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New & Upcoming Exhibitions
Exhibitions
New: A Century Ago..."They Came as Sovereign Leaders"
January 14, 2009 - February 17, 2009 (new closing dates)
On view are photographs of six great Native chiefs who participated in President Theodore Roosevelt's 1905 inaugural parade: Buckskin Charlie (Ute), American Horse (Oglala Sioux), Quanah Parker (Comanche), Geronimo (Chiricahua Apache), Hollow Horn Bear (Brule Sioux), and Little Plume (Piegan Blackfeet). While the chiefs were invited to add color to the parade, they arrived with their own concerns and actively sought President Roosevelt's attention to the needs of their people.
New: Cases: Orientation Exhibition
November 13, 2008 - TBA
These nine introductory exhibition cases cover the following topics:

• Our Place in the Universe
• Ceremony
• Native Identities
• Leadership
• Contact and Confrontation
• Challenges and Solutions
• Achievements and Contributions
• Learning More

New: Fritz Scholder: Indian/Not Indian
November 1, 2008 - August 16, 2009
The exhibition highlights the more-than-40-year career of contemporary Native artist Fritz Scholder (Luiseno, 1937-2005) through a range of media -- paintings, bronze sculptures, and lithographs -- he used to explore his evocative interests and to focus on his deeply personal experiences. Particular emphasis are on his ground-breaking and controversial Indian paintings from the 1960s and 1970s.

Video (runs continuously)

Free brochure
Catalogue: $34.95 (paper)

New: Through the Eyes of the Eagle: Illustrating Healthy Living for Children
October 3, 2008 - January 4, 2009
On view are nearly 70 original watercolors used in the Eagle Books -- a diabetes-prevention series developed for Native schoolchildren -- in which animal characters encourage physical activity, healthy eating, and learning about diabetes prevention from the elders. The works are by Patrick Rolo (Bad River Band of Ojibwe) and Lisa Fifield (Oneida Tribe of Wisconsin, Black Bear Clan) for the book series written by Georgia Perez (Nambe Pueblo).
New: Outdoor Sculpture: Obelisk
September 11, 2008 - Summer 2009 (TBA)
Obelisk (1987, ed. 2/6) is a 15 1/2 foot-tall, 1,500-pound, cast-bronze sculpture by renowned Native American artist Fritz Scholder (1937-2005; Luiseno). Scholder's obelisk was inspired by his long fascination with all things Egyptian. After an unsuccessful attempt to acquire an ancient obelisk in Egypt in the 1970s, Scholder decided to create his own. He and his former wife, Romona, asked a street vendor to translate their names into hieroglyphics. Those glyphs appear on the sculpture, along with others that Scholder invented.
Our Lives: Contemporary Life and Identities
- Permanent
This exhibition examines the identities of Native peoples in the 21st century, and how those identities, both individual and communal, are the results of deliberate, often difficult choices made in challenging circumstances. This exhibition explores the forces in modern Native life that Native peoples are profoundly influenced by -- their families and communities, the language they speak, the places they live and identify with, and their own self determination. Eight communities contributed their stories to this telling: the Campo Band of Kumeyaay Indians (Southern California), urban Indian community of Chicago (Illinois), Yakama Nation (Washington State),Igloolik (Nunavut, Canada), Kahnawake Mohawk (Quebec, Canada), Saint-Laurent Metis (Manitoba, Canada), Kalinago (Dominica), and Pamunkey (Virginia).
Our Peoples: Giving Voice to Our Histories
- Permanent
This exhibition discusses events that shaped the lives and outlook of Native peoples from 1491 to the present. The first part of the exhibition reveals the forces that affected the lives of Native peoples; it shows how Native peoples have struggled to maintain traditions in the face of adversity, and explains why so little of this history is familiar. The second area consists of eight small galleries that recount the histories of individual tribes: Blackfeet (Montana), Chiricahua Apache (New Mexico), Kiowa (Oklahoma), Tohono O'odham (Arizona), Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation (North Carolina), Nahua (Mexico), Ka'apor (Brazil), and Wixarikari -- sometimes known as Huichol -- (Mexico). The exhibition also includes a "wall of gold" featuring over 400 gold figurines, dating back to 1490, along with European swords, coins, and crosses made from melted gold.
Our Universes: Traditional Knowledge Shapes Our World
- Permanent
Focusing on Native cosmology and organized around one solar year, this exhibition explores the annual ceremonies of Native peoples as a window on their ancestral teachings. Under a "night sky" of fiber-optic stars and constellations, discover how celestial bodies shape the daily lives -- and establish the calendars of ceremonies and celebrations -- of Native peoples today. Featured communities: Mapuche (Chile), Lakota (South Dakota), Quechua (Peru), Yup'ik (Alaska), Q'eq'chi, Maya (Guatemala), Santa Clara Pueblo (New Mexico), Anishinaabe (Hollow Water, Manitoba, Canada), and Hupa (California). The exhibition also highlights the Denver (Colorado) March Powwow, the North American Indigenous Games, and the Day of the Dead -- seasonal celebrations that bring Native peoples together.
Return to a Native Place: Algonquian Peoples of Chesapeake
- Permanent
Through photographs, maps, ceremonial and everyday objects, and interactives, this panel display provides both an overview of the history and events affecting the Native peoples -- Nanticoke, Powhatan, and Piscataway tribes -- of the Chesapeake Bay region (what is now Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, and Washington, D.C.) and information on their continued presence today.
Sculpture: Sacred Rain Arrow
- Indefinitely
Sacred Rain Arrow: Allan Houser's bronze sculpture Sacred Rain Arrow (1988, 94" x 58") relates the legend of a young Apache warrior selected in times of drought to shoot a sacred arrow to the heavens carrying his people's prayer for rain to the Spirit World.
Window on Collections: Many Hands, Many Voices
- Permanent Displays
These permanent displays feature more than 3,500 items from the museum's collection that reveal the remarkable breadth and diversity of Native American objects. Located on the third and fourth levels of the museum and housed in drawers and glass-fronted cases, objects are arranged by categories, including beadwork, peace medals, arrowheads and other projectile points, containers, dolls, and animal objects.
Outdoor Sculptures: Always Becoming
- Indefinitely
On view outside the museum is a family of five sculptures hand-built by artist Nora Naranjo-Morse (Santa Clara Pueblo, Espanola, N.M.), winner of the museum's outdoor sculpture design competition. Based on aboriginal architecture and made of organic, nontoxic materials -- dirt, straw, sand, clay, wood, and moss -- the tipi-like forms are from 6 to 15 feet tall and 3 to 4 inches deep. Each will take on a life of its own as the elements of nature slowly erode the organic materials over time, thus the name Always Becoming.

Note: Nora Naranjo-Morse is the first Native American woman to create an outdoor sculpture in Washington, D.C.

Last update: January 13, 2009, 19:24

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