Our Blog

There were plenty of reasons for Wayne Valliere (Ojibwe) to be emotionally moved during his 2015 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award Ceremony on the Lac du Flambeau Reservation in Wisconsin earlier this summer.

The Ojibwe artist was surrounded by community members, elders, friends, family and colleagues. He listened as First Peoples Fund staff highlighted his life’s work as an artist and culture bearer. And, his 96-year-old mentor made the trip to attend the honoring, taking the microphone to speak of Valliere’s dedication to his culture.

But it was a small gesture by First Peoples Fund staff that made Valliere sincerely reflect on the importance of his life’s work. As part of the ceremony, staff collected and displayed artwork by Native Wisconsin artists, which included a showcase of Valliere’s art.

“They had a watercolor I did in eighth grade,” he said. “I don’t know where they got it from.”

His work, often expressed in watercolors, has followed the trajectory of his life. “I was seeing different parts of my life,” he said, as he viewed the collection. “Our art is at a much deeper level. It’s our strength.”

"Each piece represents part of his journey as a Native man and an artist. We put strength and life into each piece,” he said. “It reflects a time in our life.”

The Community Spirit Awards are given every year to recognize the exceptional passion, wisdom and purpose the recipients bring to their art and the communities they serve. Every other year, they are presented in the communities in which the artists live.

“Wayne embodies what this annual honoring is all about,” said First Peoples Fund President Lori Pourier. “It’s his willingness to take a lifetime of knowledge and wisdom and walk alongside the people in his community to help usher in the next generation of Ojibwe culture bearers.”

It was at a young age that Valliere first fell in love with art. His father led him, encouraging Valliere to use recycled paper to draw. Later, he matched his love of art with his interest in Ojibwe traditions and culture. Today, he creates a variety of traditional art, including birch bark, canoes, drums, paintings, carvings, cradle boards, Ojibwe language materials, flutes, antler horn carvings, and spears and arrows.

But much of his time is spent working side-by-side with youth, including constructing traditional canoes and winter lodges, all in an effort to perpetuate traditions that have stood on the brink of extinction.

Valliere is a good example of what can happen when quality mentorship happens within a community, he said. “The things my elders taught me … they would say, ‘We’re putting this on your shoulders now,’” he said. “I’m at that point where I’m creating a lot of programs to pass that knowledge down.”

He is doing the same within his family. As the father of eight, and the grandfather of eight, Valliere has ample opportunities to shed light on the past. “It makes me feel really good,” he said. “I’m teaching my kids by example.”

Some parents and elders exhort the younger generations to learn by what is taught, not by what is demonstrated, he added. “I say, ‘Do as I do,’ and I feel comfortable with that,” he said. “I live by the spirit and my community sees me doing that.”

Valliere said he was humbled to receive the Community Spirit Award, and was honored to share the ceremony with others. “It’s very important to keep the culture, language and art moving forward for the future generation of our tribe so we never lose our identity,” he said.

Being in the spotlight is not something he’s used to, he said. “It’s not our way to pound our chest,” he said. “Humility is our way. But it was such a great honor.”

It’s not just the individual who benefits when Native art is recognized and celebrated. “I share this award with my community,” he said. “I feel it belongs to all of us.”

Watch video of the canoe launch

‍

Brendon Albers’ (Cheyenne River Sioux) art career began with a tragedy four years ago. “My brother got stomach cancer,” said Albers. “I moved to the Sioux Falls area [in South Dakota] and I started doing ceremonies to heal him.”

Albers’ brother passed away a year after his diagnosis, but the reintroduction to the Lakota belief system, culture and traditions stayed with him. “I wouldn’t have become a sun dancer or picked up the Lakota values again if it weren’t for my brother,” he said. “It took desperate measures, but a lot of good came from it.”

He found familiarity and comfort in sculpting rocks and stones by hammer and chisel, a traditional method rarely used today. While his brother was sick, Albers stayed close by his side at the hospital. For 25 days, he spent time between sculpting and caring for his ailing brother. The result was a $2800 piece that the family later sold and used as funding to travel to honoring ceremonies for his brother, Tanner, after his death.

