Discovery Center
First Americans Museum • Oklahoma City , Oklahoma • famok . org
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PROJECTS
The RECLAIMING STORIES project is a three-year collaboration between the University of Illinois , Urbana-Champaign ; the Myaamia Center at Miami University in Ohio ; the Miami Tribe of Oklahoma ; and the Peoria Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma . The project strives to reconnect Miami and Peoria people with their legacy of hide painting . Professor Robert Morrissey leads a team of scholars , tribal cultural historians , and tribal members in studying four 17th- and 18th-century hide paintings in the collection of the Musée du Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac in Paris . Michael Galban ( Mono Lake Paiute / Washoe ) and Jamie Jacobs ( Tonawanda Seneca ) led a hide-painting workshop in Miami , Oklahoma , for participating tribal artists .
REPATRIATION
The National Museum of Scotland is repatriating the looted NI ' ISJOOHL MEMORIAL POLE back to the Nisga ' a
Nation in British Columbia . Joanna Moody ( Nisga ' a ) commissioned Oyay Tait and his assistant Gwanes ( both Nisga ' a ) to carve the 36-foot-tall red cedar pole in the 1860s . Anthropologist Marius Barbeau of the National Museum of Canada stole the pole in 1929 and later sold it to the National Museum of Scotland . This is the second totem pole to be repatriated from a European museum back to an Indigenous nation .
IN MEMORIAM
Our community has lost a beloved educator , art collector , and arts advocate LAMBERT WILSON . He lived in Bryson City , North Carolina , with his partner Jenny S . Holland , their beloved dogs , and their vast collection of Native art that he generously loaned for art exhibitions . He encouraged emerging to established artists and worked with regional art venues to feature more Indigenous art . As a board member of the Museum of the Cherokee Indian , Wilson was instrumental in establishing a changing gallery to highlight living artists and engage with the locals at the Qualla Boundary .
“ Lambert Wilson was a great man ,” shares Marcella Yepa ( Jemez / Chickasaw ), a ceramic artist from New Mexico . “ He helped Native American artists as much as he could . I really appreciate all he has done for me . He was loved by many , and he will be missed .”
Lambert Gaines Wilson ( 1954 – 2022 ) was born to Woodrow James Wilson ( 1918 – 1995 ) and Alda Nettie Woodard Wilson ( 1930 – 2018 ), both of Swain County , North Carolina . As a youth , he participated in 4-H and was even voted Mr . Swain County 4-Her in 1968 . After graduating from Swain High School in 1972 , he attended Western Carolina University where he studied middle grade education and earned a bachelor ’ s degree in 1975 and master ’ s in 1977 . In 1980 he earned a specialist degree in school administration . He launched his teaching career in 1975 at Almond School , part
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