VR and Antipodes Breaking Barriers for an Indigenous Poet
Jessica (Tyner) Mehta is a citizen of the Cherokee Nation, interdisciplinary artist and poet, and author of several award-winning books. She is the owner of a small business, MehtaFor, a writing services company that offers pro bono services to Native American led/serving nonprofits.
She integrates technology, family archival photos, and performance art into many of her creative projects. She has undertaken poetry residencies with her work being featured at galleries and exhibitions around the world.
Jessica is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Artists in Business Leadership fellow, and a virtual Artists in Residency at Crazy Horse Memorial, preparing for her first commission with Artist Trust (Seattle) for next summer.
When people come out of Jessica’s virtual reality (VR) poetry experience, they all have the same expression — one of overwhelm at experiencing VR for the first time. But through this new technology, Jessica can introduce them to something else unique to them — Indigenous poetry. Her popup VR experience, “Red/Act,” exposes people to poetry in a fresh, accessible way.
Removing the barrier of intimidation around poetry is something Jessica teaches in classes, especially those for women in prison. It was in this place that an innovative form of poetry blossomed.
“I’m constantly looking for new ways to create while integrating immersion and technology into my practice."
Jessica created the antipode, a poem with roots in both reverse poetry and the palindrome, and can be read forward or backward word by word. Creating one is often more like piecing together a puzzle than writing poetry.
“I found that most participants were drawn towards the antipode because it broke down those walls of what they thought writing poetry should be,” Jessica says. “It gives you permission to play with language and make up your own rules in many ways. It permits us to have fun with language. When you’re writing in this strange way, you have to think, ‘How does it sound forward and backward?” Even then, your organic voice is there. I feel it gives us flexibility and permission to explore and make ‘mistakes,’ and see what’s there.”
Jessica’s journey as a poet continues to open pathways for people to embody poetry. When the COVID-19 shutdown happened right when Jessica opened her ‘emBODY poetry’ exhibition, she worked to get the VR experience online. Her YouTube video takes viewers through one of her poems that were on exhibit.The video was featured at the virtual International Human Rights Festival, typically held in Manhattan.
“My art is a form of healing and trauma management,” Jessica says. “I’m constantly looking for new ways to create while integrating immersion and technology into my practice. It takes a certain type of person to pick up a poetry book or attend a reading. However, performance poetry and VR have the power to attract more people to poetry.”
PAʻI Foundation Meeting the Needs of Their Native Hawaiian Artists
Banner image: The kahikolu of the MAMo Wearable Art Show: PA'I Foundation's Executive Director and the MAMo Wearable Art Show's Producer and co-emcee, Kumu Hula Vicky Holt Takamine, co-emcee and voluntold entertainer, Kumu Hula Robert Uluwehi Cazimero, and Stage Manager, Kumu Hula Michael Pili Pang.
Native artists who are part of one of First Peoples Fund’s (FPF) Indigenous Arts Ecology (IAE) projects are surviving and thriving through support from FPF grantee, the PAʻI Foundation. Though several large events for Hawaiian artists were canceled due to the COVID-19 crisis, PAʻI has persevered and has plans for an ambitious Fall 2020.
“Our main goal is to help support those artists who have enriched our lives,” says Vicky Holt Takamine (Native Hawaiian), Executive Director of the PAʻI Foundation. “They have given so much to our community through their art, songs, stories, and dances. We want them to know we appreciate everything they’ve given to us in the past.”
"They have given so much to our community through their art, songs, stories, and dances. We want them to know we appreciate everything they’ve given to us in the past.”
PAʻI is a longtime partner of First Peoples Fund and received a 2019 FPF Indigenous Arts Ecology grant. Through the program, they poured energy into preparing their artists for the 13th Festival of Pacific Arts & Culture that was to take place in June 2020. From creating bios to telling the stories of their pieces, Vicky wanted to ensure their artists were prepared to exhibit professionally. Though the event was canceled, she knows the training artists received will help them in the near future.
“We’re looking at strengthening our local artists by doing virtual events with our trainers, as well as offering one-on-one technical assistance sessions for some of the artists,” Vicky says.
For 14 years, PAʻI has held the annual MAMo: Maoli Arts Movement Wearable Art Show. This year, the show is taking on a new form with a one-hour TV broadcast and Facebook streaming program to exhibit past years of the fashion show.
Recent college graduates, all former hālau hula (school of Hawaiian dance) students of Vicky’s, came up with their own initiative to capture artists’ stories through interviews. The videos are going up on PAʻI’s Youtube channel, and clips will be incorporated into the fashion show broadcast.
One artist they interviewed was Kawika Lum-Nelmida (Native Hawaiian), hulu (feather) artist, who also studies historical photos and pieces dating back to when Hawaiian royalty wore feather work on their clothing. Kawika’s work is on display around the world. He began learning lei hulu from Paulette Kahalepuna in 1997 at the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa, and hula from Vicky.
Kawika has worked the fashion show for years. “I’ve seen the different artists evolve and refine their work,” he says. “With the fashion shows, it’s given not just a local stage; it’s gained international recognition. Being in the show pushes the artists to be better every year.”
The fashion show has launched numerous Hawaiian artists, catapulting their businesses and lifeways into the mainstream. Vicky and her team hope for even more exposure through the fashion show airing on TV.
“Oftentimes, I think it’s about giving artists a leg up, which is what the work of First Peoples Fund and PAʻI do for our community,” Vicky says. “It’s recognizing talent and offering support to them. Give them a place to showcase their work, test their ideas, allow them to figure out what they want to do, let them flourish in their talent, and then provide a platform. We need to give artists the tools and the opportunity to grow.”