When Albers sold a sculpture to Little Wound High School, he realized he was at a turning point. “I decided then that I wanted to do this for a living,” he said.

Albers recently received an Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship from First Peoples Fund and plans to use the funding and support to expand his new business.

“It bugs me to get rid of originals,” he said with a laugh. Investing in a casting machine would help him make replicas of his original work, allowing him to work more efficiently and increase his sales.

He is also working to expand his social media presence and is in the process of building a website. And, he recently completed work on a large alabaster stone carving of the spiritual holders of the Sacred White Buffalo Calf Pipe Women (Pte Ska Win). In Lakota tradition, she taught the Lakota people the seven sacred rituals and gave them their “chanupa,” or sacred pipe. It is now on display at the Sandy Swallow Gallery in Hill City, South Dakota.

“It’s really exciting,” he said. “I feel so grateful. I’ve come a long way in a year.”

It was in a bus that Albers had his first studio. He now shares studio space with his father on a 10-acre piece of property “in the middle of nowhere. It’s perfect,” he said. “I’m building a pond before winter.”

Albers has also discovered a love of teaching. Last year he visited a high school art class. “There were guys who were athletes in there, and at first they thought art was ‘girly,’” he said, noting that they were singing a different tune by the end of the presentation. “They saw that you can be rugged and still create beautiful things.”

Helping students understand that art can be more than a hobby, and see it as a potential career path, is one of Albers’ passions now. “I want to reach out to kids who didn’t realize that art was an option,” he said.

His dream is to someday have a studio that is open to students or artists just beginning who are looking for a free place to get started. “There’s a lot of us in Indian Country looking for something for the kids,” he said. “If they want to come and dance or sing Lakota, I’ll find someone to teach them. Singing, dancing, painting… any art form.”

Following your culture shouldn’t be hard, he said. “They shouldn’t have to pay or get discouraged when they can’t find it,” he said.

He hopes First Peoples Fund will be right beside him through the process, he said. “They’re fantastic,” he said. “They’re so family-oriented, so open and trusting. It’s like I was adopted in to a family.”

Brendon Albers is a 2015 Artists in Business Leadership Fellow.

It's a year of beginnings for Dyani White Hawk Polk (Sicangu Lakota).

What the Minneapolis, Minnesota-based artist had hoped would happen at some point in the next three to four years has unfolded in front of her this year.

"I made the big, scary jump to self-employment," explained White Hawk Polk, which included resigning from her position as director and curator of the All My Relations Art Gallery in March and moving from St. Paul to Shakopee to pursue a full-time art career.

It was a good move.

"It's been crazy busy, but it's a good thing," she said.

White Hawk Polk creates paintings and mixed media art. She also does beadwork and quill work, skills she learned from family friends and then later honed at the Institute of American Indian Arts. Her work is a mix of modern abstract painting and traditional Lakota art forms.

"My life experience and education are a mix of western and Indigenous," she said. Her father is German and Welsh and her mother is Lakota, creating a complex family story. "My art has come from trying to figure out how to negotiate all that in myself," she said.

White Hawk Polk has had a long-term goal of creating artwork full-time, and realized that this year was the time to take the leap when she was granted a First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship as well as a Joan Mitchell Foundation Painter's Grant.

"My goal was to get to the point where I could just do my artwork."

It was around the same time that she was offered another full-time job and considered taking it instead of self-employment. She sat down with her family, including her husband, mother, her mother's husband, and her sister-in-law and her partner, to make the final decision. If it wasn't for their support, she said she likely wouldn't have made the leap.

"They said, 'This is your real dream,'" she recalled. "They said, let's jump on it and we'll all figure out how to make it work."

White Hawk Polk said her family moved in with them to make it all monetarily feasible, and her husband now stays home with their two-year-old. The encouragement from her family made the difference. "Without their support and guidance, I may have taken the other job," she said.

With the Artist in Business Leadership fellowship, White Hawk Polk has purchased a new computer and digital projector, as well as industrial-grade tools and equipment for a wood shop. "I can do my own framing, which saves money," she said. "And, if I needed to, I can do it for other people."

