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“A lot of the artists are expressing that they thought they were alone in this struggle, that they were the only ones having a hard time.”

—Leslie Deer (Muscogee), NAPD Trainer

When a cascade of canceled events started in March 2020, First Peoples Fund (FPF) heard directly from artists, community members, and relatives who shared their greatest needs, from income loss to lack of human connection.

In response, Hillary Presecan, FPF Program Manager of Community Development, reached out to Native Artist Professional Development (NAPD) trainers to discover what they felt was most critical to share through training.

“The NAPD trainers stepped up to a whole new level,” Hillary says. “Our trainers are part of our community, and they are artists to the core. It’s great that I’m able to say, ‘Tell me what you think people need. I want you to educate me on how we need to use our platform as an Indigenous organization.’”

Together with NAPD trainers already committed for the annual First Peoples Fund fellows convening and NAPD trainings across the country (all cancelled due to COVID), Hillary found ways to address the community’s needs. One of the challenges was shifting the NAPD curriculum to virtual training. Out of that developed the online “Resilience Webinar Series.”

Knowing it would be difficult for people to sit in front of a screen for eight hours straight, FPF chose drip feed training to break down the topics and allow people to get a taste of what the NAPD has to offer. One of those topics was “Planning the Artist Calendar,” drawn from the Marketing section of the manual.

Leslie Deer (Muscogee) — 2016 Artist in Business Leadership Fellow and NAPD trainer — led that session from the sewing studio in her home in Holdenville, Oklahoma.

“It’s important in these times to know how to plan for the future,” Leslie says. “[Continuing to learn] keeps people’s minds focused on what’s next. What can I be doing, or what opportunities are available? What are other artists doing? How is everyone coping? It is beneficial to network with others, and I think the Resilience Webinars Series is really, really important for artists.”

Hillary’s colleague, Rolling Rez Arts coordinator Bryan Parker (White Mountain Apache, Muscogee Creek, Mississippi Choctaw), knows it is critical to share inspiration. He launched “Saturday Art Live,” a vibrant, upbeat mix of performing and visual artists to bring a light of hope and inspiration to relatives around the world. The sessions include a 10-minute performing arts segment and an artist demonstration, offering both kinds of artists a platform to showcase their work.

“Before, the Rolling Rez Arts bus was limited on where we went, what community we provided resources to,” Bryan says. “Since everything was going virtual, my idea was to send the Rolling Rez out everywhere, virtually, and to utilize our fellows more with the program.”

2015 Artist in Business Leadership fellow Micheal Two Bulls (Oglala Lakota) got creative with his visual art session on printmaking, reimagining how he could share with a wide audience in a simplified way. He chose cyanotype printmaking as the most accessible for people, especially youth, to follow along as if they were at the bus, doing the project hands-on.

“You don’t need a lot of material, and what you need is relatively easy to find,” Micheal says. “It was great to have Bryan because while I was working, people would ask questions in the comments, and he would facilitate it. So it was a nice flow.”

The online interactions often continued with people private messaging or emailing each other. One thing viewers latched onto was that many of the artists were presenting from their studios.

It was the first time Micheal had opened his newer studio, located in his basement, to other artists.

“These times are hard, but there is some light,” Micheal says. “You get more access to artists with them streaming from their studios, talking through their processes.”

“It’s very relatable,” Bryan says. “When you see somebody else’s studio that may be set up similar to yours, it doesn’t make you feel as lost or helpless, in that you don’t have all the tools you want. You see somebody who’s making it work with what they have, and you think, ‘If they can do it with minimal resources, so can I.’”

“By sharing these cultural practices and cultural history, hopefully, we’ll be able to move forward in a more positive light,”

The Resilience Webinar Series, Saturday Art Live, and On the Virtual Road with Rolling Rez Arts, led by FPF artists and trainers, help meet the needs of artists, community members, and relatives with inspiration and training to keep them focused on what’s next.

“By sharing these cultural practices and cultural history, hopefully, we’ll be able to move forward in a more positive light,” Bryan says. “My whole idea with the video series is to inspire people, and to celebrate arts and culture.”

Surrounded by family and loved ones touched by her lifetime of basket making, Molly Neptune Parker (Passamaquoddy) passed peacefully in June 2020. The matriarch of four generations of Passamaquoddy basketweavers, Molly left behind footprints for future generations to walk in. She was a 2008 First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Awards (CSA) recipient and lived a life dedicated to the preservation of Passamaquoddy traditions and values.

Born in Indian Township, Maine, in 1939, Molly would sit and watch her mother make baskets. Molly gathered leftover scraps of ash and sweet grass from her mother's work and played with them.

The basket making process began with her dad pounding ash trees with the bottom of an ax to loosen each ring around the tree. Going from one end of the tree to the other, he loosened upwards to 20 rings. Molly's mother, and the other women of her family, stripped and split the ash into the correct thickness for basketweaving, depending on if they were making work baskets or fancy baskets.

Instead of going outside to play like the other children, Molly fooled around with scrap material, her interest growing with age. She soon began picking out useable material from her mother's little basket to weave, starting a 75 year journey of making baskets.

In her early twenties, Molly married a truck driver who hailed from a family of basket weavers. In the off times of work, together with a few others, Molly and her husband made 100 baskets per week to sell to fish factories.

Molly gravitated back to fancy baskets in the early '70s. She developed her signature acorn basket that features an ash flower on top, a design used by her mother and grandmother.

It wasn't long after that Molly began selling fancy baskets at craft fairs. Every time she sold a basket, she put the money in a special account, eventually saving enough for a downpayment on a home.