Another major undertaking of PAʻI’s is creating a website where artists can exhibit their work. Many of them aren’t prepared to fully stock their own website. Most of their energy goes into creating single pieces that make it difficult to market. A central website will allow them to continue focusing on their art as cultural practitioners.
“The Indigenous Arts Ecology grant is filling the gap by providing a central location where artists can put their work and provide a worldwide web presence they would not be able to afford,” Vicky says.
“Technology can be a challenge for some of our artists,” says Kaʻiu Takamori (Native Hawaiian). She is a 2017-2018 Intercultural Leadership Institute (ILI) fellow, PAʻI Folk Arts Coordinator, and a certified FPF Native Artist Professional Development (NAPD) trainer. “In this climate, we need to help them accept and embrace technology so that they too have the same opportunities to market...especially on a global level. This all brings in to play some important [areas] tabs in the NAPD training, especially marketing and pricing.”
Kaʻiu underwent a mindset shift when the shutdown happened. Accustomed to at least one event per month, she is now pouring her energy into meeting their artists’ needs through online venues. She is keeping the PAʻI Foundation social media accounts active and using them to support their artists by reposting their merchandise. She started #MAMoMonday, where she pulls photos from shows and markets of the past and posts them. She directs their artists to resources like the FPF webinar trainings, and is also working on rolling out E Hoʻi Ke Aloha, a COVID-19 relief fund for artists.
After the TV broadcast of the unique fashion show, PAʻI will be partnering with the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., to showcase Native Hawaiian artists through their “Arts Across America” online Facebook series. PAʻI is also collaborating with two other nonprofit organizations to bring hula workshops online for beginning and master classes.
All of these endeavors are building up to be a blowout Fall season that PAʻI hopes will give their artists the boost they need to maintain their lifeways.
Despite the challenges to their artists and the cancelation of their most significant events, Kaʻiu is taking heart in their people’s strengths.
“The most beautiful example of resilience I have seen through this crisis was on a Zoom meeting Aunty Vicky and I had with our artists,” she says. “To see that our artists are still creating even when the market is not there, fanned the flames within myself to want to do more for our artists. I saw them cheering each other on and networking about best practices. I usually see this during our markets, artists talking with each other during downtimes. However, to see them still doing it over this new Zoom platform touched my heart. It showed me that they didn’t lose themselves during this pandemic. Seeing this sense of community still alive has awed me to want to make sure that at the end of the day, I am giving all I can to serving my artists and my community.”
“This is a time we need artists to provide uplifting experiences, whether [it’s through] virtual events or posting new artwork,” Vicky says, “to know we are surviving.”
Trendy White Box Photography Celebrates Anishinaabe Culture
Marcella Hadden (Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe) is an Anishinaabe artist and business owner in Mount Pleasant, Michigan, specializing in Native American portraits, nature photography, and descriptive imagery. She is a self-taught photographer who owns and operates a photography business Niibing Giizis (Summer Moon), in addition to her full-time job as the Saginaw Chippewa Indian Tribe of Michigan’s Public Relations Manager.
In her photography studio, she offers specialty services in newborn, boudoir, pets, maternity, seniors, and holiday portraiture.
Marcella is currently raising her granddaughter, who she mentors in photography, and is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Artists in Business Leadership fellow.
Marcella carefully positioned the tiny newborn Connie on her back, getting her in just the right position before snapping a photograph that will last a lifetime. Newborn sessions are often Marcella’s most challenging, but not so with little Connie. The foster baby was perfect in every pose. Connie’s guardian still brings her in for Marcella’s special sessions, from Easter to Christmas.
The challenge in photographing Connie for her second birthday came with Marcella’s newly acquired skill in white box photography. It’s quite a job.
“I had the box made for $500,” she explains. “I shoot different images inside the box, and then put all of them together. It looks like people are interacting, but it’s really just one person in one box. That was a very difficult learning curve! You have to work through all the layers. I bought the templates and forced myself to do it.”
2-year-old Connie was the perfect model for Marcella to exhibit the trendy box photography style.
Most of Marcella’s shoots this year have been outdoors (due to COVID-19), including the porch shoots where she captured families outside their homes for sessions similar to if they had come into her studio. She was also asked by her tribe to document a parade of elders being honored in her community. She has an exhibit at the cultural center on Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women (MMIW) with portraits of 94 local women.
“For so many years, our beautiful culture had to be hidden; now through my art, I celebrate it,”
“For so many years, our beautiful culture had to be hidden; now through my art, I celebrate it,” Marcella says. “I love going to powwows and community events and sharing my photos with the community. I can take a photograph and in an instant, make a legacy that will last for future generations. I have seen my clients cry at the beauty of a loved one during my photo slideshows. If I can provoke emotions such as tears, a smile, or pure delight, I know I have done my job.”
The New (Virtual) Reality at the Santa Fe Indian Market
Banner image: Timeless Medicine (2020) Ink and colored pencil on antique ledger paper by Terran Last Gun.
Roaming dirt roads, paddling canoes, exploring the woods, and flinging water droplets in the Great Lakes,
Delina White’s (Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe, Minnesota Chippewa Tribe) SWAIA (Southwestern Association for Indian Arts) fashion show is vastly different in 2020. Her company, “I Am Anishinaabe,” first hit the runway last year at the 2019 Santa Fe Indian Market’s SWAIA Haute Couture Fashion Show.