She is grateful for the support from First Peoples Fund.

"I'm beyond excited," she said. "I can't even explain what it feels like."

One of the greatest changes in her life has been a separation between work and home. "For so long, I was working seven days a week," she said.

The days are still long, she said, as she works to meet deadlines before she can begin building an inventory. "But when I'm home, I'm home," she said. "Or on the weekends, I get to actually be present. It's so rewarding and refreshing. I feel healthier."

‍

When it came down to deciding whether or not to pursue a writing career, Sarah Elisabeth Sawyer (Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma) put the decision in someone else's hands.

"I'm a Christian and I knew I needed to surrender all to God," she said, explaining how she evaluated the priorities in her life. "I got to writing and I realized I would only put it back in my life if he put it back. It was the most peace I've ever had in my life."

That was six years ago, and Sawyer, now standing on the cusp of her thirties, is confident writing was a divine appointment. A tribal member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, Sawyer lives in Canton, Texas, and is the author of several books that follow the historical roots of her tribe, their families and history.

For her work and her ambitions moving forward, First Peoples Fund granted Sawyer a 2015 Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship. She travels to Oklahoma at least once a month and continues to write historical fiction that educates people about the culture and historical events of her tribe. "The Executions" was her first novel, focusing on the life of a mixed-blood 18-year-old woman in the late 1800s caught in middle of two political parties warring over the old and new ways of their people.

Though the stories spring from her imagination, the characters are often based on people she has read or learned about and the foundation of the books come directly from the past. "I take events from history and put them in an entertaining form," Sawyer said. "A lot of my ideas come from research."

The opportunity for Native and non-Native audiences to experience history through her fiction is one of the reasons she writes. "A lot of historical fiction out there is inaccurate," she said.

Her work has been endorsed by leadership in the Choctaw tribe, which is uncommon and speaks to the accuracy and thoroughness of the research, she said.

Sawyer receives support and inspiration from her family. Her mother, a photographer and filmmaker, travels and works alongside her. Sawyer's father, inspired by his daughter's desire to capture their tribe's history, had begun writing about his own life when he died suddenly in 2012. It was the same year she was accepted into the artist leadership program at the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. for her literary work in preserving Trail of Tears stories.

"It was absolutely the best and worst of times," she said.

Sawyer said she is grateful for a partnership with First Peoples Fund, and was encouraged by her experience at a recent First Peoples Fund gathering of artists in Santa Fe, New Mexico. "I got to meet the other people and they were very welcoming," she said, not only to her but also to her mother who she considers a business partner.

"The grant is very simple and seamless, so I can focus on the project."

The ABL grant enabled her to purchase a new computer and IPad and continue to work toward her goal of a full-time writing career. It also helped her publish "The Executions."

Sawyer also has her sights set on helping others. She will teach for her third year at the Chickasaw Arts Academy this year and envisions a future where she can support others in finding a voice through writing. "I'd like to do more workshops," she said. "I want to help Native writers preserve their family stories."

Feedback from readers is confirmation that she's on the right track—several have started writing their own stories to preserve history. "My mom told me stories of my family," Sawyer said, including her childhood growing up in Texas that included trips to the Trail of Tears Memorial Walk in Oklahoma.
Shaping those stories and putting them down on paper pushed her to do more.

"This has made me delve deeper," she said. "As opposed to it being something I wanted to know more about, it became part of me. People have now taken up writing and started writing their own family stories. People are beginning to take action and the ripple effect is awesome."

‍

It's a big year for Michael Two Bulls (Oglala Lakota). He's combining two of his loves—music and art—in hopes of securing a future for not only himself in the Native art world, but others as well.

He's well on his way, thanks to a boost from First Peoples Fund, which awarded him an Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship to fund a combined album release and art show planned for later this year.

Two Bulls has been an artist for more than a decade, honing his contemporary artwork skills at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico before opening Bad Art Press in Rapid City, South Dakota with Douglas Two Bulls. The studio currently includes a silkscreen business and a recording studio.

