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Female Native American artists are an important yet often overlooked part of this country’s history and current artists. For many Americans, the only indigenous women that they can think of are Sacagawea and Pocahontas but as characters, not as individuals with real lives. In one act of preserving Native art history, Edmonia Lewis’s sculptures show strong, female, Native characters, and she herself is a strong, female, Native creator. This collection showcases many different voices of many different women to help combat the stereotypes that Native women face today. They are not victims nor characters in white men’s narratives but creators in their own right. Native women have been artists since before colonization through passing down traditional art forms. The act of passing down traditions is something that will continue for as long as there are younger generations to teach, but as time continues, the ways that these traditions will be passed down will adapt to the current worldview. For a more contemporary artistic preservation, Wendy Red Star shows a modern version of teaching beadwork to younger generations through photography. The Edd sisters learned from their mother, Esther Belin, in a variety of ways that extend pass tradition and more into artistic expression of a marginalized group. Belin instilled a sense of individuality within her daughters. Although they are all artists, they each reach into different kinds of art forms: photography, painting, poetry, and filmmaking. All of these women use art as a means to voice a usually unheard perspective, both past and present. The most present issue in this collection is JB’s music video that brings emphasis to the missing and murdered indigenous women. This is an issue that many tribes all over the continent are facing, and JB, like all of these women in this exhibit, is using her platform to bring recognition to important Native, female-centric issues.

Every piece of art in this collection is more than itself. They are representations of a dynamic community. Many different customs and traditions exist within each of the hundreds of tribes in the United States, and these pieces of art and the artists are showcases of the differences. Although there are different forms of art, from photography, music, videos, painting, poetry, to sculpture, they can all come together to show a sense of female comradery and an exploration of self. ‘Nativeness’ is not something that can be measured, and many of these artists use their art as a way to find their place within a complex and difficult history of indigenous peoples. Lewis specifically explores her heritage as half Native and half African by creating a sculpture of a fictional Native American figure she looked up to. Belin uses her art to navigate through the confusing experience of growing up in the time of the Indian Relocation Act by writing about parallel experiences in the city and on her reservation. The most important thing to takeaway from this collection is that each woman, no matter how similar, express their heritage and ‘Nativeness’ differently. They are individuals first and foremost and have their own views and perspectives of what it means to be a Native American woman. This is why most of these artists showed are still alive today, and creating new, contemporary artwork. Their modern art collected together in one place can work to take back the artistic expression that colonization has stolen from them. Many current museums curated by the United States Government do not accurately portray history, nor show that specifically female artists are existing and thriving today, they are still a incredibly under-represented group that deserves a platform to express themselves. Together, these pieces showcase how differently a group of women can express something so hard to define and how incredibly talented a multitude of female Native American artists are.

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Image: Minnehaha; marble, 1868
Edmonia Lewis was a biracial (African-American and Chippewa Native American) sculptor of the late 1800s. She was born in 1844 and orphaned at 5 years old. She grew up with her mother's Chippewa tribe and eventually attended Oberlin College. However, she never finished due to accusations that she poisoned her white roommates and stole art supplies. Despite this, she went on to study under sculptors in Boston and eventually Italy. She adopted a neoclassical style and uses it to depict her duel heritage and support abolitionists (anti-slavery heroes) in marble sculptures. The "ethnic and humanitarian subject matter" Lewis depicted separated her from other neoclassical artists of her time. In 1868, Lewis created a bust of Minnehaha, a fictional Native American character from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's epic poem, The Song of Hiawatha. There are few famous Native women celebrated in art, and most people only think of Pocahontas and Sacagawea who were real women. By showcasing a powerful female Native character in a positive and artistic way, Lewis helps normalize the idea that they can be as well-known and celebrated as non-minority characters.