Molly rapidly gained recognition in the art world, though for Molly, her craft was about looking forward and also looking back to her ancestors, determined to carry on their traditions. She studied and handled baskets from present to past, up to 200 years old, from several tribes. She even had an opportunity to see a basket made by her great-grandmother.

"When I hold a basket of someone who has gone before, I am holding part of them, and it is a link to the future and all the hands that will hold it."

In her 2008 CSA application, Molly said, "When I hold a basket of someone who has gone before, I am holding part of them, and it is a link to the future and all the hands that will hold it. Art is both a way of healing by learning the discipline of basket making while being a means of expression."

Nominated by First Peoples Fund CSA honoree and Native Artist Professional Development trainer Theresa Secord (Penobscot), Molly's CSA award acknowledged her leadership in the resurgence of basketry in Maine. On Molly's passing, Theresa wrote:

"Molly Neptune Parker of Indian Township, Maine, was a natural leader in the resurgence of Wabanaki basketry among the four tribes; Passamaquoddy, Penobscot, Micmac, and Maliseet. Like a few other elders keeping the tradition alive, she continued to weave and teach Passamaquoddy basketry, during the times in the last century before there were higher prices and awards for doing so. She is credited with helping to save the endangered (at the time) ash and sweet grass basketry tradition in Maine. During Molly's nearly 20 year tenure as president of the Maine Indian Basketmakers Alliance, the average age of basket makers decreased from 63 to 40, and numbers increased from 55 founding members to around 150, bringing forth a new younger generation of ash and sweet grass basket makers. Some of these basket makers have gone on to win national acclaim for their artistry and earn viable livings through their practice, ensuring the art form will survive."

"As Gal Frey (Passamaquoddy basket maker) said upon her passing, 'Molly's loss represents the end of an era of Wabanaki basketry, where people grew up learning their traditional basketry and speaking their language in the home.' There are strong efforts currently underway to save and revive these practices thanks to the hard work and steadfast commitment of people like Molly. She is sadly missed by her family, the Passamaquoddy tribe, and the entire Wabanaki community."

The National Endowment for the Arts recognized Molly as a National Heritage Fellow in 2012, the nation's highest honor in the arts, a lifetime achievement award. Molly earned numerous awards and recognition in her lifetime, but it always came back to mentoring the next generation.

She had ten children — six natural and four adopted — and taught basket making to the ones who were interested. When her grandchild, Geo Neptune (Passamaquoddy) was four years old, they asked their grandmother if they could sit with her and make baskets. They now create their own designs, staying with traditional, yet incorporating their own style into each basket they make.

Molly was a conduit between the past generations of basket makers and future ones.

"There are more people today making baskets then there were in the '70s," Molly said in an interview with the National Endowment for the Arts. "They realize the value of the work, not only for money but to continue the tradition. They're finally realizing how important it is to carry on the tradition our forefathers started.”

"Art is both a way of healing by learning the discipline of basket making while being a means of expression."

Northern Arapaho and African American poet CooXooEii (pronounced Jaw-Kah-Hay) Black grew up with family in close proximity on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming. His mixed-race heritage and his family heavily influence his poetry. Over the past few years, he has focused on learning the Arapaho language and ceremonies. The language and ideas surrounding their ceremonies are an inspiration for most of his writings.

CooXooEii is currently attending Colorado College, graduating in the spring of 2020 with a degree in creative writing. He is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellow.

“I believe [readers] will get an idea of how poetry can pass on ancestral knowledge and lead to self-discovery,”

“Am I saying this right?”

Last summer, CooXooEii sat with his grandmother in her house on the Wind River Indian Reservation. Language worksheet in hand, he practiced his daily lesson with her. They went through fluctuations and the hard-hitting syllables.

But CooXooEii was discovering more than the proper way to speak the language. He connected with his grandmother and who she is.

“I always knew she was a fluent Arapaho speaker,” he says. “But until last summer, when I started practicing with her, hearing her speak it, I realized how powerful the language is and how powerful she is.”

CooXooEii’s goal with his First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship is to create a book of 50 original poems that pass on knowledge of his people. As he learns from his elders, people will learn from his poetry.

“The Arapaho language is a descriptive language,” CooXooEii says. “Instead of calling an item what it is, the Arapaho language describes it. For example, ‘coffee’ is woo’teenowuu’ and it is translated as black water or black liquid. The translations sometimes won’t be perfect, but it’s been amazing learning our language because it’s a different way to think of the world. I’ve been focusing more on detail in the things around me. I wonder how an item might be described or understood through imagery. This was powerful for me to learn because I had already used imagery in my poems. So not only has it given me a new way of interacting with the world around me, it’s aided my writing as well.”

Poetry has also been a way for him to engage with his experiences as a racially mixed person living in an Indigenous community.

My Grandpa Speaks Arapaho

when arapaho fills my mouth

my spirit craves to speak

with my grandpa the way he did with his parents.

i'm not fluent.

english tastes bitter when it brushes against arapaho words

and tells them how to work if they want to be in its structure.

i want to speak as if our language wasn't forced from our land

and drowned in bloody-beat knuckles in boarding schools.

our land

our land.

i imagine my grandpa,

my grandpa's grandpa,

and the land that held him.

the same land so crucial to parks

and to hot springs swimming pools.

my grandpa tells me

you have it easier

you have everything you need.

in some ways, i believe him

but it's hard when you realize how much has been lost

what's it like to lose something

you've never completely had?

i've been told if you know your language

you know yourself.

sometimes i'm not sure if i know myself

i've read books on our tribe and never finished them,

have so many questions and never asked them,

ceremonies i have yet to learn,

things i do not recognize

blood i don't know

grandpa, who am i???

don't worry grandpa,

i'm learning our music,

i'm learning our dances,

i speak

whether it's one word or two words,

i'm not fluent,

i've seen our land,

And i still have my hair —

—CooXooEii Black

‍

“I believe [readers] will get an idea of how poetry can pass on ancestral knowledge and lead to self-discovery,” he says. “As I’m teaching my fellow tribal members to process their situations through writing, and teaching them about their heritage, we will all be empowered.”

