The African Connection
A joint Indian/African fashion show
and welcome dance were among the many activities and programs presented
during the historic visit.
Last June a group of 45 American Indians made a historic foray to South
Africa and neighboring nations to open lines of communication and help
the region’s Native cultures jump-start their economies, with an
emphasis on arts and economic development.
“We were immediately impressed with a sense of what they have endured
as a people, the mind-boggling discrimination and poverty,” notes
Jill
Momaday-Gray (Kiowa), chief of protocol for the State of New Mexico.
Momaday was part of a group that visited the nation of Botswana and its
Khoisan (also known as the San, Basarwa or Khwa) people, formerly known
as the Bushmen of the Kalahari, who are believed to be the oldest
humans (in terms of genetics) on Earth. “They were so humble, yet rich
in spirit and generosity. One night, we had a feast around a fire. We
sat in the sand as 10 or so women sang and played instruments while a
group of men danced around us. It felt like a ‘blood memory,’ a term my
father (the author N. Scott Momaday) uses; it felt like coming home.
“There was a lot of intense sharing of experiences and stories and
discussion of how Indians in the United States have developed arts and
culture into a thriving economic endeavor,” continues Momaday-Gray. “Of
course, we are much further along financially and in terms of
institutions and support structures. So, it is very important for this
process to continue. We have much to learn from one another.”
Her comments are echoed by another trip participant, artist Nocona
Burgess (Comanche). “Their situation, in terms of arts development and
life in general, is like where we were in the 1920s. For many of them,
their art is their food and about their very survival. Some are in very
dire straits, living in tin shacks and huts. But we saw some wonderful
art (mostly paintings) and I think they can close the gap faster than
we did, with the help of technology.”
The trip was largely organized by staff at the Institute of American
Indian Arts in Santa Fe, which hosted a group of South African fashion
designers in 2005. Participants included IAIA staff, faculty, students
and alumni, as well as traditional healers and non-IAIA professionals
involved in education (including Michael Crow, president of Arizona
State University), health and economic development.
The 45-person delegation gathered first in South Africa, then split
into groups, with parties visiting Botswana, Zimbabwe, Mozambique,
Lesotho, KwaZulu-Natal and Swaziland. “It was not a tourist trip;
participants had to commit to opening up and sharing ideas, talents and
strategy,” explains Hayes Lewis, director of IAIA’s Center for Lifelong
Education. “It was very energizing, and it presented everyone with
great challenges and opportunities to relate to our hosts. We found
their experiences to be so similar.”
Funding for the program was provided by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation,
under the supervision of Valorie Johnson. Former IAIA director Della
Warrior (Otoe-Missouria) also played an instrumental role in the
exchange program, which will continue in the future through smaller
group meetings.
Making His Mark: Mateo Romero
In a significant step in his blossoming career, painter
Mateo Romero
(Cochiti Pueblo) was selected as the poster artist for the August 2008
Santa Fe Indian Market. His image will also grace T-shirts,
sweatshirts, mugs and other memorabilia for the 86th annual event,
hosted by the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts.
In a ceremony unveiling the poster art in late February in Santa Fe,
Bruce Bernstein, SWAIA’s executive director, noted, “We want to
continue to evolve Indian Market and take it into new directions. Our
forward-thinking poster artist this year perfectly reflects this in his
bold and muscular style that mixes elements of traditional culture with
progressive techniques.” Romero stated he was “tremendously honored” by
the selection. “The lineage of Pueblo artists in this region is
amazing, and I feel I am standing on their shoulders,” he said.
The selected work, “Deer Dancer,” comes from a series of mixed-media
compositions Romero has been exploring for a few years. The works begin
with a black-and-white photo transfer, which is then painted over with
acrylics and finished with a thinned tar glaze. “The paintings are many
things,” he noted, “historic records, portraiture, narrative, abstract,
contemporary and classical.” The original work (which features two
dancers side by side) will be auctioned off at the SWAIA Gala Dinner on
August 23 in Santa Fe.
A large selection of Romero’s paintings will also be available for
viewing and purchase long before Indian Market, in a special two-man
exhibition May 2–23 at Blue Rain Gallery in Santa Fe (opening with an
artists’ reception on May 2 at 5 p.m.). The show will feature his
newest works in oils, tackling social and political issues. “It turns
back to reinvestigate some of my earlier themes, narratives and
methods,” he explains.
Showing with him will be Hyrum Joe (Navajo), whose recent works in
oils, charcoal and watercolor depict Native life from the mid-1800s to
the mid-1900s.