Website: https://americanart.si.edu/artist/edmonia-lewis-2914

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Image: Bringing Hannah Home
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/53454/bringing-hannah-home
Esther Belin is an artist and poet, and she is also the mother to the Edd Sisters in the previous post. Her Diné Navajo heritage gives her an unique insight to some of the problematic treatment towards indigenous peoples as her parents were part of the Indian Relocation Act. Most of her artwork and poetry revolves around being a Native American woman in an urban area and addresses themes of assimilation, "racism, alienation, and substance abuse" (Poetry Foundation). She has published two collections of poetry, and her first, From the Belly of My Beauty, received the American Book Award in 2000. In Belin's poem, "Bringing Hannah Home," which is part of her first book, it is unclear if the two characters are burying a stillborn child or just burying the placenta, but either way, her use of silent female camaraderie is powerful. She mentions in the poem how she felt when she and her family had to bury her father, how natural it is to return to the ground in her Dinétah culture. With the overwhelming sense of tradition and togetherness, it feels as though even if they are burying Hannah, everything will be all right.
Websites: https://www.estherbelin.com/
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/esther-belin

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The Edd Sisters: Ruthie, Sierra, Chamisa, and Santana

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The Edd Sisters: Ruthie, Sierra, Chamisa, and Santana

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Image: "Bound to Empire" 2017
The Edd sisters run a small business called EDD GIRL ART where they each showcase their talents. They are part of the Diné Navajo tribe and live in Dibe' Ntsaa'. Ruthie uses photography and painting to portray different forms of justice in her resistance art. Sierra is a triple threat of artist, poet, and filmmaker who focuses on the lives and future of Native women. Chamisa creates films and is an artist who takes influence from Japanese art and urban life and emphasizes the "cultural significance of land." Santana is a poet and painter that creates art based on her life and confronts Native youth issue. As genetic and cultural sisters, these four women empower each other and all Native women with their wide variety of work. They are an important example that togetherness and community can uplift those whose voices may not usually be heard. In Sierra's painting, "Bound to Empire," the colonization of Native Americans is the focus. However, she depicts America and indigenous people as one woman. This showcases how colonizers built what America is today on the backs of Native Americans, specifically women. The indignities that Native women have gone through frequently go overlooked in the big picture of colonization, but Sierra focuses on it.
Website: https://www.eddgirlart.com/

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Video: Still Here by JB the First Lady
JB the First Lady is a woman of many musical and social talents: one being labeled as a rapper. Her full name is Jerilynn Webster, and she is a First Nation's indigenous woman specifically from Nuxalk and Onondaga Nations. A woman who wears many hats, she is a "hip hop and spoken word artist, beat-boxer, cultural dancer and youth educator." Webster has four studio albums that use traditional indigenous culture in a new pop-culture way. In her own unique way, she is continuing oral history and challenging political issues such as "residential schools and missing and murdered indigenous women." Her voice carries stories of Native women who are not heard and defies stereotypes of what we think rappers are supposed to be. Webster's music video Still Here is rich with historical and current issues that indigenous people and minorities have faced and are still facing. The title implies that despite all of the hardships, indigenous people have survived and still very much here. She mentions "city that gets no clean water" in reference to Flint, Michigan and "missing brother, missing mother, missing daughters" in reference to all of the missing Native Americans. The imagery has ties to familiar Native textiles, but shown in a modern way. There are also shirts hanging up with photographs of missing women. She shows incredible female solidarity and proof that there are people who still care about these missing women.
Website: https://www.jbthefirstlady.ca/

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Photo: Apsáalooke Feminist #1
Wendy Red Star is a contemporary artist whose work ranges from “photography, sculpture, video, fiber arts, and performance.” As an Apsáalooke (Crow) Native, she strives to incorporate a generational and female voice to her Native American centered art. Her work is displayed in multiple museums, and she is a visiting lecturer at multiple institutions. Red Star takes her position of power as a Native American woman in the spotlight and uses it to bring attention to “the intersections of Native American ideologies and colonialist structures.” Not only does her work showcase perspectives that are usually unseen, she is a woman that young Native American girls can look up to as shown in the picture. She makes an effort to include Native youth in her artwork in a way that they would have been included centuries ago. Specifically in this piece, she is showing the importance of teaching textiles and bead work to younger generations.
Website: http://www.wendyredstar.com/home