Some History | Some Stylin' Indians | Christianne Morris (Micmac)

Christianne Morris (Micmac artist) was known for her exquisite work in the traditional Micmac arts, supporting her family by the sale of quillwork and basketry. Her needlework, quillwork, splint basketry, and even a full-sized canoe and paddles all won first prizes at various provincial exhibitions. She once sold two beaded costumes to Indian Commissioner William Chearnley for the impressive sum of $300.

In the image below, she wears an ensemble of garments and accessories that she made her self. The outfit consists of a beaded peaked hat, a jacket, a woollen skirt appliquéd with ribbon, and beaded moccasins. She stands with her adopted son, and it is likely that she created his outfit as well.

From the portraits and works of art that survive her, we can see that she was a beautiful and gifted Native woman. One of the region's most interesting people in the 19th century, Christianne Morris is remembered not only as a model for the Nova Scotia painters who portrayed her but also as a talented artist in her own right.

Some History | Some Stylin' Indians | Caroline Parker (Seneca)

I think I'm just really into old daguerreotype photographs right now, but these images are awesome. This is Caroline Parker (Seneca) in 1849 who, by the age of 19, was already recognized as a highly skilled artist. She is wearing an outfit that she created herself.

Her blue woolen broadcloth skirt is decorated with Iroquois symbols, and incorporates 'tree of light,' 'heaven and earth,' and 'council fire' motifs. These clothes became part of the Lewis Henry Morgan Collection at the New York State Museum in Albany. The skirt and red cotton overdress are still present in the Museum's collection where they remain a source of continued inspiration to those wanting to replicate traditional Seneca clothing.

Some History | Some Stylin' Indians | Hole-In-The-Day (Ojibwe)

I have a slight obsession with this guy - his name is Hole-In-The-Day (or Bug-o-nay-ki-shig), and he was an Ojibwe leader during an important time when his community was negotiating the imposed Euro-American culture with that of their own.

His father was also named Hole-In-The-Day, and the younger succeeded him as chief of the community.

He is oftentimes described as a handsome man with polished manners, and he mingled easily in white society during his many trips to Washington, D.C., and St. Paul. He dressed in fashionable European-style clothes, but he always kept his hair long and continued to wear a blanket draped across one shoulder. Euro-American fashion was simplistic in the 1800s, and individuals like Hole-In-The-Day made it visually more exciting with the inclusion of Ojibwe accessories and items of adornment. He also continued to wear Ojibwe-style moccasins.

He was popular with both men and women, and he was a accomplished public speaker. Reverend Claude H. Beaulieu says of him:

"Hole-in-the-Day was a man of distinguished appearance and native courtliness of manner. His voice was musical and magnetic, and with these qualities he had a subtle brain, a logical mind, and quite a remarkable gift of oratory. In speech he was not impassioned, but clear and convincing, and held fast the attention of his hearers."

Soon white men in both the nation's capital and the territorial capital began to look upon him as a spokesman for all his people.

Some History | Ancient Southwest Jewelry

I'm teaching a series of Native American art history courses at Arizona State University this year, and it's has been fun getting to know the students (the majority of whom are non-Native artists). I think we're finally at the point in the semester where we 'get' each other. They are bright, and although most of them know very little about Native American cultures or art, they've taken up the material with interest and are doing a really good job (so far, haha).

Because I'm back in 'Teaching Mode,' I'll be doing more 'Some History' posts. Right now, we're looking at the Southwest region in two of my classes, so I wanted to share these images of Ancestral Pueblo jewelry.

This is an Ancestral Pueblo (also known as Anasazi, which means Enemy Ancestors in Navajo) stone figurine found at Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon. The figurine, which estimated to have been made sometime between the years 1040 and 1120 CE, is wearing turquoise a turquoise necklace.

This ancient basketry bracelet is encrusted with turquoise plaques that were set using pine-pitch adhesive. Found in Texas, this bracelet is thought to have been made around the year 800 or later.

This is a picture of Ancestral Puebloan turquoise, spiny-oyster shell, and jet beads and pendants found at Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon. The shell and jet necklace contains more than five thousand beads that range in size from 1-2mm. Just to give you a sense of size, the frog is about 3 inches long. These items are dated to around 1000-1200 CE.