Kawerak, Inc., a regional non-profit Alaska Native corporation, provides services within the Bering Strait Region of northwestern Alaska which covers about 23,000 square miles on the Seward Peninsula. They serve approximately 7,400 Alaska Native residents from twenty federally recognized tribes located throughout sixteen communities.

Kawerak is headquartered in the hub community of Nome and employs 230 individuals. One of their missions is to advance the arts community within the Bering Strait Region. Through its Community Planning and Development department, Kawerak provides technical assistance to approximately 30 artists in the region per year.

“You start[ed] your parka, and I want to see you finish it,” Aunt Adeline said.

When Lydia Apatiki (Sivuqaghhmii) wanted to learn how to make bird skin parkas, her aunt became her mentor. Partway through the difficult project, Lydia wanted to give up, but her aunt wouldn’t let her.

Lydia did finish. Learning the traditional stitching and eventually mastering it, she has now completed several parkas. But she isn’t keeping the knowledge to herself.

Partnering with First Peoples Fund (FPF) and Kawerak Inc., Lydia created a curriculum to share her cultural knowledge.  

“Lydia and her husband Jerome participated in one of the FPF Native Artist Professional Development [NAPD] Trainings in Gambell,” Alice Bioff (Inupiaq) says. Alice works in Kawerak’s Community Planning and Development department as the Business Planning Specialist. “We’ve built a relationship with Lydia and Jerome. Lydia had this amazing mission to create a sewing curriculum. Through her enthusiasm and commitment to the project, she was able to complete it with the support of First Peoples Fund.”

Kawerak, Inc. received an Indigenous Arts Ecology (IAE) grant in 2018. They used it in part to host NAPD trainings, reaching out to rural artists like Lydia who had received a 2017 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital fellowship. The region it serves includes St. Lawrence Island, King Island, Little Diomede Island, and the communities along the eastern and southeastern shores of Norton Sound. Three culturally distinct groups of Indigenous people — Inupiaq, Central Yup’ik, and St. Lawrence Island Yupik — have lived in the region for thousands of years.

The main focus of the IAE grant for Kawerak was completing an artist survey that would be developed into a report, “Arts of the Bering Strait Region.” The study illustrates the intersection of art with the culture, economy, and place of rural artists. One-on-one interviews with artists in their homes, along with three focus groups, revealed how artists are vital contributors to their communities’ existing economic landscapes. According to the study, “…hunters and gatherers combine subsistence harvesting with the cash economy to offset the high cost of living in rural Alaska. Families must navigate this new landscape, and the sale of art plays a critical role in the balance. Today, artists are economic drivers within their communities.”

“Working with our partners, we are looking at developing a program to support the arts in the region,” Alice says. “Utilizing the data to support that effort, we can show why the support is needed.”

The focus groups gave Bering Strait artists the opportunity to voice their suggestions on strengthening the practice of traditional arts and crafts forms in the region:

• Establish dedicated arts-and-crafts workplaces in communities.
• Increase education and awareness about ivory ban issues, their potential implications, and action-steps.
• Promote education about and develop opportunities for advertising and selling works online.
• Build a network of art dealers who pay equitable prices for work.
• Encourage youth interest in art.
• Provide educational opportunities to learn traditional arts, including ways to learn skills requiring use of legally protected materials (e.g. walrus ivory, baleen).
• Explore ways to support insurance and shipping costs associated with sending artwork to purchasers.
• Encourage grassroots organization around arts sales, such as supporting small groups of people transporting the work of multiple artists to conferences.
• Promote intergenerational teaching and interactions about art and crafts (particularly within families).

The study also affirmed much of what Lydia was already experiencing, especially when it comes to the transference of cultural knowledge through the generations — critical, yet often not readily available.

“It broke my heart when a young lady wanted to learn how to make a bird skin parka but had no one to teach her,” Lydia said.

Lydia’s traditional sewing curriculum is now on her website for educational programs and individuals to download for a small fee.

“There’s a direct connection between our subsistence activities providing for the family, food security, and the arts,” Alice says. “It’s all interwoven, all connected, and having access to those resources and advocating for that is important.”

Note: Kawerak, Inc. would like to thank the following organizations and individuals for their contributions to this study:

All artists and crafters who participated in the survey, focus groups, and interviews.

Randall Jones, Isabelle Ryan, and all tribal offices that helped distribute and collect surveys.

Artists who agreed to be photographed and have their photos used in the report.

McDowell Group for developing the report.

Dartmouth Interns Tia Yazzie and Shelby Fitzpatrick.

Photos by Taylor Booth Photography; Katie Miller; Alice Bioff, Nome; Huda Ivanoff, Unalakleet; and Danielle Slingsby, Nome.

Kawerak, Inc. (Danielle Slingsby, Donna James, Julie Raymond- Yakoubian, Vera Metcalf, Patti Lillie, MaryJane Litchard, Rose Fosdick, Carol Piscoya, Alice Bioff [Project Lead].

Kinsale Hueston (Diné) is a 2017-2018 National Student Poet and a sophomore at Yale University. An enrolled member of the Navajo Nation, Kinsale’s work centers on personal histories, Diné stories, and contemporary issues affecting her tribe. She is the recipient of the Yale Young Native Storytellers Award for Spoken Word/Storytelling, the J. Edgar Meeker Prize (May 2019, Yale University), and three National Scholastic Gold Medals for poetry and dramatic script. In February 2019, she was named one of “34 People Changing How We See the World” by Time Magazine in its Optimists Issue.

