At a pipe ceremony, I once teased an elder about his unorthodox way of conducting invocations. The joke (I always find myself needing to explain my humor) was that I was undermining his authority at all. I don’t even have a pipe, let alone any kind of expertise about this ceremony.
He picked up on my musings and teased back, "Who are you, the culture cop?" What seemed like a funny comment at the moment led me to think: is that what we are doing these days? I want "culture" to be something we contemplate, something magically just out of our grasp and beyond anyone’s full ownership – not something we police.
When one is in the moment – creating artwork or appreciating someone else’s – I find it hard to believe that one is self-consciously considering a specific cultural tradition. Did the Elder’s specific "cultural activity" start when he lit up his pipe, or was he aware of it while driving to the ceremony, or when he fed the parking meter? When I paint a painting I don’t imagine myself offering it up to the thundering machine of culture. I can choke down "culture" as a sort of catch-all term for large, systemic human activity – if it is equitably applied to everyone. But attaching the adjective "ethnic" goes too far. Who considers themselves "ethnic"?
"Ethnic" art is suggestive of novelty, and the term carries the hint of an outsider mimicking a European tradition. It is a word with a locus, a position, a perspective. Whose art isn’t "ethnic"? Jackson Pollack’s? Belonging to the language of the dominant group, words like "cultural" and "ethnic" assume the attitude of the prevailing majority.
Cultural concepts are handed to us embedded with agendas that don’t properly serve us. Once we realize the fallacy of glib labels, we can become increasingly sensitive about the terms we use; we can define them for ourselves and for our audiences and acknowledge their flaws a priori.
The following collection ranges from work by those who romantically embrace their "nativeness" to those who make art without many obligations to their native identity. That said, the impetus for curating a collection of artwork solely around the ancestries of the artists is inherently problematic. I don’t promote an artist’s work because their ancestry is an interest-generating novelty to others. I also don’t want to perpetuate the idea that art created under a vast, imaginary pan-category, such as "Native American," can articulate a single aesthetic inclusive of all tribes.
All I ask of any viewer is that you question your own assumptions – not that you fully accept mine.
Originally appeared in issue 22.2 of access+ENGAGE. Subscribe to this free arts e-magazine at mnartists.org/accessengage.
Pictured above: Mashkode Pijiki by Arion Poitra
Arion Poitra muscles animal forms out of raw materials as if, between the iron pours, welding, sanding, and burnishing, Poitra has wrestled the animals himself. In Mashkode Pijiki (Ojibwe for "buffalo") almost every sculptural decision is symbolic, from the way the metal oxidizes over time to the tight cage sculpted around the curves of the bison’s body, representing the confinement of this once free-to-roam animal. This piece was done in collaboration with artist David Swenson.
The Renegade by Jim Denomie
Jim Denomie is an image marksman, adept at making work that is profoundly engaging. In his painting the Renegade (part of his Renegade Series) Denomie renders mesas and plateaus as reservations that empty onto the abyss of stolen land. An angry cavalry flanks the renegades on flying horses.
Buffalo by William Ambrose, oil pastel on paper, 2006
William Ambrose’s sexy, gestural work combines a pop art sensibility with hard lines and the use of words to supplant other symbolic forms. Ambrose seems to be drawn to urban culture and native signifiers in a cool, distant way—not invested fully in either but partaking in both.
Untitled portrait by Frank Big Bear, 13.75” x 9.75,”
prisma color pencil on paper, 2000
Frank Big Bear’s portraits sink into fractured environments that cut into his figurations. Some of his subjects are shrieking and baring gnarled teeth, others sit thoughtfully. Like waking from a dream and piecing the memory of it together in a linear, sequential order, things overlap, intersecting in many places at the same time. Yet, unlike a dream’s recall, marred by lost details, Big Bear’s work explodes into color and allows the viewer time to peer into his dream’s image.
Odalisque by Lori Greene
Lori Greene has found a way of intersecting her many identities through mosaic sculptural forms. In Odalisque, Greene pairs a red reclining nude figure with Ophelia-like flowers. An “odalisque” is a female virgin slave who aspires to become a harem concubine or even a wife. Many of her adorned objects hint at the feminine body, children, and the sacred, coupling the celebratory quality of decoration with the freight of role and responsibility.
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