It’s not very often Durango gets a fashion show, but on Tuesday, the Department of Native American & Indigenous Studies at Fort Lewis College will send models down the catwalk displaying pieces made by students in the Native American Art & Culture class.
The semester-long class, co-taught by Esther Belin (Diné) and Dr. Majel Boxer (Sisseton and Wahpeton Dakota, Fort Peck Assiniboine & Sioux Reservation), introduced students to design techniques from several art traditions of Native peoples and generated a cultural arts portfolio that includes ledger art, loom beadwork, doll making, moccasin making and apparel design, according to the event webpage on the Center of Southwest Studies’ website.
If you go
WHAT: Fort Lewis College Native American Art and Culture class presents its inaugural Fashion Show.
WHEN: 4:30 p.m. Tuesday.
WHERE: Center of Southwest Studies gallery, FLC, 1000 Rim Drive.
Tickets: Free and open to the public.
MORE INFORMATION: Contact Esther Belin (belin_e@fortlewis.edu) or Dr. Majel Boxer (boxer_m@fortlewis.edu); or visit https://tinyurl.com/mskn3h7v.
“Students explored a variety of Native cultures and art forms, including the many different forms of expression that constitute ‘art’ and the complicated history of interpreting and defining Native ‘art,” the pages says. “Through research and field trips to galleries and museums, they examined the historic and contemporary societal changes that impacted and influenced these cultural art forms.”
Lexus Begay, a senior, will be modeling the Navajo skirt and moccasins she made in the class. And while the process has been fun, the actual modeling is a little nerve-wracking, she said, especially when they practiced on the catwalk. But the class – and the show – serve an important lesson, especially to younger generations.
“It helps us revitalize certain areas of traditional adornment wearing,” she said. “It’s really important for us to revitalize it and do it in our own way ... We can send it down to (future generations) and they know how to do it well.”
Steve Bradfield is a second year Native American and Indigenous Studies major who will display a ribbon Navajo shirt, beadwork, a doll and toddler moccasins made from cowhide and suede. He said what he’s learned from the class is how people look at art and how they sometimes miss the root and true meaning as pertaining to Native art.
And he learned that creating pieces takes time. A lot of time.
“It was the baby moccasins ... it took two days in total (for) just one moccasin,” he said. “Just one took anywhere from seven to eight hours, and that was because this was my first time learning this type of stitching.”
Doug Gonzales, who is a post-grad staff member taking the class, will be modeling the Navajo men’s-style shirt he made. And for him, it was fun, but challenging, and like, Bradfield discovered, time-intensive.
“With this being my first time working on items like this, each has taken many times longer than I thought it would, or anticipated,” he said. “Then even once you get the hang of the process, you also realize at the end of it that there’s just so much room to for mastery; you could spend a lifetime working on these and still keep improving. So it’s daunting in that sort of way, just thinking about the scope of how much you can learn and how much skill can be gained and put into these objects. ... For me, it’s important, because although I’m half Navajo, it’s still difficult for me to access the resources needed for this, for these objects, the people in my family that once made them are no longer here, or can even remember how to do them, and I think that’s a result of people getting older. But not only that, I think it’s mainly due to systems of assimilation, like boarding schools and removal from ancestral homelands that disconnect people like myself from that culture. So by making these objects, I get to rebuild connections to ancestors I never knew, and get to bring them into the present.”
The class has been fun, too, Gonzales said, not only because of the skills he learned and what he created, but the community the students built working together has been an unexpectedly fun part of it as well.
“It’s not only making – creating something like the moccasins has been super fun, because I never thought I could make my own shoes before, but it’s fun to be able to feel like you have the tools necessary to sustain yourself,” he said. “Not only that, I think what has been fun is the process, because we have studio hours together, so we get to chat and connect and laugh and struggle and all of that stuff in the studio together.”
And while the fashion show is an important part of the class – it is the culmination of what the students have learned all semester – for the members of the public who attend, it offers a different view of what Native art can mean, Gonzales said, adding that the showcase is a nice way to wrap up the class because it’s a way to take the art off the wall and put it on the body again. “And sort of lay claim that Native people (are) still existing, Native people (are) still making Native art.”
“With Native art, there’s a lot of factors that complicate it, right? And I think one of them, whenever we think of art in a Western context, we think of art being in a gallery on display and not being used. And I think in a lot of Native cultures, including Navajo, there’s not necessarily a word for art, because a lot of these objects were just objects that were used,” he said. “There was still Indigenous design and beauty and thinking instilled in the objects, but it wasn’t necessarily an object that was meant to be unused. So I think with the fashion show, we get to put these objects back on and recontextualize them in a way that feels more Indigenous, and it takes the art off from the wall and puts it on back onto the original canvas.”
katie@durangoherald.com
