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Artist/Maker
Wendy Red Star
(Apsáalooke, born 1981)
Publisher
Crow's Shadow Press, Pendleton, OR
Date2016
MediumLithograph with inkjet print
DimensionsSheet: 24 × 40 in. (61 × 101.6 cm)
Image: 24 × 40 in. (61 × 101.6 cm)
Frame: 28 3/8 × 44 3/8 × 2 in. (72.1 × 112.7 × 5.1 cm)
Credit LinePurchase, The Edward W. Root Class of 1905 Memorial Art Purchase Fund
Object number2016.18
Not on view
DescriptionWendy Red Star works across mediums, including photography, video, performance, sculpture, and fiber arts. Yakima or Yakama—Not For Me To Say is informed by the artist’s experience growing up on the Apsáalooke (Crow) reservation in Montana. Throughout her practice, she confronts colonialism and stereotypes about Native Americans while deploying symbols drawn from powwow and reservation culture, including public housing and “rez cars” (a derogatory term for dilapidated vehicles), along with her own childhood memories of being referred to as a “half-breed” (her father is Apsáalooke and her mother is of Irish descent). The “Eyedazzler” pattern in the background of this print is inspired by a classic Navajo design appropriated by the Pendleton Woolen Mills for blankets between about 1865 and 1930; Red Star reappropriated the design when she created the print. Collaged atop the print is an inkjet image based on a photograph taken by her father during the 1970s at the Crow Fair, an annual gathering for all Indigenous peoples of the Great Plains, held near Billings, Montana. The photograph depicts a participant in the Crow Parade, an event that has occurred for over a century, at which families display regalia that demonstrate their high status and heritage. Such regalia typically include cornhusk bags and parfleches. As modes of transportation have changed, so, too, have the vehicles in the parade. The print’s title is inspired by the different spellings used for the town of Yakima, Washington, and the eponymous Indigenous nation, which changed its name to Yakama in the mid-1990s to more closely reflect the proper pronunciation in the native tongue. Yakima or Yakama—Not For Me To Say was published in an edition of twenty by Crow’s Shadow
Press, which was founded in 1992 on the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, in the foothills of Oregon’s Blue Mountains. The print shop’s mission is to provide educational, social, and economic opportunities and a creative conduit for Native Americans. (SOURCE: Alcauskas, INNOVATIVE APPROACHES, HONORED TRADITIONS, 2017)
Additional Details
Exhibition History
2017
Clinton, NY (Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art, Hamilton College). "Innovative Approaches, Honored Traditions: The Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art at Five Years, Highlights from the Permanent Collection," September 9 - December 10, 2017 (cat. no. 139, illus.).
Clinton, NY (Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art, Hamilton College). "Innovative Approaches, Honored Traditions: The Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art at Five Years, Highlights from the Permanent Collection," September 9 - December 10, 2017 (cat. no. 139, illus.).
Provenance
2016: Hamilton College (Ruth and Elmer Wellin Museum of Art), by purchase from Crow's Shadow Press.
Markings
Blindstamps: "[Crow's Shadow Press chop mark]" lower left corner; "[Printer Frank Janzen's chop mark]" lower right corner.
Watermark: "somerset / ENGLAND" at lower right corner.
Watermark: "somerset / ENGLAND" at lower right corner.
Published References
Katherine D. Alcauskas, INNOVATIVE APPROACHES, HONORED TRADITIONS: THE RUTH AND ELMER WELLIN MUSEUM OF ART AT FIVE YEARS, HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE PERMANENT COLLECTION (Clinton, NY: Wellin Museum of Art, 2017), p. 300.
None known.
None known.
Signature
Signed lower right corner.
Inscribed
"Yakima or Yakama - Not For Me to Say" at lower edge center in pencil; "13/20" at lower left corner in pencil; "SomSat Wh / CSP15-102" on verso at lower right corner in pencil.
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