Kinsale is a 2020 First Peoples Fund (FPF) Cultural Capital Fellow and a national Mellon Mays scholar.

As she performed spoken word poetry in Los Angeles, a familiar face in the audience caught Kinsale’s attention. It was one of her former writing workshop students from Sherman Indian High School in Riverside, California.

After the performance, Kinsale connected with him and his two friends who had come to hear her perform.

“He told me that our workshops at his school had changed his outlook on art and poetry,” she says. “It was now something he was pursuing seriously as a writer in the LA area and was encouraging other Indigenous youth to pursue as well. It was a wonderful moment.”

This is a part of who Kinsale is as a poet — working with Indigenous youth to draw out their talents. One of the ways she shares with others is by holding community workshops to communicate Indigenous values and stories through poetry and spoken word.

“Most of the time we focus on finding creative ways to write about ancestral lands, ancestors, and key figures in our lives,”

“Most of the time we focus on finding creative ways to write about ancestral lands, ancestors, and key figures in our lives,” she says. “At the end of a series of workshops I usually collect work and produce a chapbook for participants and their home communities that can be displayed or shared.”

Kinsale has taken this a step further by launching Changing Womxn Collective with support from her FPF Cultural Capital Fellowship. Kinsale’s team helps her monitor social media and curate the writing.

“It’s been a lot of fun to see different women of color, Indigenous women, submit work and see their reactions when it’s published,” she says. “For a lot of them, it’s the first time they’ve been published. We don’t have the same selection processes of other literary magazines. We have a very fast turnaround, so I think it creates much more of a community feel than a literary magazine in the traditional sense.”

Much of the inspiration for Kinsale’s writing comes from stories her maternal Diné family passed down. She says, “To properly function as culture bearers and those who will pass on our knowledge to future generations, we must find outlets and ways to adapt, preserve, and keep our communities’ stories alive.”

SOUTH SHÁDI’ÁÁH

In beauty I walk Hózhóogo naasháa doo

God translation spoken in Diné

Open throat upturn hands

Trail marked with pollen

Naasháa doo I will have a light body

I will be happy forever Shideigi but I am only saying words

Hózhó náhásdlíi’ my words will be beautiful

But only if I remember His name Shideigi

hózhóogo naasháa doo open mouth open hands

I walk home in beauty

-Kinsale Hueston

‍

Banner image: Urban Rez, 2016 by Kevin Michael Campbell

The aloha spirit flowed and coalesced to bring Hawai’i to the Pacific Northwest.  “Off the islands” Native Hawaiians and non-Natives came together in July 2019 at the 17th annual “4 Days Of Aloha” in Esther Short Park in Vancouver, Washington to experience true Hawaiian culture — singing, drumming, hula dancers of all ages and skills, vibrant leis, and Native arts.

Thanks to a 2019 First Peoples Fund Our Nations’ Spaces (ONS) grant, event host Ke Kukui Foundation was able to extend the three-day festival to a fourth day. The additional day included Pa’ina (a gathering that involves food and eating), Hapa Haole Hula Competition, Ho’ike (to showcase what they learned), a 5K Aloha Fun Run, coconut weaving workshops, and fresh lei making. It also highlighted other ethnic and Indigenous groups through a multicultural showcase that included Japanese Taiko drummers, Chinese lion dancing, Filipino dancing, and blessings from the Cowlitz Tribe. Attendance at the event nearly doubled from 23,000 visitors in 2018 to 42,000 in 2019.

“The thing I’m hearing about a lot now is the spirit within the people,” said Kaloku Holt (Native Hawaiian). “The people attending, the vendors, all the staff that is involved, presenters, instructors; there’s just a spirit of aloha that you [normally] only find in Hawai’i. You’re [now] finding it in Vancouver, Washington.”

When the longtime leader of the event, Deva Yamashiro (Native Hawaiian), passed a few years ago, her son Kaloku took the lead. Kaloku is a 2016 First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership fellow and Executive Director of the Ke Kukui Foundation. Through funding from the ONS grant, he spearheaded expanding the “4 Days of Aloha.” The expansion created opportunities to involve more Hawaiian artists, bringing them from the islands to teach cultural workshops so that Native and non-native families could experience a one-of-a-kind encounter with Hawaiian culture in the Pacific Northwest.

“It’s an amazing thing to step back and watch it unfold,” Kaloku said.

“Teaching about Hawaiian cultural traditions is important to those family members that have moved to the Pacific Northwest that are far removed from their ancestral roots in Hawai’i,”

Ke Kukui Foundation, based in Vancouver, was founded in 2007. Its goal is to provide programs in and for the community, its elders (kupuna), and its youth so that the young ones can learn the traditions and ways of the Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders and become cultural bearers for future generations in the Pacific Northwest. In 2010, the foundation opened the Ke Kukui Arts and Cultural Center, which gave them a place to offer cultural programs and workshops, as well as a place for the youth to gather and learn from their kupuna. Ke Kukui Foundation believes it is essential for Native youth to learn about their cultural heritage even though they do not live on their homeland.

“Teaching about Hawaiian cultural traditions is important to those family members that have moved to the Pacific Northwest that are far removed from their ancestral roots in Hawai’i,” said Vicky Holt Takamine (Native Hawaiian). She is a longtime FPF partner, kumu hula (master teacher of Hawaiian dance), and Executive Director of the PAʻI Foundation. Known as the kumu of Hawai’i’s kumu, Aunty Vicky, as she is known by many, has traveled to share her mana’o (thoughts or ideas) and talents at the Days of Aloha event, offering participants a rare, unique experience to learn from renowned kumu.

