Dakota Modern

 The Art of Oscar Howe … now at the NYC Smithsonian Museum of Native Americans.

I

Evil Spirit of the Buffalo Dance, 1961

I was there because of a review by Peter  Schjeldahl in the 7/11 & 7/18 Fiction-issue of The New Yorker.  He wrote: “ In Bear Dancer (1962), illustrative details -a bear’s head, a wielded spear - lurk unobtrusively amid cubistically distributed abstract forms.  Yet more peekaboo are bits of figures in the plangent gallimaufry of “Dance of the Heyoka”. “. Never saw plangent gallimaufry; had to go.

His history, Oscar Howe, is laid out in a video. The Native American history of being removed from ‘the res’ to go to the white man’s school at 7 years of age.  When his mother died shortly after, he went back home to live with and to learn from his grandmother.  In 1934 he attended the government run, Santa Fe Indian School, known as the Studio School.

Sioux Grass Dancer, 1934-1938

Sioux Water Boy

Blue Antelope

He moved on to Oklahoma University where he was introduced to the Mexican muralists.  See my blog ‘Vida Americana’ dated around 2/20.

Sioux War Dance, 1954

Three Women, 1952

Buffalo Dance,1955

Ghost Dancer, 1963

Woman War Dancer, 1965

Sioux Dancer, 1953

Dance of the Heyoka

Rider, 1968

Peter Schjeldahl says he is haunted by “ One rifleman, neglecting to shoot, gazes askance with an enigmatic grin” in Wounded Knee Massacre, 1960.

I saw 

That was on the second floor.  The first floor was very good too.

 Maybe tomorrow.

It’s free!