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Image by Haris Kenjar.  Louie Gong (Nooksack) at Eighth Generation by Inspired Natives in Pike Place Market.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

A Native artist, entrepreneur, and thought leader is creating a space for the next generation in one of the world’s top 50 most-visited tourist attractions. Louie Gong (Nooksack) is literally and figuratively opening new doors for his work and for other artists through his Eighth Generation brand, First Peoples Fund program Our Nations’ Spaces, and the Longhouse Education and Cultural Center at the Evergreen State College. Louie is establishing a creative economy for Native artists across the country to reach international visitors to Pike Place Market in Seattle. The iconic market now has its first Native-owned business — Eighth Generation by Inspired Natives.

But this is more than a storefront above the gum wall art installation in the market. Nearly one-third of the space is dedicated to a gathering place where tribal and other community groups can build on their own dreams. It’s also for the Longhouse to partner with Louie Gong and provide artist-in-residence opportunities, featuring four alumni from the Longhouse’s Native Creative Development program. This is an opportunity for Plateau and Coast Salish artists to create, exhibit and sell their work in a well-established marketplace in Seattle while being mentored by Louie.

Louie has achieved national recognition as a successful art entrepreneur, activist and educator. The founder of the Eighth Generation brand, his values as a Native artist are expressed in the way he helps other artists achieve their goals — whether through motivational workshops for Native youth, business management and marketing for artists, or leveraging strategic partnerships on behalf of his work and other artists. He lives his life and guides his business by Native values of generosity and reciprocity — as his star continues to rise, he brings other Native artists up with him.

In 2014, Louie’s Eighth Generation brand launched the Inspired Natives Project. With it, Native artists can manufacture and sell their work with the Eighth Generation label. Louie wants to create opportunities for community-based artists all around the country who are like him: There is a huge demand for their artwork, but they’re not able to meet demand with their one-off pieces. He wants to bring their art to market by including their designs on blankets, scarves, bags, and more. And he hopes to provide the customers a sense of who the artists are and where they are heading.

While many non-Native companies take from Native art, Louie seeks to give back. He views art like a natural resource — if you take from it without nurturing the environment that created it, you eventually kill it.

Inspired Native influences the way consumers experience products featuring Native art. Rather than fostering the idea that Native people are simply representations of ancient history, charity projects, or extensions of the natural environment, the project showcases how Native people are thriving. They are contemporary, skilled, hardworking professionals. This working artist and business space at Pike Place challenges stereotypes about Native communities.

The store, which opened its doors in early September after a traditional blessing, represents a rare opportunity to reach international audiences with a message about contemporary Native people. By highlighting successful artists, Eighth Generation can create lifelong patrons of Native-owned businesses.

This is why Louie took great care in selecting his staff. They not only represent Eighth Generation but are also ambassadors for the Native community to the 10 million annual visitors to Pike Place Market. In the staff meeting prior to the store’s opening, they covered how to make sales, treat customers with respect, run a sustainable business, and how to spark conversations to help control the narrative around Native people.

“Indian country nationally is watching to see what is happening here. It’s really an important symbol of this Native renaissance, where Native people are starting to take over a larger share of the market that has traditionally been dominated by non-Native companies for products featuring cultural art.”

— Louie Gong (Nooksack)

The project creates an engaging venue for education and training to energize participants and inspire facilitators with countless teachable moments.

Prior to the store opening, Colleen Echohawk (Chief Seattle Club) stood before the Pike Place Market Historical Commission to support Eighth Generation’s proposed artwork above the storefront. She shared how she saw the new store as “the gold standard for how Native art should be sold, how it should be celebrated.”

The approved art now welcomes visitors. The visually expressive presentation of the store and meeting space shows Louie’s attention to detail. He has created a space that compels people to enter the store and explore authentic Native art. The 1,300-square-foot space — with its white walls, sleek blue concrete floor, and custom tables — showcases Inspired Native wool blankets, iPhone cases, Salish Sea soap, and more. Visitors are invited to engage with Native people in a way they never have before.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

It was about the time of one suicide after another on the Cheyenne and Pine Ridge Reservations. Brendon Albers (Cheyenne River Sioux) sent out a letter with his story, a story of what he had lost in life, of what he had found in art. The healing that comes from shaping stone — alabaster from the Black Hills — with a story to tell.

