Native American Indian Art History

In 1941, the director of Indian Arts and Crafts Board, Rene d’Harnoncourt and Fredric Douglas, an anthropologist and curator of American Indian collections established an art exhibition, Indian Art of the United States in the Museum of Modern Art. It was organized by prehistoric art, living traditions, and modern-day Indian art. The exhibit included art from prehistoric carvers in the West, Northeast Coast, and engravers in the Arctic, sculptors of the East, hunters, woodsmen, planters and shepherds from numerous tribes across the United States (changing, 52). Much like the art exhibit in Pueblo art exhibition in Brooklyn in the early 1900s, this exhibit stressed each and every piece of art. This was become a key theme in museums exhibiting Native American arts and crafts
The structure used by many art galleries showing Native Indian works was established in in the 1970s. The figuration of “culture area” and “tribes” was used to provide a durable basis for Native American museum exhibitions. The culture area divisions set up are explained through texts. Objects within are explained through individual labels that offer …show more content…
I was able to contact a state recognized Indian artist to interview as to what effect the Act had on her personally. Her name is Victoria “Last Walker” Ferguson, Last Walker being her Native American Name. She is a current Monacan Indian Tribe Member living in Roanoke, Virginia. She works at the Natural Bridge of Virginia, managing the Monacan Indian Living History Exhibit in which she built and interprets daily. She makes authentic Monacan jewelry, baskets, satchels, purses, and even a children’s story book of a young Monacan tribe girl, all of which she has sold and continues to sell today. She is a woman of many talents in the artistic realm. I asked her the question of how the Indian Arts and Crafts Act of 1990 have affected her work and the marketing of her