Profile | Ken Williams

Ken Williams (Arapaho/Seneca) was born into the beadwork tradition. His early years were spent on his father's Seneca reservation in NY where he started observing and experimenting with beadwork. As a teenager, he spent time with his mother's family, master beadworkers themselves, at the Wind River Reservation in Wyoming. Here he began to take on bigger, more complex projects. While at IAIA, he was mentored by Teri Greeves and began to develop his own style which mixed a contemporary aesthetic with traditional beadwork. Ken now focuses mostly on fancy bags of all sizes and shapes, each a beautiful creation with its own story to tell.

(from the Native Treasures website)

Review | Highland High School Fashion Show

Highland High School Fashion Show
by Addelina Lucero

For this particular event, I had a really different perspective than most onlookers, as I was backstage in all the chaos and fun that makes for a good fashion show. Both my children were models in the show and their excitement was contagious.

The practice walks, outfit try-ons and model picks started the Tuesday and Wednesday before the event. These were held at Highland High School. Here, we got to meet a couple of the designers and the awesome Highland High School students and staff who were putting the show together this year. As I understand it, this event is a highly anticipated one for the students, staff, and the Native Community. This is its’ 14th year and is always followed up with a pow wow at the end of April.

The purpose of the event is to raise funds for the Native American Leadership Student organization as well as to support & create awareness for Native style, designs/ers, and overall talent. It’s a very challenging sort of thing to pull off for professionals let alone a small group (8 students and 1 teacher) of non-professionals. There were 4 categories: Pow-Wow, Traditional, Contemporary and Accessories.

Profile of Margaret Roach Wheeler

Profile of Margaret Roach Wheeler: “Mahota” Chickasaw
By Richard Green

Clothing or Art?
Margaret Wheeler’s warm, welcoming smile greeted me as I entered the upstairs foyer of the beautifully restored McSwain Theatre in Ada. She is a small attractive woman with shoulder length silver hair, which beautifully complements her dark brown skin. Her face, and especially her eyes, are quite expressive when she talks.

I was there one day last summer for her help with an article I was working on. In James Adair’s book, History of American Indians, there is a passage about how the Indians used buffalo hair to make clothes and I wondered if this modern Chickasaw weaver could tell me how her ancestors did it.

Video | Louie Gong

Below is a fantastic video featuring Custom Shoe artist Louie Gong, who discusses the importance of putting Northwest Coast designs on shoes - his business goes beyond aesthetics and is an extension of his activism around racial identity. This 'artist profile' was filmed during the American Indian Film Festival by Northwest Indian News. It begins with wonderful comments by Tracy Rector of Longhouse Media.

Video | Disa Tootoosis Photo Shoot

Event | Native Treasures: Indian Arts Festival

The seventh annual Native Treasures: Indian Arts Festival is set for Memorial Day weekend, Friday, May 27 through Sunday, May 29, 2011 at the Santa Fe Convention Center. More than 200 museum-quality artists from over 40 tribes and pueblos will showcase and sell their pottery, jewelry, glass, painting, sculpture, carvings, textiles and other art.

Video | Rhymes and Runways

Here's the vid from the Rhymes & Runways Fashion Show held during Gathering of Nations 2011. The fashion show featured designers Sho Sho Esquiro, Tracy Toulouse, Alano Edzerza, Penny Singer, Wavanoonkwe Cameron-Hernandez, and Jolene Chee.

Review | Fashion and Adornment at the Nizhoni Days Powwow

Fashion and Adornment at the Nizhoni Days Powwow
Cheyenne Beardsley
Native Adornment 450

I attended the Nizhoni Days Powwow on Sunday, May 5th. It was put on by UNM’s Kiva Club. This powwow is an annual event that is held the Sunday after the Gathering of Nations. It is a nice alternative to the GON if you want or need to spend less money (like I did this year). I have attended for the past three years and it is usually held outside on Johnson Field, but they moved it to the Student Union Building Ballrooms by the time I arrived, because of the bad weather. My goal this year was to keep an eye on the fashion and adornment I saw there. It was neat going into the event with appearance in mind, because although I always love looking at powwow regalia, I paid closer attention to detail this year.