When he was fourteen, Brendon was one of those youths who needed purpose. Art class gave him that. His heart, hands and mind worked in unison for the first time. He wanted to bring this art to the youth on the Reservation.

But getting stone was hard. Brendon sent his story to companies, hoping for a partner to provide tools and stone for the youth workshops he planned through his First Peoples Fund’s Cultural Capital Fellowship.

Prayer made it happen. Louise Starbird of Sculpture House was the answer to those prayers.

A semi-truck arrived at Eagle Butte High School on the day of the workshop. They unwrapped the valuable pallet — boxes of tools, barrels filled to the rim with stones in all shapes and sizes and colors.

Having carved with only a framing hammer, screwdrivers and horseshoe files, Brendon had never seen real sculpting tools. He was just as excited as the youth. But it was only the beginning.

The youth attacked this art form fearlessly and started making things — things worth money — helping each other, smiling, laughing. They had a hidden vision, as though they’d done this always.

Brendon posted seven days of updates on Facebook. Partway through, Louise Starbird called. Sculpture House would continue their support with two shipments of rock and tools twice a year, whenever Brendon needed them. Tears came with the second part of her offer — to start a $1,000 scholarship for a graduating student to further their education and art career.

This project is reshaping the lives of Native youth — how they think about their proud heritage, who they are, what they are capable of.

The youth need people to show them there’s so much beauty to live for. Brendon is one of those people.

Brendon Albers is a 2015 Artists in Business Leadership and 2016 Cultural Capital Fellow.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

A simple stop for lunch with his hula halau (dance school) led to Kaloku Holt’s (Native Hawaiian) most rewarding experience as an artist. It happened at a restaurant on the Big Island when, over the radio, one of Kaloku’s original songs came on. The happiness it brought those around him showed he impacted people in a positive way. He will never forget that moment, fueling his drive to share the aloha spirit through his creations.

He didn’t always have that outlook.

Music wasn’t an option in Kaloku’s upbringing — it was an obligation. A lifestyle he was born into. As a young boy in Hawai’i, he reluctantly sang in the church choir, took piano lessons, even played the ukulele to entertain his mother in place of his family’s forever-broken car radio.

But his outlook on music, this obligation, changed as he grew up. It became a passion, an art. When he started his first band after high school, Kaloku knew there was no turning back. He was dedicated and eager to share the aloha spirit.

Now, he draws people from different cultures, backgrounds and walks of life together in one experience. His music touches hearts and souls. Whether as a solo artist, duet, full band, or emcee and featured singer in a Polynesian review show in Japan, Kaloku takes pride in sharing traditions of his ancestral Hawaiian home.

Art was passed down to him, and he passes it on to others. Kaloku teaches hula and ukulele to children and adults, shares his success and nurtures the next generation, equipping them to carry on the traditions of their ancestors. This brings a satisfying joy to his heart.

Kaloku appreciates his humble beginnings and the privilege to draw from his Hawaiian ancestry. Combined with the contemporary, he creates his distinct sound and shares the aloha spirit with the world.

"Take Me Back" is a song I wrote dedicated to all who are from Hawaii and have moved away from their home and for those who have visited or lived in Hawaii and always have a piece of Hawaii in their hearts. This recording was done in Honolulu, HI and performed as the duet, The Brothers Kaloku and Keawe.  - Kaloku Holt

Kaloku Holt is a 2016 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow.

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Image: Carol Emarthle-Douglas. "Cultural Burdens", 2015.Mixed media. Photo courtesy of the artist.

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By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

A cultural exchange, an art form that transcends borders — weaving. At the Ka Ulu Lauhala O Kona gathering of basket weavers, Carol Emarthle-Douglas (Northern Arapaho/Seminole) was taught how to gather material from the hala tree, strip off the thorns and prepare the leaves.

She worked alongside Native Hawaiian weavers and a weaver from Australia. They wove bracelets, bookmarks, coasters and a fan in Hawaiian style.

This was a new style for Carol, a traditional/contemporary basket weaver who uses an old method — coiled basketry. This technique called out to her twenty years ago when she took a coiled basketry class. It’s challenging and time consuming, but it’s in her. She hopes her hands hold out a long time to perform the work, to continue sharing her culture, and other cultures.

