At the Renwick Gallery, a showcase of contemporary Native craft

Jan 09, 2024

Traditional craft motifs and techniques underlie the 55 works on view in "Sharing Honors and Burdens: Renwick Invitational 2023," the 10th installment of the Renwick Gallery's biennial showcase of contemporary craft. But the six Native American and Alaska Native participants in this show blend the time-tested with the innovative, sometimes venturing into territory that isn't very traditional at all.

Thus Joe Feddersen (Arrow Lakes/Okanagan) draws on the landscapes and artifacts of his native Washington state yet often works in glass, which was introduced to the Americas by Europeans. Feddersen, who had a show last year at D.C.'s National Academy of Sciences, reproduces the forms of ancient, carved-stone petroglyphs in glass, on prints and woven into baskets. Alongside primeval images of people and animals, the artist also memorializes modern-day totems: the metal towers that support high-voltage electrical transmission lines.

Feddersen made one of the show's largest and most striking pieces: "Charmed (Bestiary)" is an array of signs and symbols rendered in clear glass and hanging together in a sort of curtain wall that stretches nearly from ceiling to floor. The result is open yet imposing, and given even more presence by the elaborate shadows the individual glass pieces cast.

The most urban — and among the most personal — works are by Maggie Thompson (Fond du Lac Ojibwe), a textile artist based in Minneapolis-St. Paul. Two of her pieces allude to unhealthy or abusive relationships. "The Equivocator" is a jumble of rope whose strands are stuffed inside stockings, suggesting a stomach tied in knots; "I Get Mad Because I Love You" repeats that phrase dozens of times in lettering made of white and silver beads.

Thompson also contributed "On Loving," a set of three body bags inspired by the utilitarian container in which her father's corpse was taken away by coroners. The artist's bags reproduce the original, but with the added adornment of a morning-star pattern often seen on Ojibwe quilts. The juxtaposition suggests that tradition can comfort at a time of loss.

Alaska-born, Santa Fe, N.M.-based Erica Lord (Athabaskan/Inupiat) offers a suite of linked works that explore historical and scientific themes but have private implications. The artist strings glass beads in patterns that depict the DNA of viruses and other diseases that disproportionately affect Native Americans. The pieces take the form of burden straps, once used for carrying supplies, or dog blankets known as tuppies. Seven of the latter are displayed on white canine forms, arranged around a sled to commemorate the 1925 dog-sled relay that delivered diphtheria antitoxin to Nome from Lord's home village, Nenana. (This was the mission led by Balto, a Siberian husky who became the subject of an animated 1995 movie and a memorial statue erected in New York's Central Park.)

DNA also defines the identities of Native Americans, many of whom are of diverse parentage. Next to her beaded works, Lord is exhibiting photographs of her tattoos, one of which records the arithmetic of her tribal qualification: 5/16ths. (To legally be Native Alaskan, the percentage must be at least one-quarter.)

Sisters Lily Hope and Ursala Hudson (Tlingit) are weavers who further the craft mastered by their renowned mother, Clarissa Rizal. Hope, who lives in Alaska, has the more traditional style, while the Colorado-based Hudson integrates Indigenous designs into contemporary fashion. Both artists are mostly showing items that are wearable, but Hope's pieces include "Clarissa's Fire Dish," a bark-and-wool vessel made in honor of her mother. Historically, such woven trays were made to be ritually burned as part of the Tlingit tradition of placing food into fire to nourish departed souls.

A basket weaver since the age of 4, Maine's Geo Neptune (Passamaquoddy) crafts intricate pieces that emulate natural forms. Included here is a cluster of multicolored corncobs, baskets and earrings in the shape and color of strawberries and a beaded basket with a small bird woven into its lid. The transgender (or two-spirit) artist works mostly with sweet grass and black ash, calling attention to the threat to the latter from the emerald ash borer beetle.

Neptune's twined creations evoke the fragility of nature but also the perseverance of culture. Working with such materials as glass, wool and beads, these six artists craft delicate monuments to Native culture as it was — and is.

Renwick Gallery, 17th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue NW. americanart.si.edu.

Dates: Through March 31.

Admission: Free.