This Ancestral Pueblo obsidian blade-shaped gorget is overlaid with a mosaic of turquoise, shell, and jet. Found in a seed jar in Utah, it also dates from around 1000-1200 CE.

These three earring sets demonstrate how the style of Southwest mosaic-inlay work has remained constant from the ancient pre-Puebloans to contemporary artists. (Top:) These Ancestral Pueblo turquoise-mosaic pendants are estimated to have been made sometime between 1100-1200 CE and were found at Canyon de Chelly. (Middle:) These Hopi turquoise and abalone shell earrings were made in the late 1800s. The mosaic includes turquoise beads found at ancient ruins. (Bottom:) These earrings of turquoise and abalone shell were made by Hopi master jeweler Charles Loloma in 1978.

This is a photo of Hoo-n-ym-pka (Hopi), who wears turquoise mosaic earrings and a necklace of glass seed beads strung with one larger bead, seen on the left. Her butterfly hairstyle is typical of postpubescent, unmarried Hopi women. Her manta is the traditional black woolen blanket dress worn by Pueblo women. This picture was taken in 1901.


To learn more, check out this book (where I found these images): North American Indian Jewelry and Adornment.

Some History | Miss Navajo Nation

It's Navajo Nation Fair time! And the folks over at Indian Country Today posted a cool article on the annual event.

The Navajo Nation Fair draws about 15,000 visitors a day to Window Rock, Arizona, the Capitol of the Navajo Nation. The week-long fair kicks off on the Monday after Labor day, September 5. It is the largest American Indian Fair and Rodeo in the Southwestern United States, and consists of over two dozen events that extend over the seven day period.

With a rodeo, arts market, Miss Navajo competition, powwow, parade, and a fashion show, I'm sad that I'm going to be missing the Fair again this year.

I decided to do a post on the Miss Navajo Nation competition because, in addition to demonstrating their skills as supremo Navajo chicks, these young ladies get to rock some awesome tradish fashion. To learn more about the Miss Navajo competition, I highly recommend that you check out the documentary film, Miss Navajo (see the trailer below). It offers an insider's glimpse into this important event, which consists of criteria that you don't get to see in your typical beauty competition, and the contestants are judged on their cultural knowledge and Navajo language skills.

For more than 50 years, the Miss Navajo Nation beauty pageant has given its contestants opportunities to showcase not only their beauty but also their skills in dance, music and sheep slaughtering. Following contestants in their quest for the crown, and featuring personal stories of recent winners, Miss Navajo is a celebration of womanhood.

The first ever Miss Navajo was Dr. Beulah Melvin Allen, who was 23 when she was crowned. She went on to become a doctor. Very badass, Dr. Allen!

The second Miss Navajo was Ida Gail Organick, who reigned from 1953 to 1954. Lookin good among those canyons Miss Ida Gail!

Miss Navajo, 1963-64, Anna Mae Begay Fowler was the first to rock the Miss Navajo crown. When Fowler competed, there were two categories - modern and traditional - and Fowler competed in both. In the traditional category, she had to demonstrate her skills in weaving and singing. For the modern competition, her skills included typing, sewing and public speaking.

This jazzy lady is Rose Ann Bekis Kenneth, who reigned as Miss Navajo from 1969 to 1970.

About her time as Miss Navajo 1979-80, Freda Nells said, "I have benefited enormously from the reigning as the ambassador of one of the largest Native American Indian people. The experience has showed me confidence, independence, ambition, respect, and set a goal for my future. With that in mind I continued my education."

Sunny Dooley, Miss Navajo 1982-83, is a storyteller, poet, playwright, workshop facilitator, lecturer and Navajo folksinger. Multi-talented!

About the importance of basketry, Karen Leuppe, Miss Navajo Nation 1994-95 (aka Miss Awesome Hair), said, “The center of the basket represents the existence of a child and the spiral extending outward from the center represents the learning environment provided at home and in the community. The coils and stitches binding them together remind us that everything in the environment is connected and ensures the child is living in harmony and peace with family and nature.”

The 46th Miss Navajo was Radmilla Cody. She says, "My grandmother raised me herding sheep, weaving rugs, and speaking the Navajo language being that was our source of communication. I dealt with a lot growing up half black and half Navajo."

