Owning the Image: Indigenous Arts since 1990

Mario A. Caro
Timelines should be flexible; they should have fluidity;
they should not be locked in time or space.
_ Jaune Quick-to-See Smith
1
THIS ESSAY IS AN ATTEMPTTO PROVIDE a brief overview of the last
twenty years, or so, of the various practices and discourses that
define contemporary Indigenous arts." Of course, this perspective
can only be partial and subjective, and will focus on a limited selec-
tion of examples that mainly cover the context in the United States.
It is a sketch that looks at the production, exhibition and marketing
of Native arts by 'identifying and briefly analyzing the various sites
that make up the contemporary Native arts world. Ultimately, the
image provided is one of a vibrant field with ever-increasing partici-
pation by Native scholars, arts managers, collectors, curators, and
artists-Native practitioners involved in determining how Native
art is contextualized,
The essay is organized along subject headings that attempt to
comprehend the elusive workings of the contemporary art world. I
begin with a look at the recent production of historical and theoretical
frameworks that explicitly address Native American art production as
part of the larger dynamics of the field of contemporary art. An aspect
crucial to the analysis of the production of knowledge about contem-
porary Native arts, one that directly affects the ways in which this art is
valued, both within the art market system as well as within avant-garde
discourses, is the lack of critical writing on contemporary Indigenous
arts. Nonetheless, here, too, some important inroads are being made.
This overview of discourses on Native art is followed by an
examination of the role played by museums in disseminating this
knowledge. It is at these institutions that during the last two decades a
shift in power-to both contextualize and valorize Native art-has
most dynamically taken place. The entry of Native scholars, curators
and collectors into these institutions has reconfigured the place of
Native arts within a wider contemporary arts world. It is particularly
the work of innovative curators -their eloquent visual treatises
affirming Native perspectives and offering new ways of seeing-that
has substantially furthered the field of museology. The practice of
curating has become Increasingly professionalized, with more
universities and post-graduate programs offering degrees in curatlon.
In terms of a specific Indigenous curatorial practice, there are
substantial developments in attempting to identify the field.
I then turn to the more pragmatic concern of valorizing Native
art in terms of the market. The market value of Native art plays a
significant role in establishing parity betweenWestern art and Native
art, increasing its relevance within the wider discourses on contempo-
rary art. Collecting practices, including those of museums, affect not
only the price, but also the scholarly attention paid to works of art.
An analogous situation is the recent rise of market value in contem-
porary Chinese art and a related increase in its critical reception. An
important aspect unique to the marketing of Native art, however, is
the increase in the number of Indian markets, sites that simultaneously
help and impede the professional development of Native artists.
Finally, I will look at institutions and processes that facilitate
Indigenous art production. Without the necessary infrastructure
that nurtures and promotes the making of art, Indigenous artists are
often at a great disadvantage when it comes to competing within a
Western art market. While some artists may have access to community
structures that have traditionally promoted art making, others are
often disenfranchised in their efforts to develop a professional
practice. This section begins by looking at schools, such as the
Institute of American Indian Arts, that have a specific focus on teaching
Indigenous art production. Outside of an academic setting, other
community-based opportunities, such as Indigenous artist gatherings,
workshops, and residencies have become more structured. In this
instance, it is the nonprofit organizers and the arts administrators
who are the lead protagonists. They are responsible for running
arts centers, developing programming, and providing a myriad of
opportunities that meet the unique needs of Native artists.
WRITINGINDIGENOUSART HISTORY, THEORY, AND CRITICISM
Writing about contemporary Indigenous arts has often been out
of step with mainstream discourses on contemporary art. It either
places work by Indigenous artists as lagging behind or, alternately, as
anticipating trends ofthe mainstream art world. At times, Indigenous
work has appeared as exceptional, as the authentic voice of otherness
that helps to define the incoherent Western unconscious of avant-
garde art." At other times, claims have been made for Indigenous art,
and its contextualization within academic fields such as art history
and anthropology, as anticipating the theory and criticism eventually
developed to discuss contemporaryWestern art. 4 While it is difficult
to comprehensively assess writings on Indigenous art-these come
from many disciplines and are disseminated in numerous and radically
different venues-there has been a sharp increase in the number of
texts dealing with the subject, at least since 1990. And it is Indigenous
scholars who are also artists that have produced many of these texts."
To begin this analysis in 1990 is not an arbitrary choice. Two
pieces of legislation that would deeply affect the practices of both
Native artists and museum professionals were passed then. The Native
American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act established a
process that required institutions receiving federal funding to inven-
tory and assess their collections in order to identify "human remains,
funerary objects, sacred objects, or objects of cultural patrimony" that
are eligible for repatriation. This law empowered Native communities
to reclaim ancestral remains and patrimony, establishing a more
equitable relationship between institutions and Native communities.
6
The other significant law passed that year was the Indian Arts and
Crafts Act, which updated an earlier version of this law concerned
with promoting "the economic welfare of Indian tribes and the Indian
wards of the Government through the development of Indian arts
and crafts and the expansion of the market for the products of Indian
art and craftsmanship."? However, the 1990 version was passed as a
"truth-in-advertising law" aimed at protecting the consumer more
than the artist. The law's emphasis on authenticating Native art by
authenticating the identity of the artist has been controversial, and
has led to divisions within the arts community on how, and whether,
Native identity should be regulated by such legislation.
These gains in legislative control over Native cultural property
and production were followed two years later by the quincentenary
commemoration of the arrival of Columbus to the Western hemisphere,
which became the occasion for the production of a great number of
Native initiatives that addressed the inaccuracies and omissions of
Western accounts of Native history. "These were more than reactive
responses; the quincentenary was seized as an opportunity for a wider
dissemination of long-held historical and theoretical Native perspectives.
The abundance of work produced included scholarship that addressed
the unique aesthetic legacies of Native artistic traditions and innovations.
ART INTHE19909
During the last twenty years, substantial changes have occurred "Within
the overall contemporaryWestern art world. In the 198os, various art
practices actively engaged the relationship between representation and
the formation of identity by critiquing Eurocentric notions of quality,
including universalist ideals of beauty and truth. These critiques reached
a crescendo in the I 990S in the form of radical practices that often
focused on the body as the site of contestation and agency, practices
that, in an eventual backlash, would be dismissively consolidated under
the rubric of "identity art."