With funding from the fellowship, Two Bulls has been working alongside other artists to develop a music album completely packaged by the art studio, including the music, lyrics, recording, and album sleeve printing and design. The studio will host an album release party and art show in October at Crazy Horse Memorial, and they are currently marketing the event by printing t-shirts, posters, stickers and patches.

"It's a huge undertaking. It's been kind of crazy. It's a lot of work."

But it's also been a great boon for business. "We've been wanting to do this for quite some time, and this gives us the opportunity to set goals and deadlines," he said.

Two Bulls has also enjoyed the opportunity to work on music. "I've been recording for years, doing local gigs, but no full-length album," he said, describing his music as indie rock.

Two Bulls said it's been gratifying to work with First Peoples Fund through the process. "For Native artists on the reservation, there is no other income," he said. "You kind of have to create your own jobs. Art is how my relatives make a living, and to have an organization promoting that livelihood is important for those communities and their culture."

Two Bulls said he hopes for the Bad Art Press studio to someday become a place for artists to come together to collaborate or simply have a place they can create.

"We want to invite artists and assist them," he said.

His motivation, he said, is that art sparks ideas and dialogue among people. His vision years ago to have a small shop to house a group of artists and talents is an example of that.

"A small-shared dream or vision among peers could lead to lifelong friendships," he said. "I know this to be true because I am a living example of this philosophy. Today, we are close to the original vision and now we have the space and equipment where we can begin our work."

‍

Keone Nunes (Native Hawaiian) prefers not to be in the spotlight, so the traditional tattoo artist said it was a little unnerving to be the center of attention at the recent MAMo Wearable Art Fashion Show in Honolulu where he was honored with the 2015 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award from First Peoples Fund.

"But I was also very honored and humbled," said Nunes, who is one of four artists receiving the prestigious award that celebrates Native artists making significant contributions to their communities as culture bearers.

The honoring was held last month at the Hawaii Theater, hosted by Vicky Takamine, a 2013 Community Spirit Award honoree.

More than a dozen people modeled tattoos that had been done by Nunes, many of them representative of the traditional Polynesian work he has been doing for the last two decades. Traditional tattooing is done by tapping one stick to another instead of using a machine, and is a process that includes a ceremony.

During the MAMo show, Nunes said he was overwhelmed as he was presented with the award by First Peoples Fund staff and given a star quilt. As he was presented with the award, more than a dozen Native Hawaiians who proudly display his work on their bodies joined him onstage.

It was also special to be part of the annual MAMo art show, which showcases six to nine artists and designers each year. Nunes said he made several connections during the evening that could turn in to opportunities for more work down the road.

"Quite a few people asked me to get in contact with them," he said.

Nunes said he does his work not only to help revitalize traditional tattooing, but also to help people of all backgrounds rediscover their ancestral traditions and cultures. He works in the Nanakuli Valley near his home and has connected with tribes in Northern California and New Zealand to help them learn traditional tattooing.

It's one of the very reasons he was chosen for the award, said First Peoples Fund President Lori Pourier.

"Keone's work is remarkable not only for the fact that he has tirelessly worked to reintroduce an important art form, but also because he has a heart and a passion to inspire people of other cultures to do the same and rediscover their traditional art forms," she said.

While Nunes said he takes great care in doing the tattoos, he doesn't feel ownership of the work like a typical artist might.

"Once I do the work, I don't think of it as my piece," he said. "It's theirs."

‍

Julie Patnaude (Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa) is standing on the cusp of a new career.

Patnaude, who is a residential advisor at Job Corps in Minot, North Dakota, recently opened her first art show at the Heart of the Turtle Native American Art Gallery in Minot.

"The first time you're putting your art out into the world is nerve-wracking," she said.

Patnaude said she has worked at several jobs in her life, but art has always been a constant. She majored in art in college and has been painting and drawing all her life. It was while she was going through hundreds of pieces of her own artwork that she had stored during the years that a friend asked a life-changing question.

"They said, 'Why don't you sell this?'" Patnaude recalled. "It was an 'aha' moment for me. I thought, 'Why am I not doing this?'"

She hopes to transition to full-time work as an artist, and said a 2015 Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship from First Peoples Fund has been a big help in getting there. Over the next year, Patnaude hopes to set up a website to showcase and sell her artwork, sell her pieces in art galleries in North Dakota and neighboring states, and complete enough pieces to sell at art and craft shows.