Her goals during her reign included working closely with youth, parents and elders. "The youth because they are the perserverance of who we are as Dine' people. The parents because they are the role models and communicators within the home. The elders because they are valuable resources and the roots of our people." She also advocated for community programs that dealt with issues such as Child Abuse/Neglect, Elderly Abuse/Neglect, Domestic Violence, Gang Activity, Natural Resources and Alcoholism/Substance Abuse.

Another doctor, Karletta 'Daane' Chief was Miss Navajo 2000-2001. Chief said, "As my grandmother and my family have encouraged me and have been my role models, I hope that I can give back to my people in the same way, to be a role model to young Navajo children, and to preserve our language, our culture, and our land."

Last year's winner was Winifred Bessie Jumbo from Two Grey Hills, NM. Jumbo will pass on the crown this week to a new Miss Navajo Nation, and continue the legacy of encouraging and celebrating the strength and importance of women as cultural bearers and cultural bridges.

Click here to read more about the Miss Navajo competition and history.

Native American and Indigenous Studies Association Conference Highlights

I recently attended the Native American and Indigenous Studies Association 2011 Conference that was held at UC Davis in California. It was a great time catching up with my peers from the American Indian Studies program at the University of Arizona, and of course, meeting a ton of new folks in the field. I chaired a panel that focused on Native blogging. It featured Native Appropriations blogger Adrienne Keene and Not Artomatic blogger Lara Evans. The panel presentations went really well, we got some great questions from the audience, and it was nice to catch up with Lara and meet Adrienne. Here we are after our panel ended:

This year, the NAISA reception was held at the California State Museum, in conjunction with the recently inaugurated exhibit, California Indians: Making A Difference. I scoped it out and found some cool images and objects having to do with adornment. Here's some of what I found:

Jesse Gonzalez III, dancing at the opening of a new health center, 2010. Pomo/Miwok. Courtesy Jesse Gonzalez, Jr.

Hupa Mother and child. Photo by Edward Curtis, 1924.

Hupa man dressed for the white deerskin dance. Photo by Edward Curtis, 1923.

A 'princess' contest at Hupa, 1940s. Photo by Ernest Marshall. Courtesy Bradley Marshall.

German soldiers playing Indian, ca. 1914. Courtesy P. Christiaan Klieger.

Elk antler purse, used to hold dentalium shell money. Yurok, ca. 1970.

The Strange History of the Indian Trade Blanket

The Pendleton discussion continues - Previously, Adrienne Keene at Native Appropriations bloggged about it, I wrote a brief post about it, and now Slate.com has posted on the 'strange history' and the 'interesting exchanges' between Pendleton and Native nations, and now, high fashion hipsters. I don't agree with some of the author's wording, but I've re-posted the entire article below:

The Strange History of the Indian Trade Blanket
By Julia Felsenthal

(Credit: Photograph © Chris Hornbecker. Courtesy Pendleton.)

Pendleton’s New Portland Collection

I recently bought a sweater online. The designer, Twelfth Street by Cynthia Vincent, calls it a Navajo blanket cardigan, and I’m well aware that it’s trendy. “Navajo,” “Native American,” and “Indian” prints are everywhere. Fashion magazines like Elle and Teen Vogue have touted their now-ness. High-end designers like Vivienne Westwood and middle-range lines like William Rast have shown these prints on the runway. Even retailers like the Gap - which this past winter peddled multiple sweaters featuring a striped pattern described as Navajo - and Urban Outfitters - which currently has 27 pieces of Navajo merchandise available online - are getting in on the action.

But why are these prints suddenly so popular? And what, if anything, do these Native American or Navajo prints have to do with Native American textiles?

(Credit: Courtesy Opening Ceremony.)

Pendleton’s Collaboration With Opening Ceremony

The fashion world’s recent enthusiasm for all things Native American was kick-started by British designer Matthew Williamson’s spring 2008 show, which featured dresses, tops, and skirts beaded with fluorescent Native American motifs. From there, the trend spread to designers like Phillip Lim, Anna Sui, Isabel Marant, and Burberry. But it was in the winter of 2009 that Native American prints gained mass traction with the launch of a prominent collaboration between Pendleton - a woolen mill in Oregon that has been making wool blankets emblazoned with Native American-inspired designs for more than a hundred years - and Opening Ceremony, the envelope-pushing fashion brand and retailer. For the past three seasons, Opening Ceremony has elevated Pendleton from catalog frumpery to the fashion front lines, cutting the boldest and brightest of Pendleton fabrics into micro-minis, cropped jackets, and even (rather garish) onesies. Other companies followed suit: Pendleton fabrics have also lined and embellished Levi’s jean jackets and adorned Timberland hiking boots, as well as Vans slip-ons and high-tops. Pendleton is now getting into the game itself with its new, blatantly hipster-oriented Portland collection.