A particularly provocative exhibition was the Whitney Biennial
of 1993, curated by Elisabeth Sussman and Thelma Golden; which
featured work that epitomized these aesthetic practices based on
identity. As the art critic Michael Brenson observed:
The mainstream exhibition most identified with multicul-
turalism is the 1993 Whitney Biennial, which crammed
NewYork's Whitney Museum of American Art "With
objects and installations that bombarded viewers with
ideas and questions about borders, violence, identity, and
audience.... Because much of its most visible art was
driven by a vehement, almost feverish, desire to tell the
truth and redress societal wrongs, the exhibition left no
doubt that for many contemporary artists, making art was
a life-and-death matter.
9
It is in this climate that many Indigenous artists vehemently engaged
their avant-garde practices.
Indicative ofthe role of Native artists within these discussions
was the representation by Native artists at this landmark exhibi-
tion." Jimmie Durham, a multimedia artist whose work is strongly
conceptual, exhibited a series of roughly constructed objects that
provoke narrative readings of encounter between European and
Native cultures. These works were produced at the same time as his
Caliban Codexseries, in which he appropriated the voice of Callban,
the paradigmatic Native invented by Shakespeare as the primitive foil
to his civilizing Prospero in the Tempest. Durham's re-imagining of
this fictional figure, what he described as the fictionalizing of a fiction,
ventriloquized irreverent responses to Prospero, who, in this revised
narrative, stands in for Columbus and his colonizing enterprise. 11
Another Native artist included in the biennial was James Luna,
primarily a performance and installation artist, who presented
his work titled UNPLUGGED: The Shame-Man. The piece introduced
the persona of a shaman who engages audiences, both Native and
non-Native, in uncovering their presumptions about Native identity.
Two years earlier, Luna had re-performed his Artifact Piece for the
Decade Show, an exhibition that in many ways prefigured the Whitney
Biennial of 1993.
12
This famous work, in which he placed himself on
display as yet another ethnographic artifact, was a critique of museum
practices that represent Native cultures as existing only as dead and in
the distant past. Luna's work prefigured the work of Coco Fusco and
Guillermo Gomez-Pefia, also included in the 1993 exhibition. Their
poignant performance, titled Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit the West,
featured the artists dramatically displayed in a golden cage, dressed in
the stereotypical garb- grass skirt and feathered headdress - fre-
quently seen in popular media as representations of Native cultures.
The work traveled to a variety of venues in Europe and the Americas,
including art museums and anthropological museums. The unintended
result of the performance in these latter venues was that many audi-
ences, fully trusting the authority of the museum, believed the parody
of displaying two Natives from Guatanau, a supposedly previously
undiscovered island in the Gulf of Mexico, to be an authentic display.
The legacy of Columbus was alive and well in 1993.
Given this vibrant climate of artistic activity, it is not surprising
that the bulk of writings on contemporary Indigenous art since the early
I 990S is found in the various art catalogues for exhibitions, many of
which were produced by Indigenous artists and curators themselves. An
early example of this kind of effort is The SubmulocShow/ColumbusWohs:
AVisual Commentary on the Columbus QgincentennialJrom the Perspective if
America's First People, which accompanied an exhibition by the same title
curated by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith in 1992. The catalogue included
poetry and short essays by Charlotte DeClue, Joy Harjo, Lucy Lippard,
Duane Niatum, and Elizabeth Woody. 13
ART HISTORY AND ANTHROPOlOGY
The principal academic disciplines that have produced lmowledge about
Native cultures are art history and anthropology. Since their inception in
the nineteenth century, these fields have often revealed an anxiety about
their role within the processes of colonization. However, it is particularly
during the last two decades that widespread reconsideration of the
detrimental effects of these discourses on the production, exhibition
and critical reception of Native arts has taken place.
In her overview of anthropology's engagement with Native arts,
Rebecca Dobkins lists some of the salient issues being reassessed
within the field, such as:
the politics of representation, the inclusion of native
voices and interpretive frameworks, the recognition of the
inadequacy of the traditional, anthropological concept of
"culture," the need for understanding political economy,
and the dynamics of colonial and post-colonial cultural
appropriation and re-invention. 14
Of course, critiques of anthropology by.Native people have been
constant, and Native scholars have developed criticism from within
academia itself. From the work of Ella Deloria, a Dakota Sioux
anthropologist and novelist, to the excoriations of her nephewVine
Deloria, Jr., from the rigorous contributions by Bea Medicine to the
recent work by anthropologist Nancy Marie Mithlo, whose research
insists on questioning the most established assumptions about Native
art, Native revisions and additions to the anthropological discourse
during the last two decades are plentiful.
Interms of the art historical production, the subfield of Native
Art History has established itself as a coherent area of study over the
last two decades. In 1992, Janet Berlo edited an anthology titled The
EarlyYeats if Native AmericanArt History, in which she declared the
field's self-critical approach:
[W]e see the history of American Indian art history
in terms of shifting truths, falsehood, appropriations,
scholarly formulations, and public responses-different
conjunctures for different historical moments.... The last
quarter of the twentieth century is clearly an era in which
self-evaluation and a self-critical stance are central to the
enterprise of encountering other cultures and their arts."
As with anthropology-and in many ways informed by that field's
self-reassessment-historians of Native American art began to
acknowledge and critique the ways in which the traditional methodolo-
gies they employed to analyze "the other" were complicit with the
project of colonization.
However, it is the entry of Native scholars into the field that
advanced theoretical frameworks based on paradigms of thought
originating from within their communities. An example of this
approach is the work of the artist and art historian Jolene Rickard,
who in 1996 wrote her doctoral dissertation based on the idea that
Native art is, and has always been, a form of knowledge production
informed by Native perspectives. She observed that "the process of
making art is central to the ongoing reproduction of knowledge in
Indigenous communities." She elaborated on how the reception of
Native art also requires an approach that takes into consideration this
process of conveying knowledge, stating that:
Native people have distinct epistemological, cosmological
and ideological constructs of reality, identified in total as a
world view. Any attempt at understanding the visual expres-
sion of Native people must be located within a framework
familiar with their specific cultural construct or world view.16
This is an approach that uses a Native perspective not merely as
a quotation to illustrate Western theory but as the foundation for
developing methodologies proper to specific Native communities.