She watched her creations showcased under dramatic lights and surrounded by theatre of music. This year, due to the COVID-19 shutdown, Delina, a 2020 First Peoples Fund (FPF) Artists in Business Leadership fellow, had to get creative with how she would introduce audiences to her woodland floral Sunrise and Sunset Collections.
Now in it’s 99th year, Santa Fe Indian Market has been a long-standing tradition for nearly 1,000 Native artists and more than 100,000 visitors who annually travel to the small, northern New Mexico town known worldwide for its incredible arts scene and Southwestern beauty. Many of the artists spend a year preparing to showcase and sell their work, reconnect with old friends and gain access to art collectors and buyers from all over the world. For many, this is their highest earning artshow of the year. However, with the spread of COVID-19, the SWAIA leadership converted this much anticipated annual event to a virtual gathering, providing artists with a new, yet sometimes foreign opportunity to participate online. And this time for the entire month of August rather than just for the typical weekend that was always chock full of events including a curated art show, panel discussions, fashion show, auctions, receptions and an awards ceremony.
For the Virtual Fashion Show, Delina pulled together a full crew with cinematographer, hair and makeup artists, and models for a video shoot to present her art.
“We went to a swimming beach down the road from my house,” she says. “Everything was taken on the main road in my community, the Leech Lake Reservation. We went down to the beach, and there happened to be kids from the community swimming. I encouraged them to get in the video, start splashing, and have a good time. Each little vignette is just a couple seconds, but it gives you a good feeling.”
Delina has kept herself busy during this summer market season by developing her business infrastructure through setting up better accounting methods, adding social media links to her website and vice versa, sewing custom orders, and preparing for sales derived through her virtual SWAIA booth.
Terran Last Gun, a Piikani (Blackfeet) citizen and printmaker, is another 2020 FPF Artists in Business Leadership fellow breaking new ground with his efforts to go virtual.
“I’ve learned so much in terms of how to market myself online,” he says. “After I got laid off in March, I had to think quickly and creatively. I was sort of doing online marketing, but after I really started pushing it, that’s when the purchases started coming in. Free shipping helps, and also knowing your value and worth. How much are you charging for art? Does it work out to do free shipping?”
“I’ve constantly had to go back to the drawing board and think about the long run.”
— Terran Last Gun
Terran is staying busy fielding increased traffic to his website, mostly buyers who visited his virtual booth at the Indian Market. A resident of Santa Fe, this is his second time participating.
“It’s nice to know these new people have found me on SWAIA,” he says. “The person I delivered a work to locally was impressed with my website. That was good to hear.”
He also has solo shows going. The Lloyd Kiva New Gallery at the Institute of American Indian Arts Museum of Contemporary Native Arts (MoCNA) booked him for an exhibit in August, leaving him with an ambitious 16 ledger pieces to create. Although the museum is closed, the store is open and allows people to visit and enjoy an exhibit.
The Old Ones Are Near (2020) - Ink and colored pencil on antique ledger paper by Terran Last Gun
Not all artists opted to participate and pay for a virtual booth at the 2020 Santa Fe Indian Market. Wade Patton (Oglala Lakota), 2017 FPF Artists in Business Leadership fellow, is hard at work maximizing every free and low-cost option for marketing his work. Since the pandemic started, he has plunged deep into digital marketing, creating his own virtual shows. He also presented a webinar for the “On the Road with Rolling Rez Arts” series, demonstrating how to matte and frame artwork.
“I’ve been doing a lot of social media, especially Instagram Live,” he says. “Each art show gets easier and easier. With social media being a free platform, why not take advantage of it?”
It took a few days for his live videos to spark interest, but people began responding with orders. Wade is now shipping his ledger art across the U.S. and into the U.K.
“I’ve done three virtual shows so far,” he says. “The third one, I got together with seven local artists. We met in Red Shirt Table (on the Pine Ridge Reservation) one afternoon to feature music and visual art. It was a good time. I’m just surviving as an artist and what we have to do in this virtual time.”
Wade set up a booth on Instagram Live to debut a new beaded cuff during the week he would have been in Santa Fe.
Jason Brown (Penobscot) is another artist who opted out of the virtual SWAIA experience. A 2016 FPF Artists in Business Leadership fellow, he and his wife own and operate a jewelry and fashion studio, Decontie & Brown.
“We are taking this opportunity to focus on some other areas of creativity that we normally would not have time to do,” Jason says. “Since the onset of the pandemic, we have been hosting our own live showcases, and they have been very popular!”
Technology and Internet access are significant issues for many Native artists, as they navigate the digital art show and marketing world. Theresa Secord (Penobscot), FPF Community Spirit Award honoree and Native Artist Professional Development trainer, expressed her thoughts in a recent Facebook post:
“I’ll miss being in the storied 99th Santa Fe Indian Market next weekend, though I’m thankful to SWAIA for the virtual market experience! I’m reminded, however, by a recent interview with another artist, how personal I think my work, my interactions/sales with collector friends and visitors [is] to my booth. They like to hold and smell my baskets with the beautiful aromas of sweet grass cedar bark and ash wood, ask questions, chit chat, and reconnect as friends, etc. It’s taking a little time to transition to thinking about my art pieces, lovingly crafted for hours, days, perhaps weeks - being clicked on, dropped into a shopping cart, and mailed off into space without any interaction at all. I’ve heard a number of people say, “Native artists need to get with the times and get with the technology.” Yet I just want to share there’s more to it...many facets involved in this digital transition. We should be patient with ourselves and others, as we continue to move into the e-commerce world and find our own places there. It’s definitely a process for me!”
“We’re all at different stages, needing to find our own spaces in the virtual market place. We should continue to be respectful of those who take their time getting there or who don’t ever go there.”
