First American Art Magazine No. 25, Winter 2020 (Jan–Mar) | Page 10

EDITOR'S GREETING
E
VEN DURING THE DARKEST CHAPTERS in our
history, art has been the vehicle of expression that has
consistently been open to Indigenous peoples of the
Americas. During their imprisonment at Fort Marion,
Southern Plains veterans of the Red River War drew ledger art.
At Carlisle Indian Industrial School, Angel De Cora (Winnebago,
1871–1919) led an art department outfitted with weaving looms,
printing presses, and a state-of-the-art photography studio and
darkroom. John Collier, Indian agent during the Indian New
Deal era, promoted arts for Native communities who had been
devastated by US federal governmental policies. A generation
later, West Baffin Eskimo Cooperative was founded in Kinngait,
Nunavut—the first of many printmaking co-ops—to provide a
livelihood for Inuit people forced to live in permanent settlements.
Lloyd Kiva New (Cherokee Nation, 1916–2002), cofounder of the
Institute of American Indian Arts, saw art as a means to build
young Native people’s self-esteem by allowing them to embrace
their cultural identity and move it forward.
Visual, literary, media, and performing arts, allow audi-
ences insights into the maker’s perspective. Currently developing
a Center for Empathy and the Visual Arts, the Minneapolis
Institute of Arts states, “If we wish to develop not only a more
equal society but a happier and more creative one, we will need to
look outside ourselves and attempt to identify with the experiences
of others. This critical skill is called empathy, which, according to
Roman Krznaric, an expert on empathy, ‘has the power to trans-
form relationships, from the personal to the political, and create
fundamental social change.’” 1 Krznaric believes empathy is “the
art of stepping imaginatively into the shoes of another person,
understanding their feelings and perspectives, and using that
understanding to guide your actions.’” 2
Today, a wealth of information about Native peoples is
available to anyone with a computer or access to a library, but
making the general public care enough to learn about Indigenous
peoples and issues is crucial. Here in the United States, Native
people make up only 0.9 percent to 2 percent of the population,
while in Canada, approximately 4.4 percent of the population are
Indigenous peoples. 3 Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research found:
“The public gets basic facts about the Native community wrong.
When asked, most people admitted not knowing a Native person.” 4
The Reclaiming Native Truth project revealed that invisi-
bility and the systematic erasure of Native peoples from public
awareness and discourse create barriers to overcoming the issues
Native peoples face. “Across the education curriculum, pop culture
entertainment, news media, social media and the judicial system,
the voices and stories of contemporary Native peoples are missing.
above America Meredith (Cherokee Nation), Alexander Posey, 2011, quail
egg tempera on true gesso panel, 8 × 61/2 in., private collection. Alexander
Posey (Muscogee, 1873–1908) was a journalist, humorist, and poet, who
used his Fus Fixico column to speak out against land allotment.
Into this void springs an antiquated or romanticized narrative, ripe
with myths and misperceptions.” 5
Art is our tool to combat invisibility and erasure, because it
has the emotional impact necessary to engage the public. Writing,
film, song, dance, and visual arts allow us to share perspectives
among ourselves and with others, so they can understand us.
Native people leverage the arts’ powers to make a profound impact
on the world, transcending the limits of our demographics—due to
genocide, disease, and displacement—a history the outside world
is seldom willing to consider. Through the power and passions
of our artists, writers, and musicians, we can coax the public to
acknowledge our realities, and this exchange of stories and ideas
benefits not only Native peoples but the larger society, as well.
The United States named Joy Harjo (Muscogee/Cherokee)
as its first Native American poet laureate, and I could not hope for
a better ambassador for our peoples. Harjo writes, “Our arts carry
memories. … Where do we look when we want to know who we
were in the past, to know where we’re going? We look to art, to
the design tracks of our material world.” 6
—America Meredith (Cherokee Nation)
1. “Center for Empathy and the Visual Arts,” Minneapolis Institute of Arts, web.
2. Jon Carfagno and Adam Reed Rozen, “Why Empathy Should Be a Required Core Value for All Museums—Period,” in Fostering Empathy through Museums, ed. Elif M.
Gokcigdem (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2016), 204.
3. Central Intelligence Agency, “United States: People and Society,” The World Factbook, web; Central Intelligence Agency, “Canada: People and Society,” The World Factbook, web.
4. Reclaiming Native Truth, “Research Findings: Compilation of All Research,” June 2018, PDF, 50.
5. Reclaiming Native Truth, “Research Findings,” 8.
6. Joy Harjo, “Thoughts and reflections,” Muscogee Nation News 44, no. 1 (January 1, 2014), via Archive.org, web.
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