In preparation for showing her artwork in stores and galleries, Patnaude plans to use some of the grant money to frame and mat the artwork. She hopes someday to produce prints of her work to reach a broader audience.

The ideas for her artwork, which is contemporary and focuses on surrealism, is inspired by the kids she works with, her heritage as a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of the Chippewa tribe, and memories of places she's been. Patnaude said she learned valuable lessons during the Heart of the Turtle Mountain show, including the importance of staying connected with potential buyers through business cards, and focusing more on fewer pieces.

"I sold four pieces, which is pretty good for my first show," she said. "But if I could go back and do it differently, I wouldn't have done so many pieces. I had 22. I worked really hard on each of them, but I would focus and spend more time on each piece."

The direction and support of First Peoples Fund has given is valuable, Patnaude said.

"They've been really supportive through their professional development training and career coaching. "They've helped me branch out and try different types of art."

More than anything, she said, First Peoples Fund has given her confidence. "I felt like I was stumbling around in the dark," she said.

A recent professional development training in New Mexico helped her connect with other artists and get a glimpse of what her future might look like. "I'm not there yet, but it was nice to see what they are doing," she said, of well-established artists.

Even after she makes the transition to full-time art, Patnaude said she plans to continue to volunteer. Before her work ends at the Job Corps, she hopes to collaborate with students on artwork.

"I'd like to do projects with them in the future, maybe a mural," she said.

It is other people that inspire her, she said, and she wants to continue to give back no matter where she is.

"I think it's important to contribute to other peoples' lives," she said.

‍

Bethany Yellowtail (Northern Cheyenne/Crow) has a problem on her hands, and it's a good one.

After working in corporate fashion design in California for several years, the 26-year-old from the Crow Nation in Montana took a leap of faith. She quit her well-paying job and started her own fashion line called "B.Yellowtail."

It was the right decision.

"It's so busy—we are just filling orders all the time," said Yellowtail. "I just don't want it to slow down."

Yellowtail, who is a 2015 recipient of a First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership Fellowship, now has her sights set on growing her business to include staff, a variety of merchandise and possible franchises.

"I see the vision for what we're able to do," she said. "I can't wait until I have a full team. But we're just a start-up right now."

Yellowtail moved to Los Angeles, California, in 2007 after she graduated from high school to attend college at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandise. After graduating in 2009, she stayed in the area, working in the corporate fashion world and working on her own designs on the side.

"I was building my brand and clientele," she said.

Yellowtail said she learned valuable skills by working in the industry, but was discouraged by the cultural inaccuracies perpetuated about Natives through "ethnic-inspired" clothing lines in mainstream fashion. It spurred her desire to start her own line, and become an advocate for Indigenous fashion and storytelling.
When she decided to branch out on her own in January, she was prepared but nervous.

"Fortunately, I had paid my dues and built my way up," she said. "But it was hard to leave the corporate structure. I was making good money and it was security."

But since then, there's been no looking back.

Her online sales skyrocketed her first week and the buzz about her line has spread far and wide. The fellowship from First peoples Fund was a part of that as she was able to fund a marketing campaign that included a fashion campaign that employed Native models, photographers, assistants, and editorial writers.

Most recently, Yellowtail dressed Inez Jasper for the MTV "Rebel Music" special, something she has done for the Native artist multiple times. But the best thing about her new endeavor, she said, is being able to weave a story through fashion.

"The imagery is what inspires me and what story I want to tell."

Some fashion designers design fashion lines based on the current trend of colors or themes. "They might decide 'summer romance' is the theme," she said. "But I take a more in-depth look. I want to tell the story of where I'm from."

That oftentimes takes her right back to Montana and the reservation. At the beginning of the design process, she creates a design board with images of her ancestors, family, people she grew up with and traditional regalia.

"I start connecting the dots for the textiles, the color pallet, and the beadwork," she said. "I'm trying to be careful and meticulous."