She added, “We’re all at different stages, needing to find our own spaces in the virtual market place. We should continue to be respectful of those who take their time getting there or who don’t ever go there.”
Theresa’s 1920 Replica Woven Glove Box won “Best of Basketry” at the 2020 Virtual Santa Fe Indian Market.
There are many unknowns still ahead for Native artists, but they are forging ahead with resilient spirits. Delina is already preparing for the 2021 SWAIA.
“Next year, I’ll automatically be accepted [due to this year’s cancellations],” she says. “I guess that’s a positive thing that happened even though it was sad that we didn’t get to go to Santa Fe. But you always have to find that silver lining. And for me, it’s having more time to get the collection done for next year.”
We invite you to visit the virtual booths of all FPF family of artists participating in SWAIA 2020:
Walking in Confident Beauty
Raised primarily in Colorado, Anna Kahalekulu (Native Hawaiian) is the daughter of a Hawaiian father and Caucasian mother. Her dad took the family home to Hawai’i often so they could reconnect. Hula was Anna’s first cultural art medium that she learned. In 2007, she moved home and settled on Maui, where she began learning fashion and traditional weaving.
Anna’s brand, Kūlua, made its debut in 2015 at the MAMo Wearable Art Show hosted by the PA’I Foundation. She has shown collections annually for five years in the Maui show and twice in Honolulu. Kūlua has part-time and full-time employees, seven wholesale accounts, a storefront, and an online shop.
Anna is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Artists in Business Leadership (ABL) fellow and lives in Wailuku, Hawai’i, with her family.
“A garment isn’t fully finished until it comes to life as it is worn,”
At a Maui Arts & Cultural Center event, Anna was standing in line at the bar during intermission when a tall woman caught her attention by the confident way she carried herself. With a start, Anna realized the dress the woman was wearing was one of her own creations — a combination of fabric, texture, form, and flow. And now, movement.
“A garment isn’t fully finished until it comes to life as it is worn,” Anna says. “It’s always my aim that the woman who wears my creations will walk a little taller, feeling connected, grounded, and beautiful.”
Anna danced hula from a young age, but when she started a family of her own, hula took on a different role in her work in fashion. There is always a story behind her print designs and colors. They mirror what Anna learned through her hula life, telling her people’s stories through dance and music.
“Beyond that, there’s a larger context to the work that I’ve chosen to do,” she says. “It’s hugely important to have Hawaiians creating and making, then also being in public spaces and having storefronts. That brings products and bearing to the community because we not only exist within ourselves, but we exist in the larger society.”
The color story of Anna’s creations comes from an earthy palette. Even her brighter colors are subtle, never loud or bold. But they make people look twice, like Anna did herself when she saw the woman at the Cultural Center. The fabric designs are personal to Anna, but she leaves room for the wearer to define and express the final meaning themselves.
Learning from the Life’s Work of a Professional Artist
Banner image: Eagle Hat - acrylic on a hat woven by Judy Helgeson
Multimedia artist X̱ʼunei Lance Twitchell (Tlingit & Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska) works in Indigenous language revitalization, Tlingit language teaching and curriculum, poetry, screenwriting, Northwest Coast design, fiction, nonfiction, critical theory, music, and film.
Having practiced traditional arts for twenty-two years, he now creates in electronic media using a tablet, then transfers the designs to wood, leather, fabric, woven hats, and other items that are often made into dance regalia. He shares his knowledge through community workshops, university classes, a YouTube channel, and blog.
A First Peoples Fund (FPF) Cultural Capital fellow, Lance owns and operates his multi-media company Troubled Raven from Juneau, Alaska, where he lives with his wife and three children.
Lance entered Nathan Jackson’s (Tlingit) workshop, a space filled with the fresh scent of wood shavings. Staying with an auntie while finishing his education at the University of Alaska Southeast in Ketchikan, Lance was right across the road from the workshop of this world-renowned artist.
Nathan Jackson, a 2000 FPF Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Awards honoree, has practiced art for almost sixty years and is recognized for his traditional wood carvings, metalwork, and sculptures. He has created over fifty totem poles, some of which are found in museums in North America, Asia, and Europe.
Nathan welcomed Lance into his workshop. It was the first of many times that Lance would sit in the workshop and sip coffee as they talked about life, culture, and what it means to be a professional artist. All the while, Nathan kept working.
“I would go over in the mornings and show him some of my artwork,” Lance says. “I was always blown away with how productive and professional he is. I talked to him 10 years ago about doing a mentorship program, and he was excited. My [FPF] fellowship is helping bring that into reality.”
In addition to the support from First Peoples Fund for the mentorship, Lance also received funding through the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation.
With the 2020 shutdown, he and Nathan have not met in person very much, relying mostly on video conferencing to push forward with the mentorship. This comes with challenges on both ends — Nathan doesn’t use technology much, and it’s hard for Lance to see the intricate details of what he’s working on.
Though it’s slowed down the flow of knowledge, Lance is still absorbing critical lessons from Nathan and plans to write a book about his mentor’s life and work.
Lance spends his own life creating and pushing himself to understand the masters of long ago through their art, language, story, and song. He’s developing skills in metalwork and engraving with Nathan’s guidance.
“In my artwork, writing, and music, I want anyone to be able to see it and tell that it is not a mass-produced foreign imitation,” Lance says, “that it is made by a person who is always seeking to improve on craft, space, symbology, and cultural knowledge.”