(Credit: Courtesy Pendleton Archives.)

Pendleton's Chief Joseph Print Blanket

Pendleton isn’t just a manufacturer of Native American designs: In fact, the Oregonian woolen mill played a huge role - perhaps more than any one Indian tribe - in creating these distinctive patterns. Pendleton’s early designers were instrumental in shaping modern conceptions of what Native American designs look like. They created bold and bright patterns that incorporated symbols from various tribes (as well as some non-Native American symbols), and their marketing persuaded Americans that the patterns derived directly from some authentic source. Pendleton was thus able to sell its product both on reservations - where Native Americans were attracted to Pendleton’s quality and vibrant colors - and off - where “authenticity” was a big selling point.

(Credit: Photograph by William Pennington/Western History/Genealogy Dept., Denver Public Library via Library of Congress.)

A Navajo Woman With Her Sheep, Circa 1920

Of course, Native Americans were making blankets long before the Pendleton mill was founded in 1893. But those blankets were largely buffalo robes, created out of hide; only some tribes produced woven blankets, and only the Navajo produced woven woolen blankets (a fact that may account for the often inaccurate description of Pendleton-esque patterns as Navajo). The Navajo developed the craft of wool weaving in the 1500s, when the Spanish brought Churro sheep to Navajo lands. Though the Navajo were the only tribe weaving wool, according to Ann Hedlund, director of the tapestry program at the Arizona State Museum, other tribes had access to Navajo-woven wool through intertribal trade in the 18th and 19th centuries. As this weaving tradition developed, the growth of the European fur trade brought new trade items to the New World, and into the Native American economy. Among the most valuable were plain wool blankets, called Hudson Bay blankets, which were introduced in the late 1700s. These factory-made blankets became very valuable, says Bobbie Conner, director of the Tamástslikt Cultural Institute in Pendleton, Ore., because they were thicker, warmer, and more weather-resistant than what most Native Americans were creating at the time.

(Credit: Photograph by Lee Moorhouse. Courtesy University of Oregon Libraries.)

The Pendleton Factory Jacquard Loom During the Early 20th Century

By the late 1800s, these machine-made blankets had flooded the market, so the Navajo had fewer outlets for their textiles. And as the 19th century progressed, political pressures and stresses - including the loss of substantial populations of the Churro sheep - made it increasingly difficult for the Navajo to weave and trade their textiles to other Native American tribes. The 19th century also saw the arrival of the Jacquard loom in America. Jacquard technology made it easier for factories to produce intensely patterned and elaborately colorful blankets, in contrast to the plain Hudson Bay Blankets, which were created on less sophisticated looms.

(Credit: Courtesy Pendleton Archives.)

Designs From the 1915 Pendleton Catalog

With a Native American market for wool blankets already in place, a new ability to produce dazzlingly colored and patterned blankets in the United States, and the depletion in trade of Navajo woolen textiles, the late 19th century was an optimal moment for white-owned companies, like Pendleton, to get into what they called the “Indian trade blanket” business. At the turn of the 20th century, there were five major companies in the United States producing wool blankets for the purposes of trade with Native Americans. Although there was at least one company, Buell Manufacturing, that tried to replicate Navajo patterns exactly, most of the Indian trade blankets were not direct replicas but original designs, based in part on motifs used in Native American handicrafts—such as teepees, ceramics, parfleche, and beadwork. Incredibly bright colors were de rigueur: Conner says that when a brightly colored, patterned alternative to Hudson Bay blankets became available, Native American customers snapped them up. According to Bob Christnacht, the current manager of the Pendleton home division, to this day, when selling to trading posts and reservations, the idea is “the hotter, the brighter, the better.”

(Credit: Courtesy Pendleton Archives.)

