ART SEMINAR GROUP WEBINAR - ONLINE PROGRAM THROUGH ZOOM

Transformation on the Plains: Shifts in Native American Artistic Production in the Reservation Era

Darienne Turner, assistant curator of Indigenous Art of the Americas at the Baltimore Museum of Art

The mid-19th century was a period of profound trauma and transformation for many tribes who called the American Plains their home. A confluence of factors ranging from protracted military battles with United States troops, to the deliberate extermination of the buffalo, to the destruction of Native economies, led to a wholesale transformation of Indigenous life and society. Increasingly unable to sustain armed conflict against legions of Native warriors in the wake of the American Civil War, the United States government shifted its sights from genocide to tightly controlling Native people’s movement, agency, and political power. Forced onto the reservation and deprived of many traditions, Natives turned to the arts in order to both retain cultural practices and innovate new forms of expression. This talk will investigate a wide range of art forms, including buffalo shields, elaborately beaded garments, painted Winter Counts, and ledger drawings.

$15 door fee for guests and subscribers (no fee for members)