and we have fresh ground

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for those forces to breed. Nobody wants a successful Indian. That is why the Native artist/writer/activist must continue to work diligently against those forces.

Judith is currently in talks with James Luna to exhibit next year at the gallery of the Powell House in Nevada City during the 6th Annual Nisenan Heritage Day at Sierra College, Nevada City campus. This year’s Heritage Day was a success with the Indians, Irony, and Identity exhibit, language and Native history talks, and cultural food, song, and dance.

James Luna is curating an exhibit about the Mission Schools, also known as the Indian Boarding Schools. He has asked Judith to write an article on the exhibit for the News from Native California magazine as well as participate in the exhibit. Judith’s description of the show: Mission Family Values—The remolding of the American Indian lifestyle through the indoctrination of the Mission network and further institutionalized by the government boarding school system,

JUDITH LOWRY

High Rollers: Eye in the Sky, 1999, acrylic on canvas, 60 × 80 in., collection of the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian. Photo: Neebinnaukzhik Southall (Rama Chippewa).

which was based heavily upon the Mission model, was purported to be an attempt at humane acculturation of the Indigenous savage, when in fact it was a campaign of total cultural assimilation that began with the youngest and most impressionable. Assimilation is partly defined as consumption or digesting, the act of absorbing something. But like stubborn lumps in gravy or troublesome knots in tangled hair, the humorous core of the native soul persisted through the many decades and kept the spirit alive.

I was privileged to participate in the exhibit Indian Humor at the National Museum of the American Indian.3 I see other programs throughout the country

based on the “Laugh Until You Heal” message. It’s a good one.

With the help of my computer collaborator David McKay, we placed the comical visage of grinning Chief Wahoo of Cleveland Indians fame upon the faces of models, dressed in fringed Nubuck, plastic pony beads, and Tandy craft moccasins. The models are supposed to represent the Indian family unit. In products, sports brand, and costume sewing pattern, we see the American Indian as commodity, as trademark, as goods to be stereotyped, trivialized,

and ready for consumption. “Mission” complete. Yet, there stand the NDNs, grinning through it all.

Another project simmering for Judith is to one day open a community cultural center in Nevada City modeled after the celebrated Pacific Western Traders, located outside of Sacramento. It was a well-known Native supply store, fine art gallery, and cultural gathering place that recently shut down after being a community hub and institution since 1971.

More information on Judith Lowry can be found on the website:

www.greatbasinnativeartists.com

3. Indian Humor was a traveling exhibit, curated by Sara Bates (Cherokee Nation) and organized by the American Indian Contemporary Art (AICA) gallery in San Francisco in 1994–1995.

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Algonquin Interdisciplinary Artist

Nadia Myre

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By Matthew Ryan Smith

N ALGONQUIN MEMBER of the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg First Nation, Nadia Myre has fast become one of Canada’s most important contemporary artists. Since 2011, Myre has been long-listed for the Sobey Art Award, Canada’s premier contemporary art prize. In 2014, she made the short list of candidates.1 On November 19, Myre was awarded the $50,000 prize at the Winnipeg Art Gallery.

Myre is a graduate of Camosun College (1995), Emily Carr University of Art and Design (1997), and Concordia University (MFA, 2002). Her work is in numerous private and public collections, including the National Gallery of Canada, Musée de la Civilisation, and the National Museum of the American Indian. Accolades for her work have reached the New York Times, the Washington Post, and Canadian Art magazine. Her aesthetic and intellectual interests are eclectic, but her most popular work engages her Indigenous identity, the communicative potential of language, and themes of loss and redemption. I had the opportunity to discuss past works and upcoming projects with Myre by phone in late fall.

I’d like to begin by discussing when you and your mother claimed Native status in 1997, which is certainly a transformative event. How did it affect both your work and your life?

One thing that happened was I had completed my master’s degree in 1997. When you’re in a master’s program, you spend a lot of time thinking about what art is, what art is for, and art in relation to what. So I started thinking about what it meant for me to be Native, how do I identify to that community, or identify as having that identity, although I wasn’t growing up in that community necessarily. Over the years, one of the things that I’ve realized is that it was a common experience for Aboriginal people like myself, either because of residential school or a number of other factors. To be alien to one’s own identity is common.

Nadia Myre (Kitigan Zibi Algonquin). Courtesy of Art Mûr.

University to do my master’s, I had also been accepted into a sculpture program, but I hadn’t ever made sculpture; that was another challenge. So, it was kind of like I want to make sculpture because I’m in this program, and I want to engage with my Native identity, but for me the answer was to learn how to create, how to make things that are about Native identity: learning how to sew, how to bead, how to make a birch bark canoe, how to make other artifacts or tools— drums, rattles, snowshoes—and learn how to do it in a traditional way, with a crooked knife and with limited tools.

Is it fair to say it was creatively liberating?

Collaboration is also an important component of your practice, and some of your work is as much a social process as it is an aesthetic one. Evidence of this idea can be found in The Scar Project (2005–2013) and some of your site-specific works, even Indian Act (2000–2002), a beadwork covering 56 pages of the annotated Indian Act, where letters of the law are replaced with red and white glass seed beads. Is that a fair assessment, and what is it about collaboration, the sharing, and exchange between people, that interests you?

It definitely created a rich focus. At that time, I was already focused on work related to language and sexualization and the power of language. The latter had been my previous focus in a way. When I eventually came to Concordia

Early on in my practice, I wasn’t a strong collaborator. People reference me having involved 250 people beading in the Indian Act as a collaborative process, but for me it wasn’t a collaboration, because a collaboration involves more going

1. The Sobey Art Award is widely considered the preeminent award for contemporary art in Canada. Myre has been acknowledged as an artist from the Province of Quebec, and in 2014 made the short list along with other candidates chosen from specific regions of Canada: Evan Lee (West Coast and the Yukon), Neil Farber and Michael Dumontier (Prairies and the North), Chris Curreri (Ontario), and Graeme Patterson (Atlantic).

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NADIA MYRE

The Scar Project, 2010. Installation view at the National Museum of American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center, New York, NY. Photo: Gavin Ashworth. Image courtesy of Art Mûr.

on—actual decisions happening together, or relationships to each other. Beading the Indian Act was more about having people participate.

My collaborator for the Indian Act was curator Rhonda Meier. She was the collaborator in that she said, “Why don’t you make it a public project?” In the beginning I didn’t have a desire to do that, and she said, “I want to be a beader, and I want to ensure that other people are beading as well, and I’ll help you do that,” and so we collaborated in that way, by making it public. Later we went to Concordia and other places in order to talk about the project and workshop it with the people there—but perhaps workshopped isn’t the right word either. As I continue in my practice, it is becoming more and more collaborative. I’m looking to work with people in different ways, and there are more opportunities with people. There are participating opportunities. So my practice may be involved in collaboration, but I think a lot

of it is more about participatory environments. And I should mention that The Scar Project isn’t collaborative either. The collaboration only happens when I have five or six students in my studio helping me to archive it.

In The Scar Project, you invited participants to sew a representation in fiber and thread of a physical, emotional, psychological, or spiritual scar they may have experienced during some moment in their lives, and write out an accompanying narrative. The results are intimate, poignant, and quite beautiful. What stands out for me is the restorative power of sharing trauma with others, regardless of its anonymity. Would you agree?

Absolutely. I think every time we tell our story, whatever that story is, there is a restorative power embedded in the tone of it. Part of the interest for me was that, as I grew up, thinking that if people could just share their things, you know, it wouldn’t be so bad. [Laughs] SPRING 2 0 1 5

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Untitled, 2014, digital print mounted to Plexiglas mounted on Omega-Bond panel, 76 × 60 in., edition of 7. Image courtesy of Art Mûr.

Those are our childhood ideals, I guess.

But also, some of the PTSD treatment researchers are conducting is reading and writing out incidents that happened and retelling it over and over and over again to a therapist—without drugs. I think those are effective treatments, and I only learned about them after I started The Scar Project. I think the project does carry some of that within it. And also, the pure humanism of being able to read other people’s stories and getting in touch with your own.

I’d like to segue here to another work. The Forgiveness Project (2011) is closely related to The Scar Project in many ways. In particular, it is a collection of statements sourced from anonymous persons; however, here they are statements that ask for forgiveness. What is most fascinating about these two projects is that in The Scar Project, the anonymous voices are victims, whereas 58 | W W W.F IR S TAM E RI C AN ARTMAG A ZI N E.C OM

in The Forgiveness Project, the voices represent sort of culprits in a way, inflictors of suffering. No? Would you say that’s accurate?

Yes, I think I would say that. But there’s also the idea that we have the ability to recognize, on our own, the way that we hurt others.

Which seems to be another aspect of this restorative idea. To this end, loss and suffering mark several of these projects. What is it exactly that makes loss and suffering so conducive to art and representation?

Well, I can’t speak for everybody. Other people’s stories are other people’s stories. I think that it’s kind of fundamental.

It’s all about growing as humans. From the moment we are born, we are in a state of loss. And then, the question becomes: How do you accept that, and how do you integrate that into your life? There’s always these challenges that happen

NADIA MYRE

For Those Who Cannot Speak: The Land, the Water, the Animals and the Future Generations, 2013, digital print, 69 in. × 78 ft. Installation view at the National Gallery of Canada. Image courtesy Art Mûr.

throughout life, which are the highs and lows of life, which are all about learning how to grow.

Catharsis appears to play such a fundamental role here, no?

Yes, I think so, and also contemplation.

That’s a great addition as well. Can you talk a little about For Those Who Cannot Speak … (2013)? Specifically, how it was manifested at the National Gallery of Canada, and how it factored into the beginnings of the Idle No More movement?

That piece has many starting points, and I had been working on it before Idle No More. The work at the National Gallery [of Canada] is a photograph of an existing belt, which is 34 feet long and about four or five inches wide. I had been working on that belt, and I had created a loom (or reconfigured a loom) that I was working with, adapting it in such a way that there were infinite spools of thread, or, they

weren’t literally [laughs], but they were much longer than you would usually have on a loom. So, the only reason the piece is off the loom is because I needed a piece for an exhibition. I didn’t even want to take it off the loom ... I wanted to make it larger. But then I was asked to create a new work for the Sakahàn exhibition [at the National Gallery of Canada]. I felt it would be a good work to show.

At the same time, I had been interviewed for somebody’s film, and I had said something in the film, and people came up to talk to me after they had seen the film. I was introduced to these Grandmothers who lived close to my community, in Maniwaki. Some of them were living in the bush there, living in their traditional hunting grounds, and being threatened by bulldozers that were clear-cutting the forest for the paper industry in Quebec.

And I became active in the group as much as I could by creating a large

banner for them, helping them stage a protest, and creating a soundtrack that sounded like people cutting down trees.

In meeting them, I was able to reconnect with people in one way, because that’s the other thing—I don’t feel that I have family on the reserve at all. Sure, I have a few uncles, but they’re not close. It’s as if you were adopted, and then you had children, then those children went back to the source. So, I heard about these women, I helped stage this protest, and I had heard that they had these things going from one reserve to another to talk about Stephen Harper’s omnibus bill2 to say why it was a bad idea. They also staged walk-ins, where they walked from community to community, and one of the things they did in January of 2013, I believe, was that they walked to Ottawa and made a public declaration, and in that declaration was the phrase, “We are saying this for those who cannot speak.”3

2. In Canada, the Idle No More movement was a reaction to Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s omnibus bill, specifically Bills C-38 and C-45, which proposed substantial changes to environmental laws. In effect, the bills restructure the protection of waterways belonging to Indigenous peoples, particularly the Navigable Waters Protection Act, which revoked lakes and streams from governmental protection. Much of the criticism arose from the facts that Indigenous groups were not consulted.

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Meditations on Red #1, 2013, digital print, 48 × 48 in., edition of 7. Image courtesy of Art Mûr.

I asked them if I could use that phrasing for the work, because the work was, in a way, monumental in my mind, and I wanted to give and do things that created a space where their declaration wasn’t forgotten, but could at least exist in another way, or be talked about in another way, not just by the actions of staging a protest.

Long story short, that was how the title came to that work. And they agreed, and then they invited me to their language camp that they did, with children too. It was really nice. What’s even more interesting is that I asked for the statement to be next to the work, so that there was a strong relationship between the statement and the work.

The [National] Gallery [of Canada] put up a statement, their own statement, saying that the views of the artist do not reflect upon the gallery in any way. Even though I was trying to marry those two, the gallery tried to unpoliticize my actions.

My next question is closely related to your last point: What other challenges or limitations have you encountered throughout your practice? How has this helped you change or develop your approach, your thought practice, and your methodology?

Truthfully, one of the things that I’ve noticed in my short 15 years as an artist is communicating is important. I remember that I created an exhibition called Cont(r)act at

3. The title of the work is inspired by a statement the Algonquin Kokoms (Grandmothers) read on Parliament Hill, Friday, January 11, 2013. It reads: “We join the voices of all our Relatives who are standing up and speaking for the land, water and future generations. We invite the Settlers to join us in this call to their governments. / We demand that the Crown and all governments on Turtle Island start to behave in accordance with the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, the Royal Proclamation, the Treaties and their own Constitution. All of the newcomer governments are in violation of all of these. This means respecting our customary law and finally beginning to be in a relationship with Indigenous People, which is respectful and honest. / We make these demands on behalf of all those who cannot speak—the land, the water, the animals and the future generations. Their very survival depends on our success. This is our responsibility as Grandmothers, Kokomisag. Chi-migwech. Signed: Algonquin Grandmothers.”

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NADIA MYRE

Meditations on Red #2, 2013, digital print, 48 × 48 in., edition of 7. Image courtesy of Art Mûr.

Oboro Gallery in Montreal. That’s where the Indian Act work comes from and the History in Two Parts (1999)—half birch bark, half aluminum canoe—and Portrait in Motion (2002), with me paddling that same canoe, a sculpture called Grandmothers’ Circle (2002), and another video called Wish (2002). So there’s quite a lot of works there, but they became pivotal in a way and affective.

When I created that exhibition, communicating was important for me, and I thought I had delivered a clear message. Yet, what I noticed was that when people came from elsewhere to see it, they said, “Oh, she speaks a Native language,” “What language is the Indian Act translated in?” even though it was just a redaction of language. I felt like I had failed.

The challenge of trying to communicate things is clearly one that is set up for failure, in a way, when you’re working with an individual, fiber-based practice as I am. My answer

was to try and be more general, in a way, or to make the messages less specific. Although, the Indian Act works on different levels for different people. Non-Native uses may be different than Native uses, so there’s that, too, being open enough to interpretations from different communities’ optics.

I’d like to shift directions here for a moment. Can you talk about your influences, your inspirations?

My mother was a big influence and continues to be so.

And finally, do you have any future projects planned?

Sure, it’s a pretty busy time for me. I have a new exhibition at Oboro Gallery, the Sobey Art Award show at the Winnipeg Art Gallery, and, if all goes well, I hope to go to Africa for an exhibition there.

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Comanche-Pawnee-San Ildefonso Printmaker

Alex J. Peña

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By Suzanne Newman Fricke

LEX J. PEÑA’S ART cannot be grasped quickly.

His work is subtle, complex, and nuanced.

Starting with paper he makes himself, he then prints images on the surface, adding paint and pencil lines to combine abstract patterns with representational figures. With so many translucent levels, Peña’s images are difficult to capture in a photograph. The artist says people often tell him his work is noticeably different in person. To properly appreciate his work requires direct interaction with the piece while in a meditative state, with a quiet, long look to grasp the many different elements.

Peña currently lives in Santa Fe, where he teaches printmaking at the Institute of American Indian Arts and the Santa Fe Preparatory School, while also creating his own multilayered works.

