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Exploring Authenticity in American Indian Art at the First Americans Festival A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at George Mason University By Rachel Delgado-Simmons Master of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies George Mason University, 1998 Bachelor of Fine Arts Maryland Institute, College of Art, 1988 Director: David Kaufman, Professor Department of English Spring Semester 2011 George Mason University Fairfax, VA Copyright 2011 Rachel Delgado-Simmons All Rights Reserved ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to thank the many friends, relatives, and supporters who have made this happen. I would like to thank my daughter, Adelina C. Simmons, for her inexhaustible patience and support during the rigors of this project. Drs. Kaufman, Shutika, and Dumont, members of my committee, were of invaluable help. I would like to thank Dr. Jean-Paul Dumont for being my advisor, supporter, and friend during my graduate program. I worked closely with Dr. Jeffrey Stewart in completing the Field Statements that preceded this study and thank him for his help. I would also like to thank Elli Dumont, Howard Hastings, and Bob Sheperd for editing my work. Special thanks to Dr. Elvira Doman who provided invaluable insight and reviewed my work and for the many years as my mentor and friend. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract................................................................................................................……….v Introduction ...................................................................................................................…1 I. Authenticity and American Indians in the Decision-Making Process .........................33 II. How Indians Developed an Indian Market ................................................................68 III. Native America‟s Most Wanted and the Authentic T-Shirt....................................120 Summary ......................................................................................................................179 List of References ........................................................................................................180 iv ABSTRACT EXPLORING AUTHENTICITY IN AMERICAN INDIAN ART AT THE FIRST AMERICANS FESTIVAL Rachel Delgado-Simmons George Mason University, 2011 Thesis Director: Dr. David Kaufman This is a study in which an attempt was made to develop the models or descriptors that aid in the identification of “authenticity” for selecting the art objects used in a festival. The selected festival in this study was the First Americans Festival that was held in the celebration of the grand opening of the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) in Washington, D.C. At the outset, the application of the term, “authenticity,” was found to be rather loose and upon further exploration of its uses, two models appeared. The two models were identified as “traditional” and “salvage.” The term “tradition” was applied to the first model in which there was agreement between the Indians and non-Indians in the selection of articles that were considered “authentic.” This model includes American Indian art created with materials, methods, and techniques of the past regardless of being developed by outsiders, non-Indian philanthropists, or identified tribes. The second model, known as the “salvage paradigm” is a description that is applied, according to scholars, to the rescuing of a subordinate group by a more dominant one. Here in this study, the focus is on a t-shirt, created by a renowned American Indian artist which eventually became the most desired item at this NMAI Festival. It will also be shown that this model can be reversed and deployed by Indian artists in ways that open new possibilities to a variety of cultural interpretations and challenge the notion of “authenticity.” Introduction “Handmade”. During planning for the 2004 First Americans Festival in Washington, D.C., a celebration for the grand opening of the Smithsonian Institution‟s National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), the words, “handmade”, often convinced members of the Indian Market Committee that artists applying into the “authentic” art market were traditional, genuine, and “real” American Indians. The purpose of Indian Market was to showcase the range of American Indian artistry from 40 selected regions throughout the United States, Canada, and Latin America. Hundreds of thousands of visitors were expected for the First Americans Festival, held on September 21-24, 2004. The Festival was the culmination of over ten years of planning by the NMAI. The new museum featured the history, arts, and culture of over 500 Indian nations throughout the western hemisphere. Therefore, the Festival‟s Indian Market Committee, a group composed of staff members from the NMAI, the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (CFCH), and American Indian organizations, took on the important task of choosing only 40 artists for Indian Market that would represent hundreds of indigenous nations. During the review of applications, committee members favored artists who expressed their American Indian identity through traditional art forms such as pottery, basketry, and silver jewelry embellished with their interpretations of feathers, buffalo, 1 petroglyphs, corn, and Four Directions crosses. Items described as “handmade”, created with “traditional” materials, or constructed by using “traditional methods,” were typically considered “authentic” by members of the Committee. However, although images of buffalo and corn (animals and plants that originate in the Americas) appealed to the committee, some elements in the artworks contained elements that do not originate from the Americas such as mirrors, silk threads, beads from the Mediterranean, designs mimicking ancient forms, and digitized landscapes. Why would Indian committee members choose certain types of images and objects to represent “real” Indian culture over others, including “authentic” items created with materials, and imagery introduced by non-Indians/whites? Since the 16th century Conquest Period, American Indians have integrated, culturally, with many ethnic groups including the Spanish, English, French, African- American, and other indigenous tribes. This intercultural mixing of Indians with numerous groups in the last few centuries should have made Indian Market Committee members realize that, by 2004, “authentic” Indian art could hardly be “pure”. In addition, objects made originally for the tourist trade during the mid- to late-nineteenth century have become incorporated as “traditional” in American Indian culture. Furthermore, the revival of so-called “lost traditions” of American Indian culture (based on archaeological findings and developed by white philanthropists) also challenge the origins of “traditional” Indian art forms and images. Finally, by the early twentieth century, art schools established for American Indians produced native artists who created genres in contemporary art and often trained at fine arts institutions in America and abroad, 2 learning techniques from European masters. Intercultural mixing, influences from non- Indian groups, the development of “tourist art”, revivals of “lost” art forms, and the integration of Euro-American contemporary styles and techniques have contributed to hybrid works of art made by American Indians. However, regardless of this history, members of the Festival‟s Indiana Market Committee saw some works of art as “traditional”, and therefore, more authentic than other works of art. In the last few decades, anthropologists and folklorists have discarded the notion of “authenticity” and the static view of culture implied by that term.1 Instead, scholarship on the topic of authenticity and native arts and crafts reveals a complex dialectic that leads us to view the cultural production of native arts as processual and dynamic. There are many studies that examine authenticity in native arts and crafts. For instance, a seminal text by anthropologist Nelson Graburn in 1973, Ethnic and Tourist Arts, contains twenty case studies examining authenticity in native art in North America, Mexico and Central America, South America, Asia, Oceania, and Africa.2 After decades of discussions, “authenticity” remains an ambiguous notion. However, these cases studies, as well as other examinations by scholars indicate that authenticity cannot be bound by any assumptions or a fixed definition of “real” authenticity. Why then, after decades of cultural integration and disagreement among scholars regarding authenticity in indigenous art, did American Indians on the First Americans Festival Indian Market Committee consider specific types of art, images, and symbols as 1 Jay Mechling, “Florida Seminoles and Marketing the Last Frontier,” Dressed in Feathers: the Construction of the Indian in American Popular Culture, Edited by S. Elizabeth Bird Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1996.), 162. 2 Nelson Graburn, Ethnic and Tourist Arts: Cultural Expressions from the Fourth World, Edited by Nelson H.H. Graburn (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976). 3 “traditional”, and consequently, “authentic”? During the vetting process, committee members expressed their beliefs that certain imagery and art forms, regardless of their origin, clearly represented “authentic” Indian culture. Committee members favored some artworks, often argued and defended their choices, and negotiated on the final selection of artists. Their selections reveals what can happen when

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