Her basket The Gathering of Nations shows women in regalia holding their finest baskets. When the award-winning piece was on display, Carol watched weavers pick out the basket from their region. One little Navajo lady in traditional dress bent down, checked it out, and was satisfied. Cultures exchanged.

On Carol’s Best of Show basket at the Santa Fe Indian Market, Cultural Burdens, each of the 11 women represented their tribe by carrying a traditional basket hanging both inside and outside the main basket.

Carol spent the summer in Santa Fe for the 2016 School for Advanced Research Ronald and Susan Dubin Fellowship. It was a time of research, learning from other artists, and using a new technique in her work: beading directly on a coiled basket.

Always, though, she brings it home. Carol shares her fine art by teaching students in the Indian Education Program, Native homeless in the Seattle area, and elders through the Northwest Indian College. They in turn share weaving with their communities.

A beautiful exchange.

Carol Emarthle-Douglas is a 2016 Cultural Capital Fellow and a 2011 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

At 8 years old, Jason Brown (Penobscot) learned from elders how to bead, to string necklaces. Then door-to-door he went in his community of Indian Island, Maine, selling his jewelry. His path was set. He walked it through his teen years, and jewelry making became his source of income.

The path led Jason to the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe for a fine arts degree, and then he spent years in the fine gift and jewelry industries, perfecting his metalsmithing techniques. Nowit’s led to the jewelry studio Decontie and Brown, named for him and his wife, Donna Decontie Brown.

Jason works with raw materials including copper, brown ash, deer antler, quohog shell (wampum) and semiprecious gemstones to bring life to the designs in his imagination. Historically, his people hired metalsmiths and jewelers to create their adornments. He’s breaking new ground as a contemporary Wabanaki jeweler.

Jason’s people have used copper and brown ash since ancient times. Copper was mined in the Bay of Fundy and used for adornment. The Wabanaki creation story tells of the brown ash tree. Jason combines these elements for the “Creation” cuff, a reflection of his culture. He captures a layer of woven brown ash between two pieces of copper with a design he cuts on the top piece. The cuff depicts the story of Gluskap who shot an arrow into the brown ash tree and split the trunk, where the Wabanaki people came from.

One of these cuffs is in the permanent collection at the Historic New England Museum.

An established Wabanaki Native artist, Jason shines a light on his little-known community and culture, calls attention to other Native artists and is a cultural ambassador for his people.

As Jason continues his journey, he reaches back and helps others find their paths.

Jason Brown is a 2016 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow

Love. Respect. Family. The Lakota way of life. Beverly Bear King Moran’s (Standing Rock Sioux) journey began with visits to her grandmother in North Dakota, where Beverly experienced her first powwow. She wanted to dance. But she had no regalia.

Many years passed before Beverly could have a Northern Traditional dress made. But then a pair of beaded moccasins at a pawnshop started her on an inspirational journey. The designs were intricate, intriguing. She had to learn this art form.

When Beverly’s then 2-year-old daughter began dancing, she needed regalia. Beverly’s love for her daughter started her down the path she now travels as a culture preserver for her people. With respect to tradition, and love for her daughter, Beverly taught herself to bead regalia for them both. She found her art when she put needle to leather. And her daughter became a champion dancer.

The awards for beadwork Beverly has garnered are humbling for her. In 2015 alone, she received honors at the Santa Fe Indian Market, Gathering of People, Wind & Water, and the Heard Museum Guild Indian Fair & Market.

According to a discussion Beverly had with the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s cultural adviser, there are few from her tribe still creating the traditional regalia. However, as long as one person is carrying on the tradition, it’s alive and well.

She has studied dresses made by Native women so many years ago. With the materials available today, she should be able to surpass them, but to her, their work is so, so beautiful. It's an exquisite, intricate process working with the traditional lazy stitch beading method on buckskin dress yokes, using applique for barrettes and hair ties, and for fan handles, the “peyote” beading technique.

For Beverly, her work is more of an inspirational journey than an art form. But anyone who sees her work knows the artistic prowess in her elaborate designs.