Inspirations Bringing drawing, painting, collage, and now sculptural elements into his work, Peña’s art gives the viewer a sense of a long expanse of time—not a momentary snapshot, but something built up slowly, over phases. His prints echo the work of 20th-century American painter Cy Twombly, whom Peña cites as an inspiration. Twombly’s drawings have strong calligraphic lines and layered approaches, but Peña describes Twombly’s work as looking “effortless. I think that’s the real beauty in his artwork, it came so naturally from him. He was able to create a visual language effortlessly.”1 Like Twombly, Peña creates his own visual language with a range of natural motifs, including flowers, birds, and trees, as well as abstract elements, such as the texture of the paper and a mix of straight and swooping lines.

Peña cites the Diné printmaker and painter Emmi Whitehorse as another influence, noting her “use of line, color, and layering. It’s all very subtle. Her work is personal; not all of it is divulged. She describes place and its meaning to her, but she doesn’t divulge all of it, which I don’t feel I have to do either. Sometimes people read that as obscure.” Peña’s work, like Whitehorse’s, indicates place without being literal. He considers different “concepts about how to indicate place.

Lucy Lippard describes in The Lure of the Local: Senses of Place in a Multicentered Society how different artists have been

Alex J. Peña demonstrates how to wipe an etching plate at the IAIA printmaking studio, 2014. Photo: Colleen Lucero (Hopi).

able to indicate place. Maybe it’s the absence of something that actually indicates the place. Those types of things are interesting to me.”

Arts Education The artist grew up in southwest Oklahoma where in 2006 he earned a BFA from Cameron University, a small liberal arts school in Lawton. At first Peña was encouraged to paint in the prevailing style for Native artists of the area, a style based on the Kiowa Six model: images of dancers and Indians on horses, painted with flat blocks of matte watercolor without background. He rebelled against the pressure to create stereotypically Native art. He felt “an expectation for romantic Native art that I resisted for such a long time. In undergraduate school they pushed me to make ‘Native work’ or ‘Indian work’ and that turned me off, because I wasn’t being honest with myself. If you’re Native or not, your art

1. All quotes in this article are from the author’s interview with Alex J. Peña on November 7, 2014, at the Institute of American Indian Arts.

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ALEX J. PEÑA

degree in 2008, and an MFA, with a printmaking emphasis in 2009. Peña studied lithography due to the media’s similarity to drawing. He enjoys “the amount of detail and subtlety that you can get with it. To make a lithograph, you must know a whole lot about chemistry and about little, tiny nuances.” Peña describes lithography as a very technical process.

Lithography is based on the fact that water and oils don’t mix. The printer draws an image on a limestone matrix with oil- and wax-based crayons, pencils, or paints. The stone is then processed with gum arabic and a nitric acid solution that’s spread over the entire stone, chemically changing the state of the drawing and stone. After this chemical transformation, the drawing or painting is embedded or etched into the stone in a relatively permanent state. The original drawing materials of wax and grease can be removed. Water is sponged over the surface and the original drawing will attract the oily ink as the water is repelled. Paper is then laid on the stone, and both are run through a press to produce a lithographic print.

Trees of Madison, 2006, lithograph on paper, 11.5 × 16 in. Photo: Alex J. Peña. All images courtesy of the artist.

is always going to be informed by who you are, what culture you are. I felt a more organic, more natural thing informed my art.”

Peña was interested in art that reflected a close attention to seeing. Peña credits Cameron University for its excellent art program. He states, “I always go back to my drawing professor, because she taught us how to see. How I look at things is different [from other artists] because of specific training where my perceptual skills were honed . . . that, I think, has affected my artworks. To see the subtlety, you’ve got to really look at

and then be able to contextualize it and conceptualize it.”

Cameron University instilled a meticulous attention to process in Peña.

His education was “very academic. They insisted on teaching the foundations very, very thoroughly, and they expected us to use that throughout our whole art education. That really stuck with me, because it wasn’t just play. It was really learning art.”

The printmaker continued to focus on technique while attending graduate school at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. There he earned an MA

While the process is highly technical, it is also “both mystical and methodical,” says Peña. “You have to be very patient, very detail oriented, and you have to keep making the little leaps of faith that, yes, if I remove the drawing, the image will still be there.” He describes how the method is “like a mystery, because once you erase the drawing, how are you going to get the image? You’ve got to know all the little steps.”

The Warmth of Paper At the University of Wisconsin, Madison, Peña studied other forms of printmaking including the intaglio processes of etching and engraving.

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Too Many Ways to Say Nothing, 2011, intaglio, chine-collé, pochoir, and serigraph on paper, 15 × 11 in.

the “coldness of canvas. That’s what I don’t like about canvas. It’s plastic, where paper has that feeling like it’s more in my control.” Whitehorse has also expressed a preference for paper, a media that feels better on her hands than canvas. She often paints and prints on paper then affixes the sheets to a canvas rather than working on the canvas directly.

Peña takes this preference further, making his own paper. Handcrafting paper requires a meditative state. “It is another process I enjoy. It adds another element of the hand to the art. It’s laborious, very laborious. It’s repetitive, just one thing after another, one thing after another. You’re not creating anything new, so it lets your mind ease out a little bit.”

Behind the Process Layers in his images highlight the various techniques used in the works. Peña describes his pieces as an exploration of “process and the layers behind it.” For him, these processes are demanding, but almost like a rite. He found that with “etching, it’s the same type of ritual with so many multiple steps that you have to do. It is very ritualistic. There’s something very mystical about it. You print it, and you get the results, and if you don’t like it, you’ve got to figure out how to fix it.”

Though he enjoys making these prints, Peña still struggles with the public reception and lack of knowledge about the medium. “I still have to educate people about what traditional printmaking is. They ask, ‘Is this a copy?’ because they think it’s a reproduction. When I say, ‘No, it’s a

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print,’ they don’t know what a print is. I’ve always had to explain what ‘multiple original’ is. The audience needs to be educated about what’s behind the process—that it is still an art form, that it still takes creation, it’s still an original.”

Most viewers understand and consequently appreciate media such as painting, drawing, photography, and digital imagery more than prints, since they already know the mechanics and the aesthetics behind them. He notes, “People tend to like digital photography and painting, because they understand it and because there’s an instant gratification in it. Once you finish a painting, it’s done. Once you finish a drawing on the stone for a lithograph, it’s not done, since you still have to print the edition, which requires additional knowledge about how to get this image to come out correctly.”

ALEX J. PEÑA

rehearsed actions, another ritual. He describes their formation as difficult but satisfying. “I find it gratifying to see the lines emerge as straight,” he says. “At the end of drawing those lines on a big sheet of paper going all the way down to the end, it has a gratifying feeling to it.” With straight red, gold, and black lines, Untitled Lines #25 embodies the idea of presence as Peña saw in the work of Ellsworth Kelly, who “helped people see the presence art can have in a space. Just by using color on a large canvas, people felt a presence because of that painting. Art needs to have a presence to it.”

In addition to the images and the straight lines, Peña adds looped calligraphic lines to the surface, lines that look like the handwritten word, as seen in Too Many Ways to Say Nothing #2.

Untitled Lines #25, 2010, graphite, enamel, and metallic ink on hand-inked paper, 15 × 22 in.

Power Lines Peña explores the potential of the line, both straight and calligraphic. He often adds thin-hatched lines, drawn close together, cloud-like forms on the paper’s surface. The lines sometimes run parallel, sometimes crosshatched, striking in their unrelenting straightness. These lines are very formal, showing space and intention, along with a larger concept of place.

The artist started drawing repetitive lines in graduate school.

“I think I’ve always loved the simplicity of the line,” says Peña. “A straight line

can have so many meanings for different reasons. It can point for direction. It can indicate place. When you group lines, it can mean a pattern or something more precise, like a graph. A straight line is something so simple that we often take for granted. We take for granted the theory behind using line and the richness of exploration of something so simple. It takes me back to my foundation courses to realize how important the line is.”

These lines form the surface for many of Peña’s 2010 works, such as Untitled Lines #25. Like the printmaking process, the lines require careful,

“The loopy lines indicate language, but they can never be read,” says Peña. “It isn’t my intention to ever make actual words, but to create an obscure-looking language that promotes reflection. It’s a retrospect of idea when I work with it.

I may be thinking about a certain place, and my work gives a sense of that place, metaphorically as well as physically. I create a type of scribble language I want to be personal and obscure. In that way, it’s kind of selfish. I’m keeping people from knowing certain things I feel. At the same time, if you just look at it from an aesthetic point of view, I feel like it’s very beautiful, knowing it or not.”

For Peña, the curved lines refer to form and aesthetics of Japanese calligraphy.

He says, “I really enjoy Japanese calligraphy, because it can be conceptual and at the same time beautiful. People stray away from beauty; it’s like a fourletter word in art school or in academics.

If you want it to be beautiful, it’s as if you’re cutting off the potential of conceptual exploration. When you use your hand in the work, you have both of those possibilities available to you. I make certain things more legitimate, but still at the same time, for the enjoyment of looking at it.”

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Too Many Ways to Say Nothing #2, 2013, digital, acrylic, enamel ink, and gold leaf on board, 8.5 × 11 × 2.5 in.

As an undergraduate Peña studied Romance languages.

“Language has always intrigued me. The language aspect is very apparent in my work.” As the title Too Many Ways to Say Nothing #2 suggests, words can have multiple meanings, or no meaning at all. “Learning languages is part of communication, but it’s more lyrical, more beauty behind the communication. You’re communicating something digitally and thoughtfully, but it also can be done beautifully.”

It is a reminder that the beautiful can give comfort when something is very hard to deal with. Using those things that have that dichotomy within them is very interesting to me. I’m still trying to figure out why I’m using flowers other than just for mourning.”

Images from the Natural World

The flowers and the lines, two different elements in Peña’s work, create an internal dialogue within the piece, rather like a discussion between different parts of the brain: the analytic and the perceptive, the thinker and the observer, the logical and the intuitive.

When Peña combined images with the lines, his work moved from the analytic to the emotional. In Volatile Certainty (2011), Peña placed carnations next to hatched and crosshatched thin, gold lines. The flowers suggest various emotions and ideas. Flowers decorate homes, but also memorialize and comfort mourners. After his grandmother died, Peña began to use flowers in his art.

“I started exploring why flowers are used in so many different aspects. For instance, at the funeral, why are flowers used as a symbol of consolation and for grieving?

The title Volatile Certainty suggests a scientific study. Peña often uses words like volatile, certainty, and uncertainty in his titles. As an undergraduate, he studied sciences, including biology and psychology, which appealed to him because, as he says, “I like principles, theories, ideas. That’s why there’s number 1, 2, 3, 4, whatever [in the artwork’s titles], because there are multiple ways of looking at one thing. I have a certain viewpoint towards what is certain and what is more certain, what is less certain, and so there’s a volatile sense to it. That is working on the principle of more psychological,

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A Temporary Foundation of Certainty #3, 2013, plaster with mixed media, 8 × 11.5 × 1.5 in. Two views of the same piece.

emotional types of things. In that way, it does relate, not directly to science, but something like my own science.”

In addition to flowers, Peña repeats images in his work, including trees, birds, twigs and branches, and chamisa. “All of these have a specific, concrete meaning for me.”

An earlier lithograph, Trees of Madison, combines a gnarled, silhouetted forest with a matrix of olive and moss green dots. For Peña, the trees are “an element of place. I find trees anthropomorphic, so they represent the way you feel around people that you’re comfortable with—that engrossing feeling.”

The silhouetted image may be a literal representation of a site, but the dots and shapes overlay a sense of narrative, offering a view of the site along with its history.

Ongoing Experiments In more recent works, as in A Temporary Foundation of Certainty #3 from 2013, Peña uses plaster with found objects such as dried flowers and wire to make a three-dimensional version of his layered art, complete with calligraphic lines.

“My work is not overt in any way. There’s no mention of any type of politics or social issues. I want my art to be more personal,” he says. “Sometimes it’s not always read easily by the viewer, but then if you get to spend more time with it, study it, then it becomes a lot more evident of what the

communication point was.”

Like a scientific research study, Peña explores the possibilities of printmaking, painting, and mixed media in variations. He believes, “There is no one solution to anything. If I am exploring something, it can disappear and dissipate at any time.”

As a Native American artist, Peña shows his work in different galleries and has only recently joined Native-only shows.

His work often does not fit with the established categories of Native art. The year 2014 was “only my third time participating in the annual Santa Fe Indian Market. I thought it would be nice to have the juxtaposition between my work that’s very contemporary” and more established styles of art.

“There’s a lot more going on than what people expect to see.

That’s my way of showing the shifts that continue to happen in the Native art world. Yes, what I like about it is how people will come from one booth and they’ll say, ‘This is so different.’ It takes them aback for a minute, and then they start to look and they say, ‘I like this. It’s so different.’ I like how it makes them reflect a little bit. I like that little shock that they have, since it is more of a contemporary voice.”

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Zuni Sculptor

Troy Sice

By America Meredith

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THIRD-GENERATION CARVER, Troy Sice comes from a family of accomplished artists among an entire community of artists. Multitalented, he is a sculptor, a jeweler, and a lapidarian who possesses an intimate knowledge of his materials that only comes with years of hands-on experience. Some of these materials, like turquoise or jet, have been used in Zuni for millennia; some are more exotic and novel. Troy shared his carving techniques with his partner Ray Tsalate (Zuni), who has gone on to forge his own successful art practice. Both are from Zuni, the largest pueblo in New Mexico with approximately 10,000 enrolled tribal members.

In Zuni, Troy learned different skills from several family members. While honing his techniques, he developed a unique, personal style. His swaying corn maidens and bears singing from pursed lips have a lyrical quality. His carved bears have become something a trademark, at once both graceful and whimsical; some delicately balanced on one foot. Soft tones of antler and ivory1 contrast with brilliantly hued, inlaid semi-precious stones, polished shells, or coral.

In collaboration with Orlando Dugi (Diné), the duo won the Native Peoples Magazine Creativity Award at SWAIA’s Indian Market for an elaborate, beaded handbag with a handle carved in the shape of Kolowisi, the Water Serpent. Although Sice primarily sells directly to galleries, he has also exhibited throughout the West, at venues such as the Duhesa Gallery in Fort Collins, Colorado, and the Northwest Painted Face American Indian Art Show at Julyamsh, Post Falls, Idaho. His work is in public collections such as the Museum of Northern Arizona, Colorado State University, Smithsonian Institution, and the Heard Museum. He participates in art fairs, and his artwork is part of a lively, secondary market. Despite his many successes, Troy remains relaxed and down to earth, with a ready laugh.

Raised in his culture, Troy is very clear about the difference between religious items and his sculptures. In his own words:

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N ZUNI HISTORY, fetish carvings are animals turned into stones by our Twin War Gods during the migration, or the story of how we came to be—from when we came from the underworld. We came up from the ground, from Mother Earth. Our Sun Father brought down his twin sons, the War Gods. On earth, there were animals, ferocious beasts that roamed the lands. In order for these beasts not to eat the people,

Troy Sice at his studio, Albuquerque, NM. Photo: A. Meredith.

the Twin War Gods struck them with their arrows. When they struck them, they turned these beasts into stone. That’s how the first fetishes came to be. They spared their hearts—their hearts in the stone, so that’s how the animal itself was still alive in the stone. The Zuni religion uses the true fetishes, that’s what they’re called.2 True fetishes—those are the ones with medicinal properties?

Yes, that’s where the term fetish comes into play. The work I do has no magical powers or blessings of any kind. So the proper term for my work would be carvings. It’s sculptural.

Your Grandfather George Haloo CheeChee was a carver, right? He started with bird carvings?