An influential endorsement of this approach is Linda Tuhiwai
Smith's Decolotnzmo MethodoI0Bies, a meta-critique of the ideological
workings of research methodologies. She argues that the traditional
and systemic practices of collecting Native knowledge used byWestern
scholars constitute an imperialist "collective memory." She explains:
This collective memory of imperialism has been perpetu-
ated through the ways in which knowledge about Indigenous
peoples was collected, classified and then represented in
various ways back to the West, and then, through the eyes of
the West; back to those who have been colonized.'?
However, this Western economy of knowledge production about the
Native is subverted by the simultaneous appropriation of Western
methodologies and the development of autochthonous scholarly
practices. In fact, Smith's own work is an example of an approach
that readily adapts Western scholarship, such as deconstruction and
postcolonial theory, in elaborating Maori epistemology.
Of the various categories of scholarly writings on contemporary
Native arts, there is an increase in the quantity and quality of some
types of production-such as monographs, catalogue essays, and
anthologies-while other forms-such as surveys and art criti-
cism - still require more attention. Although there are surveys
tracing the developments of Native art within the twentieth century,
the art produced during the last twenty years has yet to be gathered
into a coherent narrative. 18
One indicator of the vibrancy of contemporary Native art scholar-
ship is the number of anthologies that have been produced as the result
of conferences, symposia, and seminars. Recent examples of these
gatherings include two conferences held at the Denver Art Museum on
contemporary Native art, one an assessment of the field and another
specifically focused on performance art." Another example is a
collection of essays from a series of seminars addressing the particular
challenges faced by Native women artists published by the School for
Advanced Research, which has a long tradition of programming on
contemporary Native errs." There is also a series of publications by
the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian that features
proceedings from several conferences they have organized. 21 These
are a few of the institutions in the US explicitly engaged in a sustained
development of discourses on contemporary Native artists.
Photography and film are media that have a long tradition within
anthropology as modes of representing Native Americans as objects
of study. Within art history, accounts of the development of these
media narrate the photographic image of the Native as emerging at
the concurrence of modernity and modernism. These are also media
that have been employed by Native artists from the inception of
these technologies to represent themselves. 22 A significant collection
of essays focusing on contemporary Native photography is Strong
Hearts: Native American Visions and Voices, published in 1995, which
includes writings by many of the leading Native artists and curators
of the time. Other important contributions over the last two decades
include Native Nations:Journeys in American Photography, a catalogue
from an exhibition held in 1998-99 at the Barbican Art Gallery
in London. Our People, Our Land, Our Images: International Indigenous
Photographers, was published as a result of a conference held at the
C.N. Gorman Museum at the University of California Davis in 2006.
This publication was followed by a touring exhibition with the same
title. Visual Currencies: RifJections on Native Photography is another
volume that was inspired by sessions on photography held at the
Native American Arts Studies Association Conference in 2005.23
Within the scope of writings on the history of Native art,
monographs have been few and far between. It may be argued that
the production of in-depth studies of individual artists may replicate
the power dynamics that have excluded them from art discourses in
the first place. Nonetheless, it is essential that scholarship on single
artists be developed in order to establish a foundation, at least one to
eventually work against.
24
During the last twenty years, however,
living artists have been increasingly the subject of monographs,
mostly in the form of catalogues for retrospective exlubmons."
Finally, the advent of the internet over the last two decades as
a means of researching and disseminating the plethora of discourses
engaged with contemporary Native arts has become an effective
way to enter these discussions through a less hierarchal structure of
knowledge production. Artists, tribes, historians, and critics from
all backgrounds are developing web presences and blogs allowing for
vibrant exchanpea."
MUSEOLOGYAND
A more traditional means of disseminating discourse on Native
cultures to wide audiences is via museums. These institutions are one
of the primary sites where narratives about Indigenous peoples are
disseminated to the general public, often with interpretations that
echo nationalist sentiments about Native cultures as predecessors to
contemporary American culture. The curators who author these nar-
ratives enact Western history and theory through the development of
exhibitions, programming, and publications. Many of these practices,
however, have undergone a radical reassessment during the last twenty
years." Professionals in the field have re-conceptualized the mis-
sions of their institutions-traditionally focused on insular projects
centered on protecting and contextualizing precious objects-and
have become more responsible about attending to their relationship to
the various constituents they serve, The audiences for these exhibitions
and programs are now considered to include not only visitors and
local communities but also the communities represented within the
collections of these institutions.
While much of this re-envisioning has occurred within Western
institutions, cultural institutions run by Indigenous practitioners,
particularly tribal museums and cultural centers, also express similar
concerns. The rapid rise in the development of these institutions
began in the 1970S, and by the I 990S tribal museums had come into
their own in terms of establishing Native museological practices.
Some notable examples of museums that began to operate during
this time include the Museum at Warm Springs, on the Warm Springs
Reservation in Oregon, the Makah Cultural and Research Center
on the Olympic Peninsula in Washington, the Mashantucket Pequot
Museum and Research Center in Connecticut, and the Ziibiwing
Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifewavs in Michigan. "While these
museums do not focus exclusively on contemporary art, they do
exemplify the establishment of cultural institutions that convey the
specific perspective of the community they represent.P' An important
caveat is to not consider these institutions as solely responding to a
Western history of representation, as oppositional voices persistently
countering the master narrative of the West. As Nancy Marie Mithlo
has argued, "Oppositional denotes a reactive stance-betraying,
I think, not only a focused belief in the operational strategies of the
majority but also a lack of innovative proactive measures on the part
of tribal tmttettves.'?" Instead, the concerns of tribal museums are
with preserving and representing their own history and culture.
After a long period of planning and fundraising, the Museum
at Warm Springs opened in 1993.
30
It explored the possibilities for
a cultural institution to effectively represent the complexities of
contemporary Native life. A particular challenge was to represent the
three different groups living on the reservation (the Warm Springs,
the Wasco, and the Paiute) within the single space of the museum.
This challenge was turned into an opportunity for collaboration,
resulting in a permanent exhibition that seamlessly weaves these
various traditions together.
The Makah Cultural and Research Center has an earlier history,
having opened in 1979. It was originally built to store and display
materials found as part of an archeological study, which unearthed
part of a village that had been buried and preserved by a mudslide in
the fifteenth century. Since then, it has come to include an extensive
collection of materials reflecting historical and contemporary Makah
life. The museum is situated on the Makah Nation at Neah Bay, a
remote point on the northwest tip of Washington State, but despite
this isolation, the center successfully runs a variety of programs that
address the local community as well as outside visitors.?'