“I taught two classes, and then we showcased that class at Esther Short Park with all the visitors and family and friends that came out to see what was happening,” Vicky said. “It’s been a wonderful opportunity to work with the Ke Kukui Foundation for the last 17 years. They’re so enthusiastic. It’s really amazing because people came from as far as New Jersey and Canada, and all along the Pacific Northwest, and California, to learn hula.”

Each year, the festival opens the door for Native artists to move beyond their own space to access a new market and for Native performing arts groups to share their history, talents, and culture before thousands of spectators. The festival is a vehicle for current and new Native artists to express their craft.

Since adding the fourth day and actively increasing the foundation’s presence in the community, the Ke Kukui Foundation now works with new vendors, officials, and other organizations in the community and beyond. This happened by continuing to promote the aloha spirit, reaching out to new Native artists, tapping their skill sets, and using that focus to strengthen ongoing and new relationships within and beyond the community.

The family-friendly event draws in thousands of visitors each year, gaining recognition and positive momentum for the foundation. It creates visibility in the community and sets an example of building positive impact for the youth. Families come to enjoy Hawaiian culture through workshops, the variety of products from Hawai’i, and watching performing arts on stage.

There is something for everyone, and it is encouraged to participate together in aloha. The foundation hopes people “walk away with their hearts feeling full from the friendships, knowledge, and meaningful memories gained.”

The spirit of aloha that comes from within, once demonstrated by Deva Yamashiro, now lives through the seeds she planted. Reconnecting Native Hawaiians with their culture is a huge part of the festival’s mission — a way of glueing the community together simply by sharing aloha.

Note: Our Nations' Spaces grants expand opportunities for Native performing artists within and beyond their own communities and are generously funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

Flora Jones (Red Lake Ojibwe) is a pillar of the Red Lake community in Red Lake, Minnesota. Her art includes quilt making, sewing traditional Ojibwe regalia, beading, and quillwork. She volunteers her time to children, young adults, and elders, sharing her skills. She has received numerous awards at fairs, powwows, and community events, and was awarded a 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship.

It only took one yard of material for young Flora to make herself a pair of jeans. At boarding school in the 1960s, Flora learned to make her own clothes, and she continued sewing throughout her life. But she didn’t take it on as an art form until her daughter was at Red Lake high school in the 1990s, and Flora volunteered in the home economics classroom. It was there she learned the art of quilting.

“We started off making ‘trip around the world’ quilts, and I’ve been sewing ever since,” she says.

Flora began selling quilts and became proficient in star quilts. She shops sales at the local stores, gathering as much fabric as she can. At home, she lays out materials by shade and color, eyeing the combinations and picking out what catches her attention. Blues, blacks, reds, yellows. Her culture plays a substantial role, especially when she spots colors that remind her of the eagle or turtle.

“Some years ago, my sister, Earlene, bought me a new sewing machine, and it was then I decided I could do business with my sewing skills,” Flora says. “I have always wanted to start my own business in sewing and teaching others to make a star quilt, especially the younger children.”

After a few years, Flora found herself teaching people in her community how to quilt and to bead. Her First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship is going toward hosting classes at the Northwest Indian Community Development Center located in Bemidji, Minn.

“I think it would have a great impact on the Indigenous community in Bemidji to learn the ways I was taught,” she says. “I want to thank you all [FPF] for everything you have given me and what I was able to buy with the money. It’s just a pleasure, and I wouldn’t have been able to do that without you.”

Grown from the little girl who could wear jeans made from one yard of material, Flora is now teaching her granddaughters to sew and bead.

“They are 17 and 15 years old,” she says. “I’ve been having them sew with me. One is kind of leery of the sewing machine, but she is learning. I told them you’ve just got to keep on. The most rewarding experience with my art is making people happy with what they can do and make when they come and sew with me.”

Delina White is an enrolled member of the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, Minnesota Chippewa Tribal Nation. An award-winning artist, Delina learned to create functional art — apparel and accessories such as moccasins, bags, and garments — using the traditional methods and designs reflective of the natural surroundings of the woodlands. She specializes in creating her own fabrics from her original beadwork designs. Her work mixes traditionally Indigenous materials with contemporary fabrics.

Delina is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership fellow, residing in Walker, Minnesota.

Birchbark, wampum, shells, pearls, gemstones — Delina makes her material selections carefully. Indigenous materials that touch the heart. Blends of old and new, traditional and contemporary. The materials not only go into making a unique piece of jewelry; they serve a secondary purpose ever since Delina expanded her beadwork by using those beaded designs to create her own fabrics.

When her mother passed some years ago, Delina was left with the task of sewing regalia for the family. Sewing wasn’t something she had focused on, but circumstances forced her to learn. She started with ribbon skirts, bringing what she made into the everyday lives of her family. It led her down a new path that morphed into fashion shows and education.

“My work re-tells stories of the people who live on the great fresh waters, within its forests among the once bountiful fur-bearing animals,"

“My work re-tells stories of the people who live on the great fresh waters, within its forests among the once bountiful fur-bearing animals,” she says.

Delina enjoys doing beadwork for medicine bags, pipe bags, handbags, and bandolier bags, but had gotten away from those pieces for a time. She began looking at ways to bring her beadwork and sewing together.

“I wanted to do something contemporary, and to incorporate our traditional materials because I have an affinity for textures,”

“I wanted to do something contemporary, and to incorporate our traditional materials because I have an affinity for textures,” she says. “I use digital printing to create fabrics from photographs of my handmade beadwork on traditional velvets of the Great Lakes, and hand-tanned smoke hide. I use the fabrics to make apparel that is worn in today’s environment.”

Delina is using her First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership funds to expand her art business, “I Am Anishinaabe.”