Mastering & Teaching the 3-Drop Gourd Stitch with Blue Dots
For over 16 years, Cynthia Masterson (Comanche Nation of Oklahoma) has beaded traditional objects for ceremonies and powwows. “Our Stories Are Mixed” was her first juried art show, held at the “In the Spirit” event at the Washington State History Museum.
Cynthia carries the name of her great-great-great-grandmother Cynthia Ann Parker, mother of Quanah Parker, one of the last Comanche chiefs. She is an enrolled member of the Comanche tribe and a Titchywy descendant. Born and raised in Oklahoma, she lives with her husband Bret in Seattle, Washington.
Cynthia reached for a blue dot bead and added it to her design. A bead weaving technique that is done one bead at a time around cylindrical objects, the traditional 3-drop gourd stitch is difficult to master. When Cynthia feared making mistakes, she often did the only thing she knew — a row of blue dots, the only element that would fit her unplanned design.
“When I’m feeling lost and don’t know how to begin or end, a round of blue dots always comforts me,”
To learn the 3-drop gourd stitch while living in Seattle, Cynthia watched a series of VHS tapes produced by someone in her church back in Oklahoma. It was challenging, but through the years, Cynthia started mastering the form, and people asked her to teach it. This developed into presenting workshops and teaching at every opportunity.
Cynthia was on the cusp of launching her art as a business with help from a 2015 First Peoples Fund (FPF) Artist in Business Leadership fellowship. But a few days after the FPF fellows convening in Santa Fe, she was hospitalized and faced two surgeries and months of bed rest. Later, she suffered from shoulder issues and more surgeries. It was a long road to recovery, one that inhibited her ability to bead.
But she found her way back. In 2019, Cynthia participated in a catalyzing show at King Street Station in Seattle though yəhaw. Yəhaw is a project series of collective of Indigenous creatives providing interdisciplinary cultural, art, and design services. The show opened new doors and gave her beadwork the recognition it needed.
Cynthia was selected to receive a Cultural Capital Fellowship and made plans to fly home to Oklahoma to present workshops. Due to the national shutdown, she had to switch to online teaching, finding herself in the difficult position of once again dealing with video instead of hands-on mentorship. However, she’s found ways to explain and demonstrate when a student has done a stitch incorrectly, showing it to them by live video.
Today Cynthia runs her own website, Blue Dot Beadwork, where she sells her creations and offers workshops and video tutorials.
“There are so few people who do this unique style of beadwork,” she says. “I want to change that. I struggled to learn, and I want to ease the way for others.”
Power to the Poets
For Pte San Win Little Whiteman (Oglala Lakota), writing is about her self-journey and her potential career as a poet. She is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Emerging Poets Fellow. Pte San Win joined Dances with Words at its inception in 2014. When she was 14 years old, that poetry program — also facilitated by FPF — allowed her to find her voice in spoken word.
“I was never super outspoken about my poetry. But after joining the program and getting familiar with public speaking, I gained confidence in my writing. The workshops helped with writer’s block when I didn’t know what to write, but had a desperate need to write. The program helps with that and different opportunities, such as steps to make a career out of it.”
— Pte San Win
This was the pilot year for First Peoples Fund's Emerging Poets Fellowship, giving young people a chance to go beyond the skill of writing poetry; it has taught them the business side. The program’s intention is to provide poetry, leadership, and professional development training to young people through the Youth Development Fellowship Curriculum. It integrates poetry curriculum developed by Layli Long Soldier (Oglala Lakota), and professional development components created by Autumn White Eyes (Oglala Lakota), inspired by the FPF Native Artist Professional Development curriculum for Performing Artists.
Autumn is the Youth Development Consultant for the Emerging Poets Fellowship, providing oversight, trainings, mentoring, and evaluation for the partners. Augusta (Gusti) Terkildsen (Oglala Lakota) and Sunny Red Bear (Cheyenne River Sioux) served as poet mentors for Dances with Words.
The program included regional partners in the Pine Ridge/Rapid City areas; the Cheyenne River Youth Project in Eagle Butte, SD; Nis’to Incorporated in Sisseton, SD; and the Indigenous Peoples Task Force in Minneapolis, SD. Approximately seven poets took part in each region. The program builds on work done by poet mentors and Dances with Words.
Kinsale Hueston (Diné) 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellow joined for a session on revising and performing poetry.
Lakota Funds, a Native Community Development Financial Institution, and First Peoples Fund partner, joined the project to provide financial literacy training.
“They explained things about budgeting and finance that are important for a writer,” Pte San Win says. “A lot of poets don’t understand that finance is important.”
The curriculum covered resume building, cover letters, budgeting, how to balance a checkbook, and forming an event budget. In the final weeks of the fellowship, the poets received instruction on creating chapbooks and writing their artist bios, something they struggled with in the past.
The poets put all the training into practice by coordinating and presenting an end-of-the-year poetry reading. With the 2020 shutdown, they shifted their event to live streaming with Zoom and Facebook Live, and included a raffle of donated items from Racing Magpie and Autumn.
While disappointed and lacking the energy of a live audience, the poets made the best of it. Pte San Win found it easier to deliver her deeply personal poem from her bedroom, while another poet, Ashanti Martin (Standing Rock), discovered she was more nervous doing an online event over in-person. She joined Dances with Words in 2018.
“It’s difficult for the audience to react to what you’re saying which usually I like at a poetry event,” Ashanti says. “You hear people saying things as you speak to show they liked what you’re saying or encourage you. At our event, people from First Peoples Fund and the poets’ family members, friends, and others commented favorably. The response was pretty positive.”