An institution that exemplifies the possibilities of a well-funded
Native museum is the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research
Center. A major difference between this and the previous examples is
that of the anticipated audience addressed by the museum's narratives.
While the Museum at Warm Springs and the Makah Cultural and
Research Center have an intimate relationship with their communi-
ties, the Pequot. is located near the tribe's casino, whose primarily
non-Native customers make up the majority of the museum's visitors.
The Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways, located
on the Saginaw Chippewa Reservation in Michigan, is one of the latest
tribal cultural centers to open its doors, inaugurated in 2004. In her
analysis of the ways in which this center differs from a typical non-
Native museum, scholar Amy Lonetree states that the museum:
... exemplifies a decolonizing museum practice through
privileging oral tradition, and through speaking of the
hard truths of colonization to promote healing. The
Center sensitively incorporates Anishinabe philosophy
and spirituality that effectively conveys the uniqueness
of the tribe's world view and knowledge system. What
the Ziibiwing Center staff members have achieved truly
represents a decolonizing museum practice ....32
The most provocative re-visioning of the practices of displaying
Indigenous culture occurred with the opening of the Smithsonian
National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) on the National
Mall in 2004.33The impossibility of representing the vast diversity of
Indigenous cultures in the Western hemisphere establishes the NMAI
as a rich site for constant engagementin robust debates on museology
and critical approaches to institutional self-representation that
emphasizes an Indigenous perspective. The museum generated much
criticism when it opened, and has continued to engage scholars,
particularly Native scholars, on its various practices, ranging from
conservation to curation.e" And it is particularly the practice of curating
from an Indigenous perspective that has been the focus of much of
these discussions.i"
INDIGENOUSCURATORIAL PRACTICES
Unlike community-based institutions, the NMAI's role as a national
institution has allowed it to provide a coherent presence for Native
American communities at an international level. It is at this level
that Indigenous curatorial practices can most effectively address the
significance of the sovereign status of Native nations. The international
ramifications of Indigenous curating require a wide perspective that
is difficult to gain from traditional curatorial training. While some
curators have developed their practice independently, curating is
often a career that requires a degree in art history, anthropology,
museum studies, or arts management. There are also now degrees
that specifically focus on the art of curating. However, the curation
of Native arts is a specialization that requires not only knowledge
of curatorial practices but also a commitment to understanding the
perspectives of the various cultural groups represented by the works
of art. As with the curation of Western art, which demands an under-
standing of the social, economic, and geo-political historical context
of art, the curation of Native art requires an understanding of the role
played within, and outside, the Native communities represented in an
exhibition. Given the sovereign status of many Native communities,
this often means operating within an international context.:"
While some inroads have been made in establishing an interna-
tional Indigenous network of artists and exhibition venues, a sustained
engagement within the traditional international sphere of Western art
has also been a pursuit." It is inVenice, in particular, that Native artists
and curators have made substantial contributions to the international
arts scene. The Venice Biennale, the most revered biennial, has endeav-
ored to feature the best in contemporary art since I 895. It is structured
around thirty national pavilions, with many other additional venues
radiating from this core. This structural framework creates a nationalist
grid, which can present unique obstacles for Indigenous participants
whose bid for inclusion within a national pavilion can replicate and
endorse colonial power structures.
Nonetheless, in 1995 Gerald McMaster curated the work of
Edward Poitras, which was featured in the national Canadian pavilion,
the first national pavilion to feature an Indigenous artist from North
AmertcaP'' Within this nationalist structure, the Native American
presence in Venice has been represented by a most intrepid curatorial
project instigated by Nancy Marie Mithlo. She first gathered a
self-curated group of Indigenous artists and curators in I 999, which
was accepted by officials as representing a sovereign nation, and has
continued to produce exhibitions at this prestigious biennale ever
stnce." Mithlo's work facilitated the eventual participation-of the
National Museum of the American Indian, which in 2005 featured the
work of James Luna and in 2007 the art of Edgar Heap of Birds.
These curatorial projects have not only provided opportunities for
Native artists to be included in exhibitions traditionally closed to them,
they have also produced interventions that included programming that
generated scholarship on curating from a Native perspective.w
MARKET VALUE: MUSEUMS, GALLERIES AND INDIAN MARKETS
Of course, the opportunities for artists to participate in these interna-
tional venues are somewhat limited. The majority of professional artists
are often more focused on the pragmatics of marketing their work,
and museums can, at times, playa role. During the last two decades,
there have been significant changes to the ways in which the collecting
and marketing of contemporary Native arts occurs at museums. The
National Museum of the American Indian has paid careful attention
to this sector and has produced various exhibitions that have provided
opportunities for acquiring significant works. The same is true of
other museums, such as the Denver Art Museum and the Heard
Museum. The Eiteljorg Museum, in particular, has been highly active in
promoting and collecting contemporary Native art. Their prestigious
Eiteljorg Fellowship for Native American Art acknowledges the work
of established Native artists, and, in addition to providing each artist
with an unrestricted award of $20,000, the museum purchases a work
for their collection. These museums have quickly developed substantial
collections of contemporary Native art, which increases its value, both
cultural as well as commercial.:"
The number of museums that include an emphasis on collect-
ing contemporary Native art is small. One museum that has been
exclusively dedicated to the preservation, exhibition, and scholarly
investigation of contemporary Indigenous art is the Museum of
Contemporary Native Arts. ltsaffiliation with the Institute of
American Indian Arts, which hosts Native students from around the
world, has allowed it to nurture and maintain intimate connections
with various communities. Their collection, referred to as National
Collection of Contemporary Native American Arts, has grown to
nearly 7,500, making it the largest museum collection of contem-
porary Native art. This level of commitment is a sharp contract to
major metropolitan museums that collect contemporary art, but that
continue to neglect this important sector of contemporary art.
At another end of the marketing spectrum, there is, of course,
the internet, which, in terms of providing a means of exposing Native
artists to worldwide audiences, has had the greatest impact during
these last two decades. Nonetheless, the promise of universal access
offered by the medium remains unfulfilled. While some artists may
still lack appropriate access to this technology, there is growth in
more traditional means of gaining access to a market.
Commercial galleries playa significant role in determining
value. Unfortunately, galleries that specialize in contemporary Native
arts are often located in regions away from major contemporary art
markets. Galleries focusing on contemporary Native arts in places
such as Seattle, Portland, and Santa Fe, often have an established base
of collectors. Other venues that sell Native arts in places-like New
York and Los Angeles tend to focus on ethnographic materials and
do not provide a proper outlet for contemporary art. While galleries
not dedicated to Native arts represent some artists, there tends to be
a ghettoization of the marketing of contemporary Native arts. Thus
contemporary Native artwork offered at galleries is often priced
lower and sells at a slower rate than other contemporary art.
