Masterpieces Of American Indian Art

The collection includes superb objects from nearly all important American tribes. Presents 100 of the collections finest works.

In addition to the historic pieces which make up the core of traditional Native American art are works from modern-day masters, the painters and sculptors of the twentieth century.

North American Indian Art: Masterpieces and Museum Collections from the Netherlands showcases 114 oustanding examples of Native art and heritage from the Canadian subarctic forests to the American Southwest preserved in Dutch museums. Many of these rare material documents collected between the seventeenth and the twenty-first century have never been published before. They are here stunningly presented as individual works of art and placed into their cultural and historical contexts by forty-two leading American, Canadian, and European experts who weave together the historical narrative of each object's acquisition with current Native and scholarly interpretations of their use and meaning. In his introductory essay Pieter Hovens provides a detailed account of the history of Dutch interests in North American Indian cultures, from the seventeenth-century colonial experience in New Netherland through the collecting activities of public institutions and private connoisseurs to academic scholarship and social engagement. All of these interests have contributed to the wealth and range of objects featured here as well as to the public perception of Native Americans in the Netherlands. This book offers for the first time an overview of all institutional collections of Native North American arts and cultures in a single European country. It is the privilege of the Dutch museums to share these heritage collections with the widest audience possible.

The nation's premier private collection of Rookwood art pottery featuring American Indian portraiture is on display at the Cincinnati Art Museum from October 2007 to January 2008. Rookwood and the American Indian: Masterpieces of American Art Pottery from the James J. Gardner Collection is a remarkable exhibition catalogue that will be of interest well beyond the exhibition because of its unique subject matter. Fifty-two pieces produced by the Rookwood Pottery Company are showcased, many accompanied by black-and-white photographs of the American Indians portrayed by the ceramic artist. In addition, the catalogue includes a brief biography of each artist as well as curators' comments about the Rookwood pottery and the Indian apparel seen in the portraits. The catalogue also presents two essays. The first, "Enduring Encounters: Cincinnatians and American Indians to 1900," by ethnologist and co-curator Susan Labry Meyn, describes American Indian activities in Cincinnati from the time of the first settlers to 1900 and relates these events to national policy, such as the 1830 Indian Removal Act. Rookwood and the American Indian, by art historian Anita J. Ellis, concentrates on Rookwood's fascination with the American Indian and the economic implications of producing that line. Rookwood and the American Indian blends anthropology with art history to reveal the relationships between the white settlers and the Native Americans in general, between Cincinnati and the American Indian in particular, and ultimately between Rookwood artists and their Indian friends.

From the author of the award-winning Art of Grace and Passion comes this spotlight on North American artisanship between 200 BC and the early 1900s. The masterworks featured here range from clothing, accessories, and ceremonial and hunting gear to blankets, cradles, storage vessels, and utensils. Each was crafted of such diverse materials as quills, ivory, hide, wood, fibers, stone, clay, and even glass beads imported by European traders. George Everett Shaw, Steven C. Brown, Benson L. Lanford, and Bill Mercer examine how American Indians' existence developed around the challenges and benefits of the climate, terrain, flora, and fauna of their locales. Their art objects embody the spiritual devotion--inseparable from their relationship with the natural world--that even now shapes their lives. Whether decorated with abstract patterns or with representations of humans and animals, such pieces were vehicles for passing down beliefs and customs before written languages existed. Thus we can appreciate them not only for their beauty and the skill and ingenuity of their makers but also in the context of the cultures from which they sprang.

A splendidly illustrated introduction to the rich history of Native American art, distinguished by its broad coverage and nuanced discussion. This timely new book surveys the artistic traditions of indigenous North America, from those of ancient cultures such as Adena, Hopewell, Mississippian, and Anasazi to the work of modern artists like Earnest Spybuck, Fred Kabotie, Dick West, T. C. Cannon, and Gerald McMaster. The text is organized geographically and draws upon the testimonies of oral tradition, Native American history, and the latest research in North American archaeology. Recent art historical scholarship has helped restore, to a large degree, some understanding of the identities and cultural roles of Native American artists and the social contexts of the objects they created. Native American art is often discussed simply as a cultural production rather than the work of individual artists who made objects to fufill social and cultural purposes; this book focuses as much as possible on the artists themselves, their cultural identities, and the objects they made even when the names of the individual artists remain unrecoverable. But this is not a book of artists' biographies. It seeks to inform a general readership about the history of Native American art with a lively narrative full of historical incident and illustrated with provocative and superlative works of art. It explores the tension between artistic continuities spanning thousands of years and the startlingly fresh innovations that resulted from specific historical circumstances. The narrative weaves together so-called "traditional" arts, "tourist" arts, and Native American art of today by taking the point of view of their particular and local histories—the artists, their communities, and audiences. Among the many cultures included are: Arapaho, Athapascan, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Chumash, Hopi, Hupa/Karok, Inuit, Iroquois, Kwakiutl, Lakota, Miwok, Navajo, Ojibwa, Pomo, Tlingit, Tsimshian, Uypik, and Zuni.

Encompasses all major tribal areas: the Southwest, California, the Pacific Northwest, the Eskimos of Canada and Alaska, the Plains and the Eastern Woodlands. Numerous colour photographs.