Sandra Hale Schulman
Special to ICT
The latest: Documentary artist solo show, art that transmits, cult classic revelations.
EXHIBITS: Buffalo awaken in ledger art
The searing Ken Burns PBS documentary “The American Buffalo” made a deep dive into the North American history of the buffalo, its significance to Indigenous people, and the efforts to bring the buffalo back from near extinction.
The key artwork for the film was made by John Isaiah Pepion, Piikani Band of the Blackfoot Confederacy. His strong graphic design artwork is featured on the documentary’s poster, DVD cover, and other marketing materials.
“My name is John Isaiah Pepion,” he said in a press statement. “I’m based out of the Blackfeet reservation in north-central Montana, where the Rocky Mountains meet the plains. I am best known for my ledger art, which is an art tradition that developed in Plains tribes: as the buffalo hide we traditionally used for painting became scarce, Plains people were forced to adapt by making artwork on ledger paper from accounting books. I come from a family of artists, and ledger art has been in my family for hundreds of years.”
John’s ledger art is currently featured in an art exhibition called “Buffalo Awakening” at the Old Main Gallery in Bozeman, Montana, through July 19. The art exhibition showcases the importance of the buffalo to Native people and highlights the buffalo’s comeback from near extinction through their reintroduction to their traditional homelands by Indigenous people. John is known for his contemporary ledger art, much of which features images of buffalo along with horses and hummingbirds.
The art journey has been ceremonial for Pepion, who descends from Mountain Chief, a Blackfeet leader who preserved history through numerous winter counts. He speaks with troubled youth in public schools to promote the benefits of art as therapy. He holds formal degrees in Art Marketing and Museum Studies from United Tribes Technical College and the Institute of American Indian Arts. His art deepens his connections to self and place, providing him with a sense of strength.
ART: Deities become radio tower art
Nani Chacon, a Diné and Chicana artist, has been awarded a Creative Capital Award for her clever site-specific public art sculpture on the Navajo Nation called “Our Gods Walk Among Us.”
Taking visual cues from traditional sand painting motifs of Yebicheiis, or Navajo Deities, Chacon reimagines them as a sculpture that mirrors the graphic framework lines of 20th Century wasp-waist steel lattice electrical transmission towers. The sculpture will also broadcast community voices as wavelength transmissions via an embedded FM radio transmitter. Drawing attention to the landscape it also works as community engagement, where Navajo community members will provide words of affirmation to be broadcast from the sculpture, the intention being that their words and affirmations will exist as wavelengths embedded in their landscape.
Construction of the sculpture will consist of steel rod materials with a proposed height of 12-15 feet, with the low power FM transmitter, acknowledging that like electrical power lines, wavelengths are being emitted into our environments, into our thoughts, with an implication that these are found in modern technologies and in traditional ways of knowing and being for Navajo peoples. The Navajo Nation Museum is a partner in this project.
Chacon has been highly active in the public arts sector known for large scale murals, she also works in illustration and installation. Last year she had a major solo museum exhibition at SITE Santa Fe inspired by Diné creation stories. Her numerous mural projects focus on community engagement, addressing the complexity of contemporary Indigenous culture and identities.
FILM: New info from ‘Thunderheart’
The cult classic film “Thunderheart,” based loosely on the Leonard Peltier story of FBI agents infiltrating reservations and starring Graham Greene, Val Kilmer and John Trudell – who cut his hair into a Mohawk style to reference the Mohawks fighting the Canadian government – has a new release with previously unknown information from an unlikely source.
“I’m grateful for the many friends from around the world who have long been fans of my movie ‘Thunderheart,’” said John Fusco, screenwriter, in a social media post. “When Sony soon releases the new 4K DVD with my commentary you’ll hear about why it took so many years to get it made in mainstream Hollywood, the resistance from the studio system, the federal interference (the fear of getting the truth out), and the inspiring support of Native Americans around the country.
“You will hear that there was only one singular reason that I was able to get the movie made. Only one powerful name that got behind me, stood by me, and even traveled to the Pine Ridge Rez to sit with Chief Fools Crow and meet the indigenous people who survived government oppression.
“That one man was Robert De Niro.”
Ironically, DeNiro just played the villain William Hale in “Killers of the Flower Moon.”
“He went to the studio and pledged an acting commitment in the near future IF they made ‘Thunderheart’ as I had written it,” Fusco continues. “Having just formed Tribeca Productions, my film would be the company’s very first movie, produced by me, DeNiro, and Jane Rosenthal, a film that helped pass legislation to protect sacred Native American sites. The movie would not exist without Robert DeNiro. I’m not political and this is not a political post. Just a personal remembrance of someone who fought for the underdogs and who taught me that fearless integrity in pursuit of truth is a human trait that can still exist in this world.”
The pursuit of truth continues as Leonard Peltier was just denied parole, he has been in jail for 50 years.