Designs From the 1915 Pendleton Catalog

Of those five companies, Pendleton is the only one still in existence. Robert Kapoun, the author of Language of the Robe: American Indian Trade Blankets, attributes Pendleton’s longevity to its single-minded commitment to Indian trade blankets; in the company’s first decades it eschewed all other woolen goods and focused exclusively on producing these blankets.

Barry Friedman, the author of Chasing Rainbows: Collecting American Indian Trade and Camp Blankets, says that Pendleton's patterns were much more stylized than those of the other companies, and much more the product of a single man's imagination. That man was Joseph Rawnsley, an Englishman who studied at the prestigious Philadelphia Textile School; Pendleton hired him in 1901 to operate its Jacquard loom. Rawnsley's blanket designs emerged out of his travels to various reservations in the north- and southwest, where he went to live for months at a time on research trips. According to Christnacht, Rawnsley cobbled together elements that he saw in everyday life on the reservation, sometimes mixing symbols from different tribes in a single design. Rawnsley’s blankets incorporated not only Native American motifs, but also European and Oriental geometric elements. "Early Pendleton ads intimate that Indians were part of the design of the blankets," Friedman says. "But it was sort of what white people thought looked Indian."

(Credit: Photograph by Lee Moorhouse. Courtesy University of Oregon Libraries.)

A Cayuse Man Wearing a Pendleton Blanket

It’s surprising that Native Americans would so wholeheartedly adopt a white, factory-made product that copied, and distorted, Native designs—especially during a period of major conflict with white America. But that’s exactly what happened in the case of Pendleton blankets. According to Hedlund, Native Americans may have been attracted to Pendleton blankets not because they were familiar, and bastardized, but because they were exotic and new. And though Pendletons - durable, warm, and weather-resistant - certainly served a practical purpose, they quickly began to take on spiritual and ceremonial importance. Pendletons became a symbol of honor and respect, and the giving of a Pendleton blanket still accompanies many important occasions in Native American life. According to Kapoun, even today, Native American babies of many different tribes who are born on reservations are swaddled in Pendleton blankets. Conner says of her people, the Umatilla: “when people have a ceremony, a wedding, a memorial, a burial, a birth - there will always be Pendletons present. In our lives they are precious.”

(Credit: Photograph by Lee Moorhouse. Courtesy University of Oregon Libraries.)

A Photograph Staged in the Pendleton Factory

Though these blankets were conceived with Native American customers in mind, companies quickly began marketing them to white clients as well - an endeavor that depended on establishing the blankets as “authentically” Native American. (This early 20th-century Lee Moorhouse photograph of a Native American man posing in the Pendleton factory may have been taken as a promotional picture to strengthen that association.) Just as Indian trade blankets were becoming standard on the reservation, white America’s fascination with Native American handicrafts was reaching fever pitch. The Arts and Crafts movement, popular at the time, idealized the authentic and the handmade. One decorative notion was that of the Indian room, or cozy corner - basically a space in the house where one could escape corporate and industrial corruption by surrounding oneself with Native American textiles and handicrafts.

(Credit: Courtesy the Farmington Museum Collection.)

A Navajo Rug, Circa 1900

The rise of the notion of the cozy corner proved fortuitous for Native American artisans, too. Enterprising traders saw a new niche they could ask Navajo weavers in their territories to fill: a market for Navajo rugs. Traders encouraged the Navajo to begin rug weaving (which they had never done), by showing them examples of Middle Eastern rugs for inspiration; the result was that the Navajo began to incorporate some of those Middle Eastern motifs into their new, unprecedentedly thick textiles. So as white Americans were making blankets that were supposed to look authentically Native American for a largely Native American market, Native Americans were making textiles tailored to white use for white people.

(Credit: Image from 1915 Pendleton catalog. Courtesy Pendleton Archives.)

A “Cozy Corner”

A 1915 Pendleton catalog describes possible uses of Pendleton blankets in non-Indian homes: “A ‘Den,’ ‘Cozy Corner’ or ‘Indian Corner’ is not complete without one or more Indian Robes, which are made in such a wide range of colors that any carpet or drapery can be perfectly matched.” At the same time, the catalog also emphasizes the supposed authenticity of its product: “Pendleton Indian Robes are made in more than a score of different designs, every one of which is a true Indian pattern, original and unique in conception.” As Kapoun points out in Language of the Robe, Pendleton’s early advertising “somewhat exaggerated” the connection between Pendleton and the nearby tribe of Umatilla Indians, in order to establish a sense of legitimacy. A sort of origin myth printed at the front of this particular catalog reads, falsely, that, “The Indian could bring in his favorite designs [to the factory] and have them woven into a fleecy robe of gorgeous hue.”