1. Native American artists today work in walrus or mammoth ivory, not elephant ivory.

2. All quotes are from Troy Sice in discussion with the author, December 2014.

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Your uncles created standing bears?

Yes. I was never able to ask my Uncle Ramie if he was the first one to burnish his bears, but that’s what I’ve read in different articles. They credit him for burnishing the bears. I don’t know if my Uncle Miguel ever used a torch, but I’ve watched him burnish the ears and nose of the bear using matches. He would strike the match on the concrete, and he would put it on the bear. The flame burns the ears and the nose until the antler burns and darkens.

Wow, I had no idea!

I don’t know if it was just at that moment [that he used matches]. I use a jeweler’s torch, which works much better than the matches my uncle was using [laughs].

When did you first pick up tools and start carving?

Warrior Mice, antler inlaid with various stones including turquoise, jet, and lapis lazuli, and mother-of-pearl and natural coral. Photo: Yvonne Stokes, Grey Dog Trading, Albuquerque, NM.

Yes, the little shell birds and also the birdin-flight pendants he used as centerpieces for necklaces. He started roughly in the 1930s. When I was about six or seven years old, I’d see my grandfather do his work at my mom’s house. He taught his sons, my uncles Miguel Haloo and Raymond Haloo—they called him “Ramie” as a nickname. Both brothers are credited for making the standing bears.

I also used to watch my mother do her jewelry work, which she still does to this day. She is Tina Haloo. Her maiden name is Haloo; she goes by Tina Gasper now.

Almost everyone in Zuni is around art all the time. When you’re growing up,

the kids are in the house before they start school. Someone’s always doing art in the house. It might be jewelry, carving, pottery, painting, or any kind of art form. For me, watching stuff like that was inspiring. I was motivated. I had that thought, “When I grow up, I want to create and to do stuff like this.”

My Aunt Rosalie, she was my mom’s sister. I’ve watched her work with my Uncles Ramie and Miguel at my grandmother’s house. I’ve also seen my older brother Colvin work. He’s from my mom’s other marriage, but we consider each other brothers.3

I was dabbling between 1990 through 1993. That’s when I started picking up things. My brother Colvin would finish work and come to Albuquerque to sell. I would ask if it was okay if I just messed with the scraps. He gave me permission, so that’s what I did—messed with the Dremel tool. Just dabbling with things, and that’s how I learned. It takes a lot of practice [laughs]. The first corn maiden piece was a small slab of antler. The face was round, but when I made the eyes, one eye was higher than the other. My mom still has that piece.

Yeah, it’s always good to save your early work, just to see how you’ve grown.

It’s come a long way. My first corn maidens and bears were stiff statues. Some of the corn maidens were really long; the proportions weren’t right. The bears looked stiff. Now they have a little more movement to them.

That’s what really strikes me about your work—the implied motion, the flow, and the body language of the

3. George Haloo CheeChee (1908–1983) was the stepfather of Rosalie Quam (1929–1989) and father of Raymond “Ramie” Haloo (1944–2006), Miguel Haloo (dates unknown), and Tina Haloo Gasper, Troy’s mother. Colvin Peina (1967–2005) was Troy’s half-brother. Troy has several other siblings and many relatives that are successful carvers and jewelers today.

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Piano, fossilized ivory, jet, and sterling silver. Photo: Yvonne Stokes, Grey Dog Trading Post.

figures. Is that something you’ve really worked on?

What materials do you use in your sculptures?

I’ve really paid attention to that. The first design I started with was from my Uncles Ramie and Miguel. It’s the basic design our family does—the standing bears. Colvin had really good ideas. You could just see it in his work—the way he used the Dremel tool, the way he carved the corn maidens, the way he carved his bears—some looking up into the sky, the arms off to the side, like this or like that. He inlaid turquoise. He was the first one to use inlay for a necklace design on bears. When Colvin passed on, I started looking at what Colvin used to do and the designs for Miguel and Ramie’s bears.

I incorporated those influences and took it my own way. That’s how my bears have a little more movement.

My main medium right now is elk antler … and deer antler. I do work with ivory—fossilized mammoth ivory occasionally walrus ivory. Very rarely, I work with marble, black marble, Picasso marble,4 white marble, all the marbles that are out there. Sometimes I use amber or lapis lazuli. I made an opal bear once. Calcite is what I work with— honeycomb.5

And their mouths—they often look like they’re singing.

I got tired of just a line of black to indicate the mouth. I wanted more detail with more expression. I thought, wouldn’t it be cool to put lips on it? I’m still getting it down, seeing if I can do other expressions on them, seeing what I can do with the hands and the feet and all these little gestures. I can make a million bears, but each one would pose different ways.

Are you looking for a softness or texture that makes it easier to carve?

It’s more the coloration of the stones, something that catches my eye. The hardest stone I’ve worked with so far is lapis. There are different jasper stones.

Labradorite has a nice shimmer to it, but I don’t want to get into that stone yet until I have the right grinding equipment, so I can execute the piece the right way the first time.

Could you walk me through your basic process?

An idea pops in my head, like a sculptural piece that I’m thinking about with a slab of moose antler. For the flat part of the antler, I’m thinking about carving scenery. I have this technique to do it, but I’m not quite sure what I’m going

to put onto the moose piece, just an idea. Sometimes I draw out the ideas.

My first nativity set—once I thought about it, I sketched out how I thought the nativity scene would come out—the wise men, Mary, Joseph, Baby Jesus. I tried to execute it the way I drew it out, but sometimes when you carve, it gives it a different turn. If you think you’re going to carve something out a certain way, it will work differently. Sometimes if you make a mistake, you try to carve it in a way to fix the mistake. Let’s say I’m carving something and a piece of stone chipped off it, maybe I can round it off and put it up higher.

What tools do you use to rough it out?

I use grinding stones, grinding wheels with variable grits, anywhere from 60 to 80 grit. Grinding wheels are what I use to remove the skin of the antler.

The stones go onto the vacuum motor that I use. The stones could be from six to eight inches big. For detailing, that’s where the Dremel tool comes in—if I’m making hands, for the fingers, or shoes, or a hair bun, the fine detail and the inlay.

The inlaying stones that I use, everything I use has to be natural. We don’t buy cabs [short for cabochons], the already-polished stones from gem suppliers. We buy rough materials: coral, turquoise, marble, and lapis. Whatever we’re going to use for inlay, it has to be natural stone. We cut and grind all our stones, and we polish all our stones ourselves.

Why do you choose to do that?

It’s a preference. The quality standing of my work. A lot of people use stabilized turquoise.

Does that last indefinitely or does it start to disintegrate?

Stabilized turquoise is real turquoise; it just has an epoxy filler. The stabilizing

4. Picasso marble is metamorphic rock formed by magma flowing through cracks in limestone. It can be white, grey, tan, or brown with characteristic black veins. Named after the Cubist artist Pablo Picasso, it is found in southwest Utah.

5. Honeycomb calcite is a translucent crystal, ranging in color from soft, lemony yellows to warm ambers. Its fibrous structures surrounded by white membranes resemble honey. Recently discovered, it is only found in Utah.

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TROY SICE

hardens the stone. The glue, or chemical, or whatever they use to fill it—to me, it may as well be plastic. There’s nothing wrong working with stabilized; I just choose not to.

What’s the largest piece you’ve done?

It might have been a three- to three-anda-half-foot-tall sculptural piece, carved out of elk antler.

How large are elk antlers?

It depends. Hunters go by points, five, six, seven, the highest might be a nine-pointer.

They get big, from the ground to about that high [indicates four and a half feet with his hand]. They get huge. I’ve seen trophy elk antler where the base on the bottom is huge. With my line of work, I try not to buy the trophy antlers, because I’m going to cut them up anyway. There’s no need to buy a two- to three-thousand-dollar matching pair [laughs].

So, that piece was series of corn maidens coming out.

Could you talk about who the corn maidens are?

The corn maidens in Zuni are our Corn Mothers. Our directional colors, north, south, east, west, up, and the underground.

Do you have center as a direction?

That might be us in the center plane.

There are six directions, and Corn Mothers are associated with each direction and color—red, blue, yellow, white, black, and multicolored. Our Corn Mothers are intertwined with the directionals, and they are part of why we pray. In the past, our people mistreated the Corn Mothers. That was spoken about in our migration stories and our sacred prayers. When our people mistreated the Corn Mothers, they left us and fled. When they ran away, our crops didn’t grow. Our people were starving.

They called one of the katsinas to look for them. He found them and asked them to come back home. They did come back,

and they told our people, “You don’t mistreat the corn anymore; you have to respect the corn.” That’s what our people did.

You have to have your corn pollen in the morning. When a kernel or several kernels fall off an ear of corn, you have to pick them up, because our grandmothers and our grandfathers tell us that the little kernels cry. You have to pick all of them up, and you have to treat them with care.

And you don’t play with food or throw it away. You never toss food to another person; that’s not acceptable in our way.

You have to treat it with care. That’s like a brief, crash course on the corn maidens.

It’s much longer with more details. That’s just the basic information about our Corn Mothers.

Corn Maiden Necklace, natural coral, sterling silver, mother-of-pearl inlaid with turquoise, jet, coral, and lapis lazuli. Photo: Yvonne Stokes, Grey Dog Trading Post.

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detailing on the teeth.

The really scary part for me was to inlay the stingray leather. I’ve never worked with stingray leather, and I was sitting there, scratching my head, wondering how I was going to inlay this leather into the Kolowisi. I knew I had to make a housing for it, so I drew it out with a pencil on the top. I cut just a couple millimeters into the antler. I had to grind the leather, little by little, because the leather’s really movable. I was holding it tight. I finally got the shape that would fit in to the Kolowisi on the top, the next part was putting it into place. I was so scared. I kept putting it on the top then taking it off. I had to put the adhesive on it. I kept trying. I don’t know how many times I placed it. Then finally I was like, I’m applying it, here goes, and I started doing it. I put the adhesive on, placed it in there, and it stuck. Then I started putting more dabs on it, making it flush with the sides. In the end it worked out. I was sitting there, holding my breath.

Ray was standing right there, watching me, and every time I started to put it on, he would walk away into the other room.

He didn’t want to see me messing up or whatever [laughs]. But it turned out all right. It turned out well.

Troy Sice (Zuni) and Orlando Dugi (Diné), The Guardian: Bringer of Thunder, Lightning, and Rain, 2013, Kolowisi handle: elk antler, stingray leather, Amazon parrot feathers, lynx fur, sterling silver, turquoise, rubies, mother-of-pearl; handbag: stingray leather, cloth, sterling silver, 13° Czech beads, electroplated beads, carved fish and frog effigies; private collection. Image courtesy of Orlando Dugi.

I was blown away by the collaboration you did with Orlando Dugi on the Water Serpent piece. That was amazing. Was that a huge leap or have you done other collaborations? How did that come about?

We were all hanging out in one of the bistros in Santa Fe. Ray or Orlando said, “We should do a collaboration.” We brainstormed through lunch. Orlando had this idea of putting raindrops, like on a windowpane, on a beaded bag.

Someone said, “How about the Zuni water serpent? Kolowisi would be good for a handle.” And we were all like, “Yeah, yeah!”

Originally I was going to use a mammoth ivory base for the Kolowisi. I was looking for an ivory piece seven inches long, which I couldn’t find anywhere. So I thought, I’m going to use elk antler.

When I started executing the piece, the carving part I had down—the little rows of bumps on the bottom. Then I did the

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The rubies for the eyes—I was trying to set them. I put gold-lipped mother-ofpearl for the eyes, then drilled a tiny hole for the rubies to sit into and I wondered, how am I going to set the rubies in there?

Am I going to grab it with a tweezer?

I tried it with a tweezer, and it kept popping out on the floor. I can’t glue it, because then there will be a film of glue on the ruby, and I’d have to wax it to remove the glue and repolish it, then the wax would get into the stingray leather.

What I did was take a piece of blue painter’s tape, and stuck it to the ruby, stuck that in adhesive, and then stuck it in the eye. Because the adhesive—once it touches, it sticks.

You can’t make a mistake.

TROY SICE

Singing, Dancing Bolo Tie Bears, burnished elk antler inlaid with jet, lapis lazuli, turquoise, and natural coral. Photo: Troy Sice.

Yeah, so I put it on and then just took the tape off. I had to think and do things differently. That was challenging work to do, but it also taught me new techniques to use on other projects. I learned new things [laughs].

How long have you been doing the art markets?

The first time I ever did Santa Fe Indian Market was 2005. I’ve seen a lot from different artists. You see all the different booths, all the different art forms—just everything inspires you. A lot of artists come up to me and say the same, that they are inspired by what I do. We all work together.

So, seeing good art is a good stimulation for making art?

That’s what really kicked off my [personal style], was Santa Fe Indian Market, where my artistic vision grew and started evolving. I came up with different designs. I came up with the dancing bear, bears with bolos, neckties, bow ties—the possibilities are just endless. If you put your mind to it, you can be creative.

How is the Arizona art scene different from New Mexico?

I think there’s a circuit of artists that go to Phoenix. They should put everybody on a bus and have them go to these markets [laughs]. It’s almost everyone you see in Santa Fe, you see at the Heard.

Do you feel like you get a different audience?

Actually, I do. A lot more people are noticing my art in Arizona. A lot of people there collect my work. When Grey Dog Gallery was still in Tucson, I used to do a show with them in Tucson.

It was awesome. I’ve never seen a show like that. People lined up like they’re there to see a new movie. It was amazing to see people lining up to see the artwork.

When the time was ready to move that red ribbon, people were grabbing carvings. People had five, six pieces. They were just grabbing work. I’ve never seen anything like that before.

Do you feel that the audience there in Tucson was well informed, well educated about what they were looking at?

I’m pretty sure they knew something about the tradition behind the work and about carvings.

Plus, Kent McManis is really knowledgeable about a lot of things. He’s the owner of Grey Dog and has written books about Zuni art.

What ideas do you have for the future?

For the future … everything. I’m looking at everything. For the work that I do, I want to make it bigger and bigger and bigger. I have visions of maybe making some bronze sculptures.

In the future, I want to have my own business, where I manage everything myself, for Ray and me. He’s always thinking about me and him, and I’m always thinking the same way. So everything I do it’s pretty much me and him.

We do have our separate works, but we do talk about collaborating. So who knows? Maybe we’ll come up with something cool for the Heard. If not this year, maybe next year.

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Anchorage

Rolled & Reliefed Anchorage Community Works “The artist has the moment.” —Ryan Romer

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CRISP, FALL EVENING in Ship Creek. Not your typical Anchorage neighborhood.

The industrial sector feels like stepping back in time, with dirt roads crisscrossing railroad tracks. Parking lots surround the warehouse building that is Anchorage Community Works.

Renting monthly studio spaces to local artists, Anchorage Community Works has concrete floors, a stage in one corner, lighting, speakers, event space, printmaking supplies, and past and current creative projects adorning its walls. A large garage door open on the backside allows indoor access for the steamroller.

Of the opening, curator Ryan Romer (Yup’ik-Athabascan) says, “It is theatrical, performance-art style, the unveiling and the ooh’s and aah’s from the crowd. The artist has the moment.” Adding another dimension to the evening’s reception, Shyanne Beatty (Hän Gwich’in), NAMMY-nominated songwriter, sang for the crowd.

The world of curating shows is not new to Romer, as he spent three years as a gallery photographer and exhibit installer at the Alaska Native Arts Foundation.

Romer has lived in Alaska his entire life, and he cares about his community and his state. Raised in the village of Bethel, Romer moved to Anchorage in 2001 to attend art school. One of his most memorable classes while attending the University of Alaska, Anchorage, was with his printmaking professor Gary Kaulitz. In this class, Romer also met dear friend and fellow Anchorage-based artist and graphic designer Holly Nordlum (Iñupiaq).