Chocolate Dreams
Jordan Dayish, vice-president; Andrew Dayish, CEO; Shelby Marks, art
director; Tya Manygoats, production manager; Creedence Sampson, president; Nicole Keith, administrative assistant.
Lickity Split Chocolate Studio, a thriving gourmet chocolate retailer
currently owned by 18 Diné, Ute and Anglo youths between the ages of 8
and 15, was born when some of them approached AmeriCorps volunteer
Elaine Borgen in 2004 for movie money. Borgen, a former executive,
suggested they figure out how to earn it.
The group first sold homemade candy door-to-door, and then—with some
Ute Mountain Ute tribal funding—bought supplies and machines to make
tempered molded chocolates and scale up the business. Since then, all
their efforts have been bootstrap. Borgen says no loans or government
funds have been sought or granted, providing an entrepreneurial model
for Native youth.
In November 2007, Lickity Split opened a storefront in Blanding, Utah
and now also operates a bakery. Both businesses are doing well, despite
their remote location in the state’s poorest county. The business
purchased property for a new bicycle-repair shop in February, and two
new designs for their sugar-free candy recently have been introduced.
Adults perform some jobs while the youth are in school, but the
children run the entire business, from marketing to accounting.
“They’re like a beacon. Whenever somebody says ‘Lickity Split,’ I get a
warm feeling,” says Donna Singer, CEO of the Navajo Health Service in
Blanding. “It’s nice to have a specialty shop here, but the more
important part is to see how much our young people can do with a little
support.”
In 2007, Lickity Split was honored at Utah’s Rural Economic Development
Summit, and took the National Center for American Indian Enterprise
Development’s 2007 American Indian Youth Entrepreneurs of the Year
Award.
The business’ signature design is a lollipop patterned like a Navajo
wedding basket. Truffles, wedding hearts, chocolate pretzels and toffee
bars are available. White chocolates with symbols of the four sacred
mountains, lollipops designed with a spirit bear, and dark chocolates
bearing the symbol of the Navajo Ya’e people (winter only) are
accompanied by their traditional stories. Details: lickitysplitchocolate.com or 435/678-2626. —Pam Hughes
shards
Whistler, British Columbia, site of many of the events in the upcoming
2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver, can now also boast of a
world-class Native museum, the
Squamish Lil’wat Cultural Centre, which
opens its doors in June. The museum, with massive windows facing
imposing mountains, evokes both traditional Squamish longhouses and
Lil’wat pithouses, and includes exhibition galleries, ethnobotanical
gardens, a café, a gift gallery and an 80-seat theater where dance,
music and films will be presented. Special emphasis is being placed on
helping to revive textile weaving and cedar basketry. Details: slcc.ca
Recent college grad
Christine Begay (Yankton Nakota/Arikara/Diné) has
been selected as the New Mexico Citizen Journalist Street Team
representative in MTV’s Choose or Lose ’08 Campaign, a project to
increase young adults’ involvement in the presidential race and the
political process in general. She is the only Native American
representative in the project and is focusing her work on highlighting
issues affecting life in Indian Country. Check it out at
think.mtv.com/cmbegayNM.
A new book,
Allan Houser: Selected Works in Public Collections, has
just been released that documents most of the late Chiricahua Apache
artist’s sculptures found in public collections. The publication
contains images of 118 different works in some 65 collections, from the
Pompidou Center in Paris to the Heard Museum in Phoenix. Brief text
includes an introduction, biography and chronology. It sells for $40.
To order a copy online, go to lulu.com/content/1661110.
The
National Indian Education Association, in conjunction with the
National Education Association, recently released an important report,
Native Education 101, that provides a snapshot of the problems and
promise of Indian schools and education. In a press conference held to
publicize the report’s release, it was revealed that only 47 percent of
Native students graduate from high school. “Indian kids are caught in
an unnatural cycle of despair,” said NEA President Reg Weaver. “It will
take all of us, working together, to turn this around. Access to a good
education should be a basic right.” Copies of the report are available
by writing to NIEA, 110 Maryland Ave. N.E., Suite 104, Washington, D.C.
20002, or at nea.org/mco/images/07nativeeducation101.pdf.
Following up on our story in the last issue on the revival of buffalo
on Native lands, we’ve received news of the world’s first meat-based
energy bar, made primarily of buffalo.
The Tanka Bar, produced in Kyle,
South Dakota by a Native-owned and -operated company, Native American
Natural Foods, is based on traditional recipes for wasna and pemmican
and consists of smoke-dried buffalo meat blended with cranberries,
salt, garlic, onion and other natural ingredients. It contains no
nitrates or trans-fats. “They are tender, flavorful and good for you,”
says company CEO Karlene Hunter (Oglala Sioux). Details: tankabar.com
passages
Carole Anne Heart (Sicangu Lakota), who served as the National Indian
Education Association president in 2001, passed away on Jan. 25 in
Rapid City, South Dakota after a battle with cancer. Heart was also
active in health education and awareness programs.