“I can either create a garment that is a replica showing this is how we dressed, or I can make it in contemporary clothing using my beadwork, which is the cultural foundation piece,” she says. “There has to be that foundation of my culture. I am inspired by the ancestral arts of my people, and contemporary works of all Indigenous people.”

“Watching from Los Angeles.”

“Love from Frisco, Texas.”

“Listening from Florida.”

“Saunders County, New England here.”

These comments and more popped up on Facebook as Lynette Two Bulls (Oglala Lakota) and Phillip Whiteman, Jr. (Northern Cheyenne) went live with an evening of traditional storytelling. The COVID-19 crisis continues to cause mass cancellations of performing and visual arts events across the country, including storytelling. Still, culture bearers like Lynette and Phillip are turning these challenging times into an opportunity to reach people across the U.S. and around the world. Viewers tuned in from Canada, France, Italy, and African countries.

Lynnette and Phillip are 2016 First Peoples Fund (FPF) Community Spirit Award Honorees, and Philip was awarded a 2007 Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship. They founded Medicine Wheel Model, LLC; Medicine Wheel Model—Beyond Horsemanship; and Yellow Bird, a grassroots, nonprofit organization. They teach their life model and do traditional storytelling throughout the U.S. and Canada to share the lifeways of Native people with teens, adults, and elders.

When Lynnette and Phillip started seeing their events being canceled in March, they decided to push through and learn how they could best connect with people online.

“Actually I like it, though it was challenging at first just getting used to doing things a different way,” Lynette says. “Especially with technology, it’s harder as you get older. But at the same time, I think it’s good to challenge yourself with all the available platforms. Artists are creative already, so we need to go with that and be creative in the way we reach people.”

Lynette and Phillip asked elders in their area if they would be willing to share traditional stories on camera for a multi-part online series. They hosted the special events through the Yellow Bird Facebook page. After the live recordings end, the videos are shared widely. The first has 5,000+ views and counting.

“We have to slow down and be quiet, listen to the stories because these stories have a very powerful message. I think that’s what resonates with people because the messages are timeless.

“It’s something that connects with people,” Lynette says. “We have to slow down and be quiet, listen to the stories because these stories have a very powerful message. I think that’s what resonates with people because the messages are timeless. The stories are not just history of long ago. No, this is a way of life that we live today, so it brings it to the present.”

Lynnette and Phillip only planned to host the traditional storytellings through March, but after the response they received, they brought them back for April, plus added more innovative ways to help bring light into peoples’ homes. They added Morning Coffee with Yellow Bird and Talk for Teens with Yellow Bird while continuing their wellness coaching through online video conferencing.

“I’m almost busier now than I was before,” Lynette says. “It’s exciting because we’re doing something different and something creative. We’re resilient people.”

The COVID-19 crisis hit performing artists hard when spring bookings were suddenly canceled. Kaloku Holt (Native Hawaiian), 2016 FPF Artist in Business Leadership fellow and executive director of the Ke Kukui Foundation, had a three-city tour lined up with other Native Hawaiian artists.

Now with much more time on his hands, Kaloku is using the time at home to pivot his work. He went live on Facebook with an informal music session, playing the piano and singing with his two-year-old son. To his surprise, someone in a mortgage company watched his performance, visited his website, and then booked Kaloku for a paid performance. Kaloku’s live performance for the company’s virtual party was a hit, and also directed viewers to his online tip fund.

A significant aspect of Kaloku’s work is event planning. Sponsored partly through an FPF Our Nations’ Spaces grant and hosted by Ke Kukui Foundation, the annual 4 Days of Aloha in July 2019 drew 40,000+ visitors to the Pacific Northwest for a celebration of Hawaiian art and culture. While Kaloku hopes the 2020 event goes as planned in July, they are prepared to scale it down or move it to later in the year.

With all the uncertainty, Kaloku is focused on the positives coming out for him, professionally and personally.

“Since I’m forced to be a homebody, I’ve noticed how much I was always on the go, go, go, and stressing myself out by being so busy,” he says. “But now I can really enjoy family time, spend time with my son. As far as work goes, and festival planning, doing shows, I got a chance to look over things and think, maybe I’m doing a little too much in a lot of different areas. Maybe scaling things down, but adding quality to the things that I can. I want to make sure I’m always creating. If I keep my mind busy creating, I think that’s what keeps me alive and energetic.”

Visual artists have experienced equal hardship with the crisis. Community Spirit Award  honoree, Artist in Business Leadership fellow and FPF trainer Theresa Secord (Penobscot) took it upon herself to create a valuable list of tips for fellow visual artists.

“As an FPF fellow (basketmaker) I wanted to share some things I'm working on during the pandemic to try to keep art income coming in,” Theresa says. “Basically, encouraging them to stay in touch with buyers, collectors, fans and to be as effective as possible in online art marketing and their social media presence.”

She also created a virtual sweet grass braiding workshop with her grand-nephews as part of their distance learning to continue teaching traditional arts during this time.

“I think their great, great, great, great grandfather, a Penobscot tribal chief and basket seller [shown here in 1920] would be proud,” she says.

““We constantly have to adapt and adjust and be like water and be able to go with the flow. This is another opportunity to reach a broader audience of people from all walks of life.”

— Lynette Two Bulls

During this time of art being generously shared, it is important to remember that many Native artists make their living through performances and markets. Please consider supporting them through purchasing their art online, giving monetary tips during streaming performances, and contributing to the Resilience Fund through FPF.

As our artists and culture bearers adjust and adapt to this unprecedented and challenging time, First Peoples Fund (FFP) is pleased to announce that we have established a Resilience Fund to provide support to those artists who have experienced a loss of income due to the COVID-19 crisis.