In 2005, Gary hosted an earlier steamroller printmaking event, and Romer and Nordlum were two of the 72 participating artists. The resulting prints were displayed at the International Gallery of Contemporary Art in Anchorage. Romer appreciated how social the event was,

TOP: Bystanders and helpers huddle around the canvas that will become Holly Nordlum’s print Naataq (“Grey Owl” in Iñupiaq). “Owls are personal to me. My Iñupiaq name is Mititquq, ‘a place where birds land.’ To me, the owl is feminine and mysterious, and I use them a lot in my work,” says Nordlum. Ryan Romer and the steamroller are in the background.

BOTTOM: Three attendees work together to reveal Migration, Romer’s finished print.

Both photos: Michael Conti.

with complete strangers collaborating in an assembly line, all pitching in with the common goal of creating new, original works of art.

Organizing live printmaking for the public to observe involves care and planning for the complicated process. You need the exact quantity of ink on the block, clean hands to handle the prints, and the right amount of pressure to transfer the design onto size-appropriate sheets of canvas.

It isn’t all glory. Three months prior, supplies were delivered to people’s houses,

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and thinking caps donned. The artists were given blank sheets of plywood varying in size from 5-foot squares to 4-by-8-feet rectangles, and had the three months to design and carve, in some cases creating their first relief print.

Iñupiaq artist Sarah Whalen usually works in large-scale oil painting and mosaic.

Her printing block sat in the garage for a long time. “I would go out at night after my kids were in bed and look at the wood wondering what would come of it, and why I had agreed to this. Putting the first line down was horrifying, but now

REVIEWS

looking back, I’m glad I was roped in. It opened up a new medium of art for me to play with. I have always loved Japanese woodblock prints, but never imagined I’d have the patience.”

Outcomes of the Exhibit Participating artists were Ryan Romer, Holly Nordlum, Shyanne Beatty, Sarah Whalen, Drew Michael Becky Grunder, and Ruby Kennell. Some of the artists’ prints sold to private collectors, others hang at local Blue Hollomon Gallery, and others still were donated and sold at local art auction fund-raisers.

Romer describes the Rolled & Reliefed as “a community art event, achieving ‘mass art thought.’ The people that interact at the art event will turn into the culture bearers and carry a common message that they in turn share amongst their community.”

A transplant himself, Romer comments on social phenomena in the design of his Escher-esque block print. Migration was inspired by his observations of “the subtle transition and influx of rural native population coming to the big city to survive; only to find the hardships involved in becoming stranded in a new world, all the while still at home, here in Alaska.”

Riding the success of his latest event, Romer plans to take the model to remote hub towns in rural Alaska where the public eye hasn’t yet been given the opportunity to observe and aid in this creative process.

“A positive message is needed in our communities. Art is part of our culture, it is part of the way we dress, we talk, and it is part of who we will be in the future.”

“Living in the village, I would have been all over that, even as a high school student,” says Nordlum. “I love the idea of Ryan traveling this show style to outlying villages in Alaska.”

I enjoyed the energy of this event, the camaraderie of the artists, and the calm of the participants, cool, collected, and working together. It takes a team to produce a set of prints. Everybody is there to help and has a job. People enjoyed being a part of accomplishing a collective goal. I would like to see similar wholesome group activities once again championed in our region. —Anna Hoover

Minneapolis

On Fertile Ground: Native Artists in the Upper Midwest All My Relations Arts

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ITH THE JURIED EXHIBITION On Fertile Ground: Native Artists in the Upper Midwest, All My Relations Arts continued their track record of important leadership in displaying the work of contemporary Native American artists. The exhibition featured some 40 works by 15 artists, including work by the three invited artist-jurors, Julie Buffalohead (Ponca), Jim Denomie (Ojibwe), and John Hitchcock (Comanche).

On Fertile Ground was the first of three annual shows organized to celebrate the creative efforts of artists tribally based or residing in Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wisconsin. When all is said and done, the three shows will give 45 artists the opportunity to show their work to a Twin Cities audience.

Handsomely installed and varied in focus, On Fertile Ground provided a compelling feast of diverse materials and styles. In addition to the work of the three jurors, the show featured pieces by Judith Allen (Bois Forte Chippewa), Wendy Boivin (Menominee), Alexandra Buffalohead (Sisseton-Wahpeton Dakota), Nelson Chasing Hawk (Sicangu Lakota), Wanesia Misquadace (Fond du Lac Ojibwe), Karen Savage Blue (Lake Superior Ojibwe), Nelda Schrupp (Pheasant Rump Nakota), James Star Comes Out (Oglala Lakota), Jodi Webster (Ho-Chunk-Potawatomi), Dennis White (Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe), Jennifer White (Arikara), and Monte Yellow Bird (Arikara-Hidatsa). The eclectic offering included abstract and representational paintings, prints, drawings, and mixed media sculpture, as well as objects conceived from traditional materials such as sterling silver, beads, birch bark, and horsehair.

For a stop-in-your-tracks viewing experience, it was tough to surpass the highly embellished horse halter and US Cavalry saddle by James Star Comes Out, respectively titled Gleglega Sapa (“Black

Cloud”) and 1904 Mila Hanska Can Akinii.

The canvas halter and actual 1904 US Cavalry saddle were boldly reenvisioned with colorful beads, brass bells, tin cones, mirrors, goose feathers, and horsehair. Both reflected Star Comes Out’s rigorous work ethic that transformed the common horse tack through materials, striking geometric patterns, and historic references. The red horizontal stripes crossing the saddle’s spine not so obliquely referenced a cavalry jacket’s decorative pattern of stripes and buttons.

Other functional work that celebrated longstanding traditions were Nelda Schrupp’s silver necklace rattles, that incorporated jasper, lapis lazuli, and carnelian, and were elaborated with graceful tails of horsehair. Wendy Boivin’s necklace and earring set and concho belt made from sterling silver and cut-glass beads had a strong sculptural presence. Wanesia Misquadace’s small, tubular containers with lids were constructed from birch bark, metals, and other materials. Inventive and political, with titles like Smallpox Blankets and Honor the Treaties, Misquadace’s baskets demonstrated her mastery of birch bark biting. Dennis White’s vividly hued and fringed sashes displayed his skill at the Ojibwe art of fingerweaving. Woven from wool and acrylic fibers without the use of a loom, the geometrically patterned sashes are the result of his research at NMAI and reveal his commitment to the continuation of Ojibwe culture.

Alexandra Buffalohead’s three large-scale, mixed media sculptures were constructed from chicken wire and nylon. Grouped as an installation, the figurative pieces were suspended by wires from the ceiling.

Autobiographical with titles like Self Portrait and Skinless I and II, the installation would have benefited from a deeper exploration of figure/subject to materials by this artist to convey her formal and narrative ideas.

Painting was well represented in style and content. In her acrylic on masonite paintings, Jennifer White depicts female nudes in an abstract, quasi-Cubist style.

Largely self-taught, White’s imagery boldly reflects the personal narratives of Native women living in the Dakotas. Jim Denomie’s acerbic oil on canvas paintings also tell the complex stories of Native people living in contemporary society. A SPRING 2 0 1 5

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colorist who wields a sharp brush in a loose, expressive style, Denomie’s pointed narratives exploit topics including Christianity, pop culture, and personal experience. Although little escapes Denomie’s discerning eye, his critical commentary is undergirded by a wry sense of humor.

Stylistically opposite to Denomie’s gestural and graphic approach are Nelson Chasing Hawk’s meticulously rendered oil on canvas portraits. Chasing Hawk captures the essence of his subjects as is seen in the convincing Grandma High Rock (in the catalogue), a robust woman wearing an apron with her grey hair tied back. Unidealized, we sense her long journey and wisdom. In a similar representational style, Jodi Webster depicts Native people in contemporary day-to-day environments. Working with graphite and

colored pencil on paper, Webster imbues her subjects with immediacy as in On to Market where a young boy, who proudly mixes historical and contemporary dress, rides a customized bicycle.

Karen Savage Blue also works in a representational mode. Her three, modestly scaled, oil on board landscape paintings are beautifully conceived and provide an intimate look into the natural world. In their romantic stance and detail, Savage Blue seems an heir to the mid-19th-century, French Barbizon School of painters.

Julie Buffalohead creates a world where animals and humans often masquerade as each other, acting out narratives that seem rooted in literature’s genre of magical realism or the tales of the Brothers Grimm.

In Untitled (Selfie), a mixed media on paper

work, a pristine deer sporting a blanket and saddle stands next to a long-eared rabbit poised on stilts and wearing a bluestriped pinafore. Posing intently, both look into a smart phone screen held up by the rabbit.

Most elusive is Judith Allen’s painting titled Vestiges. Painted with oil on board in a subdued palette, a figure wearing a black strapless dress, stockings, and shoes sits on a stool and grasps tightly around the neck a white miniature horse bearing a symbol on its hindquarters. Throwing a long shadow against the wall, the figure’s closely cropped hair and facial expression lead us to question whether this is a woman or a man. An uneasy work, Vestiges prompts us to consider the complexities of gender identity in any society.

Continuing in the tradition of ledger drawings, Monte Yellow Bird works in a static but effective style, drawing images of Native Americans, flora, and fauna on 19th-century railroad payroll and mercantile ledgers. These are beautifully conceived pieces in colored pencil, in which Yellow Bird reinterprets historic ways of image making in a contemporary manner, successfully combining the old with the new.

Working in an abstract but figurative style, John Hitchcock demonstrates his skill as a draftsman and printmaker.

Using the imagery of horses and deer, he enlarges their visual and symbolic presence through an agitated, expressive line and a searing, rainbow palette. Prints such as Cotton Electric and Chemically Wasted Warhorse reflect stylistic ties to Abstract Expressionism in their gestural, psychological force and Pop Art in their use of bold, isolated images.

Karen Savage Blue (Lake Superior Ojibwe), Beaching for the Light, oil on board. Image courtesy of All My Relations Arts.

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On Fertile Ground presented the viewer with a range of ideas, styles, and subject matter. Juried shows also reflect the preferences of the jurors. If there was one overriding notion, it was the significance of narrative. Virtually all 15 artists used storytelling as a strategy, whether evoking historical times and events or contemporary situations. On balance, the exhibition was a memorable marker, demonstrating the strength and vision of contemporary Native artists of the Upper Midwest. —Mason Riddle

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St. Paul

Connecting the Past to the Future: Contemporary Native Portraits Gordon Parks Gallery, Metropolitan State University

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S A TYPOLOGY OF IMAGE MAKING, portraiture is a tricky and complicated task for the maker, subject, and viewer. Whether the medium is a painting, sculpture, or photograph, portraits as a genre of art raise numerous questions about the maker’s intent and point of view and the resulting representation of his or her subject. Is close adherence to a person’s physical likeness important? More so than a portrait evoking the subject’s emotional and psychological aura? Does the idealization or distortion of physical traits lead to a deeper understanding of the subject? Or is a direct, unfiltered representation more “truthful”? And is the subject’s setting or context critical to an accurate or revealing portrait?

Part technician, part seer, Joseph J. Allen (White Earth Ojibwe) holds these questions of making in a delicate balance in his compelling exhibition of black and white photographs titled Connecting the Past to the Future: Contemporary Native Portraits. Curated by Kristine Sorensen, the modestly scaled show reveals Allen’s sensitive but almost documentary approach to his subjects, most of whom gaze directly into the camera lens.

Male and female, young and old, these are members of the Leech Lake Ojibwe, Red Lake Ojibwe, White Earth Ojibwe, Rosebud Lakota, and Sisseton Dakota.

Allen’s images are not about differences, but about connections, connections these people have to their tribal traditions past and present and to each other as Indians in contemporary society. Significantly, most appear interconnected with their environment, usually nature.

Allen’s deft eye permits just enough entry into these people’s lives for us to be curious and respectful, but not enough to know intimately their story. At once they seem accessible and remote. Are they friends, family, or acquaintances of the photographer, we wonder? What we do know is that Allen’s “images focus on individuals who are active in the movement to strengthen and revitalize Indigenous values and traditions.”

Allen’s photographs are quiet but powerful as demonstrated by David Manuel, Red Lake Ojibwe. Tall and lean with a chiseled face and hair tied back, Manuel gazes directly into the camera lens with a squint so piercing as to challenge Clint Eastwood. The out of focus background brings our full attention to Manuel, whose handsome but detached visage projects both wisdom and weariness. He wears a t-shirt emblazoned with the word Popeye and an image of the feisty cartoon sailor-hero, who solves problems and saves the day. Through Allen’s lens, Manuel must do the same.

More neutral but compositionally more complex is the photograph Dennis Williams, White Earth Ojibwe. A young man, Williams stands outdoors against an open sky and is dressed in traditional clothing, perhaps to dance at a tribal ceremony; it is Allen’s most direct reference to the present-day relevancy of traditions. In Gabrielle Tateyuskanskan, Sisseton Dakota, a middle-aged woman wears a beaded jean jacket and stands in a sylvan meadow bordered by a white rail fence. True or not, Allen’s image allows us to sense Gabrielle’s comfort in nature and, perhaps, even with horses.

In the only interior image, Anna White Hat, Rosebud Lakota, a seemingly ancient woman is surrounded by a gallery of family photographs and holds a framed image in her lap. One is drawn to her lined face and imagines her wealth of experience. Perhaps most unorthodox, in its setting at least, is Simone Senogles, Red Lake Ojibwe. Here, a young woman with long hair sits passively next to a wooden beehive swarming with honeybees. A beaded cuff and a ring bring attention to her long slender arms and lovely hands—

Joseph Allen (White Earth Ojibwe), Clifford Canku, Sisseton Dakota, 2011, C-print. Image courtesy of Gordon Parks Gallery.

and the possibility of being stung.

Historically, photographs of Native Americans have been problematic in their premise or execution, no matter how beautifully rendered. Often overly dramatic or misleading, many images are simply false depictions categorizing Indians as either noble or savage. With Allen we sense a path of creative accuracy and truth in his social investigations. He is at his best when his subjects are depicted front and center, commanding the picture frame as revealed in Clifford Canku, Sisseton Dakota. In this photo, a dignified man dressed in a suit jacket and bolo tie stands before a lashed wood, wigwam structure. Canku emanates both power and that he is empowered. We have little doubt.

Ultimately, Allen’s unmanipulated photographs bring into high relief what it means to document a particular culture, a particular group of people. He provides us with an unidealized but poetic portrait of his subjects, who are believable as real, in-the-flesh people, not costumed players in a constructed environment. Forceful but respectful, insightful but associative, Allen’s photographs resonate deeply with many creative and positive voices in spite of their silence. —Mason Riddle SPRING 2 0 1 5

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Santa Fe

Courage and Compassion: Native Women Sculpting Women Museum of Indian Arts and Culture

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EVEN NATIVE WOMEN showcase their monumental sculptures in this exhibit, curated

by Letitia Chambers, PhD, former CEO of the Heard Museum and ambassador to the UN General Assembly.

The shows features figurative works

by Tammy Garcia (Santa Clara), Estella Loretto ( Jemez), Kim Seyesnem Obrzut (Hopi), Rose B. Simpson (Santa Clara), Roxanne Swentzell (Santa Clara), Kathy Whitman–Elk Woman (Mandan-ArikaraHidatsa), and the late Retha Walden Gambaro (Muscogee Creek, 1917–2003).

(Chiricahua Apache, 1914–1994), depicts a woman in exquisitely detailed, Pueblo regalia. She stands erect, her left hand cradling a white bowl with a red, scalloped rim for corn pollen.

Roxanne Swentzell continues the theme of prayer by depicting a naming ceremony in her sculpture Child. A woman holds aloft a baby, obscuring her face. The pair’s lack of clothes or adornment makes them timeless—archetypes. Swentzell is the master of body language, from the concern and joy of the mother, to the wonder—bordering on fear—of the child, down to their wriggling toes.

The only non-bronze pieces are Kathy Whitman’s two mixed media works of steel and aluminum with carved marble faces. Dancing to the Heartbeat of My Ancestors, portraying a fancy shawl dancer, is a kinetic piece with

Courage and Compassion is split between the sculpture garden and museum interior.

One of two pieces inside, Grace Adorned, is a collaboration by Roxanne Swentzell and her daughter Rose B. Simpson.

Loosely based on the Virgin of Guadalupe, the ceramic bas-relief features a darkskinned woman’s bust with outstretched hands floating on a steel cumulus cloud.

Streaming white hide thongs, resembling rain or paint drips, are tied to O-rings surrounding the cloud. The winged putto that supports the Virgin is transformed here into an upside-down figure, suspended from the woman’s necklace, helpless and dependent.

Tammy Garcia’s Andrea is the most refined and resolved of the works in Courage and Compassion. Sharply angular, this female figure emerges from her hexagonal base like a mountain struck by lightening.

Diagonals dominate her skirt, sash, shawl, evergreen sprays clasped in her geometric hands, blunt-cut bangs, and array of arrows stretching out of her tablita. These symbols of tension and power contrast greatly with her featureless, smoothly burnished face, hinting at an inner serenity.

Retha Walden Gambaro’s two pieces, Courage and Acceptance, are soft-focused, loosely defined figures in flowing dresses.

Gambaro carved marble statues then cast them into bronze. She carved Acceptance at the age of 80. This self-portrait shows her seated, head bowed over a pin oak leaf, contemplating and surrendering completely to the changing seasons of her life.

Few of the sculptors represent specific individuals, and even Acceptance, a selfportrait, is devoid of any distinguishing characteristics. Andrea, too, could be a portrait of an individual, but is wholly stylized and idealized. The artists aren’t lionizing historic figures. Instead of portraying women, these seven sculptors are portraying womanhood, a shared identity crossing generations and national boundaries.

The Roland Courtyard in the southwest corner of the museum houses the heart of the exhibition. The space is tight for eight monumental bronze, steel, and aluminum sculptures, but they are positioned carefully, leading the viewer along a clockwise thread. The first sculpture Greeting the Sun, by Kim Seyesnem Obrzut, is a sleek, stylized female figure with patinas ranging from a rich auburn to a green gold. Its flowing, botanical contours call to mind a calla lily or flame.

Morning Prayer by Estella Loretto, who apprenticed under Allan Houser

aluminum fringe and jingles swinging in the strong, winter wind. Jingle cones were originally rolled from chewing tobacco lids. Whitman, known for her use of recycled materials, extends this Indigenous repurposing of materials throughout the piece. The dancer’s shawls are mesh, decorated with aluminum lids, which cast an extraordinary shadow.

Taking banal construction and storage materials, Whitman shows how dance can transform our mundane, daily lives into transcendent moments that connect us with previous generations. The articulated metal structures of Dancing and Whitman’s adjacent Standing Strong with My Feet Rooted to Mother Earth carry an air of a woman as a futuristic cyborg or a warrior in Samurai armor—either way, a superheroine.

Tammy Garcia (Santa Clara), Andrea, 2010, bronze, edition of 8, 84 × 41 × 47 in. Image courtesy of Blue Rain Gallery.

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An attractive, slim catalogue accompanies the show and introduces the artists and their works, while contextualizing the show within the larger history of

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Indigenous American sculpture. I’m gratified the catalogue discusses Edmonia Lewis (Mississaugas Ojibwe, ca. 1844– 1907), who pioneered monumental, marble sculpture for Native Americans in the modern era. Bronze, a copper alloy, has precontact roots in the Andes and Mesoamerica, but not in what is now the United States. Bronze, steel, and aluminum may be relatively new materials for Native American women artists, and women may still be the minority in the world of sculpture, but Courage and Compassion demonstrates that a strong cohort of Indigenous women sculptors are making this medium their own and creating bold, public statements that are larger than life. These artists are taking this art form and integrating it into their own tribal expressions. As Roxanne Swentzell shared at the show’s opening, a sculpture “is not just something to put on your mantle. It is a living thing. It’s alive and in action right now. It is causing blessings to happen right now. They are alive. They are not just a composition; they are a prayer.” —America Meredith

Tulsa

Here & Now: Contemporary Native American Art of Oklahoma 108 Contemporary

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TRATEGICALLY LOCATED next to Philbrook Downtown in Tulsa’s energized Brady District, the 108 Contemporary gallery is a lambent space, with crisp, white lines and abundance of light to delight the senses.

Here & Now is a diverse display. Featuring 35 works by 19 Oklahoma Native American artists, the exhibit celebrates the many ways artists bring their traditional knowledge and sensibilities to reflect on their current world.

Formerly known as the Brady Craft Alliance, 108 Contemporary is a nonprofit, fine craft organization that showcases Oklahoma artists—those with an Oklahoma heritage as well as those

Michael Elizondo Jr. (Southern Cheyenne-Kaw-Chumash), Mere Extraction, 2014, mixed media painting on board. Image courtesy of 108 Contemporary.

now residing in the state. The gallery has done much work over the years to bring appreciation and recognition to artists who work outside of the easel. Although the current show is exclusively Native American artists, tribal people are always represented in the gallery’s store and are included in most exhibits. According to Krystle Brewer, associate director, the opening reception drew over 2,000 people, making it the most successful opening in the organization’s history.

The gallery’s focus on showcasing and elevating fine crafts benefits Native artists who have struggled for recognition of their media and legitimate status for many years. Gone, thank heavens, are the days when this complex art was considered “cabin crafts.” Gone, too, are the days when baskets, pottery, etc., were viewed as pretty, utilitarian objects.

With the information written on their website and blog, the gallery does an excellent job of expanding the reach and depth of the show and encouraging sales and understanding. Practiced and casual visitors are brought into the story of each piece through artist statements clarifying the intent of each artist.

The exhibit’s jurors heather ahtone (Chickasaw-Choctaw) and Mickel Yantz, have separated the artists into three main groups. Recognizing that within each group are newer artists and those who have achieved national prominence, their

first category includes those who work in materials seen as “traditional.” These include Anita Fields (Osage-Muscogee Creek), Margaret Roach Wheeler (Chickasaw-Choctaw), Molly Murphy Adams (Oglala Lakota descent), Troy Jackson (Cherokee Nation), Shan Goshorn (Eastern Band Cherokee), Laura Borders (Cherokee Nation), and Mel Cornshucker (Cherokee Nation).

The second grouping includes those who incorporate new tools, devices, and materials in their work. These are the artists who “challenge the expected.”

Included are Heidi Bigknife (Shawnee Tribe), Holly Wilson (Delaware NationCherokee), Tony A. Tiger (Sac and FoxMuscogee-Seminole), Bobby C. Martin (Muscogee Creek), and Michael Elizondo Jr. (Southern Cheyenne-Kaw-Chumash).

The artists of the third group are described as those “whose works retain a visual connection with traditions but defy categorization.” Within this group are Marcus “Maka Wase” Bush (Lakota), Royce Myers (Cherokee Nation), Randi Narcomey Watson (Seminole), John Owen (Cherokee Nation), Robert Shinn (Cherokee Nation), and Stephen Wood (Cherokee Nation). “Each brings a flair for the fantastic to art,” says the gallery’s website.

Many of the artists produced excellent works of recognizable style and medium, while others created visual surprises.

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Among these, Mel Cornshucker’s Like Blades of Prairie Grass, a wood-fired, stoneware depiction of rows of tipis surrounded by and held in place by steel rails, reveals a side of his work not usually seen. The exquisite needle weaving of Margaret Wheeler’s The Story of Mahota is so tiny and precise it requires a magnifying glass to focus on the workmanship, but its depiction is clear and powerful even with the naked eye.

Heidi Bigknife’s Woodland Dreams Sewing Kit is an assemblage of miniature baskets, thread, and other essentials made from sterling silver, stainless steel, recycled fur, embroidery floss, and metallic leather.

These are embellished with Shawnee designs, such as the oak leaf, hearkening back to a time when the tools to make art were artworks themselves.

Randi Narcomey Watson’s Untitled covers an entire wall. The oversized patchwork appliqué of repurposed vinyl was previously mounted on a highway billboard as part of the Seminole artist’s master’s thesis. The white vinyl with faded red speaks to maintaining cultural continuity despite shifts in blood quantum.

The diversity of the exhibit is evident in range of material, from Watson’s Untitled (multiple shirts) made from plastic bags, to Robert Shinn’s ZAPO Tech-geek made from assembled and painted, found architectural objects with his own special centering figure, to the more traditional clay, wood, and acrylic paint.

The commitment of the gallery and the selections by the jurors contributed to an exhibit with excellence of presentation and quality of work. Despite the fact that no further Indian-only shows are planned, Native artists who are living in or have roots in Oklahoma should look for opportunities in forthcoming exhibits, and collectors of fine Native American Indian crafts should follow 108 Contemporary’s website and blog. As Native artists strive for recognition in the larger art world, it is refreshing to find a gallery that routinely recognizes the quality of Native artists.

—Mary Ellen Meredith

Tulsa

Impact: Philbrook Indian Annual Philbrook Museum of Art

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ODAY, SWAIA’S SANTA FE INDIAN MARKET is the oldest and largest juried Native American art event in the world. But for Native painters and their collectors, this was not always the case. After World War II, a juried art show in Oklahoma assumed prominence for over three decades as the premier showcase for Native American painting (and later sculpture and graphics), from 1949 until its swan song in 1979. Impact: The Philbrook Indian Annual, curated by Christina Burke and exhibited at the Philbrook Museum of Art, examines the significant role of this often overlooked event during a renaissance in Native Art that attracted over a thousand artists from over 200 different Native communities, and countless thousands of collectors from around the world. Scholars like Jackson Rushing, Janet Berlo, Bruce Bernstein, and Mark White, among others, have provided significant studies of post-war Native American painting and certainly acknowledge the importance of the Indian Annual, but none before Burke exclusively focus their attention on this singular—and sometimes controversial—event.

For Native American painting, the year 1958 may be regarded as what the year 1776 means for most Americans: a declaration of independence from colonial influence. Native painters of the early 20th century in the Southwest and Southern Plains were presumed to paint flat, two-dimensional figures, with little if any background or depth of field, depicting historical events or ceremonial practices; this was thought to be a subject and stylistic continuance of 19th-century ledger art. Such stylistic design was encouraged by notable Native painting instructors of the era, such as Dorothy Dunn at the Santa Fe Indian School and Oscar Jacobson at the University of Oklahoma. Consequently, the emerging critical appreciation of and commercial market for Native painters was largely

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established by non-Native scholars and collectors, influencing both what and how Native artists painted. Such early promotion and patronage culminated in the groundbreaking exhibit Indian Art of the United States at the Museum of Modern Art in New York curated by René d’Harnoncourt—a major art museum presenting a large scale exhibit of Native paintings before America’s entrance into World War II in 1941.

But in 1958, 13 years after serving both his country and as a judge for previous Indian Annuals (then in its 12th year), the Yanktonai Dakota painter Oscar Howe entered an artwork in the show. Howe had earned his MFA degree from the University of Oklahoma and studied with both Dunn and Jacobson, and his artwork was in d’Harnoncourt’s exhibit. He had submitted a similar work with a Tohokmu (Dakota for “spider web”) design, Dance of the Heyoka, for which he was presented a Grand Award four years earlier, but his 1958 entry was rejected by the Philbrook jurors for a painting that was criticized as being “nontraditional.” In his now (in)famous letter to the museum, Howe writes: Who ever [sic] said that my paintings are not in the traditional Indian style has poor knowledge of Indian Art indeed . . . Are we to be held back forever with one phase of Indian painting that is the most common way? . . . the Indian has always been, put on reservations and treated like a child, and only the White Man knows what is best for him. Now, even in Art . . . Well, I am not going to stand for it . . .

Howe’s missive not only prompted Philbrook to create a “Special Category” for such artwork, that the artist won as well as the Grand Award the next year, but it served as a catalyst for a continually evolving discussion which is prompted by the title of the museum’s press release for this exhibit: “What is Native Art?” Rather than rely on a chronological format for the exhibit, Burke thematically organizes the exhibition into five sections canvassing the Indian Annual’s impact: on history, format, diversity, innovation, and the future of Native painting. In doing

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For Native American painting, the year 1958 may be regarded as what the year 1776 means for most Americans: a declaration of independence from colonial influence. so, Burke juxtaposes works that might otherwise not be considered together because of age, media, regional, or cultural differences.

The exhibit begins with what has become almost a standard exhibition device: wall-sized, enlarged historic photographs.

By presenting the history of the exhibit through photographic record, viewers are provided a more intimate portrait of the artists than textual didactics often afford: a photograph of Blackbear Bosin (Comanche-Kiowa, 1921–1980) in his beaded bow tie is every bit as intriguing as one of his paintings.

Museumgoers then walk into a large, rectangular gallery with over 69 artworks on the four walls, and as floating partitions and vitrines create an atrium in the center of the room. Rather than signaling different parts of the exhibit through large text on walls, color-coded banners from the ceiling distinguish one section from another. These provide a large, open feel to the installation but with a progression and flow to the exhibit, while increasing wall space to allow for a more comprehensive visual survey of the Indian Annual.

The installation also accentuates the spectrum of the different post-war styles of Native painting. Two early works from 1947, Koshare Rainbow Dance by Alfonso Roybal, also known as Awa Tsireh (San Ildefonso, 1895/8–1955), and Buffalo Dancer by Bosin serve as polar opposite examples of dancers. One is rendered realistically, but with little perspective other than overlapping figures floating slightly above, below, or in front of one another, and no background or horizon line to fix their position to a landscape. The other has figures situated in a landscape with dimension, but abstracted in lines and varying colors, creating only figurative representations.

This variation of style, however, is not only demonstrated by different artists, but sometimes the same one. W. Richard “Dick” West Sr. (Cheyenne, 1912–1996) aptly illustrates the versatility of Native

Oscar Howe (Yanktonai Dakota, 1915–1983), Dance of the Heyoka, ca. 1954, watercolor on paper, Philbrook Museum purchase 1954.12. Image courtesy of the Philbrook Museum of Art.

painters, with two different works only two years apart. Dance of the Soldier Societies from 1949 shares more similarity with Tsireh’s emphasis on naturalism and diminished concern for perspective, while Water Serpent from 1951 more resembles Bosin’s abstraction and focus on form and color. Other works by Fred Beaver (Muscogee Creek-Seminole, 1911–1980), Joan Hill (Muscogee Creek-Cherokee), and Lawney Reyes (Colville) underscore the diversity of Native painting styles, media, and techniques.

While Impact presents a who’s who of post-war Native painters, some luminary artists are distinctly absent, such as Fred Kabotie (Hopi, 1900–1986), T. C. Cannon (Kiowa-Caddo, 1946–1978), and Fritz Scholder (Luiseño, 1937– 2005), all of whom either entered or served as judges for the Annual.

However, Impact also presents works by some lesser-known Native painters like Jimalee Burton (Muscogee CreekCherokee, 1920–1977), Florence Nupok Malewotkuk (Siberian Yupik, 1906– 1971), and Tom “Two Arrows” Dorsey (Delaware-Onondaga, 1920–1994).

While plenty has been written about the first three, more critical attention should be paid to the latter three artists.

Showcasing previously overlooked Native artists and historic Native art events is perhaps the most lasting impact of Impact.

As Burke notes: In the process of developing this exhibition and catalogue, it became clear that it would be a broad, sweeping overview of the influence of the Philbrook Indian Annual. It also became clear that a larger, more in-depth scholarly analysis of the Annual was necessary, given the influence of the show on individual artists, collectors, institutions, and the history and definition of Native art in the Twentieth Century.

After years of collecting and cataloguing original documents, a computer database has been created of the art and artists of Impact: The Philbrook Indian Annual.

Such a resource will afford Burke and other scholars access for research that will continue a critical discussion of Native painting for years to come. A companion, 172-page color catalogue is also available to the public. —Scott W. Hale SPRING 2 0 1 5

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Book Review Monograph/Catalogue

For a Love of His People: The Photography of Horace Poolaw Nancy Marie Mithlo, ed.

Yale University Press, 2014

and calendar keeper. Around age 16, Poolaw apprenticed with two professional photographers and was given his first camera. From the 1920s to the late 1960s, Horace Poolaw photographed the intertribal community on the Southern Plains. Money was tight, especially during the Depression, so he carefully composed each shot, never taking multiple shots of the same scene.

Family members, Native artists, historians, and art historians share their perspectives on Poolaw’s work. Fundamental information gets repeated, but the varied viewpoints produce a thoughtful, multifaceted look at Poolaw, his photography, and his people.

Linda describes with emotion the dedication of the Horace Poolaw Room at the University of Science and Arts of Oklahoma. John Poolaw shares impressions his grandfather’s photograph made upon him as a boy. Dane Poolaw (Kiowa), Horace’s great-grandson composes an essay in Kiowa.

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HIS PUBLICATION accompanies a solo exhibit at NMAI’s George Gustav Heye Center. Horace Poolaw (Kiowa, 1906–1984) shot photographs, “not as a moneymaker but for a love of his people” writes his daughter Linda Poolaw on page 31. Linda has been a driving force behind the research and exhibition of her father’s work for a quarter century, ever since she curated her father’s show War Bonnets, Tin Lizzies, and Patent Leather Pumps: Kiowa Culture in Transition at Stanford University in 1989–90.

Since that time, scholarship of early Indigenous American photography has grown, and Horace Poolaw can now be seen in context of other early Indigenous American photographers. He follows earlier Kiowa photographers such as Parker McKenzie and Nettie Odlety McKenzie but stands out due to his professionalism and prolific practice. He left an impressive corpus of 2,000 negatives. These images have been beautifully restored by co-curator Tom Jones Jr. (Ho-Chunk) and Jones’s students.

Horace Poolaw was born in a tipi outside Mountain View, Oklahoma Territory. His first language was Kiowa. His parents were Xó:mà, daughter of a Mexican captive, and Kiowa George Poolaw, a soldier, doctor,

Bead artist Vanessa Paukeigope Jennings (Kiowa-Kiowa Apache-Pima) analyzes the beadwork featured in Poolaw’s photographs.

She shares a dream about Horace’s brother Justin Poolaw. Opening up like this suggests a strong trust in the project.

Visual anthropologist, co-curator, and the book’s editor, Nancy Marie Mithlo (Chiricahua Apache) places Poolaw’s work in the context of photographic theory. Mithlo writes that he engages in the “aesthetics of affirmation.” In multiple instances, Poolaw’s shots are juxtaposed with those of WPA photographers, determined to reveal the abject poverty of the Depression, while Poolaw’s photographs affirm a healthy, tight-knit community of elegant, confident American Indians thriving in a rapidly changing society. Mithlo examines variations of gaze and his framing of shots.

“Close attention to Poolaw’s compositions,” she writes on page 88, “reveals an affinity for modernist aesthetic forms, such as geometric patterning, a flatness of plane, and a sharp focus.” He employs third perspective, defined by film scholar Fatimah Rony as “signal[ing] the recognition of multiple viewpoints, especially those of the observer observed,” Mithlo writes on page 95.

Poolaw’s work inspired Tom Jones as he began photographing his own tribe.

Jones mentions rules Native artists follow, specifically not photographing ceremonies.

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Because Poolaw followed these protocols, his daughter writes he was never refused a photograph. In a second essay, Jones examines humor found in Poolaw’s work.

Richard Ray Whitman (Yuchi-Muscogee Creek) discusses the importance of getting to know the people he photographs so they aren’t simply subjects. Historian Ned Blackhawk (Shoshone) describes portrayals of American Indians in mainstream visual culture during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He write about how Frederick Douglass, former slave turned social reformer, recognized the power of photography to convey the humanity of African-American people to the public.

Martha Sandweiss, also an historian, points out photography arrived in Indian Territory by 1842, three years after the daguerreotype’s invention. Art historian Laura Smith examines changing social mores among Kiowa women in Poolaw’s photography. She writes how Kiowa women continued to wear tribal dress despite pressure from missionaries to adopt Western clothing. Photographer David Grant Noble analyzes Poolaw’s compositions, while art historian Cheryl Finely examines his subject matter, notably American flags and automobiles.

Art historian David Penney compares Poolaw’s work to that of the Kiowa Six and French photographer Pierre Tartoue. While the others created timeless scenes, Poolaw’s are specific to place and time. “Poolaw, who remained largely rooted to his Oklahoma community,” Penney writes on page 62, “shows how the world arrived there, via countless networks and pathways, and how his fellow citizens incorporated the resulting worldliness into their lives.”

Kiowa George Poolaw was a calendar keeper for the Kiowa people. Both Jones and Jennings see Horace Poolaw’s work, his recording of weddings, homecomings, dances, floods, tornadoes, and funerals, as a continuation of this role. Jones writes on page 102, “The shift from painting with pigment on hide to creating images with a camera is a smoother adjustment than one might think.”

The images are exquisite, and the writing is brisk and engaging. For a Love of His People is a fitting tribute to Horace Poolaw and sets a new standard for Native American art history writing. —America Meredith

REVIEWS

Survey

Native North American Art, 2nd Edition Janet Catherine Berlo and Ruth B. Phillips Oxford University Press, 2014

Berlo and Phillips, both leading scholars in the field of Native American art, choose the approach of material and visual culture to navigate through this necessary but daunting task. They organize the main argument, that “the visual arts have long played a critical role as carriers of culture within Native North American societies,” through a regional view of the United States and Canada.

This method has not really changed since the first edition, and includes six chapters dedicated to a specific region: the Southwest, East, West, North, and Northwest Coast.

as inclusion, identity, authenticity, and the definition of art with clear authority.

The informational content in Native North American Art successfully contributes to the field by documenting an overall introductory impression of the current general knowledge of precontact through contemporary Native American art in the United States and Canada.

Consistent with their very direct and honest approach, the authors initially disclose that the text reflects their positions as scholars from specific areas within the field.

It will be for the next generation of scholars to initiate the multi-volume, multi-authored approach to Native North American art that we are beginning to see in surveys of other great world arts.

F

IFTEEN YEARS AFTER THE FIRST PUBLICATION of Native North American Art, in this second edition Janet Catherine Berlo and Ruth B. Phillips update their canonical survey of art, with a scope that ranges from the precontact period all the way through to contemporary times.

When applying the term, “North American,” the authors focus on the geographical areas of the United States and Canada rather than on the broader North American continent, which lies for the most part between the Arctic Circle and the Tropic of Cancer. This area, which reflects a broad variety of topographies, cultures, and people from places such as Greenland, the Caribbean, and Central America, encompasses 23 countries and nearly a dozen territories that are all part of North America. The sheer breadth of this place, combined with a general lack of attention scholars have customarily given to the subject, highlights the greatest challenge in writing an art historical survey about Native North American art: how do you choose what to include?

In this new version however, focus on modern and contemporary art is vastly expanded. Not only does modern art have a separate chapter, so does contemporary art. In addition, within in each regional chapter, Berlo and Phillips engage a conversation between contemporary art with its predecessors—a strategy that builds and expands the role of the visual arts as carrier of cultures, to include the visual arts as “articulations of contemporary identities” and “struggles for sovereignty.” Practically speaking, this expansion adds 56 illustrations— roughly 25 percent of the total images in the 440-page book—focusing solely on modern and contemporary art.

In addition to these changes, another significant modification with this second edition further reflects the changing climate of the field. As the authors suggest in their preface, the discipline of Native American art has grown considerably since the first edition, and this updated text reflects a significant shift in literature, which now utilizes Indigenous knowledge and perspectives.

Subsequently, Berlo and Phillips begin their introductory discussion by directly addressing current points of tension in the growing field. As respected scholars who speak from established and prominent positions from within the center of this location, they tackle difficult issues such

As a reader, I found this partiality refreshing and challenging; challenging because the material does read more thorough and complete in places such as the discussion on modern art, while not as thorough and complete in other places such as the conversation about the Southeast, and refreshing because while Berlo and Phillips are leading authorities on the subject, they do not claim to know everything.

Which leads me back to my initial question: how do you choose what to include? In answering that question, I use the words of Janet Catherine Berlo and Ruth B. Phillips: “A one-volume survey limited to 233 images and eight chapters cannot possibly do justice to an entire continent, whose hundreds of artistic traditions span three millennia. It will be for the next generation of scholars to initiate the multi-volume, multi-authored approach to Native North American art that we are beginning to see in surveys of other great world arts.”

In other words, through Native North American Art, Berlo and Phillips have begun the process of documenting the vital history of Native North American art that has too long been overlooked in the larger conversation of art history, and now is the time to take up and continue what they have begun. —Jean Merz-Edwards SPRING 2 0 1 5

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REVIEWS

Graphic Novel

Red: A Haida Manga Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas Douglas & McIntyre, 2014

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E KILL TO DISSECT,” as William Wordsworth put it. We who continually examine and review media of any sort know this idea best: Look hard enough at and into anything and it begins to lose its luster, especially over time. Thus, it is a pleasure when a medium genuinely surprises me by offering something refreshing and new.

This newness is exactly what I found while reading Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas’s Red: A Haida Manga.

Based on an ancestral Haida morality tale and chock-full of dynamic art, Red pulls cultural iconography into a succinct journey utilizing sequentialimage storytelling. While the term manga suggests big eyes and motion lines to comic book readers, Red holds up its end of the bargain by utilizing stylized and artfully expressive imagery, which is also standard to manga.

The story even has a steampunk-esque element. Despite taking place in a seemingly less technological time period many years ago, characters in the story somehow obtain and use a submarinelike vehicle! Yahgulanaas also offers a delightful “Easter egg” for readers at the end of this cautionary tale.

However, what of the common stereotypes we often see in comics with Indigenous people? Readers of my work on the subject know I employ a specific set of criteria to generally measure the amount, in number and kind, of Native American stereotypes. Let’s see how Red measures up.

Is the vocabulary demeaning? Comics that feature Indigenous people often use derogatory terms: redskin, savage, injun, etc. Comics referring to Native people as such suggests that we are somehow less (in one way or another) than non-Native characters. Thankfully, this graphic novel offers no such terminology; the characters are simply people, whether good, bad, or both.

Do the Indians talk like Tonto? Many comics portray Indigenous characters speaking to non-Native characters in broken or pidgin English, which of course hints at the basic stupidity—or worse—of Indigenous characters. None of Red’s characters talk like Tonto. Of course, the story is told in Haida language and therefore all characters speak on the same level. No characters are portrayed with reduced mental prowess as demonstrated by a distinct lack of language skills.

Do the Indians belong to the Feather-Bonnet Tribe? This is a staple of comic books with Native American characters, replete with images of pseudo-Plains Indians wearing feathered headdresses and most likely on horseback. Of course, not all of our tribal communities wore these beautiful headdresses, just as not all of our communities lived in tipis; however, a casual comic reader wouldn’t know this based on representations in comics, as the majority of comic book Indians are portrayed this way. Red’s characters are most definitely not from this generic “Feather-Bonnet” tribe.

Are comedic interludes built upon firewater and stupidity? There are no “drunken Indians” or “stupid Indians” in Yahgulanaas’s Red. The tone is both respectful and celebratory of Haida culture.

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Are the Indians portrayed as an extinct species?

Comics, along with a lot of other media, tend to show Indigenous characters as only historical figures, suggesting that we, as people, do not exist in modern times. One could argue that Red supports this idea, as the story and characters take place in a nondescript time in history.

However, the story takes place in the past, given that it is a part of Haida history.

Red is touted as a cultural manga. By using this milieu rather than traditional oral recounting, Red helps propel Haida culture into contemporary times.

Therefore, Yahgulanaas is not guilty of portraying Indians as extinct.

Are the Indians either noble or savage? Along the lines of suggesting there are only “good” or “bad” Indians, many comics cast a positive light on Indigenous characters who align themselves with non-Native characters. Aside from ethnocentric implications, this type of representation does not allow for a complex character, i.e, one with human qualities. Red does an admirable job of allowing its main characters, both protagonists and antagonists, to be both good and bad, showing their complexity and refraining from relegating individuals to rigid noble or savage roles.

Is the tone patronizing? Given that this is a story celebrating traditional Haida culture, this one is a no-brainer. There are no sarcastic or sardonic overtones in Red. Is Indian humanness recognized? Without a doubt, Yahgulanaas depicts his Indigenous characters with a specific sense of humanity. They have a measure of emotional complexity and transform within the confines of the story.

These criteria, as well as how Red handles them, are, of course, up for debate.

However, the book is a great read, has beautifully vivid art, and offers refreshing surprises in its colorful pages. Throw in a splash of Indigenous-flavored steampunk, and there you have Yahgulanaas’s work, which I thoroughly recommend. Good stuff!

—Michael Sheyahshe

REPORT

Report Kamloops

unlimited edition Kamloops Art Gallery Printmaking also helps keep the culture alive. Most houses in Indian communities today have screen-prints by tribal artists on their walls. Children grow up familiar with images nearly forgotten by their parents.1

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HERE HAS BEEN LITTLE art historical writing about the many First Nations printmakers in Canada active in the last six decades. The desire to validate the influence these artists sparked what became unlimited edition. This exhibition, curated during a residency with Kamloops Art Gallery, will tour several Canadian cities in 2015. The show explores how Indigenous artists in Canada negotiated the integration of their prints in the tourist trade, gallery world, and art market from the late 1940s to the early 2000s.

In Northwest Coast Indian Graphics, one of the few sources on this subject, Edwin Hall, Margaret Blackman, and Vincent Rickard claim that First Nations artists began producing silkscreen prints in reaction to non-Native artists such as Charles Greul, who enjoyed commercial success with his loose appropriations of Northwest Coast First Nations motifs. This in contrast to the demands of First Nations artists to make work representative of “true Northwest Coast Indian design.”2 “In those early years, the printing was not good, the paper cheap, the editions unlimited and unsigned,” wrote Hilary Stewart.3 While she provides some art historical framing of Northwest Coast First Nations printmaking, her focus is on “quality” and a distinction between “high” and “low” art. My interest is how artists negotiated such binaries while acknowledging the social and political worlds in which they lived.

In the late 1940s, Ellen Neel (Kwakwaka’wakw) began screen printing traditional designs onto silk scarves.

Ultimately, she printed on ties, place mats, and tea sets through the 1950s. Her designs were the first to be created by a First Nations artist solely for the medium of silkscreen. This contrasts with previous examples discussed of First Nations designs translated into print by non-Native printmakers.

There was much debate about the state of First Nations cultures when Neel made her first silkscreened scarf. Ethnographers held that the most valuable forms of First Nations culture were from the past and contemporary First Nations cultures were in decline. But First Nations artists such as Neel argued against such a static view of their culture. She asserted that For if our art is dead, then it is fit only to be mummified, packed into mortuary boxes and tucked away into museums. Whereas to me it is a living symbol … And our art must continue to live … We must be allowed to use new and modern techniques. I do not mean that we should discard the old, only that we be allowed to use the new.4 Almost two decades after this statement, the artist Chief Henry Speck (Tlowitsis Kwakwaka’wakw) created a series of drawings and paintings of Kwakwaka’wakw design. The drawings were reproduced as silkscreens and exhibited at the New Design Gallery in Vancouver. This was the one of the first exhibitions of an Aboriginal artist working in serigraphy that was also explicitly framed as contemporary.

Doug Cranmer (Kwakwaka’wakw) was among the early artists involved in the

widening field of Native Northwest Coast art. During the 1960s he produced a series of silkscreens in his studio and store Talking Stick on South Granville Street in Vancouver. Talking Stick was an important, early First Nations-run enterprise meant to ensure greater control and financial return for First Nations carvers and artists.

Cranmer experimented with serigraphy, printing on different surfaces (including burlap), and serializing images for bags. The innovations of Cranmer along with Neel and Speck set a critical precedent for First Nations printmakers.

Women artists during this period, including Neel, Freda Diesing (Haida), Daphne Odjig (Odawa-Ojibwe), and Susan Point (Musqueam), were highly influential.

The increase in women who earned their living as artists challenged definitions of gendered artistic production. While many of the aforementioned artists’ work dealt with issues of self-representation and selfdetermination, they resisted expectations of how to make their work look “Native.”

First Nations art has always included a political dimension. Artists such as Speck, Neel, and others mentioned in this essay actively engaged in First Nations political life. While the artists integrated political and cultural concerns into their work, they had to contend with how their work was defined and valued by a non-Native art market.

The relationship between the art historian, the patron and the market for serigraphy should be juxtaposed with the Indigenous objective of reclaiming and restoring through storytelling.5 These artists have subverted colonial and capitalist strategies meant to speak for and even assimilate their culture. I make the case for the inclusion of First Nations and Inuit artists in art historical accounts of printmaking in Canada and assert the need for this in the United States as well, to honor the stories, struggles, and artistic genius of many trailblazers in the many contemporary media in which Indigenous artists work today. —Tania Willard

Chuuchkamalathnii (Nuuchahnulth), Lightning Snake, 1972, silkscreen on paper, 18 × 22 in., 9/105 edition, collection of the George and Joanne MacDonald Collection of Northwest Coast Graphic Art, Carleton University Art Gallery, Ottawa.

Excerpted from the essay, “unlimited edition: An Art Historical Framework for Indigenous Artists in Printmaking,” produced for the exhibition unlimited edition, Kamloops Art Gallery, 2013.

1. Bill Ellis, foreword in ’Ksan: First Annual Collection: 1978 Original Graphics (Vancouver: Children of the Raven Publishing, 1978).

2. Edwin Hall, Margaret Blackman, and Vincent Rickard, Northwest Coast Indian Graphics (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1981): 50.

3. Hilary Stewart, Robert Davidson: Haida Printmaker (Vancouver: Douglas and McIntyre, 1979): 9.

4. Quoted in Ronald Hawker, Tales of Ghosts: First Nations Art in British Columbia 1922-61 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2003): 10.

UNM, 2012).

5. India Young, “Re-Pressed: How Serigraphy Re-envisions Northwest Coast Iconography,” ARTiculate: Graduate Student Journal of Art History 1 (Albuquerque: SPRING 2 0 1 5

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IN MEMORIAM

Gina Leona Gray

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July 21, 1954–December 20, 2014

ENOWNED OSAGE ARTIST GINA GRAY, 60, passed peacefully away in her home in Pawhuska, Oklahoma. She was surrounded by family at the time of her passing.

Making her living as an artist, Gina was considered a master by her peers and Native American art aficionados. Her work has exhibited from Pawhuska to galleries all over the world. A winner of art competitions throughout Indian Country, she was known for her fresh, contemporary vision of the warrior in her paintings and monotype prints.

Gina’s career in art started at the Institute of American Indian Arts where she graduated from high school. She later attended the prestigious California Institute of the

Arts in Valencia where she studied as a commercial artist.

Her art was in hundreds of shows and is in collections across the globe, including the palace of the Sultan of Brunei. Gina owned galleries in Santa Fe and Tulsa that showcased her unique work. Her long career included serving a four-year term as commissioner to the secretary of the interior for the Indian Arts and Crafts Board. She counted winning the SWAIA’s 70th Annual Santa Fe Indian Market Fellowship Award as a great honor. She was a featured artist at museum showings at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, among other locales.

NCAI commissioned her to provide the book cover for The National Congress of American Indians: The Founding Years. Her

Gina Gray. Image courtesy of Louis Gray.

artwork also graces the cover of Bootheel Man, a mystery novel about Osages by Morley Swingle.

Gina followed a family tradition of fighting for Native rights when, in the middle of winter 1973, she hitchhiked from Santa Fe to the historic occupation of Wounded Knee in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. She returned to her studies at IAIA after a month at Wounded Knee. Many programs were born after the occupation to the betterment of Indian Country.

Gina is the mother of Addie Roanhorse of Pawhuska and Dante Halleck of Santa Fe. She is also survived by grandchildren Ezra, Olden, Neo, and Thor Halleck, and Anya Roanhorse Brezinski. She is survived by her siblings Jacque Butler, Andrew Gray Jr., Mary Bighorse, Louis Gray, Margo Gray, Jim R. Gray (former Osage Chief ), and Pat Tinker. She has one daughter-in-law, Yanti Halleck. Gina is proceeded in death by her parents Andrew and Margaret Gray.

Gina Gray (Osage Nation), detail of He. Ska Moi (Whitehorn Standing), acrylic on canvas.

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Pallbearers were Matthew Reed, Nikia Parker, Louis Gray Jr., Matthew Gray, Anthony Gray, Edward Gray, John Hopper, Paul Gray, and James Eagleman. Honorary pallbearers were Henry Roan Gray, Bruce Bear, and Matt Revard. Both Indian and Roman Catholic memorial services were held for her, with Cameron Pratt officiating her Indian services. She was interred in Pawhuska Cemetery.

—Louis Gray

IN MEMORIAM

Bobby Kenneth Hicks

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February 5, 1934—November 14, 2014

NE OF THE MOST POWERFUL Native American men in Hollywood has passed. Bob Hicks dreamed of a world with Native Americans in film, working both in front of and behind the camera. His success was not measured in wealth or the larger feature films he spent his life creating, but how, in chasing his dreams, he opened countless doors for so many others to tell stories and share in the hope of Native American-made feature films.

While working at the American Indian Resource Center in Tahlequah, Oklahoma, I met Bob Hicks. Bob was working on projects back home and was hired to help me teach filmmaking to Muscogee Creek and Cherokee children. We spent many hours in the car together, talking as we drove to different schools. Watching him teach was a joy.

He followed every step, from treatments to screenplays to labeling each shot. Bob was trained in all aspects of filmmaking.

It was a great learning experience for the students and me.

Bob had an unlikely start for a filmmaker. He grew up in the Muscogee Creek Nation with Muscogee Creek as his first language. As a child, he found his love for movies when his family went to town in Okemah. Bob discovered theater in Tulsa while running an automobile upholstery shop with his brother. He started directing, writing plays, and casting Native people as his actors, but he dreamed of making movies. He did not like how Native people were portrayed in film or that they were played by whites. After many years, Bob researched film schools and applied for the American Film Institute, where he was accepted. After graduation, he spent most of his time working in his chosen profession.

Bob later ran the American Indian Registry, a directory that promoted Native American talent to studios and other industry decision-makers. A strong example of Bob’s influence was the producers of Dances with Wolves using the registry. Bob said, “This was a big moment when Hollywood started really casting Native Americans.”

He later helped found First Americans in the Arts, an awards show honoring Native Americans in film and television.

It was always exciting to see Native Americans dressed to the nines at First Americans in the Arts gala events. While most of us knew Bob in his t-shirts and short pants with white socks pulled up, nothing compared to the sight of Bob Hicks hosting the event in his tuxedo.

Bob was a warm, gentle person with an easy laugh. He often told stories of working on different sets and took pride in the friends he made. He helped so many Native people find their way to Hollywood along the path he cleared.

While much work remains in getting more Native people working in the film industry, Bob’s influence greatly changed the way Native American films are made.

His power came from his influence, passion, and his dream of our stories being told by our people. He was a leader; he was the Great Bob Hicks of Hollywood and of the Muscogee Creek Nation.

Bob passed away in Washington, DC. He was directing a play at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian about the Dawes Commission—a play he also wrote. Bob died doing what he loved, telling the stories of Native people with Native American actors.

Bob Hicks (center) works with The Dawes Commission cast in June 2014. Photo: Ric Denney (Muscogee Creek Nation). Image courtesy of Mvskoke Media.

Many of us have fun memories about our times with Bob—stories he told and adventures we had together. We lost a good friend, a great writer, and a brilliant director. Bob was a hero in Native filmmaking. For all of us who work in this field, and for those that will come after, we will always owe Bob our gratitude and a mvdo (thank you).

—Joseph Erb SPRING 2 0 1 5

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IN MEMORIAM

Josephine Myers Wapp February 10, 1912–October 26, 2014

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Y MOTHER JOSEPHINE WAPP (Comanche) was born to James and Heva Lena Fischer Myers and raised on her grandparents’ allotment, south of Apache, Oklahoma. She attended St. Patrick’s Mission in Anadarko, Oklahoma, and then continued her high school education at Haskell Institute (now Haskell Indian Nations University) in Lawrence, Kansas.

The turning point in her life came when the Bureau of Indian Affairs established an art education program at

the Santa Fe Indian School in the late 1930s. The curriculum was designed under the 1934 Indian Reorganization Act to educate American Indians as art instructors and to eventually place them as art teachers in American Indian boarding schools. She chose fiber and traditional arts as her major areas of study.

After completing her art education, my mother taught American Indian arts and crafts at Chilocco Indian School. In 1963, she was invited to join the faculty at the newly founded Institute of American Indian Arts in

Santa Fe, New Mexico. Josephine retired in the mid-1970s and eventually moved back to Oklahoma and lived in Lawton.

During her time as a teacher and professional traditional artist, she influenced and inspired a large number of American Indian artists. Besides teaching, she also promoted American Indian culture, especially music and dance. For her students, she was that link from historical lifeways to the present. As an artist, she specialized in fingerweaving, an art form found among many Woodland tribes.

Josephine received many awards and served on numerous committees and boards. As selected examples, she was a member of the committee that helped found the Museum of the American Indian in New York City.

Josephine was a founding member of the committee that established the Comanche Nation Museum and served on its board for several years.

As the featured artist at the opening exhibition at the Comanche National Museum, she exhibited her collection of blankets and fingerweavings. She was also a featured artist at the Red Earth Festival and the Oklahoma State Capitol, both in Oklahoma City.

Her artwork has been exhibited in the United States, Canada, Europe, the Middle East, and South America. In 2013 she received the Santa Fe Indian Market’s Povi’ka Award, which is awarded to outstanding individuals who influenced, contributed to, and promoted American Indian art.

Josephine Wapp (Comanche), left, with fellow IAIA faculty member Otellie Loloma (Hopi), Santa Fe, New Mexico, 1968. Image courtesy of IAIA, #rg03box12f21i02.

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Living to 102 and having been recognized as the oldest living Comanche was an outstanding accomplishment in itself.

—Edward Wapp Jr.

ART + LITERATURE

Suquamish Poet

Cedar Sigo Interview by Reid Gómez

I

MET CEDAR IN SAN FRANCISCO. Not long after he arrived, everyone told me I had to meet this poet from Suquamish. We finally met at Small Press Traffic’s conference Coordinates 2002: Indigenous Writing Now. At Coordinates, we were from nine nations (Laguna Pueblo, Navajo, Suquamish, Dakota, Arapaho, Cherokee, Nez Perce, Mohawk, and Chippewa); among us were Gerald Vizenor, Esther Belin, and Kimberly TallBear.

Cedar spoke on the morning panel, “Conjuring with the Hand of Language.” A few days later, I was asked to write about the event for Strong Medicine, the short-lived urban Indian newspaper published by Native American Health Center. I wrote, “Early Saturday morning, he introduced the audience to his relationship with the Suquamish language saying, ‘The Earth is one word deep, that is your name.’ Remember this man.”

Angry Dog Press published Sigo’s first book, Goodnight Nurse, which he characterized as a conversation with his cousins, telling them he was “a fag without shame.” Since then he’s published numerous volumes including Selected Writings No. 1 and No. 2 (Ugly Duckling Presse), Expensive Magic (House Press), Stranger in Town (City Lights), and most recently Language Arts (Wave Books). When we met, Goodnight Nurse was out, and he was publishing the journal Old Gold. He hand-typed the poems, copied the pages, sat in his apartment with a stapler, and assembled. He had a timeworn quality about him then, an audacious depth I have no better word for than beauty. After the Coordinates conference, we made a date, and he showed up with a selection of his chapbooks as gifts. His generosity continued.

My favorite of his books at that time contained a centerfold pinup of himself in glorious black and white, printed on photo paper.

Each of his books is a perfect body. I don’t think he’d like that word, but he constantly reworks and recasts pieces, placing them alongside each other and reaching into them to feel and discover how he can make them better. He doesn’t talk about revision; he talks about the poem resting, hardening, and healing. He works in our tradition of creating beautiful things for quotidian use, where form and content are an indivisible whole, best described as power. He does not believe in anthology ghettos and made a name for himself in the San Francisco literary and visual arts world.

“Trash,” he has told me, “is the material of creators.”

For First American Art Magazine, we conversed over several emails and phone calls. The following is a record of the deep love and profound respect I have for this artist and his craft.

I won’t ask you if you have a favorite book, but I think Stranger in Town is special. In addition to being part of City Lights’ Spotlight Series, the whole thing seems to have something different about it. How did it come into being?

I assemble my work into chapbooks in advance of my fulllength collections. I enjoy helping to choose the elements of design and font and deciding on a cover. I seem to be able to see my work clearer when dealing with 20 pages at a time. Poets and artists always drop by my apartment, and so, if I have a book, it is easy to distribute. I feel like poetry thrives on these bursts of underground printing. When I was approached about Stranger in Town, I had two stapled books out a few years apart, so the work already felt shaped and nailed down in my head. Publishing your own volumes or working with a friend’s small press can keep you from feeling the pressure that can develop when trying to shape years of work into a full-length manuscript. When they [City Lights Books] asked, I had those two books to show them, and my editor Garrett Caples kept adding pieces till pretty much the last minute. Poetry can become scarce when pressed to appear, or often that’s a fear, so I like it presented as a rarity. That makes sense to me. My newest collection Language Arts is fairly short. I was interested in having a perfect-bound book in what might otherwise be a stapled format or the length of an old mimeographed magazine.

Poetry is so often refused; I think it’s our prerogative to toy with the way it is presented.

I’ve sat with your work for many years, but, in preparation for these conversations, I’ve not allowed myself other poetry. I’ve sat with you, and I keep thinking about how I love being lost inside your world of words. Often I have no idea what you’re saying, but I don’t care. I just want to read and read and read you. I feel that especially strongly about Stranger in Town.

Thank you. I was at a dinner in Zürich two years ago, and a woman asked me point blank, “What is your poetry about?”

That can kind of stun you, especially if you have been writing for close to 20 years. I thought and then tried to impress that my poetry is about the materials used to make SPRING 2 0 1 5

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ART + LITERATURE

it. The way one could say that a cedar basket or bentwood box is “about” its materials, or even Abstract Expressionist painting seems to me explicitly about its materials. My poems often begin as if in the middle of the experience of composition. They seem to be inside out and still fully insulated entities. I also enjoy giving myself perimeters in order to generate text. I recently tried a form in which I went backwards through the table of contents of Language Arts and wrote down everything I could remember about the composition of each of the poems. I feel a responsibility to arrange language the way in which I hear it. When it arrives, it is often even more warped and clustered than the way it ends up living on the page. I always loved Ezra Pound’s command, don’t do in poetry what is best left to prose.