An unusual phenomenon that presents a unique set of advantages
and disadvantages is the development of Indian markets. These venues
provide short-term opportunities for Native artists to sell their work
directly to the public, which is a great advantage for artists who do
not have access to an urban market. Indian art markets create an
alternative space for the marketing of contemporary work, which
may also be considered a form of marginalization. There is no doubt
that these various forms of art fairs are driven by a unique dynamic
of supply and demand that addresses the needs of Native artists and
collectors of Native art. For many Native artists without gallery
representation, these are the main opportunities to market their work.
However, for artists seeking to enter the avant-garde contemporary
arts market, these venues may prove detractive and even detrimental
to the development of their careers.
The oldest, most prestigious, and successful of these is the
Santa Fe Indian Market, which was established in I 9 2 2. This market
includes a wide spectrum of work that ranges from traditional to
avant-garde production and has become a model for other markets
throughout the US and abroad. Other substantial markets that have
developed during the last twenty years include those held annually
at museums such as the Eiteljorg Museum, the Heard Museum, the
Autry National Center of the American West and the Smithsonian
National Museum of the American Indian. This model is also being
implemented by Native groups in places such as Hawai't, through the
establishment of the Native Hawaiian Arts Market, and in Aotearoal
New Zealand, in their development of the Maori Art Market.
NURTURING ART PRODUCTION
Ultimately, the advances made in gaining Native control over the
discourses on contemporary Native art begin with Native artists
themselves. And it is institutional and community support that is
often most needed by artists in obtaining their professional goals. As
far as pursuing art as a professional practice, lack of access to mentors
and peers is devastating for the development and sustainability of an
artist's career, As with any profession, artists require the nurturing
of established teachers as well as the many opportunities offered by
institutions in order to support the research and travel necessary for
their practice. They also require access to networks and professional
organizations that can allow them opportunities for, exhibiting,
funding, and publishing their projects. 42
Institutions dedicated to the formal training of Indigenous
artists are scarce, to say the least. In fact, the only higher education
institution exclusively dedicated to providing art education focusing
on Indigenous cultures in the US is the Institute of American Indian
Arts in Santa Fe. The history of the school goes back to its founding
in the 196os, and has undergone many changes, including the opening
of its museum in 1992.43 The school and its innovative Museum of
Contemporary Native Arts occupy a unique position in being able
to simultaneously support Native artists at a local and national level.
The Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian is another
institution that provides many programs and grants to assist artists in
their professional development."
Despite the lack of national institutions specifically addressing
the needs of Native artists in the US, many community-based cultural
centers, institutes, and residencies provide assistance for the training
and development of professional artists. A few examples from the
Northwest illustrate the possibilities of developing community-based
support for artists.
Crow's Shadow Institute of the Arts is a unique institution
located on the Umatilla Reservation in Oregon. It was started by
James Lavadour in I 99 2 in order to nurture the work of Indigenous
artists. The institute, initially funded by a grant from Bureau of
Indian Affairs, isa premier printmaking facility. In reference to James
Lavadour's work at the Crow's Institute Indigenous curator, Gerald
McMaster has observed that "artists needed to be taken seriously, they
needed opportunities to show their work, and they needed institu-
tions to support the creation of their work.":"
Another example of an institution dedicated to meeting the needs
of Indigenous artists isThe Longhouse Education and Cultural Center
in Olympia, Washington. The Longhouse has hosted a variety of work-
shops and gatherings meant to expose artists and local communities to
techniques, strategies, and cultures of other Indigenous communities.
Most recently, it developed a reciprocal residential exchange withTe
Waka Toi, the Maori arts board of Aotearoa/New Zealand.
There are also several nonprofit organizations and foundations
that provide grants for furthering Indigenous arts and cultures."
Some, such as the Seventh Generation Fund, established in 1977,
have a long history of providing various types of support. However,
during the last twenty years there has been a notable increase in
Native philanthropy for Native arts, with foundations such as the First
People's Fund and the Potlatch Fund leading the way in providing
financial support specifically for the arts;" A development that marks
a milestone in Native philanthropy is the establishment of the Native
Arts & Cultures Foundation in 2007, an outgrowth of the concerted
efforts of the Ford Foundation's Indigenous Knowledge & Expressive
Culture Portfolio which, under the leadership of ElizabethTheobald
Richards, made a substantial difference in the ways in which grants
for the arts were disseminated within Native communities."
CONCLUSION
During the last twenty years, a radical reconfiguration of how Native
arts are exhibited, marketed, and contextualized within scholarly
discourses has taken place. Much of this change is due to the rapid
increase in the participation of Native scholars, curators, and other
arts professionals. Of course, leading these new approaches are Native
artists who often tend to perform many of these roles simultaneously.
Not only have Native artists been prolific in their practice, their work
has driven the development of discourses that specifically address
these new themes, media, and venues. Their efforts have continuously
posed challenges to the ways in which we think about the practice of
exhibiting Native art.
Native curators have also made notable contributions to the
presentation of Native art, often taking the work as the starting point
for producing new contexts for interpretation. These new curatorial
practices have also helped to reconfigure the ways in which museums
represent Native peoples-from the work done by tribal museums
and cultural centers to the comprehensive projects developed at the
Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.
Despite these innovations, there are still areas in which the
field needs to be developed. The collecting of Native works, both by
museums and private collectors, is an aspect of the art market that is
still relegated to specialists in Native art and has yet to be accessed by
collectors of avant-garde art. Similarly, the development of art criticism
that earnestly considers the specific socio-political as well as cultural
frameworks in situating Native art within avant-garde discourses will
complement advances in academic, museum and artistic practices.
I would like to thank Nancy M, Mithlo and Ryan Rice for their insightful comments on this essay. Their
observations helped improve it greatly. Of course, the shortfalls that remain are completely my own
Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, "2007 Eiteljorg Fellowship for Native American Fine Art Symposium
keynote address" (keynote address, Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art,
Indianapolis, IN, November 10, 2007), hnp:llwwweiterljorg,org/ejm_MP3/Jaune_Quick_to_See_
Smith32K.mp3.