Yellowtail was able to share her work with fellow Native artists at a recent First Peoples Fund training in Santa Fe, New Mexico. "I felt so much more confident to know that there's a place for what I do," she said. "It's hard when I'm in L.A. and brands fit in a certain mold. It's cut from the same cloth and I'm not. It's hard not having someone you can relate to."

The trip with First Peoples Fund changed that. She was inspired by the artists she met, and instantly felt a connection with their work and lives. "It's a different medium, but we all have the same vision," she said. "It's about moving our culture forward. To know that I have those resources, I can't even put a value on that."

For more information on Yellowtail, visit www.byellowtail.com.

To see her fashion short film, visit www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGRiAWzqIPc&feature=youtu.be.

‍

One of the most exciting projects Gilbert Kills Pretty Enemy III (Standing Rock Sioux) has going right now lives in his house.

"I'm teaching my boys art and my oldest son is getting in to it and following in my footsteps," said Kills Pretty Enemy, a Native artist from McLaughlin, South Dakota, and the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe.

Kills Pretty Enemy is one of this year's First Peoples Fund Artist in Business Leadership Fellows, and has been creating art since he can remember. "When I was a little kid, my mom used to buy me art books and my dad was an architect and an artist," he said.

His love of drawing eventually blossomed into a desire to attend school to study art. He graduated in 2001 from the United Tribes Technical College with an associate's degree in art marketing. He returned in 2005 to earn a second associate's degree in small business management.

His work, now under the name "Chameleon Horse Art and Design," includes drawing, graphic art, silk screening, tattooing, tribal art, wood burning and painting. His fellowship from First Peoples Fund is helping him do several things, he said.

The first is purchasing silk screening screens and a pressure washer. The second will be to purchase a matte cutter, matte board and shrink-wrap machine for sales of prints, cards and postcards. "It will help make it easier for customers to get the work home," he said.

The third area includes airbrush art. Currently, Kills Pretty Enemy works with a small amount of airbrush supplies, making it a challenge to expand that part of his business. The final piece will be ordering Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator programs, tattoo materials and blending markers for a comic book he is working on.

Comic books have been a bridge among generations for Kills Pretty Enemy and his sons, ages 14 and 17. It continues to be an inspiration for his artwork.

"I was raised in the 1980s and comics and video games were the styles—the media was clean and perfect," he said. "It's like my dad being an architect, everything was measured right on."

Kills Pretty Enemy's comic books, "Akicita" and "Iktomi," will be the culmination of his graphics work. "Iktomi" will be a Lakota language tool for the Lakota people. Kills Pretty Enemy said he plans to use the books as a marketing tool.

"These two books will show the world what I can do as well as helping other Lakota artists reach for their dreams of working in the comic book industry," he said.

While the comic style of his youth came easily, incorporating his Native culture in his art took some studying, Kills Pretty Enemy said. "I didn't start out doing strictly Native art," he added. "But as I got older, for horse paintings and beaded design, I'd go to the library and read a lot."

His sons, who are also currently working on a comic book, are also on the hunt for information. His oldest plans on studying art at the same tribal college he graduated from several years ago. Kills Pretty Enemy's long-term goal is to be able to focus more time on his art.

Connecting with First Peoples Fund, and receiving their support is a major step toward that, he said. "It's really a great feeling to be part of these people," he said.

He recently traveled to a First Peoples Fund artist training in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

"I got to see everybody in action," he said, "and I thought, 'I'm in the right place.' When I got back, I got a second wind and got energized."

Follow Kills Pretty Enemy's business, Chameleon Horse Art and Design, on Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/ChameleonHORSE

‍

Cheyenne artist remembered for generosity he extended to both Native and non-Native people

When the friends and family who knew Frank Sheridan, Sr. (Cheyenne/Arapaho) best reflect on his life, the word “generous” comes up time and time again. But they will say that it wasn’t just that he was generous with the artwork that he created.

It was the generosity that he extended to all peoples—sharing his time and talents and life experience with everyone he met.

“If you wanted to know how to do something, Frank would show you how to do it,” said Teri Greeves (Kiowa Indian Tribe of Oklahoma), who nominated Sheridan for a Community Spirit Award nearly one decade ago.