Review | RED Runway Fashion Show

RED Runway Fashion Show
by guest post writer Brenton Bluehouse

A backdrop of loudly tattered beat music played inside as it covered what was already playing hip-hop old school connection of 90’s tunes outside in the bar that would be the setting for the RED Runway fashion design premier. Club 405 was probably not the best venue to hold such an event, but when it comes to the Gathering of Nations weekend, it’s almost necessary to be where you know the brown masses are going to congregate and be there ready to show your stuff.

Being that this would be my first formal experiment with a fashion show in Native America, I went in with no expectations but a good time and a glimpse into the world of Native fashion.

Video | Angela DeMontigny on ThatChannel.com

Check out this interview with Metis fashion designer Angela De Montigny, who talks about the state of arts and culture in the Aboriginal community and her work during the Vancouver Olympics and the upcoming Calgary Stampede (skip ahead to around 1:16:00):

Review | Fifth Annual Highland Native Leadership Council Fashion Show

Fifth Annual Native American Fashion Show Review
by guest post writer Cheyenne Beardsley

I attended the “Fifth Annual Native American Fashion Show” held at the UNM Continuing Education Building on March 24th, 2011. The event was sponsored by the Highland Native American Leadership Council.

This was only the second Native fashion event I have ever attended. When I first arrived right at 6pm when the show was supposed to start there were not many people there. However when the show started one of the MC’s mentioned that usually people trickle in as the show progresses and sure enough by the end there were a lot more seats filled.

GON 2011 Review | Gathering of Nations Powwow

This past semester I taught a course at the University of New Mexico titled Native American Adornment. It was an upper division course in Native American Studies and Anthropology, and it focused on Native American practices of adornment from prehistory to the present. Throughout the term, we investigated the creative, social, political and cultural aspects of decorating the body.

It was a terrific class, and I had a group of bright students who enthusiastically took on the course requirements and did an amazing job. One of the requirements was to attend Native fashion or cultural events, and write a succinct review. The purposes of the assignment were to get students to view the garments on the body and in motion, to see and experience the community aspects of clothing and adornment, and to get students to think critically about these events.

I want to share a few of their reviews over the duration of the next week, and here is the first review by Brenton Bluehouse:

Gathering of Nations Pow Wow

It is probably one of the greatest showcases of indigenous peoples gathering in the world, and depending on what your view is of this pow wow, it still is a spectacle to see and be a part of. Every year thousands of individuals make there way to Albuquerque, New Mexico for the Gathering of Nations Pow Wow to be included in what has become a showing of quasi-indianism in the United States. If you are not a dancer, you’re a family member of a dancer and if your not participating in the pow wow, you have come to the pow wow to listen and watch the high sound and colorful costume. For thousands of people come to share their personal expressions of themselves and their culture.

GON 2011 Turquoise Soul

Ah, it's always good to run into amazing Anish peeps, and Wabanoonkwe Cameron-Hernandez is one aaamaaaazing woman. She is the creative mind behind Turquoise Soul - the blingin' beaded jewelry biz that came close to selling out during GON.

I first met Wabanoonkwe through photographer Thosh Collins who sent me photos that he snapped of model Amberae Wood rockin some Turquoise Soul beaded earrings (click here to see the pics and my designer profile on her). Wabanoonkwe invited me to tag along on their latest photoshoot where I finally met her and fashion designer Sho Sho Esquiro (click here to see the 'behind-the-scenes' post).