2, I will use the terms Indigenous and Native interchangeably
3. In his often-reprinted essay, 'Artist as Ethnographer," Hal Foster cites James Luna and Jimmie
Durham as examples of artists who play the authenticity game in order to highlight its duplicity
However, the irony is that this implies that, for Foster, Native artists are the only ones authentic
enough to do so. Hal Foster, "Artist as Ethnographer;' in The Return of the Real: TheAvant-
Garde at the End of the CenturV(Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1996): 171-204
4. Janet 8erlo has touted the subfield of Native art history as "substantially anticipatlincl some of
the transdisciplinary practices of visual and cultural studies," "Anthropologies and Histories of
Art: A View From the Terrain of Native North American Art History," in Anthropologies of Art, eo.
Marii'itWestermann lWilliamstown, MA:The Clark Institute, 2005), 180.
5 Some examples of Native artists who have also produced important scholarship during the last
two decades include Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Jolene Rickard, Gerald McMaster, Hulleah
Tsinhnahjinnie and GailTremblay
6. Rebecca Dobkins lists the various levels at which NAGPRA has been beneficial: "1) it implies a
critique of anthropological and archaeological fieldwork and collecting practices that all anthro-
pologists need to be aware of; 2) it has brought native community members into museums as
consultants, visitors, staff members on an unprecedented level; 3) it has been part of a broader
movement toward the establishment of tribal museums; 4) the circulation of repatriated objects
has reintroduced a wealth of cultural material back into native communities, with potentially
significant impact on artistic production; and (5) it has linked the collecting of native art with
the arena of human rights," Rebecca Dobkins, "Art;' in A Companion to the Anthropology of
American Indians, Old. Thomas Bicls!(Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2004). 217
7. "Indian Arts and Crafts Act 011935;' US Department of the Interior: Indian Arts and Crafts
Board, http://www.doi.gov/iacb/iaca35.html.
8. In terms of aWestern response, many museums and libraries exhibited items in their col-
lections that had only the slightest relation to the encounter. An example of the ostentatious
nature of many of these endeavors is the National Gallery's Circa 1492: Art in the Age of
Exploration, which attempted a synchronic survey of cultural production around the globe during
the period of Columbus's travels. For a discussion of the massive literary output dealing with
the quincentenary see James Axtell, "Columbian Encounters: 1992-95;' The William and Mary
Quarterly, 3rd series, 52, no. 4 {October 1995): 649-696
9. Michael Brenson, Acts of Engagement: Writings on Art, Criticism, and Institutions, 1993-2002
(Oxford: Hottman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc" 2004). For a philosophical analysis of this
exhibition, see Michael Kelly, "The Political Autonomy of Contemporary Art: The Case of the
1993Whitney Biennial;' in Politics and Aesthetics in the Arts, eo. Salim Kemal and Ivan Gaskell
(Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 2000). 221-263.
10. In addition to Jimmie Durham and James Luna, the performance artist Robbie McCauley,
whose grandfather was Native American, was also a participant in the exhibition.
11 Durham published two books this same year: a re-releese of Columbus Day: Poems and Stories
About American Indian Life and Death in the Nineteen-Seventies (Albuquerque, NM: West End
Press, 1993, originally published in 1983) and A Certain Lack of Coherence: Writings on Art and
Cultural Politics (London: Kala Press, 1993), a collection of two decades of his writings.
12. Luna first performed this work in 1987 at the San Diego Museum of Man.
13. Carla A. Roberts, ed., The Submuloc Show/Columbus Wohs: A Visual Commentary on the
Columbus Guincentennial from the Perspective of America's First People (Phoenix: Attetl,
1992). For a review of the show see W. Jackson Rushing, "Contrary Iconography: the Submuloc
Show;' The NewArt Examiner(Summer 1994) 30-35.
14. Dobkins, "Art," 212.
15.Janet Berlo, "lntroduction:The FormativeYears of Native American Art History;' in The Early
Yearsof Native American Art History, ed. Janet Berlo {Seattle: University of Washington Press,
1992L 1-21
16. Jolene Rickard, "Indigenous and lrocucian Art as Knowledge: In the Shadow of the Eagle;' (PhD
diss., State University of New York at Buffalo, 1996L 5, 1
17. Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples (London:
Zed Books, Ltd., 1999), 1
18. For an important survey of twentieth-century Indigenous painting and sculpture, see Margaret
Archuleta and Rennard Strickland, eds., Shared Visions: Native American Painters and Sculptors
in the Twentieth Century (New York: The New Press, 1991!.
19. See Nancy 1. Blomberg, ed., Action and Agency: Advancing the Dialogue on Native Performance
Art (Denver, CO: Denver Art Museum, 2010) and Nancy J, Blomberg, ed., {Relinventing the
Wheel: Advancing the Dialogue on Contemporary American Indian Art (Denver, CO: Denver Art
Museum, 2008).
20. Cynthia Chavez Lamar and Sherry Farrell Racette, with Lara Evans, eds., Art in Our Lives: Native
Women Artists in Dialogue (Santa Fe: School of Advanced Research, 2010).
21. Thus far, the titles include The Native Universe and Museums in the Twenty-First Century: The
Significance of the National Museum of the American Indian (Washington, DC: National Muse-
um of the American Indian, 2005); Essays on Native Modernism: Complexity and Contradiction
in American Indian Art (Washington, DC: National Museum of the American Indian, 2006); Karen
Coody Cooper and Nicolasa I. Sandoval, eda., Living Homes for Cultural Expression: North
American Native Perspectives on Creating Community Museums (Washington, DC: National
Museum of the American Indian, 2006): and Vision, Space, oesre: Global Perspectives and
Cultural Hybridity (Washington, D.C.: National Museum of the American Indian, 2006).
22. For brief accounts of early Native photographers, see essays on Benjamin A. Haldane (Tsimshi-
an, 1874-1941). Jennie Ross Cobb {Cherokee, 1881-19591, Martin Chambi (Quechua, 1891-1973)
and Bertha Felix Campigli (Coast Miwok, 1882-1949) by Mique'l Askren, Joan Jensen, Teo Allain
Chambi and Andres Garay Albujar and Theresa Harlan, respectively, in Hulleah J. Tsinhnahjinnie
and Veronica Passalacqua, eds., Our People, Our Lend, Our Images: Internetionallndigenous
Photographers (Berkeley, CA: Heyday Books, 2006), 2-12.