Greeves entered her first art show thanks to Sheridan. Today she is a world-renowned artist whose work can be found at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., and in galleries and museums around the world.

His teaching went beyond the “how-tos” of art, Greeves said.

“After teaching students how to create something, he would give them the patterns for it. In that way, no matter what, they would always have skills—and a base—from which to make money. They would always have a way to make a living,” she said. “He gave them not just pride in the ability to create something, but the ability to take care of one’s self. It is a very traditional idea that he was great at sharing.”

Sheridan—who passed away this month—was an artist for four decades, starting as a young child when he brought a series of mismatched beads to his mother Ruby Sheridan Bushyhead, and asked her to teach him how to bead. Those early lessons began a journey in which he bridged both the Native and non-Native worlds by sharing his art through education. It was a calling that made a difference in the lives of hundreds of young people, and thousands more who have seen his art.

He worked with a variety of different mediums, from rawhide to buckskin and nearly every other traditional material, and became widely known for his Cheyenne style ledger drawings and contemporary variation of ledger style drawing.

Sheridan was also a distinguished scholar. He earned an associate’s, bachelor’s, and two master’s degrees, and lectured for the Association of American Indian Physicians on “Spiritually Based Alternative Therapies.” He worked in the federal service for almost three decades, as well as with Indian Health Services as a community intervention specialist, using his artistic gifts in his professional work to help people heal.

In 2005, he received First Peoples Fund’s Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award for the commitment and passion he brought to passing cultural traditions on to tribal communities.

Jhon Goes in Center (Oglala Lakota), a former First Peoples Fund board member, said his friendship with Sheridan began when Sheridan came to Rapid City to accept the Community Spirit Award.

“Frank was the epitome of what a good relative and servant leader is. I first met Frank at the Community Spirit Awards, and since then have shared a close enough relationship to call each other brother,” Goes in Center said. “I learned much about Frank for the respect his relatives, community and friends accorded him in the setting of community and Cheyenne life-ways.”

“Frank embodied the Collective Spirit in every way,” added Lori Pourier, president of First Peoples Fund. “Our hearts were saddened at the news of his passing, yet our hearts are also full with gratitude for all he shared—with me, our staff, his fellow Community Spirit honorees, and the tribal communities in which he did his deep, important, life-changing cultural work. Through our mission, we will continue to honor him and all the First Peoples artists who we have been honored to meet.

‍

Wayne Valliere's (Ojibwe) father used to cut paper grocery bags open and draw on them, making a cheap canvas out of recycled material—and planting a seed in his son's mind that art could take you anywhere.

"He would start drawing scenes of trapping, hunting and fishing," said Valliere. "He would say, 'Where do you want to go tonight, son?'"

With those memories still fresh in his mind, Valliere's interest in the cultural and historical traditions of the Ojibwe people grew. Living in north-central Wisconsin on the Lac du Flambeau Reservation, Valliere spent time with Elders learning a variety of art forms and to this day is able to create dozens of traditional items, including birch bark, canoes, drums, paintings, carvings, cradle boards, Ojibwe language materials, flutes, antler horn carvings, and spears and arrows.

"My fascination with the culture started (early). I've spent my life doing these things. The greatest blessings I have as a Native artist is having the opportunity to be in the forest harvesting materials. It keeps me in balance as well as remembering the teachings of my Elders."

Valliere, who is a teacher in the Wisconsin public school system and founder of the Ojibwe Winter Games, has been named a 2015 Jennifer Easton Community Spirit Award honoree from First Peoples Fund. The honors are given every year to recognize the exceptional passion, wisdom and purpose the recipients bring to their art and the communities they serve. This year's honoring ceremonies are taking place around the country, right in the communities where the artists live and work.

Valliere said he is honored to be included in this year's group of recipients. "It makes me feel good and lets other Native people realize what art can do," he said.

Valliere is currently working on a project called "Carrying the Culture Forward." He will help students construct a 14-foot birch bark canoe in the school, similar to a canoe he recently helped students and the community build at the University of Madison-Wisconsin. Tom Loeser, professor and chair of the art department at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, said working with Valliere in building the canoe was the most exciting and rewarding project he had worked on in his 23 years at the university.