“Before Dances with Words, I was incredibly shy and social anxiety was very, very real. I never felt comfortable expressing myself around others. Being in Dances with Words and working within a small group, helped me be more comfortable with those experiences.”
— Ashanti
After the end-of-the-year poetry reading, the poets chatted virtually, praising one another at the success of their celebration.
“They had expressed feeling nervous before the event, and were relieved when it was over,” Autumn says. “We were able to utilize the Zoom chat for them to encourage and affirm one another throughout the event.”
Pte San Win performing at the end-of-the-year poetry reading. Watch the full poetry reading on Facebook.
As the program looks ahead to this next year, program staff and poet mentors are taking into consideration feedback from the poets and partners. One thought is recruiting young people in Dances with Words to take on leadership roles in the program or within the fellowship. Someday, they might become poet mentors themselves.
“I would enjoy helping fellow youth poets understand their poetry; to understand that poetry doesn’t have to have a specific algorithm,” Pte San Win says. “I want them to have a good idea about what opportunities there are for them that I didn’t have when I was their age.”
There is also discussion of expanding the Emerging Poets Fellowship into a two-year fellowship. This would allow poet mentors and the young people to focus on the skill of writing poetry while the second year could focus on the business and financial side of becoming a professional writer.
“Whenever I thought about a career in poetry and writing, I imagined it was just something you did at home,” Ashanti says, “sending out cover letters to get published and things like that. That’s what I envisioned in my head, nothing more. The fellowship helped allow me to know what else there was. And one of the former mentors for Dances with Words got me into another local gathering. I performed at that event, which was neat.”
“The fellowship not only touched base on different forms of writing and how to write different forms of poems,” Pte San Win says, “but also how to further your poetry, how to make it more than writing on a piece of paper and make a career out of it.”
We fight this war together,
Future and Past
We’re both stubborn,
But, pain will never last.
You’re only 12 years old,
There’s so much I wanna say,
So much I wanna do.
But, I should end this letter.
Love, You.
— Pte San Win Little Whiteman, “Beat of Our Soul” poem excerpt
the negative thoughts and words from others are slowly melding with my own thoughts
i hate that
so easily influenced
my thoughts are pessimistic
negative and draining
being me is so exhausting now
im no longer physically repulsed by myself
no longer do i desire the features of others
i see myself and feel content with my outer shell
but exhausted inside
so exhausted
i want to self destruct but i can’t
i won’t
— Ashanti Martin, poem excerpt
From Family Stories to High Caliber Theatre
Header photo: “Bound.” Written and Directed by Tara Moses. Photography by Joe Velez.
Tara Moses (Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, Muskogee/Mvskoke/Creek Nation of Oklahoma) is a playwright, director, artistic director, and a citizen of the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma. Her plays have been produced and developed with companies in New York, Connecticut, California, Oklahoma, Nevada, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Washington, D.C. She is the Resident Artistic Director at AMERINDA, a 2018/19 fellow with the Intercultural Leadership Institute and winner of the Young Native Storytellers Contest.
Tara is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellow and resides in Tulsa, Oklahoma. www.taramoses.com
It was a typical theatre performance of Tara’s play, so she was surprised when a young woman from the audience approached her afterward, crying.
“Are you okay?” Tara asked.
The young woman was a freshman at the University of Tulsa and told Tara how this was the first time she had left home. She was having a hard time finding a community and wanted to be a part of what she saw in that theatre performance. With no prior acting experience, she auditioned for Tara’s next play and landed a role.
“At my theatre company, we pride ourselves on community and giving people access to opportunities."
“She was so inspired by what she saw on stage that she wanted to be on it,” Tara says. “At my theatre company, we pride ourselves on community and giving people access to opportunities. The majority of our acting company never performed in a play until they came to us. We put on professional productions, and people don’t know the actors have never identified as an actor until that moment in time. So, I’m excited for her because she didn’t even know she is so talented. We could be kickstarting the next star.”
Rich experiences are part of every high caliber theatre performance Tara produces. She thinks of theatre as a community-building experience, which is at the heart of Native people connecting with one another.
For her First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship, Tara gathered stories from her family and community that she has longed to tell and wrote them into a play.
"Experiencing family stories in such a unique way is reminiscent of the storytelling we’ve done for a millennia."
“Whenever we have those moments of feeling [that] we don’t have the strength, we’re able to think back to our parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, [and] great-great-great-grandparents who overcame the odds and continued to fight on,” she says. “Those stories are incredibly healing. Experiencing family stories in such a unique way is reminiscent of the storytelling we’ve done for a millennia. And theatre creates this unique feeling of being in a community. Alongside these stories, that gives us strength. It’s another way to share hope and inspiration for generations to come, while also supporting Native people in the theatre.”
In Solidarity, Justice and Freedom
Lori Pourier (Oglala Lakota) and Carlton Turner share heart thoughts on current events and how the Intercultural Leadership Institute allows them to embrace shared experiences and interdependence.
In response to the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and countless others before them, and the nationwide protests over the past few weeks, I find myself, as many of us, experiencing a full range of emotions from outrage, anger, and grief to an overwhelming empathy for each of the families who have lost their loved ones.
It has also spurred me to reflect on the work across communities of color that I’ve done for three decades and the numerous experiences when I’ve engaged in deep conversations on racism in America. One of my early experiences was in 1992. I joined Tia Oros Peters, Executive Director and Chris Peters, President, of the Seventh Generation Fund at an anti-racism workshop, Undoing Racism, presented by the Peoples Institute on Race which today has become one of the most reputable coalition-building anti-racism organizations directly addressing structural and historic racism in America. I had limited knowledge of how large a part government policies have played in the systemic racism imposed upon Black communities, some of which were already thriving. At the time, it was a struggle for me to hear a narrative that did not include Native peoples, because we too had been deeply impacted by destructive policies and my own family had been affected.