(Credit: A painting, based on a Lee Moorhouse photograph, from the 1915 Pendleton catalog. Courtesy Pendleton Archives.)

A Painting Based on Pendleton Designs

Pendleton blankets represent a complicated alchemy of white industrialists’ ideas of Indian-ness, combined with actual Native American market preferences. Pendleton’s Christnacht points out that the company’s practice of merging symbols from multiple tribes into a single design wasn’t so unusual, given that various tribes of Native Americans were trading widely among themselves prior to Pendleton’s founding. Conner agrees that any appropriation, influence, or even theft, went in both directions: “There are people who feel like they stole our designs, but we did the same thing when the French trappers and traders came here. We appropriated the fleur-de-lis. If mimicry is a form of flattery, I would say that the Pendleton woolen mill flatters us by using designs that we take responsibility for originating.” What we think of as authentic Navajo weavings are also a mishmash of styles and influences, as Hedlund notes: Navajo weaving emerged from an earlier Pueblo weaving tradition. And the Navajo wove textiles from Spanish wool, using Mexican dyes, influenced by Anglo-American quilt patterns, and later, by Middle Eastern rugs.

(Credit: Photograph of Monica Yazzie from the Navajo Cowboys series. Courtesy Brad Bunyea.)

Levis Workwear by Pendleton

These days, Pendleton is generally very careful to refer to its designs as Native American-inspired—though in its announcement of the fall 2011 collaboration with Opening Ceremony, Pendleton refers to its own “beautiful Native American fabrics.” And in its Collaborations blog, Levi’s plays into the conversation about authenticity—by referring to “the authentic wool jacquard fabrics of Pendleton”—and reinforces the Navajo association in a series of blog posts called “The Navajo Cowboys,” featuring young Navajo riders wearing the Levi’s/Pendleton line.

Christnacht says there’s no tension between the arm of the company that still creates Indian trade blankets and the arm of the company that arranges collaborations with fashion brands. “We take a lot of our Indian designs, and we’ll keep the same basic designs, but we’ll change the coloration,” he says, “with the thought that one will be a reservation design, one will be a couture design, and one will be a mainstream American design.” Christnacht doesn’t think the collaborations can shake the community’s commitment to Pendleton. “We’re already the gold standard down on the reservation, so I don’t think that a Levi’s collaboration will change the perception of Pendleton in the Native American community.”

(Credit: Courtesy Pendleton.)

The Pendleton Collaboration With Opening Ceremony

But others are not so sure about Pendleton’s new direction. In a post on the blog, Native Appropriations, writer Adrienne K., whose heritage is Cherokee, takes a more contentious view of Pendleton’s recent emergence as a high-fashion brand. “Seeing hipsters march down the street in Pendleton clothes, seeing these bloggers ooh and ahh over how ‘cute’ these designs are, and seeing non-Native models all wrapped up in Pendleton blankets makes me upset,” she writes. “It’s a complicated feeling, because I feel ownership over these designs as a Native person, but on a rational level I realize that they aren’t necessarily ours to claim.”

Her objection comes down to expense as well; Pendleton’s collaborations and its new line are priced for the fashion market, placing these designs out of reach for the Native communities for whom Pendleton blankets were first intended. And Kapoun has noticed that the cost of a regular Pendleton Indian-style blanket, which now sells for around $200, may have become prohibitive for some Native Americans. He‘s seen Native Americans where he lives in Santa Fe, N.M., using cheaper, acrylic blankets from big box stores like Walmart, rather than Pendletons. But Conner maintains that when Native Americans have a ceremony, a wedding, a memorial, a burial, or a birth, there will always be Pendletons present. “They might use a bunch of polar fleece blankets,” she says. “We can’t afford to do all Pendletons, but the people we care the most about get the Pendleton vest, the Pendleton blanket.”

(Credit: Photograph © Chris Hornbecker. Courtesy Pendleton.)