Now it’s time for Beverly to go deeper with her historical knowledge. First Peoples Fund is supporting her research of the rich collections of artifacts at the Denver Art Museum to find patterns and techniques to revive. This knowledge, these resources, she can bring back to her community and beyond to educate people about her heritage. She plans to become the mentor she didn't have.

Beverly carries on the beading traditions and beauty of her relations. The Lakota way of life.

Beverly Bear King Moran is a 2016 Cultural Capital Fellow and a 2008 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow.

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2016 JENNIFER EASTON COMMUNITY SPIRIT AWARDS

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 8

“It’s an honor to do the work we do in our communities, and that’s enough. But to think that someone would recognize us this way, bring us together and celebrate us, this makes our hearts full.”  — Community Spirit Award honoree David R. Boxley, Tsimshian.

Our hearts are still full with deep gratitude following the 2016 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Awards. We are grateful for the support we received — from artists, community members, volunteers, businesses, sponsors, donors large and small, media, and local government. Together, we brought the celebration home to Rapid City to shine a light on what is working, and what has always worked, in Indian Country: The culture bearers and cultural assets that have been inextricably linked with the well being and livelihoods of Native Peoples for centuries.

The celebration drew the largest audience since the Community Spirit Awards began in 2000. We united in an evening of Collective Spirit®, joining the positive momentum building in our community around intercultural understanding. Through the generosity of the National Endowment for the Arts, our honorees reached more than 600 young people and adults with school visits and community appearances on the days before and after the Community Spirit Awards. And, for the first time, the chairman of the NEA attended the celebration. We were honored by the presence throughout the weekend of Chairman Jane Chu as well Clifford Murphy, director of the NEA’s Folk and Traditional Arts.

Local sponsors, including the Rapid City Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Rapid City Journal, helped us reach thousands of people through comprehensive media coverage locally, regionally and nationally. We were honored by Rapid City Mayor Steve Allender’s executive proclamation of Community Spirit Day. And, we were thrilled to partner with the Black Hills Powwow, which recognized our culture bearers during the Grand Entry on Saturday afternoon and whose dancers opened our performance that evening.

Thanks to so much support, we were able to surpass our fundraising goals leading up to the Community Spirit Awards. Funding supports First Peoples Fund programs that give voice to culture bearers across the country, helping them pass on their skills and knowledge within their communities. Together with our community partners, we provide professional and leadership development opportunities for Native artists — fellowships, grants, and entrepreneurial trainings. Our work is concentrated close to home, including Rolling Rez Arts and Dances with Words™, which bring our programs to youth and adults across Pine Ridge Reservation.

We have heard from many of you that the evening moved and awakened you. When she founded First Peoples Fund 20 years ago, Jennifer Easton set out to spread just this understanding and deep appreciation for the diversity and splendor of Native art and culture.

If you were able to attend, we hope you left the Performing Arts Center of Rapid City filled with the Collective Spirit® that emanated from the stage, from the crowd, and from the artistry on display during the art auction and performance.

Shortly after he returned home from the Community Spirit Awards to his Northern Cheyenne community in Lame Deer, Montana, honoree Phillip Whiteman, Jr. said,

“First Peoples Fund has helped my transformation as a performing artist, as a community service servant. It’s not what you accumulate, it’s what you give back to the circle.”

We hope we can count on you to remain in First Peoples Fund’s circle. Donate, follow us online, sign up for our eSPIRIT newsletter. Walk with us as we continue to live our mission to honor and support Native artists.

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Photo by Steve Peterson/www.stevepeterson.photo

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Washington, DC – On October 7-8, 2016, Jane Chu, chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA), will travel to Rapid City, South Dakota, where she will visit organizations that are actively engaging, serving, and promoting the arts in the Native American community. Chairman Chu will visit the Crazy Horse Memorial, participate in a Repatriation Ceremony at Tusweca Tispaye Lakota-Dakota-Nakota Language Summit, attend the Black Hills Powwow, and give remarks at the First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Awards.

On October 7, Chairman Chu will visit the world’s largest sculpture, Crazy Horse Memorial at the Indian Museum of North America. This monument depicts Crazy Horse, an Oglala Lakota warrior, riding a horse and pointing into the distance. The memorial was commissioned by Henry Standing Bear, a Lakota elder, and sculpted by Korczak Ziolkowski.

