Author: FAAM Staff

Joan Hill, one of the most celebrated Native women painters of the 20th century, walked over to the other side on June 16, 2020. In celebration of her memory, we are sharing her artist profile from FAAM Issue No. 9, Winter 2015/16 online. By Daniel McCoy Jr. (Muscogee/Potawatomi) As a child, I went on trips with my grandparents and my aunt to various museums throughout Northeastern Oklahoma. Among those we frequented were the Gilcrease Museum and Philbrook Museum of Art, both located in Tulsa, and the Five Civilized Tribes Museum of Muskogee. I enjoyed these trips so much; they were…

Issue No. 26, Spring 2020 Click here to purchase a digital copy for $7 from Issuu. To purchase a print copy, select your location: Locations US, New Mexico $9.74 USD US, other than NM $8.99 USD Canada $9.99 USD International $15.92 USD Features Making Masks, Spinning Webs, and 49 Rhythms: The Native Theater Movement of the 1960s and 1970s in the United States by Candice Byrd (Quapaw/Osage/Cherokee Nation), 20–25 Dixza Rugs and Organic Farm: A Benizaa Family Strikes a Balance by Rosa Cays (Chicana), 26–32 Parfleches: How Native Women Pushed the Envelope of Abstraction by America Meredith (Cherokee Nation), 34–39 This…

 By Laura Marshall Clark (Muscogee Creek) If you pass him on the street, he’ll flash a big, infectious grin your way. Even if you don’t know him, you just can’t help smiling back. That happy grin belongs to Santa Fe artist Duhon James, known to many as the “Yiiyah Man.” His first love is relief printing, and he works in drawing, painting, and wood and linoleum block printing. Within the printmaking of this Diné artist are beloved symbols of his Ganado, Arizona, home—sheep, corn, family, hogans, stars—and one more thing. Aliens. Duhon James is Water’s Edge clan, born for Bitter…

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Need some quality viewing during quarantine? Roaring Fire Films’s Neither Wolf Nor Dog stands the test of time By RoseMary Diaz (Santa Clara Pueblo) If you’ve followed the work of the writer, director, and producer Steven Lewis Simpson over the years, you will certainly recognize the artist’s creative signature in his most recent cinematic storytelling endeavor, Neither Wolf Nor Dog. An adaptation of Kent Nerburn’s award-winning, autobiographic book, Neither Wolf Nor Dog: On Forgotten Roads with an Indian Elder (New World Library, 1994), Simpson’s translation is solid and loyal to Nerburn’s page, save the handful of creative liberties exercised in translation. Those…

By Staci Golar Not much makes us pause and stop scrolling on social media these days, but Animkeewa Aankwad White Eagle’s illustrations do. Informed by anime, racial injustice, pop culture, history, politics – and everything else an American Indian teenager observes in his day-to-day life – the work White Eagle posts is highly narrative, conceptually complex, and masterfully illustrated. After seeing his artwork it may not be as much of a surprise to learn that the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa/Kiowa youth hails from a creative, socially conscious family. His parents are the talented Kiowa beadwork artist Teri Greeves (who…

By Jean Merz-Edwards Visiting with us from her home studio in San Francisco, California, mixed-media artist Geralyn Montano (Navajo/Comanche) shares thoughts on the current social and economic climate in the Bay Area. A graduate of the San Francisco Art Institute, Montano uses provocative imagery inspired by personal experiences that relate to feminist and cultural themes in her work. She currently works as a teaching artist at Creativity Explored, a nonprofit organization that helps artists with developmental disabilities. What is the cultural and social climate like in the Bay Area now? In San Francisco, it seems like everything has come to…

Best of Show Howard La Fortune (Tsawout First Nation), Bear Snout Second Place Leith Mahkewa (Oneida Nation of the Thames), I Am Protecting You from Me Third Place “Quill Bill” William M. Mendoza (Oglala Lakota/Sicangu Lakota), Dentalium and Quilled Mask Judge’s Choice heather ahtone: Katrina Mitten (Miami Tribe of Oklahoma), You May Not Kiss The Bride Samonia Byford: Shayai Lucero (Acoma/Laguna), Breath of Life Candice Byrd: Serene Weasel Traveller (Piikani Nation), Face Mask Quilt Kelly Church: Pilar Agoyo (Ohkay Owingeh/Cochiti/Kewa Pueblos), Protection Heather Cox: “Quill Bill” William M. Mendoza (Oglala Lakota/Sicangu Lakota), Dentalium and Quilled Mask Andrea Ferber: Crystal Worl…

The virtual exhibition, Masked Heroes: Facial Coverings by Native Artists, is organized by themes based on subject matter and materials. Masks in the Winged Beings category feature bird, flying insect, and wing imagery or are made with feathers. Abstraction | Four-Leggeds | From the Water | Plant World | Two-Leggeds | Winged Beings

The virtual exhibition, Masked Heroes: Facial Coverings by Native Artists, is organized into themes based on subject matter. This category focuses on humanity. The overwhelming concern in this classification is for honoring and fighting for justice on behalf of the Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women (MMIW), an ongoing crisis that includes the systematic targeting and trafficking of Native women and girls. For more information, please visit the Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women’s website. Abstraction | Four-Leggeds | From the Water | Plant World | Two-Leggeds | Winged Beings