He described Valliere as a "passionate, intense and caring teacher," and said he was a "fabulous educator and ambassador for the Native community."

The canoe, which was built with the hands of dozens of students and brought together hundreds of people in the community, is now housed in a lakefront dormitory on the shores of Lake Mendota.

Valliere's expertise extends well beyond canoes. He also recently led students in an endeavor to finish an Ojibwe winter lodge, a nine-month project that taught the students hands-on experience of how Elders used to construct the structures.

"It's amazing," Valliere said. "We brought history back to life."

They stayed in the lodge overnight when the temperatures dipped below freezing and discovered they were successful in the construction process. "It was beautiful," Valliere said. "It was a journey, an adventure and identity for our young people."

It all adds up to his mission—to breathe life back in to the traditions his ancestors lived by.

"I work a lot with young people to not add or take anything away from our traditions, so everything stays pure."

His community struggles with the same historical trauma many Natives experienced, Valliere said, and it lives on in the younger generations. "The detriment done to our tribe due to colonization left a lot of identity loss for our young people," he said. "For the last five decades, we've relied on help from the outside for our social problems. The answer lies within our culture."

He has seen positive changes in his community, including a higher high school graduation rate, more sobriety, and more students enrolling in college.

"We're teaching our next generation who they are," he said.

Valliere said it's an honor to be part of that work.

"I was born with a white streak in my hair and my grandmother told my mom I was a reincarnated Elder and I would carry the torch forward," he said. "I've done my best to do that. When I see young people get on the right path with culture, it's very gratifying. I feel like my life's work has meant something."

‍

During his childhood, Warren "Guss" Yellow Hair (Oglala Lakota) was reprimanded in school for drawing. That same passion that used to get him in trouble has since developed in to a successful career as a Native Plains artist.

It was originally Yellow Hair's uncles—one a musician and the other a carver and painter—who inspired him to pursue art.

"It was great to have them as mentors and role models," he said.

Yellow Hair, who is an adjunct professor for Oglala Lakota College in South Dakota and teaches Lakota language and traditional Northern Plains art classes, is a recipient of a 2015 First Peoples Fund Cultural Capital Fellowship. The fellowship has made it possible for Yellow Hair to organize and lead art therapy courses for youth ages 12 to 17, including hands-on lessons on drum making. He learned the form from his cousin about 15 years ago.

"I love to learn, and be around learning. When we were working on a project together years ago, the little ones would surround us. I would talk to them, incorporating Lakota phrases and it turned in to an after-school program."

The courses provide students hands-on lessons in preparing raw materials to make hand drums, including scraping and de-hairing the hides using traditional Lakota methods. He also teaches the students the traditional meanings of the colors used, and the songs. The students get to keep their own drum at the end of the process.

Yellow Hair is also using the fellowship to host traditional camping workshops for drum making. Youth will camp outside for three to four days and be immersed in the traditional Native spirituality, healing and survival methods. Two more camps, one in June and one in August, will be held this year with the help of the Cultural Capital Fellowship.

"It strengthens the mind, heart and body," he said. "With the high rate of suicide, it helps to build a rapport with these students. Once they feel comfortable and safe, they're able to share of themselves. The kids just blossom. It's a chance to grow and be proud of our culture."

He has also used some of the funding from the fellowship to purchase a computer and market the camps. He has utilized First Peoples Fund Native Artist Professional Development Training to become more "savvy" about how social media and technology can advance his career and art.

Yellow Hair said working with First Peoples Fund has been exciting, and meaningful. His relationship with the organization led him to an engagement with The Gymnasium, an arts organization located in Minneapolis, for an event held in Sioux Falls, South Dakota a few years ago. He also performed for Queen Elizabeth II of England during her Diamond Jubilee in June 2012 and was the featured Indian artist at the Agate Fossil Beds National Monument in July 2012.

"I'm overwhelmed and just really happy to receive the Cultural Capital Fellowship," he said. "You get one-on-one treatment with First Peoples Fund staff. They support me, and are just wonderful to be around."

‍