23. Henrietta Lidchi and Hulleah J. Tsinhnahjinnie, ecs., Visual Currencies: Reflections on Native
Photography {Edinburgh: National Museum of Scotland, 2009).
24.ln their introduction to their book on feminism and art history, Norma Broude and Mary D.
Garrard note "some art historians have observed that the death-of-the-author theories emerged,
perhaps not fortuitously, just at the time when feminist scholars were attempting to gain a
place for women artists within the historical canon:' Norma Broude and Mary D. Garrard, The
Expanding Discourse: Feminism and Art History (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1992). 4. For
a discussion on the role of the monograph within a feminist art historical practice see Kristen
Frederickson and Sarah E. Webb, eos., Singuiar Women: Writing the Artist (Berkeley, CA: Univer-
sity of California Press, 2003)
25. Some contemporary artists who have been the focus of these studies include John Hoover,
Jimmie Durham, Truman Lowe, Rick Bartow, Joe Feddersen, James Luna, James Lavedour,
Preston Singletary, Brad Kahlhamer, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith and Rebecca Belmore, to name
a handful. See Julie Decker, John Hoover: Art and Ufe (Seattle: University of Washington Press,
2002!: Laura Mulvey, Dirk Snauwaert and Mark Alice Durant, eds., Jimmie Durham {London:
Phaidon Press, 1995!: Jo Ortel. Woodiand Reflecrions: TheArtofTruman Lowe (Madison: Uni-
versity of Wisconsin Press, 20041: Rebecca Dobkins, Rick Bartow: My Eye (Seattle: University
of Washington Press, 2002); Rebecca J, Dobkins, with Barbara EarlThomas and Gail Tremblay,
Joe Feddersen: Vital Signs (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2008); James Luna, Truman
Lowe, Paul Chaat Smith, Daniel Davis and Kathy Suter, James Luna: Emendatio (Washington,
DC: National Museum of the American Indian, 2005); Vicki Halper, James Lavadour: Landscapes
(Seattle: University 01Washington Press, 2001); Melissa G. Post Preston Singletary: Echoes,
Fire, and Shadows (Seattle: University 01Washington Press, 2009); Charles Cute, Suzanne
Geiss, et al., Brad Kahlhamer(NewYork: Deitch Projects, 2007!; Alejandro Anreus with Gail
Tremblay, Joy Harjo and Lucy Lippard. Subversion/Affirmations: Jaune Quick-to-See Smith-A
Survey (Jersey City, NJ: Jersey City Museum, 1996l; Jessica Bradley, ed., Rebecca Beimore:
Fountain Ikamloops. BC: Kamloops Art Gallery, 2005). As this sampling shows, there is a clear
gender imbalance in the opportunities provided for solo exhibitions.
26. An excellent example of an artist's blog is that run by Larry McNeil, who shares his wisdom
and humor on photography and the human condition, http://www.larrymcneil.comf-Adynamic
blog by an artist and art historian specializing in contemporary Native art is that of Lara Evans,
Not Artomatic: http://travelpeapod.wordpress.comf-NotableisalsoAmericaMeredith'sblog,
Aha/enia: Native American Art History, Writing, Theory and Practice: http://ahalenia.blogspot
com. Irreverent, and at times insightful, is the Native American Indigenous Cinema and Arts
publication, which is no longer active, but an archive can be found at: http://www,thenaica.org/,
although the publishers still maintain a blog at: http://thenaica.orglwordpressl
27. What amounts to a civic engagement manifesto was written in 2004 by Ron Chew, a journalist,
activist and executive director of the Wing luke Museum. See, "Taking Action!" Museum
News (March-April 2004): 38-43. This essay is also availabie at http://www.aam-us.org/pubs/
mnjMN_MA04_TakingAction.cfm. Much has been published on museums, particularly during
the last decade. A selection of important anthologies includes: Ivan Karp and Steven D. levine,
eoe.. Exhibiting Cultures: The Poetics and Politics of Museum Display (Washington, DC and
london: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991); lynne Cooke and Peter Wollen, Visual Display:
Culture BeyondAppearances (New York:The New Press, 1995); Sharon Macdonald and Gordon
Fyfe, eos., Theorizing Museums (Oxford: Blackwell, 1996); David Boswell and Jessica Evans,
eds., Representing the Nation: A Reader/Histories, Heritage, and Museums (New York and
London: Routledge, 1999); "Museum Meanings," a series by Routledge lncludes.Tlm Barringer
and Tom Flynn, eds., Colonialism and the Object: Empire, Material Culture and the Museum
(New York and London: Routledge, 19ge); Eileen Hooper-Greenhill, Museums and the Interpreta-
tion of Visual Culture (New York and London: Routledge, 2000); and Christina F. Kreps, Liberating
Culture: Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Museums, Carstion and Heritage Preservation (New
Yorkand London: Routledge, 2003). Work that is explicitly dedicated to the display of Native
cultures includes: W, RichardWest Jr., ed., The Changing Presentation of the American Indian:
Museums and Native Cultures (Seattle and Washington, DC: University of Washington Press
and National Museum of the American Indian, 2000); lynda Jessup and Shannon 8agg, eds..
On Aboriginal Representation in the Gallery (Hull, QC: Canadian Museum of Civilization, 20021;
Miriam Clavir, Preserving What is Valued: Museums, Conservation, and First Nafions (Vancou-
ver: University of British Columbia, 2002); Laura Peers and Alison K. Brown, eos.. Museums
and Source Communities: A Routledge Reader (New Yorkand London: Routledge, 2003), On
the history of the museum see Tony Bennett, The Birth of the Museum: History, Theory, Politics
(London and New York: Routledge, 1995); Dougias Crimp, On the Museum's Ruins (Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press, 1993); and Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Destination Culture: Tourism, Muse-
ums, and Heritage (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 19981.
28. The National Museum of the American Indian has made available a publication that provides an
overview on developing a tribal museum, available online at: http://www.nmai.si.edu/shop/pdfl
LivingHomesforCulturaIExpression,pdf. Karen Coody Cooper and Nicolesa I. Sandoval, eds., Liv-
ing Homes for Cultural Expression: North American Native Perspectives on Creating Community
Museums (Washington, DC: National Museum of the American Indian, 2006)
29.Nancy Marie Mithlo, "Bed Man's Burden:'The Politics of Inclusion in Museum Settings," Ameri-
can Indian Quarterly (Summer-Fall 2004): 754.