I adore “The Sun.” It is one of your pieces of perfection and so explicitly about craft.

There is an echo with “The Emerald Tablet.”

Particularly the lines, “I sacrifice beautiful and resplendent lines in the service of the skeleton” and “You may have to sacrifice beautiful & resplendent lines in service of the skeleton.”

Can you talk to me about those two pieces?

In Stranger in Town, I noticed a move you seem to have made toward prose (not into, but toward). Especially with “My Drawings” and “Portrait of Sara Bilandzija.”

Who is she? I know you have translated together.

I met Sara in 2004 or so, when she was living in Madrid and teaching English. I stayed with her and her sister there, and then we traveled to Barcelona and also to Lisbon. After her time in Spain, she moved to San Francisco and we translated a sequence of prose poems by José Antonio Ramos Sucre around 2007. I have always been interested in harnessing the syntax of prose for the purposes of poetry. “Portrait of Sara” was a takeoff of Gertrude Stein and her constantly ingrained repetition. Sara and I were both somewhat fanatical about the relevance of Gertrude Stein. Her use of words as objects and taking an aerial view of storytelling dates incredibly well. Stein is a writer best enjoyed aloud, and I think “Portrait of Sara” is meant to show that same variance or extension in my line.

“My Drawings” was a takeoff on Joe Brainard, an artist who wrote incredibly sincere-sounding, diary-like entries, and I wanted to see if I could get to the same base truth, but with my own Cedar Sigo. Photo: Alan Bernheimer. Image courtesy of the author.

I sometimes like to leave voice. Joe always sounds certain lines glimmering past the mysteries of craft and so like a crushed-out lover on the other end of the phone. His will repeat them in cornerstone spots. In Language Arts, candor disarms paranoia. I often think I could write fiction if another line is found in two places, “Key doors shining I was being paid like a pulp writer, like ten dollars per page forth.” Poetry is something encrypted enough to hopefully or something. It’s almost like to get anything done, I need to be returned to. I think finding a language to describe approach it through the lens of form. I think the “Portrait the total immersion of the process is something every of Sara” was also written as a birthday gift, so it had that serious poet should push themselves to do. I wanted “The practical application—giving the million-dollar gift when Sun” to sound like a lecture that had been taped and then you’re dead broke. transcribed years later, something that fit to the contours There is always another world in your work. If I were of my most intimate exacting tone of voice. The tone of a better writer, I would have a way to describe or way my essays on poetics can border on the mystical, at times they sound riddled with belief. Poetry is not an indulgence of naming that world. Because I write fiction, I see that for me but an ongoing courtship. I believe it’s an element world as poetry. What would you call it? that runs through all the arts, not just under its own The forces of imagination must be in place to go so far as banner. Discussions of craft in poetry should be applicable to construct a poetic cosmos. Poetry is not an easy surface to the other arts. I love interviews with great vocalists or to skate over. Amateurs can rush the event and twist words painters, and reading the habits of other writers has always comforted me. “The Emerald Tablet” was a piece written for to suit whatever is on their mind, making “poetry” say this and that. But that kind of approach dooms you to remain a monograph of the artist Oscar Tuazon. I was thrilled that what was initially considered a piece of art writing would fit on its surface. If you attend to the music of the scored page in so naturally with my poetry. and renegotiate the poem as it is being read, particular to 90 | W W W.F IR S TAM E RI C AN ARTMAG A ZI N E.C OM

CEDAR SIGO

We should try and live lives that poets of the future will daydream about. that night and the tone of the room, you can access the ghosts that should be coursing up from behind your voice.

There should be bass arrangements running under the lines, simultaneous to the voice running over the top. This ability to be in two places at once is the cracking open of the world.

The physical act of reading and the risk it involves are the lifeblood of poetry.

With Stranger in Town, I kept asking, “What town? And who is the stranger?” How do the worlds of poetry and Suquamish revolve around, or exist in relation to, each other? And you, how do you move in and around them?

Only a few years after it was published did I see the title Stranger in Town as relating to my status as an off-reservation Indian. I see myself as a figure moving in and around the crowded hilltops of San Francisco, usually by the light of the night. Suquamish always figures into my work, not so much from start to finish throughout every poem, but usually a line or shadow thrown pertains to my coming from Suquamish. In Language Arts, I have a poem entitled, “Things to Do in Suquamish.” I wanted to write a poem that used the landscape of the reservation as its trigger.

There sometimes feels as if there is nothing to do when I visit home, and so to begin a list poem under that title seemed fairly easy. It is a form borrowed from one of my masters, the poet Ted Berrigan. I liked the idea of the list poem triggering the lighter side of reservation life. So often I think people expect a Native poet to deal immediately in the heavier aspects: identity, our combined survival, our ceremonies. To me, these are quite personal subjects. They feel so huge. I think I have a fear of mishandling them. It might be easier in the form of autobiography with all of the room that full sentences provide.

The body is all over your work, not always explicitly, but always as an elemental piece.

The body is always considered, as the poem is literally projected from out in front of it. I did a reading in early October, and they had a desk set up implying that the readers should sit down while reading. I was worried about the qualities of projection in my voice being diminished, but I sat and it was fine. It felt like I was flying a plane alone. But I always consider of my body whenever I am called upon to read. I always loved Charles Olson’s imagining of the path the poem takes in his essay “Projective Verse,” “the heart by way of breath to the line.” I was also blown away by the poet Alice Notley’s recently posed question, “Why do we need bodies?

Everyone I love has been taken away from me.”

I close this conversation by asking if you want to say anything about the sense of vocation and devotion you have. When I think of your life, and the people in our communities, the lives they lived, and how the community used to support that (with food, etc.). And I think about you, and your complete acceptance of this poetic life, especially in the city today. How do you survive it? Who are you, and who might you be in 20 years?

I have been writing poetry since I was eight or nine, mostly in rhymed couplets then, and my father Charles Sigo was always interested to hear them. He was a photographer and archivist for the Suquamish Museum in the early eighties.

A lot of my early memories involve his dark room at the Suquamish Tribal Center, as well as hanging around the archives, looking at negatives and baskets. My mother Lynne Paulson is a singer. So between them, I always got a sense that being an artist of any kind demanded absolute fascination with techniques. I survive it by going out in the city and enjoying other types of art. I have never had the construct of academia hanging over my head or determining a definition of success. I have also met so many incredible artists along the way. I feel like we owe it to each other to continue.

My life in San Francisco often feels like a huge pile of separate nights that is teetering and threatening to wipe out my memory completely. I take on each night as it comes, and I think that can account for the intensity that breathes behind the work.

As artists we have to turn the tables and make the publishers and galleries and distributors come to us. Don’t wait for them. Publish something the way you see it in your mind’s eye. I don’t settle for the space society makes for me as a queer or Native writer. I want to reach as many folks as is humanly possible and by any means necessary.

That’s when glamour and politics get all mixed together. I always loved Ted Berrigan’s line, “Die nightly for a change of style.” We should try and live lives that poets of the future will daydream about. In 20 years, I hope to be writing poems that more closely match my imagination.

I am never quite satisfied with my books by the time they are published. It’s all about the untyped poetry in my journal. Certain aspects of writing poetry, I suspect, are permanent no matter how long it goes on. Poetry can sometimes equal a state of trance in its intensity. We track time in the arc of composition, so it provides the only true form of escape from practical, earthly matters. I have seen it keep my friends alive.

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ART + LITERATURE

Green Rainbow SongHung up on

TOP: Topaz Jones (Shoshone-Lummi-Kalapuya-Molalla), It Starts With a Dream, 2013, acrylic and self-leveling gel on canvas, 23.5 × 23.5 in. Photo: Jason S. Ordaz (ordaz@zadrovizualz.com). Image courtesy of the artist.

BOTTOM: Topaz Jones (Shoshone-Lummi-Kalapuya-Molalla), Where the Water Babies Grow, 2011, acrylic on canvas, 36 × 29 in. Photo: A Meredith.

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my hearing and deep in whose playbook one too many nights and never a black-out Doing the best I can, only a man It hurts me too Blues in the night Verlaine Blues sitting here thinking a blues for Anne (all nerves) and mine the most dirty unhurried afternoon jags A freshly penned lyric for sinking to autumnal atlantean shade I wish us more luck I wish my little tiger lily sheltered in a clear crystal box (being carried) Green pearl-handled mallets edging the annunciation toward a new burn The chamber of maiden thought is metered Big fields villagers, stars on the back-lot blues it’s the smoke spot I shade softest a curve so tight its really blind the chamber gives way to the word in this case (mine) —Cedar Sigo

ART + LITERATURE

THINGS TO DO IN SUQUAMISH for Jason Morris

Smoke Salmon

Call San Francisco----------“Like . . . Totally!”

Get driven to the terminal,

escape.

Come back after dark and feed the horses:

alfalfa timothy oats

Pick their hooves.

Visit the Suquamish Museum the eyes of Chief Seattle are shut (his spirit to himself )

sepia tones, baskets, white-hot rocks cobalt trade beads Say “hi” to all my cousins “Hi Josh!”

“Hi Jeremy!”

Drink Rainier beer

(cul-de-sac)

a red ribbon

out up and over the peak

(I confuse it with Mount Fuji)

Walk back to dad’s room.

He talks when he wants and smokes, linger over his bookshelf Moby-Dick, Starling Street, all of Kurt Vonnegut.

Try and write the serial killer light at night

(see-through green & black) Give up. Try Prose.

—Cedar Sigo Copyright © 2014 by Cedar Sigo. Used with permission of the author.

TOPAZ JONES is a painter, printmaker, and sculptor. Born in 1983 in Portland, Oregon, she is an enrolled member of the Shoshone-Paiute Tribes of the Duck Valley Reservation and is also of Lummi, Kalapuya, and Molalla descent. She earned her AFA and BFA degrees at the Institute of American Indian Arts. In 2009, Jones participated in the Turkish Coalition of America’s Native American Tribal Nations gathering at Ondokuz Mayis University in Samsun, Turkey. In 2014, she was the featured artist for the National Indian Child Welfare Act Annual Conference in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She now lives in Santa Fe with her family. Jones is a member of the Great Basin Native Artists, and her profile can be found at: www.greatbasinnativeartists.com/topaz.html.

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57th Annual Heard Museum Guild

Indian Fair & Market

Celebrating the Art of Basketry March 7 & 8, 2015

2301 N. Central Ave. Phoenix, AZ | 602.252.8840 x2276 | heard.org/fair From the Heard Museum Collection, from left: Terrol Dew Johnson (Tohono O’odham),Basketry olla, 2006-2007, Eucalyptus wood, beargrass, sinew. Heard Museum Purchase, 4470-1. Jeremy Frey (Passamaquoddy),Pictorial basket, Black ash, birch bark, sage, sweet grass, leather, porcupine quills Heard Museum Collection, 4302-1A,B. Dorlene Gashweseoma Lalo (Hopi), Sifter basket, c. 2005, Yucca. Bequest of William F. & Virginia C. Waterman, 4666-93. Diane Douglas-Willard (Haida),Rattle-top lidded basket with frog fetish, 2001, Cedar bark, spruce root, ivory, glass beads. Estate of Dr. E. Daniel Albrecht, IL.1732.ALB-B-92A,B. Evelyn Fredericks (Hopi) demonstrates basket weaving technique. Lisa Telford (Haida, A Night on the Village, 2004. Red cedar bark, guinea feathers, cotton cordage, leather, ivory. Heard Museum Purchase, 4303-1. Sally Black (Navajo), Ye’ii’ Pictorial Basket, 1979. Heard Museum Collection, NA-SW-Na B-20. Shan Goshorn (Eastern Band of Cherokee), 10 Little Indians, 2013. Arches watercolor paper splints printed with archival inks, acrylic paint. Purchased at the 2014 Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair and Market, Gift of the Heard Museum Council, 4781-1. Jennifer Sapiel Neptune (Penobscot), Basket, 2005, Sweet grass, dyed ash. Purchased by the donor at the 2005 Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair and Market. Gift of James T. Bialac, 4352-1.

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Advertiser Index Bahti Indian Arts | bahti.com

4

Cherokee Art Market | cherokeeartmarket.com

1

Cherokee Heritage Center | cherokeeheritage.org

94

Cherokee Heritage Press | cherokeeheritage.org

48

Orlando Dugi | orlandodugi.com

interior back cover

Exhibit C Gallery | exhibitcgallery.com Shan Goshorn | shangoshorn.com

3

interior front cover

Benjamin Harjo Jr. | benjaminharjojr.com

49

Heard Museum Guild | heardguild.org

95

April Holder | Instagram @ aeon_fluxus

49

Home & Away Gallery | homeandawaygallery.com

6

Idyllwild Arts | idyllwildarts.org

2

Indian Arts and Crafts Board | iacb.doi.gov

4

Keshi the Zuni Connection | keshi.com

3

Lizard Light Productions | lizardlight.com

4

Sheridan MacKnight | sheridanmacknight.com

47

Native American Art Appraisals, Inc. | naaainc.com

6

Noksi Press | noksi.com

96

Advertise in First American Art Magazine! Classifieds provide affordable advertising solutions for art professionals and service providers. Contact us today: (505) 473-0149 or ads@firstamericanartmagazine.com.

Jackie Sevier | northernplainsstudio.com

46

Nelda Schrupp | designsbynelda.com

46

CALLS FOR ART

Penny Singer | pennysinger.com

47

Cherokee Heritage Center in Tahlequah, OK, invites artists from federally recognized tribes to participate in the 44th annual TRAIL OF TEARS ART SHOW, running April 18 through May 23, 2015. Submission deadline: April 1st. $10 entry fee. Juried show with $10,000 in prize money. For rules, email michael-yantz@cherokee.org or go to www.cherokeeheritage.org/for-artists.

Spider Gallery | artscenter.cherokee.org

4

Kathleen Wall | kathleen-wall.com

47

Classified Ads

ORGANIZATIONS

Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian wheelwright.org exterior back cover

The Southeastern Indian Artists Association (SEIAA) is a Native American-run nonprofit organization, whose mission is to promote and educate about the arts and artists of tribal peoples. SEIAA, while a network of primarily Southeastern tribal artists, is supportive of all federally recognized Native artists. Visit www.seiaa.org for more info.

Great Basin Native Artists, collective of Native American professional artists in Nevada and Eastern Sierra Nevada range providing support through our online directory, image gallery, exhibiting opportunities, art business workshops, forum for Native artists and interested community members to connect and interact, and an online presence for rural Native artists. For more info, contact Melissa Melero at (775) 424-3159 or gbnativeartists@gmail.com and visit www.greatbasinnativeartists.com.

INTERN/VOLUNTEER Internships at First American Art Magazine, LLC, available through IAIA or independently. Writing, graphics, or business focus.

Volunteers needed for tabling/events. Contact us at: info@firstamericanartmagazine.com.

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Cecelia Yellow Robe learning beadwork from Grandma Rolls Off (both Lakota), Rosebud Indian Reservation, South Dakota, ca. 1936, National Archives and Records Administration.

SANTA FE, N.M.

www.OrlandoDugi.com

W

Wheelwright Museum OF THE AMERICAN INDIAN

W

Coming to the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian

Public Opening

Santa Fe, NM

The first exhibition anywhere devoted permanently to the study of Native American metalwork, lapidary, and related traditions.

Photo by Addison Doty

www.wheelwright.org

This exhibition funded in part by the City of Santa Fe Arts Commission and the 1% Lodgers’ Tax; New Mexico Arts, a division of the Department of Cultural Affairs and the National Endowment for the Arts; and many private donors.