Chief Marie Smith Jones, the last known full-blooded Eyak Indian of
Alaska and the only known speaker of the Eyak language, passed away in
January. She was 89. Details:
aprn.org/2008/01/22/eyak-language-dies-with-its-last-speaker
Emory Sekaquaptewa (Hopi) passed away on Dec. 14 after nearly four
decades spent teaching Hopi language and culture at the University of
Arizona and compiling the definitive dictionary of Hopi language. He
also was a noted artist and served as a tribal judge, spokesperson and
village governor. The West Point Academy graduate is thought to have
been the first Native American to obtain a law degree from the
University of Arizona. He was born, it is believed, in 1928.
honoring
Delaney Tyon (Oglala Lakota), age six, has been selected for
personalized training at the Winter Sports Club in Steamboat Springs,
Colorado, living up to his acclaim as an extremely promising young ski
racer. He was selected by none other than former Olympic skiers Billy
Kidd and Suzy Chaffee. Tyon grew up on the Pine Ridge Reservation,
South Dakota. See him rip it at youtube.com/ watch?v=kvTxSy01Mwg.
Documentary filmmaker
Alanis Obomsawin (Abenaki) of Canada is being
honored with one-woman retrospective of her body of work at the Museum
of Modern Art in New York. Screenings and discussions with the artist
begin on May 14 at 6 p.m. and continue almost daily through May 26. In
addition, on May 2 Obomsawin was awarded Canada’s highest honor in the
arts, the Governor General’s Performing Arts Award. Details: moma.org
Photographer
David Bernie (Yankton Dakota), painter and poet
Bunky
Echo-Hawk (Yakima/Pawnee), bead and quill worker Beverly Moran
(Standing Rock Sioux), sculptor
Lillian Pitt (Yakama/Wasco/Warm
Springs), bead and quill worker
Stephanie Sorbel (Oglala Lakota) and
traditional artists
Francis and Mary White Country (Sisseton Dakota)
have been awarded Artists In Business Leadership fellowships from the
First Peoples Fund of Rapid City. The artists will provide fellow
Native artists with business training and advice.
The world-watched Site Santa Fe Biennial has selected three Native
artists for its seventh gathering, to be held June 22 through Oct. 26:
sculptor and multimedia artist
Nora Naranjo-Morse; her daughter
Eliza
Naranjo-Morse, who works in clay and also creates drawings on canvas
using organic materials; and 25-year-old musician and visual artist
Rose Simpson. All three are from Santa Clara Pueblo; Simpson is the
daughter of talented sculptor Roxanne Swentzell.
In February,
Robert Mirabal (Taos Pueblo) won a Grammy Award in the
Native Music category for his CD Totemic Flute Chants, recorded under
his alter-ego moniker “Johnny Whitehorse.”
The State of Ohio has reaffirmed its official recognition of the
Shawnee Nation United Remnant Band of Ohio.
Principal Chief Hawk Pope,
in a Senate Proclamation, noted the tribe’s long history of service to
the state and its contribution to state history.
With his selection as a member of the National Geographic All Roads
Photography Program, photographer
Larry McNeil (Tlingit) was awarded a
prize from liveBooks.com, which he has used to create an interesting
Web site at larrymcneil.com.
The Heard Museum in Phoenix crowned
Charles Denny (Chippewa/Cree/Ute)
of Fort Duchesne, Utah the new world champion hoop dancer (in the Adult
Division) on Feb. 10, barely nudging out Brian Hammill (Ho-Chunk).
Taking the Teen Division crown was Kevin Dakota Duncan
(Apache/Arikara/Hidatsa/Mandan), while Moontee Sinquah
(Hopi/Tewa/Choctaw) took first in the Senior Division.
Corwin Clairmont (Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes) was one of
four Montanans recently to receive a Montana Governor’s Award for the
Arts. Clairmont is a visual artist and head of the art department at
Salish Kootenai College.
Norbert Hill Jr. (Oneida) has been elected the new chairman of the
board of the National Museum of the American Indian. Seven others also
have been appointed to the museum’s board: Manley Begay (Navajo),
Howard Berlin, Roberta Leigh Conner (Blackfeet), Catherine S. Fowler,
George Gund III, Eric Jolly (Cherokee) and Jose Zarate (Quechua).
Bruce Eldredge is the new executive director and CEO of the Buffalo
Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming, having left his previous
position as CEO of the Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture in
Spokane, Washington.