On October 8, Chairman Chu will participate in a Nation-to-Nation repatriation ceremony of Oglala Lakota cultural audio artifacts. During this ceremony, Chairman Chu, on behalf of the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, will transfer Oglala Lakota audio artifacts (recordings of traditional music) to the Oglala Sioux Tribe and Oglala Lakota College. Chairman Chu serves as an ex-officio Board Member of the American Folklife Center. The American Folklife Center is digitizing the audio at no cost to the NEA or to the Oglala Sioux Tribe. Oglala Sioux Tribe President John Steele; a representative from Oglala Lakota College; and, Mike Carlow, founder and director of Tusweca Tiospaye and community liaison for The White House Initiative on Youth and Education at Pine Ridge will also participate in the ceremony.

Next, Chairman Chu will attend the Black Hills Powwow. The Black Hills Powwow is a significant American Indian cultural gathering, hosting hundreds of dancers, singers, artisans, and several thousand spectators from across several U.S. states and Canadian provinces. The Grand Entry will celebrate this year’s First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Awards recipients.

That evening, Chairman Chu will give remarks at the First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Awards Ceremony.  Each year, First Peoples Fund honors and celebrates exceptional American Indian, Alaskan Native, and Native Hawaiian artists who embody the Collective Spirit—that which manifests self-awareness and a sense of responsibility to sustain the cultural fabric of a community. First Peoples Fund chooses its Community Spirit Award honorees for their commitment to sustaining the cultural values of Native people. The First Peoples Fund is an NEA grantee and their FY 2016 grant is supporting the Community Spirit Awards ceremony and Rolling Rez Arts workshops.

Media should contact Judith Kargbo at kargboj@arts.gov if they would like to attend any of the site visits or request an interview with Chairman Chu.

ABOUT THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS

Established by Congress in 1965, the NEA is the independent federal agency whose funding and support gives Americans the opportunity to participate in the arts, exercise their imaginations, and develop their creative capacities. Through partnerships with state arts agencies, local leaders, other federal agencies, and the philanthropic sector, the NEA supports arts learning, affirms and celebrates America’s rich and diverse cultural heritage, and extends its work to promote equal access to the arts in every community across America. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the National Endowment for the Arts and the agency is celebrating this milestone with events and activities through September 2016.

SCHEDULE

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2016

1:45PM- 2:45PM                  

Crazy Horse Memorial Site Visit

Location: 12151 Ave of the Chiefs, Crazy Horse, SD 57730

Participants: Jane Chu, chairman, National Endowment for the Arts

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 8, 2016

9:00AM- 11:30AM              

Repatriation Ceremony at Tusweca Tiospaye Lakota-Dakota-Nakota Language Summit

Location:Rushmore Plaza Civic Center, 444 Mt Rushmore Rd, Rapid City, SD 57701

Participants: Jane Chu, chairman, National Endowment for the ArtS

John Steele, president, Oglala Sioux

Representatives from Oglala Lakota College

Mike Carlow, founder and director, Tusweca Tiospaye, and Community   liaison for The White House Initiative on Youth and Education at Pine Ridge

Lori Pourier, president, First Peoples Fund

12:30PM –1:30PM                

Black Hills Powwow

Location: Rushmore Plaza Civic Center, 444 Mt Rushmore Rd, Rapid City, SD 57701

Participants: Jane Chu, chairman, National Endowment for the Arts

Lori Pourier, president, First Peoples Fund

2016 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award Honorees

7:00PM- 9:00PM                

First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Awards

Location: Performing Arts Center of Rapid City, 601 Columbus St, Rapid City, SD 57701

Participants:Jane Chu, chairman, National Endowment for the Arts

Lori Pourier, president, First Peoples Fund        

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By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, Artist in Business Leadership Fellow 2015

They’ve spent over 50 years of marriage, art and living cultural practices of the Cherokee people in the heart of the Great Smoky Mountains in western North Carolina. This is where Butch and Louise Goings(Eastern Band of Cherokee) connect with everything and stay balanced in life. It’s what they teach. It’s the way they live.

When Louise was growing up, she watched her mother weave baskets and snip off bits of white oak. In the room scented with walnut and bloodroot dyes and white oak splits, Louise picked up the bits and was mindful where she stepped. If she cracked one of her mother’s white oak splits, she got a scolding.