With initial funding from key foundation partners, First Peoples Fund has awarded more than 100 artists and culture bearers in 24 states from throughout the lower-48 states, Alaska and Hawai'i with up to $1,000 in emergency relief funding to help with their housing, food, medical and caretaking expenses.

““Thank you First Peoples Fund for this grand grant. I’m not able to travel to teach through the University of Alaska-Bristol Bay campus at this time, where I teach carving and sell to interested peoples. This grant is much appreciated and my family thanks you all. God bless you for thinking of us during these limiting times.”

— Alfred Twilly Gosuk (Togiak Tribe, Yupik Eskimo), Carving Artist

The Resilience Fund is currently focused on the 350 artists and culture bearers who are already affiliated with First Peoples Fund -- Community Spirit Awards honorees, Artist in Business Leadership, Cultural Capital and Emerging Poets fellows, Rolling Rez Arts instructors, Native Artist Professional Development artist trainers, and community partners through our Indigenous Arts Ecology and Our Nations' Spaces initiatives.

Since the pandemic hit the U.S. earlier this spring, cancellations of performances, art markets, cultural gatherings, workshops, speaking engagements, etc. have resulted in 97 percent of First Peoples Fund artists surveyed reporting income losses ranging from $150 to $35,000-plus. Performance artists have been hardest hit and impacts have been swift, completely wiping out most income sources. Visual artists are experiencing a drop in demand from direct sales, as well as wholesale purchases from gift shops and the like. As spring and summer markets cancel or postpone, they will experience even more significant losses. For example, nearly 100 of FPF artists rely on Santa Fe Indian Market, the largest in the country, for a significant amount of their annual income. Just last month, the market, usually held in August, was cancelled.

Beyond providing monetary support, First Peoples Fund continues to fulfill its work of providing workshops and training, convenings and network building -- working closely with its artists and instructors to pivot and adapt its delivery of services and programs to the challenging times. The Native Artist Professional Development group is launching a series of Resilience webinars this week to help artists adjust their way of conducting business during the pandemic. Rolling Rez Arts will be hosting Facebook Live arts demonstrations, and Fellowships are facilitating virtual gatherings, as well as providing outreach and technical support where needed. Through social media, First Peoples Fund is also helping to promote the creative offerings FPF artists are delivering online -- live storytelling and performances, instructional videos, etc.

First Peoples Fund is guided by the conviction that culture bearers and artists are the heart and center in reclaiming and revitalizing art and culture to strengthen Indigenous communities through teaching, healing and creating holistic, shared wealth. The organization, founded in 1995, honors and supports Native artists and culture bearers who are vital in nurturing culturally informed, locally-led community development that enhances tribal economies, guides cultural healing, creates positive narratives and contributes to the rich cultural fabric of vibrant Native communities and the entire Indigenous Arts Ecology.

"We are working hard to raise more funding for the Resilience Fund so that we can provide additional emergency relief in the coming weeks and months," says First Peoples Fund President Lori Lea Pourier (Lakota). "We are resilient peoples, because we have a long history of working together and always lending a hand of generosity. The impact of COVID-19 is going to have a lasting effect on the world and our communities. First Peoples Fund wants to make sure we are a steadfast source of support to our Native artist and culture bearer community. They are critical to linking our past, present and future."

To make a contribution to the First Peoples Fund Resilience Fund, please visit the giving page.

““Wow!!!! Ahéhee!! Thank you so much! With everything going on in our lives as a whole I’ve been praying for healing and protection of all our communities and had placed this ask in the back of my mind. My family & I are beyond full of appreciation on this notice! The support and care of First Peoples Fund is widely known throughout the Indigenous Art world. I’ve always been honored to be a past fellow!”

— Shawna Shandiin Sunrise (Diné (Navajo) / Kewa (Santo Domingo Pueblo), weaver, filmmaker, producer, organizer, actor, multi-media artist, floral designer

As a blizzard loomed on the horizon, a group of Indigenous women stood in a semi-circle — facing one another while connecting with their audience at the Ojibwe Language Symposium. The special event was held at the Fond du Lac Tribal & Community College in December 2019.

Filled with nerves and wondering how people would respond, it was hard for the Oshkii Giizhik Singers to think of the moment as their first “performance” for their new CD. It was more about sharing the language and culture with their own people.  But standing before everyone, firm in their 13-year history as a drum group gave them the confidence to play and sing songs of their ancestors’ and of their own making.

“It was more like an ‘informance,’ not just a performance, and I think it was well-received,” says Lyz Jaakola (Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior), a former First People’s Fund Community Spirit Award recipient (2012). Also known as Nitaa-Nagamokwe, Lyz intertwines art, music, and education. A wife, mother, and dedicated community member, Lyz teaches music and directs the Ojibwemowining Language and Culture Resource Center at the Fond du Lac Tribal & Community College in Cloquet, Minn., on the Fond du Lac Reservation.

The group she founded, Oshkii Giizhik Singers (OGS), received a 2019 First Peoples Fund Our Nations’ Spaces (ONS) grant for their concert and CD project, “Anishinaabekwe Inendamowin” (Women’s Thinking).

“We were a little nervous [at the performance] because you never know how people are going to respond, but they were right there paying attention,” Lyz says. “Some members of our community learned and acknowledged that women have been singing independently from men for centuries, which was new information for them.”

OGS is a community-based group of Native women singers from the Fond du Lac Reservation/Duluth area. Since 2006, over 45 women have sung with OGS in various forms and venues. Since being awarded “Best Traditional Recording” at the 2009 Nammys (Native American Music Awards), their focus is to give back to the community.