As one example, the Urban Relocation Program that began in the 1950's was designed to remove Native peoples from our homelands and to assimilate us into mainstream society. My parents were uprooted and sent to Dallas, Texas where they were promised housing and employment, but when they got there they were left on their own in the middle of an urban city. My mother recalls when she was homesick she would sit on the steps of a Black Baptist church and listen to their choir sing, as a way to bring herself some comfort.
Twenty some years after the Undoing Racism workshop, I found myself in the Peoples Institute training again, as part of an arts and social justice working group. While engaging in a critical analysis on systemic racism in America, I was again confronting my personal struggles -- what seemed to me was the repeated invisibility of our 574 Tribal Nations who are still here, many of whom still remain in their own territories. My reaction was to stand strong in my own identity, my Lakota values and my own reality on the topic of race.
Fast forward to 2016 when First Peoples Fund joined with Alternate Roots, National Association of Latino Arts and Culture Organization and the PA’I Foundation to launch the Intercultural Leadership Institute (ILI). (ILI translates to “skin” in the Hawaiian language.) The common experience that brought us together was that as leaders within our own organizations, we repeatedly found ourselves in spaces where we were faced with having to fit into mainstream white organizational models of sustainability. Built on a foundation of trust, ILI allowed us to embrace our shared experiences and interdependence. While each leading our respective organizations, it was an important time for us to create a mutually-shared space, not only for critical analysis and action, but one in which we could build upon our collective intellectual and cultural knowledge.
Over the past few years I have started to acknowledge that even in trusted spaces like ILI, I have felt a tension between my Black peers and American Indians, especially on the topic of Anti-Blackness. I’ve come to recognize that, while holding on to my Lakota values and my concerns around invisibility and erasure of Native peoples, I have become shortsighted in acknowledging the reality of Anti-Blackness and how pervasive it is.
As I continue to grow and learn, I am reminded of the words of my brother, First Peoples Fund board member and founding ILI partner, Carlton Turner from Utica, Mississippi that he shared at ILI Lakota in 2018. “When Native Americans pray and smudge and they speak in their language, it is very apparent that it is not from the mainstream. Yet when Black folks sing those are the same songs and language of the oppressor. Our rituals and our ceremony are not seen as ceremony because they didn’t come in the same types of packages.”
Carlton is speaking his truth when he talks about Black peoples’ loss of connection to their languages and African roots making it easier for others to discount their rituals and ceremonies as sacred. Today, I have come to challenge my own biases and will make it my practice to honor and respect their sacred spaces as much as I do my ancestral homelands. The blood of each of our ancestors is rooted in these lands. Their ancestors survived slavery in America and through prayer and song they were given hope, faith and remained resilient even in the darkest times.
Although we are in a dark time in America, I have faith that First Peoples Fund and our ILI partners will hold ourselves accountable to our Black brothers and sisters across this nation. We must lift each other up and be the good relative that our Ancestors would expect of us.
First Peoples Fund was founded on the principle of Collective Spirit, “That which moves each one of us to stand up and make a difference, to pass on ancestral knowledge and simply extend a hand of generosity.” It is time that we extend a hand in humility and of shared resilience and stand with our Black relatives in the fight for freedom and justice.
—Lori Pourier
For the first time in my memory the nation paused for a moment on Friday, June 19, 2020 to celebrate Juneteenth, the day the last group of enslaved people of African descent in Galveston, Texas learned of their freedom. However, the Emancipation Proclamation was signed by President Abraham Lincoln on September 22, 1862, more than two years before this date. The fact that Juneteenth is even a thing is an appropriate metaphor for the delayed freedom that African Americans have experienced under this government. This delayed justice is demonstrated in many facets of American history. It is a hallmark to the concept of separate and unequal, a foundational principle that stains the very fabric of American ideas. This delay allowed a constitution that states that all men are created equal to be written by white slaveholders that considered African descendants to be three-fifths of a person and considered our Indigenous family to be godless savages.
White supremacy contaminated the root of the American experiment from the very beginning. A plant growing in such circumstances is unable to produce healthy fruit. What we see today in the streets of Minneapolis, New York City, Los Angeles, and Atlanta is not the response to the murders of George Floyd or Breonna Taylor or Amaud Aubrey as an isolated or series of events. What we are seeing is the response to the death of the ideathat the possibility of freedom and justice could ever be attainable in the country’s current configuration. People are protesting because they have lost all hope in the system to be able to correct itself. They are now placing their faith in people, regular people like their neighbors and friends.
This moment is a confluence of a global pandemic, one that is adversely impacting Black and Indigenous communities; an economic crisis that is further widening the wealth gap between Black, brown communities and our white counterparts; and a rise in extrajudicial police killings of Black people. Things are dire, so much so that my son, a 2020 college graduate asked me, “Is this the beginning of the end of the world?”
I answered with a resounding yes and, well, no.
Yes, this moment marks the ending of the world as we knew it pre-COVID. A world that just accepts oppression and injustice as the norm. And no, the world will continue. I tell him, here is the caveat, we have the opportunity to shape what comes next. Our ability or inability to work together to build new systems and structures based on values of love and reciprocity, or not, will determine the world that you raise your children in.