Bit by bit, Louise wove little bread baskets. Her mother stressed that when she grew up and married, it would be her place to make baskets to help pay the bills. That would be her job.

But that was a long way off. Louise bought sodas and candies with the money she earned in those early years.

Louise’s bread baskets sold along with her mother’s to the Qualla Arts and Crafts Mutual Inc. (known as “the co-op”). They must have thought the bread baskets were her mother’s, which was quite a compliment. Louise’s mother was selected by the National Art Council to travel abroad and demonstrate her basket making.

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Her mother taught Louise and her seven siblings the Cherokee ways. She took them into the woods and showed them how to harvest materials they needed to make baskets. Her mother always emphasized that if they found a straight white oak with no blemishes, cut it down, made splints, gathered the dye plants, dyed the splints, and wove the basket, they were basket makers. If they used splints someone else made, they were basket weavers. Louise is a basket maker.

And she did marry. Butch and Louise have shared love and laughter for 52 years.

Butch is a carver. He started in high school, and carves figurines in buckeye, cherry, butternut, holly and black walnut wood. Later, he added stone carving. He studies a stone for awhile, and eventually sees the shape of an animal, object or person, and he knows what that stone will be.

Butch joined the co-op in 1960. Through the years, he’s volunteered on the board of directors, serving 14 years as president. The artists go through a rigorous process to become members. The co-op now has over 300 Cherokee artists, and Butch still encourages others through the membership process.

He learned about the needs of Cherokee basket makers from Louise’s mother. He helps them gather materials from their original homeland to weave with.

Her whole life, Tonya Carroll has seen Butch and Louise make her community a better place, and she wanted to give back to them. Nothing measured up except nominating them for the First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Award. When Tonya thinks of people who keep their community spirit alive, Butch and Louise are the ones that come to mind.

At stomp dances, Louise is cook, shell shaker, and Wild Potato clan mother. Butch keeps the grounds clean and ready for the next stomp. They donate art for local fundraisers. They teach at the schools and for the Cultural Summer Sessions. In these things, they help their people heal.

Too often, Butch and Louise see a focus on the tragic aspects of their history, but those represent only a small part. When the children ask about past injustices, prejudices and pains, Butch and Louise teach the positive that has come from their Cherokee roots. The Cherokee people are strong, intelligent and resilient.

This is what they passed on to their son and grandchildren, who are now weavers, carvers and weapon makers. Butch and Louise themselves continue to learn more about the artwork, history, culture and language. They believe you never stop learning and everyone is a teacher.

They ask nothing in return. They are happy just knowing their culture will live on.

Butch and Louise Goings are 2016 Community Spirit Award Honorees. Join us in celebrating Butch and Louise and the other honorees on October 8, 2016.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, Artist in Business Leadership Fellow 2015

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The January day is quiet, the mood somber, the air cold as a mountain stream. A hundred Native youth sit on the patches of grass in the snow and listen to the stories. When a time of silence comes, they listen for the cries of women and children who were shot in this place. Children like them, with their Cheyenne blood. Their ancestors. The tears come and bring healing.

When Phillip Whiteman Jr. (Northern Cheyenne) and Lynette Two Bulls (Oglala Lakota) initiated the Fort Robinson Outbreak Spiritual Run, it was not to traumatize the youth. It was to bring out the hurt and let it go, prepare to return home. The true interpretation of Lynette’s name is Woman who will lead and clear the way for the people. Philip is a traditional chief of the Northern Cheyenne Nation and lives on land his ancestors died for. The run honors the ancestors by remembering their sacrifices.

For two days, the youth are prepared for the 400-mile relay-style run. Now in its 20th year, this run has helped hundreds of youth reconnect with their heritage, culture and themselves. One of these youths was Cinnamon Spear. The run was one of the most important events in her unstable early life at home, and she continues to be involved with the run. She tells the youth, open your heart to the stories, the songs, the language. If you do, it will change your life. Her relationship with her mentors Phillip and Lynette has grown through the years. To Cinnamon, they are living representations of what the First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Award is designed to honor, and led her to nominate them for the award.

Inside replicated barracks at the historical Fort Robinson site in Nebraska, the youth anticipate the moment when the door will open. At 10:30 p.m. — in 1879 — their ancestors waited with a different yet same anticipation. The youth hug one another and say, we are going home.