Pendleton’s Portland Collection

As for the high-fashion collaborations, Conner sees those as an extension of a Native American tradition, as well: “We cut up Pendleton blankets, and use them for whatever we need,” she says. “The reason the Pendleton home store cuts up that fabric by the bolt and makes jackets, is because we used to do that. In our culture, if you kill a deer or an elk, you use everything: the hooves, horns, brain. Scraps from the woolen mill: same exact philosophy. When the Pendleton home store launched with the tote bags and the jackets, they were just catching up with us, from my perspective.”

Click here to read the interesting reader comments and feedback

Some History | Metis Textiles

I came across this article on the University of Oregon's Museum of Natural and Cultural History about Metis Textiles :


French and Scottish fur traders arrived at Hudson’s Bay in the 17th century, trapping across the drainage basin of the bay and beyond. Some settled and married Native women. Their descendants came to be known as the Métis. Drawing from Native and European ancestry, the Métis became intermediaries between traders and Native peoples and created a distinct culture of their own. While the Métis maintained separate communities in the south, in the north they remained primarily a part of the respective Native societies.

Mission schools, founded to teach Christianity to Native peoples and children of Europeans, also taught domestic arts of sewing and embroidery in the European tradition. European-style clothing was encouraged and quickly became part of the Métis wardrobe, however Métis preferred tanned hide to woven cloth, adorning clothing with intricate beadwork and/or embroidery. European embroidery techniques were quickly adapted to work with traditional Native motifs. Métis beadwork was highly prized, and the Métis were, in fact, called the “flower beadwork people.” This was a part of their blended culture.

The black velvet beaded pouches and buckskin jacket show the intricate designs favored by Métis beaders and illustrate their skill and artistry. Floral motifs have an almost three-dimensional quality and often exhibit symmetrical designs of great intricacy. Each bead is sewn in place using a two-thread, couching technique. Women who specialized in beadwork were highly respected and their work was of great value and sought after by the local community and collectors. Most of the glass beads originally come from Bohemia or Italy, where traditional beadmakers specialized in creating specific colors, according to secret recipes. Often recipes were not passed on, and the color was lost forever.

Collected by Samuel Washburn between 1897 and 1905, and donated to the Museum of Natural and Cultural History by his niece Jessie B. Sterne, in 1959, these objects came from the Mackenzie and Hay River region of northwestern Canada, traditional territory of the Athabaskan Dene people. Photography by Chris White, text by Beverly Fernandes, and web development by Keith Hamm. Images © UO Museum of Natural and Cultural History.

Course on Native Adornment

I will be teaching a class at the University of New Mexico this semester for the second 8 weeks. The class will focus on Native American adornment; the first half of the class will look at traditional attire, and the second half will investigate the contemporary Native fashion world - sign up!


(flier made by graphic artist Keith Grosbeck of Future Phased Design)

A 'Look' at Indians and Mirrors

A while back, Lara Evans from travelpeapod left an enlightening comment on one of my posts about ‘prehistoric fashion.’ She said:

Great post! One interesting thing to consider... No mirrors. That means you must rely on the opinion of the people you live with in order to know if you look good or not. What if what was happening was that people dressed and decorated each other? Clothing, beads, etc. would then symbolize relationships between individuals, not individuality. I think good mirrors change everything.

It’s one of those things that you probably never thought of, but as soon as it was brought up, it opens a whole new world of questions.

So I became curious about the history of mirrors, and here’s what I could gather:

The first mirrors used by people were most likely pools of still water, or water collected in a vessel of some sort. The earliest manufactured mirrors were pieces of polished stone such as obsidian. Examples of obsidian mirrors have been dated back to 6000 BC, and polished stone mirrors from Central and South America date from 2000 BC. Mirrors made of metal, such as polished copper or bronze mirrors, were crafted in Mesopotamia from 4000 BC, in ancient Egypt from 3000 BC, and in China from 2000 BC. Metal-coated glass mirrors are said to have been invented in Lebanon in the first century AD. In the 16th century, Venice, a city famed for its glass-making expertise, became a center of mirror production using this new technique. The invention of the silvered-glass mirror is credited to German chemist Justus von Liebig in 1835. This silvering process was adapted for mass manufacturing and led to the greater availability of affordable mirrors. Which brings us to today.