In order for us to build the world we deserve we have to build on a foundation of trust. The type of trust that has led to multi-cultural coalitions like the Intercultural Leadership Institute. The type of trust that is founded on mutual respect, global indigenous knowledge, cultural competency, and a willingness to lean into our growing edges together. It is this trust that extended me an invitation to become a First People’s Fund board member. The same trust has brought me, time and time again, to the Lakota ancestral lands to break bread with Lori and her family. It is this trust that has allowed us to strategize for more than a decade on how to advance Indigenous sovereignty and anti-racist worldviews to the US cultural sector.
The work Lori and I do together is part of our commitment to each other. Our commitments to each other are deeply tied to our individual commitments to our families and a deep respect for the legacy of liberation that we were each born into. I consider my work with First People’s Fund to be more than board service. I consider the work done in FPF’s name a practicum in the liberation of my own family and community. The work we do together is not theoretical, our lives literally hang in the balance.
—Carlton Turner
Art Echoing the Voices of His People
Stanley Goodshield Hawkins is an enrolled member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe and has been practicing his craft for nearly 30 years. Raised in San Jose, California, Stanley moved back to the Rapid City area in 1969.
He launched Black Hawk Creations in November 2014, and today, his business has multiple lines, including wood products, Native jewelry, and regalia.
In 2017, Stanley earned a bachelor’s degree in Business and an associate’s degree in Arts in Lakota Studies from Oglala Lakota College and currently teaches classes on traditional arts. He is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellow.
Stanley traced the rawhide X on the back of the hand drum, showing his work to the KEVN- Black Hills FOX news camera. The buffalo hide drum he crafted echoes the voices of his people, as does each handmade piece he creates. The TV news feature captured a brief glimpse into Stanley’s artistic life.
After 28 years in the electronic field, he longed to reconnect with his peoples’ culture. He’s put his engraving and woodworking skills to use by making pool cues embellished with traditional designs. He also makes men’s and women’s breastplates, shields, earrings, chokers, turtle rattles, bracelets, and necklaces. A box of buffalo bone ribs showed up at his studio one day, and he turned those into a men’s breastplate.
“I produce what I consider traditional style, but I leave some room to create my own style in the design,”
“I produce what I consider traditional style, but I leave some room to create my own style in the design,” he says. “I only use the best and close-to-time period components available. My work is as close to traditional as I can get, with old-style beads and other supplies becoming scarce.”
Being as correct in his materials and processes as possible, Stanley regularly consults elders and artistic peers like Kelly Looking Horse (Oglala Lakota), also a First Peoples Fund fellow. Stanley has learned to approach each piece with a right attitude, smudging, and a prayer.
“You are never supposed to start anything if you are in a bad mood,” he explains.
In 2007, he began making regalia and jewelry for relatives and friends. In 2014 he launched Black Hawk Creations.
“I started out of pocket and later looked for funding,” he says. “Lakota Funds stepped up and gave me a loan. It took several years of creating before I started making a profit.”
He opened a studio at Racing Magpie in Rapid City, South Dakota, and has three apprentices working with him: two grandsons and a niece. His work in wood, leather, feathers, and stones has become recognized in the community for its authenticity and craftsmanship.
“This inspires me because I want this practice to be continued by future generations.”
But Stanley feels he is always learning, continuing to consult elders as he creates art that echoes the voices of his people. “This inspires me because I want this practice to be continued by future generations.”
Kindling the Fire for the Grandchildren's Dance Society
An award-winning artist and culture bearer, Kelly Looking Horse (Oglala Lakota) shares Lakota stories and makes and performs art through traditional dancing, drumming, singing, leather and wood work, beading, quilling, and painting — to enhance, reinforce, and illustrate the stories.
Kelly founded Lakota Red Nations, a family-owned and operated enterprise specializing in traditional Native arts, crafts, and Oglala Lakota history. He and his wife, Suzie (Pomo of the Robinson Rancheria Band), live in Batesland, South Dakota. He is a 2020 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellow.
Children entered the room, most of them hesitant and uncertain. They were there to learn what it means to become a powwow dancer. Kelly and his wife, Suzie, welcomed them and explained the significance of the journey they were embarking on. By the end of the orientation for the Grandchildren’s Dance Society, the children’s shyness had melted away.
“Both the parents and children are excited about it,” Kelly says. “When you become a dancer, you’re in a position for people to call upon, whether you dance performances for somebody or contribute to a powwow. When you show up in your regalia, the organizers get excited because you’re a dancer. You become a special person.”
With the global shutdown, the Dance Society has been put on hold, but Kelly and Suzie are keeping some part of it alive by posting moccasin makings virtual workshops on the Oglala Lakota College website. One of their dance students watched the workshop video then went to buy needles. Suzie offered to give the student everything else she needed to start beading moccasins with the help of her parents.
“They are excited about the day they can see their child coming out in full regalia and dancing,” Kelly says. “We got the fire started at the orientation, and the parents are doing a good job keeping it going.”
Kelly is using funds from his First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship to purchase materials a little at a time for the rest of his fellowship project. He hovers over the hides and drum shell in storage for the big powwow drum project he plans to do with students. He battles the temptation to put it together himself. But he is patient, wanting everyone to have a hand in making the drum.
“We want to encourage people [to come] together and see the children learn to dance. It’s an inspiration for the community.”
“The [fellowship] project is more than a workshop or trying to build our dance group,” he says. “We want to encourage people [to come] together and see the children learn to dance. It’s an inspiration for the community.”
“Once they hear the stories about the origin of where the dance bustle came from, or what the proper definition is of a moccasin, they get excited, and it makes us excited, too. One day, when we’re not here, the people we taught will carry on these stories. These stories will live and continue on into future generations.”