The ancestors knew death likely waited on the other side of the door. Yet they still broke out. They ran from the barracks amidst rifle fire. Some got away. Most were killed.

At 10:30 p.m., these youth break out, jostling through the doorway, with the sounds of victory — clapping, shouting. The journey begins. They run.

The ancestors ran until they reached Antelope Creek, 22 miles northwest of the fort. Here, most were slaughtered. This is where the youth are brought before the run to hear and to heal.

The ancestors who escaped continued the run — a total of 400 miles — to their home.

For days, the youth run from sunrise until deep in the night through the Sandhills of Nebraska, the sacred Black Hills of South Dakota, and the mountains of Montana. They are going home.

The relay runners are followed by a caravan of buses and vans carrying chaperones, elders, and leaders of the event, keeping everyone safe. The youth run through snow, sunshine, the dark of night. The male runner holds the Eagle Staff and the female runner carries the Cheyenne Nation flag.

Today they are not running from gunfire. They run for the future.

For Phillip and Lynette, this is a part of their work, not only as artists but their lives. There is no separation between life and art, whether they are storytelling, teaching culture, singing songs, being spiritual and wellness advisers, dancing the grass dance, fancy shawl and jingle dress, or showing compassion to relatives. These things are art.

The youth run on and say, almost there. Almost home.

They arrive on the Northern Cheyenne reservation and come into Ashland, Montana, to the cheers, horn honking, and fist pumping of their families and friends. At 10:30 p.m.

This run is just one of the cultural preservation practices Phillip and Lynette have under their organizations, Medicine Wheel Model LLC (a right-brain, circular, holistic wellness model); Medicine Wheel Model—Beyond Horsemanship (a healing with horses program); and Yellow Bird (a grass-roots, nonprofit organization).

The Fort Robinson Spiritual Outbreak Run concludes with a time at the graveyard of the ancestors, the ones who made the original run home. A song, prayer, hugs, tears and a moment of silence, a final remembrance.

They are home.

Phillip Whiteman Jr. and Lynette Two Bulls are 2016 Community Spirit Award Honorees. Join us in celebrating Phillip and Lynette and the other honorees on October 8, 2016.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, Artist in Business Leadership Fellow 2015

A Dances with Words poet ended the “I Too Am American” session with his poem “You Call Me Indian.” At the Brave New Voices (BNV) competition in Washington, D.C., fingers snapped in approval during his performance, where Marcus Ruff (17, Oglala Lakota) alone represented North American Indigenous people. The audience was amazed at how different the Native voices and narratives were, yet still paralleled their own challenges and struggles. These bold young people from the Pine Ridge Reservation were valued. Their voices heard.

Lori Pourier (Oglala/Mnicoujou Lakota), president of First Peoples Fund, joined the Dances with Words (DWW) poets at the opening ceremony for the BNV competition at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Over the next few days, DWW competed with teams from around the country and the world, including Des Moines, Baltimore, Miami, and London.

The experience was unbelievable for Senri White (16, Oglala Lakota). The music, the intensity. The poems gave her goose bumps. The Baltimore team — her favorite — spit a poem about loss that stuck with her, the only poem that made her cry.

The Baltimore team was also Marcus Ruff’s favorite. He felt the energy within the language and imagery as the poets put their hearts and souls into their performances.

Ohitika Locke (17, Hunkpapa Lakota) met amazing people and loved the encouraging words the BNV participants gave. He was nervous, but thanks to the support, performed his poem well.

Once he started delivering his poem, Cetan Ducheneaux (16, Cheyenne River Lakota) felt at home once again. The sights, the spoken words, the people. Memorable.

The youngest poet, Sina Sitting Up (13, Oglala Lakota), shared her sweet heart with the team and leaders throughout their journey.

But for the DWW team, this wasn’t only a trip for an international poetry competition. They explored the nation’s capital for a week. It started with a VIP tour of the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI). They gathered in front of a collage of historical photos with the words We never gave up. This theme found its way into their poems at the BNV workshops and open mic sessions. They presented the NMAI with a Cheyenne River flag, a flag the museum didn’t have.