“My community hasn’t always been the most supportive of ladies hand drumming,” Lyz says. “But we were able to demonstrate the historical context to show that women were singing 110 years ago, and even 200 years ago. We’re following in the footsteps of our grandmas.”

"We’re following in the footsteps of our grandmas.”

Many women have come and gone from the group over the years. It’s a difficult commitment to make. This was alleviated in part by the ONS grant that went toward paying the singers and drummers for the time they invested in their CD project.

“Being able to offer compensation for this work felt so good,” Lyz says. “The ability to pay these women for their time and work felt correct and respectful to them.”

While six of the songs on the CD were newly composed tracks, 10 were gathered from 100-year-old recordings held within what is known as the Densmore Collection.

Beginning in 1907, Frances Densmore was employed by the Bureau for American Ethnology. Over her lengthy career, she took 79 field trips to 54 locations, made 3,500 recordings, transcribed more than 2,300 songs, and published 16 books and hundreds of articles. Densmore spent over 50 years studying and preserving American Indian music.

Plumbing the depths of the Densmore Collection, Lyz and the other women “rematriated” several of the songs.

“I think repatriation is crucial work,” she says. “But often in that narrative, we lose track of the women’s stories. To call attention to it by coining that term ‘rematriation’ is recognizing the importance in the women’s voices.”

One song OGS drew from the collection was “The Little Girls’ War Song.” They recruited four young girls to record on the project, lifting the words and melodies from a wax cylinder into their hearts and through their lips, giving life to their ancestors’ voices.

“One of Densmore’s most willing singers, a man named Odjibwe, recorded this song that little girls would sing when playing war,” Lyz says. “So an elder man recorded the little girls’ song, we retrieved it and taught it to our little girls who recorded it with us on the CD.”

The performance at the college was the first time many of these songs had a voice among their people in over 100 years.

"We did it because we love our ancestors, and we love our culture."

“We’re the conduit to update the recordings,” Lyz says. “Those wax cylinder recordings, even digitized, are hard to listen to. We were able to bring them up to today’s standards of recording. That was really humbling. We did it because we love our ancestors, and we love our culture. Because we led with these motivations, it’s apparent to our community that we are not trying to do anything but help our people grow in knowledge and strength. This is the best way to build community in Anishinaabe country.”

After the performance, they gifted CDs to the attendees. Remaining CDs that were purchased with the ONS grant are being used as a fundraiser for a possible gig the group was invited to perform at in July 2020— Riddu Riđđu, an International Indigenous Music Festival in Norway.

Through the project, each woman developed a new level of confidence in her language and singing skills.

““This has empowered them physically, intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually to do any of their work with more confidence. This has manifested itself in their ability to work better in their field, their job, their classroom, and some have been invited to take on more gigs or responsibility in their professional or cultural lives.”

— Lyz Jaakola

“Giving a concert, recording a CD, learning the language, painting art for the CD cover, rehearsing and singing songs for the sake of singing songs — all of these are measures of achievement in and of themselves,” Lyz says. “I think this project is considered a monumental effort by all involved. We want to do more of this type of rematriation of songs. We are very grateful for the opportunity afforded us by this grant.”

Note: Our Nations' Spaces grants expand opportunities for Native performing artists within and beyond their own communities and are generously funded by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation.

Caitlin Newago (Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa) is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership fellow residing in Eau Claire, Wisconsin. Battling multiple, chronic health issues, Caitlin has found it nearly impossible to adopt traditional neurotypical work standards. However, as an artist from birth, she has dabbled in many mediums, currently focusing on mixed media art with wiigwaas (birchbark) and acrylics. She started her first business at age 21, opening Bizaanide’ewin Beadwork & Supplies in 2016 after leaving a toxic relationship and using the income to rebuild her life.

She is using the funds from the fellowship to break barriers by purchasing new equipment and securing her livelihood by growing her customer base.

The birchbark crackles and pops as the tree releases material that Caitlin needs to create her specialty jewelry pieces. She had carefully cut, then peeled away the bark from the birch tree. It was just a couple of years ago that her father taught her how to harvest the bark and to work with it. It’s now become a vital part of what she does in her art business. But more than that, working with the birchbark is therapy for Caitlin.

“Bizaanide’ewin translates to ‘peace of heart.’ I hope that my art will evoke the same emotions of joy, wonder, and contentment in others who view and wear it.”

She left her abuser in early fall of 2017 and has been working full-time from home ever since. Her five-year-old son, Makoons, is the driving force behind her healing and her art business.

“Taking my creative abilities and combining it with a historical medium, I thought it was the perfect way to do something I would enjoy and be able to support my son at the same time,” she says.

On the Bad River Indian Reservation, Caitlin harvests birchbark by hand. At home, she lays it flat to dry and presses it under weights to keep the flat shape. She cuts, files, then cleans the bark with a fast-drying disinfecting solvent. She meticulously hand paints the earrings she’s made with acrylic paints before adding any final touch-ups or Swarovski embellishments. Each piece goes through an in-depth sealing process to ensure quality and durability.

“I’ve come to find a place where I feel like I truly belong, and have finally found my calling in life. To have something feel so completely right is a blessing — I’ve never experienced anything remotely like it.”

“I’ve learned not only about my own culture, but about the unique characteristics of others as well,” Caitlin says. “I’ve come to find a place where I feel like I truly belong, and have finally found my calling in life. To have something feel so completely right is a blessing — I’ve never experienced anything remotely like it.”

She hopes she can promote healing as she connects with and uplifts other abuse survivors through the process of reconnecting with her culture.

“I try to use Ojibwe language on my website,” Caitlin says. “Bizaanide’ewin translates to ‘peace of heart.’ I hope that my art will evoke the same emotions of joy, wonder, and contentment in others who view and wear it.”