So, basically, reflective devices did exist in the past – for Native North American people, it was probably water found at the edge of lakes, or rain water caught by shallow pools in flat rock formations, or water collected in bowls or pots.

When mirrors were introduced to tribes (which I assumed was in the 1800s since mass production would have made them available trade goods - however a list to Spain in 1600 requested "200 ordinary mirrors" to be traded with the caciques and Indians), many Native nations incorporated them into tribal aesthetic and cultural contexts. Edwin L. Wade explained, “Mirrors served an entirely different purpose among Native Americans than they did among Europeans. For Native Americans, mirrors were symbols of wealth and prestige. They were commonly mounted in dance batons or other objects of ceremonial regalia, since it was their light-reflective property, not their ability to reflect images, that was considered important.”


(Above: Lake Superior Chippewa woman's cape/overblouse, 1920-1940. Velveteen, wool cloth, glass bead/beads, metal cones, wool twill tape, silk ribbon, metal button/buttons, mirror, thread, clothing snaps. Collection of NMAI)

Native people incorporated mirrors into their regalia and ceremonial objects, along with sparkling beads and metal tinklers, perhaps to reference the luminous surfaces of great lakes. Among the Chippewa, women fastened circular mirrors onto their overblouses or onto men’s vests, and in Oklahoma, the Caddo decorated their dance bustles with mirrors. Interestingly, the base of the Anishinaabe word for mirror is waabi, which translates as vision, sight, or see. In Alberta, a popular lake is named Wabamun (a Cree word meaning mirror). So the connections between mirrors, lakes, and ideas about visions are, well, clear.

Historian Bruce White has noted the importance of mirrors as trade goods in an article on Ojibwa and Dakota theories about French merchandise: "Native people appreciated European goods such as beads, mirrors, bells, and caps 'for their aesthetic, magical, or purely decorative and fascinating worth, not their economic value.'" (and this has led scholars to note that these actions were 'a trade in metaphors').


(Above: Caddo dance bustle, Oklahoma, 1890-1909. Feather/feathers, commercially tanned leather, hide, wool cloth, velvet, cotton cloth, brass bell/bells, metal bell/bells, mirror, glass bead/beads, deer hair, rawhide, metal tacks/bosses, dye/dyes, paint. Collection of NMAI)

Some suggest that mirrors were used by Native men to send signals by reflecting sunlight – either to communicate vital messages to distant outposts via horseback, or during a dance to send a flirtatious signal to a potential girlfriend.

In the Song for the Horse Nation exhibit, NMAI curators explained, “Europeans frequently traded small glass mirrors to Native peoples. Plains Indian men wore them on their fur chest decorations or inserted them into carved wooden frames. Often, they ornamented the frames with brass tacks (another popular trade item), metal inlay, or paint. Men carried mirrors such as this in dances.”


(Above: Iowa mirror, ca. 1880. Wood, brass tacks/bosses, lead, mirror, iron nails, brass nails. Collection of NMAI)

So, a rich history with mirrors does exist in Indian Country, but this trade item was recontextualized into an Indigenous framework. Interestingly, Evans posits that the current prevalence and types of mirrors used today may have changed tribal processes of ‘beautifying’ – from a communal activity to an individual undertaking. In the past, we depended upon family members to dress and decorate us, not the mirror.

If this is true, then the objects used for beautification (i.e. beads) take on additional meanings, and they could "symbolize relationships between individuals, not individuality." For example, a beaded shirt could symbolize a relationship between a mother and her son, rather than just a man's identity as, say, a warrior.

Though times have changed, I think, there are ‘places’ where the communal still reigns. For example, at powwows, you’ll see girls fixing each other’s hair and makeup, and for Pueblo ceremonies the women still get dressed communally. Last summer, my cousin Kristy asked me to be her ‘personal attendant’ for her wedding. She said, “I trust that you and Brandy (our other cousin) will make sure I look beautiful for this important day.” I see this occasion (along with other weddings that take place here) as a form of reasserting the communal – of reinforcing familial ties and the roles and responsibilities that go with it.

The idea of mirrors – or more accurately, the concept of beautifying as a communal versus individual process – is an interesting one, and I’m curious if anyone out there has any thoughts to add...?