30. For an account of the development of the Warm Springs Museum see Janice Clements, "The
Integration of Traditional Indian Beliefs into the Museum at Warm Springs;' in The Changing
Presentation of the American Indian: Museums and Native Cultures, eo. W. Richard West Jr.
(Seattle and Washington, DC: University of Washington Press and National Museum of the
American Indian, 2000). 67-71
31. For background and analysis of the Makah Cultural and Research Center, see Patricia Pierce
Erikson with Helma Ward and KirkWachendorf, Voices of a Thousand People: The Makah Cul-
tural and Research Center (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2002). and Janine Bowechcp.
"Forging Indigenous Methodologies on Cape Flattery: the Makah Museum as a Center of Col-
laborative Research;' American Indian Quarterly 29, no, 1-2 (Winter-Spring, 2005): 263-273.
32.Amy Lonetree, "This is What Indigenous Curation Looks Like," in Visiting: Conversations on
Curatorial Practice and Native North American Art, eo. Nancy Marie Mithlo, page 6 of insert 3
This publication was produced as a result of a symposium titled "The American Indian Curatorial
Practice" held at the University of Wisconsin-Madison on September 25-27. 2008. An online
copy can be found at http://www.nancymariemithlo.comNisitingbycontent-1,pdl.
33. The history of the museum's creation dates back to 1989 when legislation was passed to estab-
lish the institution as part of the Smithsonian Institution.
34. For an excellent compilation of scholarly responses see Amy Lonetree and Amanda J. Cobb,
sds., The National Museum of the American Indian: Critical Conversations (Lincoln: University
of Nebraska Press, 2008).
35, The curatorial work at the NMAI by Kathleen Ash-Milby, Truman Lowe, Gerald Mcfvlaster and
Paul Chaat Smith is exemplary of this approach.
36, A brief but insightful comparison of developments in Indigenous curatorial practices between
Canada and the US is provided by Ryan Rice, curator of exhibitions at the Museum of Contem-
porary Native Arts, in Mithlo. Visiting, passim. Rice, who is also a practicing artist, received his
degree in curatorial studies from Bard College.
37. A notable circuit of artistic exchange between Native nations in the Pacific and North America
exists as a result of exchanges with various Maori arts groups. There are also various Indig-
enous international film festivals that have helped to establish an international community of
filmmakers and organizations. For a list of festivals visit http://www.nativenetworks.si.edu/eng/
yellow/lestivals.htm.
38. RoverThomas and Trevor Nickells. Aboriginal artists from Australia, were the first Indigenous
artists to exhibit at Venice in a national pavilion in 1990
39.The 1999 exhibition, titled Ceremonial (http://www.nancymariemithlo.com{venice_biennale2009.
htm), included the artists Harry Fonseca, Richard Glazer-Danay,Bob Haozous. Jaune Quick-to-
See Smith, KayWalkingStick, Frank Lepena, Richard RayWhitman and poet Simon Ortiz, The
curatorial team members included Patsy Phillips and Elisabetta Frasca.
40.0n Indigenous curatorial practices, see Lee-Ann Martin, "An/Other One: Aboriginal Art. Cura-
tors, and Art Museums;' in The Edge of Everything: Reflections on Curatorial Practice, ed.
Catherine Thomas (Banff, AB: Banff Centre Press, 2002). 49-56, and Lee-Ann Martin, ed., Mak-
ing a Noisel Aboriginal Perspectives on Art, Art History, Critical Writing and Community (Banff,
AB: Banff Centre Press, 2004).
41 Much has been written on the collecting of Indigenous arts by anthropologists, by collectors
of ethnographic material cultures, by museums, yet not much is known about the collecting
practices by Indigenous collectors. Arguably, this would further the ability of Indigenous peoples
to better participate in the processes that affect the value of Indigenous arts
42.While the impediments for Native artists have a particular history within the process of Western
colonization, a comparison to the marginalization of women within the history of art helps
to highlight the various systemic practices of exclusion also at work for Native artists. For an
assessment of the historical exclusion of women artists, see Linda Nochlin, "Why HaveThere
Been No GreatWomen Artists?" ARTnews (January 1971): 22-39, 67-71
43.ln her review of an exhibition surveying arts produced at the IAIA during the 1960s, Nancy
Marie Mithlo noted the lack scholarship on such a unique institution. She provided two volumes
that address this lack: Joy Gritton, The Institute of American Indian Arts: Modernism and U.S.
Indian Policy (Santa Fe: University of New Mexico Press, 2000), and Winona Garmhausen,
History of Indian Art Education in Santa Fe: The Institute of American Indian Arts with Historical
Background, 1890 to 1962 (Santa Fe: Sunstone Press, 1988). See Nancy Marie Mithlo, "IAIA
Rocks the Sixties: The Painting Revolution at the Institute of American Indian Arts;' Museum An-
thropology 12, no, 2-3 (September 2000): 63-68, There is also a brief but rich overview provided
by Suzan Harjo titled "Arts, Contemporary (Since 1960);' in Encyclopedia of North American
Indians, ed. Frederick E. Hoxie (New'Klfk: Houghton Mifflin Co., 19961: 50-56.
44.The National Museum of the American Indian promotes a variety of contemporary art initiatives
through its Indigenous Contemporary Arts Program,
45, Gerald McMaster, "Crew's Shadow: Art and Community;' in Migrations: New Directions in
Native American Art, ed. Marjorie Devon (Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico Press,
2006), 25.
46. For an analysis of the patterns of giving by large foundations see "Large Foundations' Grantmak-
ing to Native America" a report by Sarah Hicks and Miriam Jorgensen, prepared lor the Harvard
Project on American Indian Economic Development. available at http://s70362.gridserver.com/
sites/default/files/Large-Foundations-Grantmaking-to-Native-America.pdf.
47. For a list of other funding sources, see a list provided by Grantmakers in the Arts at http://Www
giarts ,org/indegenous-resources-native-arts-and-culture-resources.
48. The development of this foundation was primarily the result of efforts led by Elizabeth Theobald
Richards, during her tenure as program officer at the Ford Foundation. A report, titled "Native
Arts and Cultures: Research, Growth and Opportunities for Philanthropic Support" provides an
overview of her advocacy for the development of an independent foundation. The report can be
found at http://www.fordfoundation,org/pdfs/library/Native-Arts-and-Cultures,pdf.
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MUSEUMOF
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MoCNA Director: Patsy Phillips
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