The DWW team, their leader and mentors — Brandie Macdonald (Chickasaw/Choctaw), Dawn (Denise) Moves Camp (Oglala Lakota), and Josh Del Colle — went to the NMAI Cultural Resources Center to examine collections and touch their history. Bustles, moccasin patterns. Treaties. They were grounded in the connection with their ancestors.

They visited the National Congress of American Indians at the Embassy of Tribal Nations. This broadened their understanding of nonprofits’ work to create and support movements in Indian country, and internship opportunities for young people. The Pine Ridge youth saw it as their embassy, comprehending what sovereignty means for Indian nations.

Food broadened the youths’ experience in cultural diversity. They embraced first-time experiences at an Ethiopian restaurant and discovered the blend of food and feeding their art at Busboys and Poets.

For downtime, the team relaxed on the grass-lined sidewalk of Washington Circle and practiced slam poetry with NMAI partner Keevin Lewis (Navajo). Keevin spit a poem for the first time.

Lunch at the NMAI opened dialogue with the executive director of the White House Initiative on American Indian and Alaska Native Education, Bill Mendoza (Oglala-Sicangu Lakota), about education in Indian country. The youth also spoke with the NMAI education department about ways to bring Dances with Words poetry to the NMAI.

The young poets returned to Pine Ridge, but their lives, families and communities won’t be the same. They experienced the nation’s capital with a brave community of poets. They’ve been transformed by the Dances with Words program, and are now transforming their world.

By Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer, Artist in Business Leadership Fellow 2015

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The class gathers and sits on mats to prepare for a lauhala weaving class. “Lauhala” simply means “leaf from a hala tree.” But this isn’t simply a craft class. There is protocol, an ancient way to approach this art that was taught to Duncan Ka’ohu Seto (Native Hawaiian) by master weavers of his time. Now Ka’ohu is a master weaver, and it is his turn to be the kumu, the teacher.

Ka’ohu’s students share stories while they work, and he joins in, though always watching carefully. When he sees a mistake made, he is the kumu. He corrects the error with humor and understanding. They laugh. There is a balance between firm and fun, because when Ka’ohu takes on students, he is responsible for them. He reminds them that it’s their turn. It’s their time. They stand on his shoulders.

Beyond the chants, protocols, and stories, the harvesting itself should be done correctly, as well as caring for Hawaiian resources. Ka’ohu wants the students to not only weave but reconnect with the legacy of their ancestors. This strengthens his community when they choose lauhala to express themselves as Native Hawaiians.

Elizabeth Ka’iulani In Takamori counts herself among the next generation of artists that Ka’ohu’s generation is building bridges for. She has known him as a Maoli Arts Month artist, Wailoa Art Gallery curator, teacher, and First Peoples Fund co-trainer. She knows him as a mentor, a quiet, humble giant with deeply rooted ancestral knowledge which is at the heart of why Elizabeth nominated Ka’ohu for the First Peoples Fund Community Spirit Award.

Only a generation ago — the generation of Ka’ohu’s grandmothers — lauhala was a part of Hawaiian households. Families gathered and went through the production process together to make floor mats or baskets. Today, families do not make time for this process. Ka’ohu wants to make the practice accessible for his communities.

Lauhala plays an important role in another part of his life’s work — repatriation, bringing home his ancestors’ bones that have been scattered around the world. Ka’ohu is a member of a Native Hawaiian organization called Hui Mālama I Nā Kūpuna O Hawai’i Nei. They have repatriated from institutions in the United States, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Scotland and the United Kingdom.

There was a great deal of discussion on the proper way to bring bones home with dignity. It was decided to wrap the bones and put them in lauhala baskets. Hala means to “pass on or die.” Lauhala baskets were appropriate for the task. Ka’ohu has made numerous burial baskets through the years.

Ka’ohu began as a student 30 years ago. Now he is a teacher, a kumu who is intimately familiar with Hawaiian styles and philosophies. He has incorporated it into his life and way of teaching his students. He wants them to have a clear path to follow, for them to become deeply rooted in ancestral knowledge. In this way, Hawaiians will always have lauhala mats to sit on while weaving.

Duncan Ka'ohu Seto is a 2016 Community Spirit Award Honoree. Join us in celebrating Duncan and the other honorees on October 8, 2016.