(Wabanoonkwe at her booth in the tents at GON)

(India Lowry Jones, Wabanoonkwe, me, and Wabanoonkwe's sister and model Miigwaans Cameron at the Rhymes and Runways event)

(India and I earlier in the night - getting many compliments on our Turquoise Soul earrings)

GON 2011 G Jewelry, Mea Bfly, and Dre Lynn Design

At the annual Gathering of Nations Powwow, I always get to catch up with some great artists/fashionarias. Check out these three super fly ndn chicks and their badass earrings!:

G Jewelry
Tina Ootsukaeliza has been creating affordable, fun to wear accessories ("handmade with love"!) since 2005.

If you missed her at GON, you can check out her selection on Etsy, or email her for more information at gjewelry@hotmail.com

She was reppin' a huge selection at GON (see left), and even spotted me some dope black and white earrings featuring the badass artwork of one of my favorite artists, Thomas Marcus (aka Breeze).

The Tribal Trend: "It’d Be Truer To Call It 'Colonial.'"

Ooh girl!

Sarah Nicole Prickett published this article, titled Trending: The safari that never stops, over at the National Post yesterday, and it is an excellent critique of the current Tribal Trend:

When I was a child, the month of May meant my parents would sandwich us into the Volvo and drive to the middle of Nowhere, Ont., for the annual Mennonite Relief Sale. I’d go to the Ten Thousand Villages tent and buy something from Somewhere Else: an Indonesian woven bracelet, say. I knew nothing about the larger world, but I liked to imagine a girl my age making crafts with her mother, as I did, but with different-coloured hands. I also liked the bracelet.

Today — as in right this second — I could go into Urban Outfitters and buy the same thing for a little more money. It’s probably made in Indonesia, too. Village. Sweatshop. Same diff.

GON 2011 Vans x Pendleton

Check out this special collaboration that Vans did with Nibwaakaawin for the Gathering of Nations Powwow and All Nations Skate Jam.

These shoes premiered last year at ANSJ 2010 and sold out within hours.

For the 2011 event, Vans created several limited edition SK8-HIs, Classic Slip-Ons and Chukka Lows using Pendleton fabrics. Proceeds from the sale of the sneakers will go towards Nibwaakaawin’s fundraising efforts – a Native non-profit organization whose goal is to empower Native youth through skateboarding.

GON 2011 Beadwork on Crack

As we walked around the GON vendors in the tents, we noticed table after table of crazy cool beadwork, and one of my friends (can't remember who!) stated, "Woah... it's like beadwork on crack..."

See what we mean:

Sadly, I didn't get the names of the sellers - I guess you'll just have to go to GON 2012 to check it out for yourself!

GON 2011 Tracy Toulouse

Stylin' Indians! They were everywhere at GON. I definitely didn't get snaps of them all, but here's some! And here is a quick post on one of my favorite fashionistas - Tracy Toulouse!

Hailing from the North shores area in Northern Ontario, Toulouse is a member of the Sagamok Anishnawbek First Nation.

Toulouse shows her work throughout Canada and is known for her modern fashion lines as well as for her creation of elaborate and intricate custom regalia for clients.

She shared a booth with Wabanoonkwe Cameron-Hernandez (the brains and style behind Turquoise Soul - more to come on this), and she brought some fabulous Ojibwe fashion designs to the powwow scene.

I snatched up one of her red jackets and wore it out to the NMS Red Runway event held at the 405 Lounge on Central, where I met up with Tina and Andrea (who both make super fresh earrings (aka, you can expect a future post on these gals)).

Click here to read the Beyond Buckskin Designer Profile on Tracy Toulouse. You can also find her on Akwekon.

GON 2011 Stylin' Indians

Coming to you from Albuquerque, New Mexico - it's the Gathering of Nations 2011 recap! (or, the beginning of it...)

Every year at the end of the April, millions of Indians from throughout the world come together for the biggest powwow in the universe. Ok, maybe not millions of Indians, and maybe they're only from this continent, and maybe NABI is a lil bigger than this powwow, but you get the picture.

Over the duration of the next few days I'll be posting pics of some STYLIN' Indians spotted at the GON powwow and events. Super fresh. Stay tuned. Until then, here's a pic of the Grand Entry on Friday night: