indigenous perspectives on contemporary native art, indigenous aesthetics and representation

260 Pages·2016·9.2 MB·English

University of New Mexico
UNM Digital Repository
Language, Literacy, and Sociocultural Studies ETDs Education ETDs
4-2-2013
INDIGENOUS PERSPECTIVES ON
CONTEMPORARY NATIVE ART,
INDIGENOUS AESTHETICS AND
REPRESENTATION
John Paul Rangel
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REPRESENTATION." (2013).https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/educ_llss_etds/37
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© 2012 Copyright by
John Paul Rangel
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Further reproduction prohibited without permission.

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I would like to acknowledge Dr. Greg Cajete, my advisor and dissertation chair, for
the encouragement and advice throughout the years of graduate studies. I am so grateful
for his guidance, mentorship, professionalism and friendship that have had a profound
impact on my understanding of Indigenous studies, education, and leadership.

I also thank my committee members, Dr. Penny Pence, Dr. Anne Calhoun, and
Dr. Nancy Marie Mithlo, for their valuable recommendations and insights pertaining to
this study and their assistance in my professional development.

To the members of the Native arts community and specifically the Native artists
whose contributions to this study made it possible, I am grateful for all the conversations
leading up to this project, the meals we shared and the issues you brought up. I hope I did
right by you and will continue to do my part to emphasize the importance of Indigenous
perspectives and worldviews particularly pertaining to our arts and cultures.

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INDIGENOUS PERSPECTIVES ON CONTEMPORARY NATIVE ART,
INDIGENOUS AESTHETICS AND REPRESENTATION

by
John Paul Rangel
B.F.A., Studio Art, University of Texas – Austin, 1998
M.A. American Studies, University of New Mexico, 2007

Ph.D., Language, Literacy and Sociocultural Studies,
University of New Mexico, 2012

ABSTRACT

In this dissertation I examine and posit Indigenous perspectives on contemporary
Native art, Indigenous aesthetics and issues of representation. Contemporary Native art at
this moment is best described as an expression of values—personal or communal or
cultural—with an attention to material conditions and current issues. I employ Indigenous
methodologies and Tribal Critical Race theory as a critical framework to intervene in the
dominant discourse on Native art. This research focuses on the narratives and
perspectives of eight artists who represent a cross-section of the current state of Native
arts production in North America drawing from the local Native arts community in Santa
Fe, New Mexico, various urban areas of the United States, and a artist in Vancouver,
British Columbia. These artists span three generations of artistic practice that includes
display, performance, lecture and education. I utilize the current scholarship on Native
arts, curatorial practice and the perspectives of museum professionals from the Institute
of American Indian Arts, a federally chartered college and museum.
Utilizing Indigenous perspectives and frameworks is necessary for understanding
Native art and Indigenous aesthetics, particularly in public institutions such as museums.
Reclaiming the apparatus of an institution like the museum promotes and encourages the
recognition of Indigenous ways of knowing, models of representation and the delivery of
knowledge pertaining to Native arts and culture. The Native museum becomes a site to
re-educate the general public about the complexities of identity and influence, cross-
cultural exchanges, and the prevalence of thriving Indigenous living cultures. This is an
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area of research that is under-developed and I extend the discourse on Native art theory
and representation through Indigenous aesthetics.
Indigenous aesthetics are an expression of a continuum of cultural production and
connections to place, language, culture, traditions, values, oral histories and Indigenous
knowledge, ancestry and also to future generations. This includes indigenous mapping
where the connection to place is tied into worldview, ceremony, language, songs, dance,
prayer, family and cultural continuity. Native American art is a spectrum of expression,
influences and perspectives represented in forms that embody an expansive range where
I utilize the terms essentialism and hybridity. Essentialism employs the concepts of
cultural distinctiveness and tribal sovereignty that allows the Native artist to claim and
interpret cultural patrimony. Hybridity, in an Indigenous context, resists the limitations of
dominant culture projections of Native culture and encourages innovation, adaptation and
a response to influences, current conditions and new media.
Native artists use Indigenous aesthetics to respond to colonialism through
political/social commentary, addresses stereotype and racism, indicating survivance and
enacting cultural sovereignty. When Native artists and intellectuals do this they are
re-appropriating or indigenizing ideas, symbols, mascots, the colonial gaze. I discuss
re-presentation of Native arts and the ongoing development of Indigenous aesthetics
through recent exhibitions, current scholarship, Native curatorial practice and the
ethnographic narratives of Native artists. I extend the current discourse on Indigenous
aesthetics through the concept of the Indigenization of space that occurs when Native
people reclaim a location through cultural signifiers, performance, ceremony, song,
dance, or installation conveying the existence and presence of Native peoples. My
research illustrates how Native people reclaim cultural, intellectual and physical
patrimony through this new discourse by using Native critical theory and methodologies,
Indigenous aesthetics and Native art terminology.

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LIST OF IMAGES..........................................................................................................x
LIST OF FIGURES........................................................................................................xvi
CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION....................................................................................14
Research Questions 4
Definitions 4
Significance 15
CHAPTER 2 LITERATURE REVIEW........................................................................17
Conceptions of culture 17
Natives in popular culture 19
Cultural theory and issues of representation 20
Native North American Indian Art 23
Indigenous Aesthetics 31
CHAPTER 3 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK.........................................................35
Decolonizing Methodologies 36
Indigenous methodology 37
Critical Race Theory 38
Tribal Critical Race Theory 40

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CHAPTER 4 METHODOLOGY...................................................................................48
Ethnography 48
Critical Ethnography 50
Critical Analysis and Theory 51
Indigenous Methodology 52
Research Methods 55
Ethics/Reflexivity 59
Community-based and Collaborative Research 60
CHAPTER 5 NATIVE ARTISTS: PROFILES & ART, THE CASE STUDIES…..63
Charlene Teters 63
Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas 94
Teri Greeves 115
Marcus Amerman 139
Sarah Sense 152
Frank Buffalo Hyde 166
Dyani Reynolds-White Hawk 178
Chris Pappan 199

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CHAPTER 6 ANALYSIS.............................................................................................211
Native Art representation in Museums 216
The Museum of Contemporary Native Arts 218
Indigenous Perspectives in a Native Arts Museum 220
Indigenous aesthetics 227
Chapter 7 CONCLUSION............................................................................................233
APPENDICES................................................................................................................241
APPENDIX A – THE INDIAN ARTS AND CRAFTS ACT OF 1990.....................241
APPENDIX B – SANTA FE INDIAN MARKET STANDARDS.............................242
REFERENCES...............................................................................................................248
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