hovendicktstudios

"This canvas is the cover of the tipi, my home, once built; now a remnant of reminisce cloths torn and worn by my people, worn and degraded by the nails that built yours; the red thread a life line of blood that flows into our children's children: cut, stripped, and torn, but our marks stood the test of time and our stories told". 60" x 72". 2021.

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"This canvas is the cover of the tipi, my home, once built; now a remnant of reminisce cloths torn and worn by my people, worn and degraded by the nails that built yours; the red thread a life line of blood that flows into our children's children: cut, stripped, and torn, but our marks stood the test of time and our stories told".

Struggling with self identity, I fought for this piece. The story of the culture influenced canvas with many symbols turned from the recounting of the process to the recounting history.

Having started with a bad can of red paint, I recalled how the red paint felt sticky on my hands, much like how the blood would have felt from all the fighting between the Natives and the Whites in past ages. I then painted the canvas black, much like covering up the past or the battle marked history of my nation between these two peoples. Black, also the color of death or shadows or night. An action reflective of how history transpired.

Initially, I didn't know where to go from there, so I stalled for a few days with materials and overwhelming amounts of stagnant ideas. Eventually, the two "raw" marked pages fell onto the floor, onto the canvas, and gave me the inspiration to tell the story of mark making and Natives (Word of Professor Bockelman in quotes). The two sheets standing for Natives (one centered, and one on the right side; one without feathers, one with cut strips of canvas in the upper left corner to serve as a headdress- an array of feathers; one without a bone plate, one with nails to serve as; one without "natural" colors on tassels, one with because of strips of cloth below) depict marks through status.

As for the left hand side of the canvas, the strips of cloth also stand for Natives- fallen Natives. The colors used are mostly earthy tones, colors the Natives used. These strips are both weaved and have nails on either side of the tops of them. Notice the red string coming from each of them and on the papers. These strings stand for the blood shed, and for their bloodlines.

For the reason behind a canvas, canvas material was close to that of what some of the homes of the Natives were made of.

Finally, to put it all together, I couldn't stay silent, so I crafted a poem, the title of the work from the perspective of a Native.

"The title became a poem, the poem became a story, and the piece became a narrative."