Arts of the Americas

Resources for Mary Sully: Native Modern

Exhibition page 

Mary Sully: Native Modern

Runs March 15, 2025 – September 21, 2025
Gallery 276

Talks at Mia

“Mary Sully: Native Modern” presented by Philip J. Deloria is Professor of History at Harvard University

March 16, 2025 at 2 PM

Tickets: https://new.artsmia.org/event/talk-mary-sully-native-modern

Videos

  1. “Mary Sully: A Reclamation,” Metropolitan Museum of Art, https://www.metmuseum.org/perspectives/mary-sully, Metropolitan Museum of Art, November 14, 2024

This is a great overview of Mary Sully–interview with her great nephew.

2. “Mary Sully and the Women’s Arts of the Great Plains,” YouTube, St. Louis Art Museum,
December 19, 2024. https://youtu.be/2Pt_1IZl4sU?feature=shared

The 2024 Donald Danforth Jr. Lecture on Native American Art was given by Philip J. Deloria, the Leverett Saltonstall Professor of History and the Chair of the Committee on Degrees in History & Literature at Harvard University

 

Newspaper Articles

Angeleti, Gabriella, “ The late Dakota artist Mary Sully in four key works at the Metropolitan Museum,” The Art Newspaper, August 24, 2025. https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2024/08/26/dakota-artist-mary-sully-exhibition-metropolitan-museum

 

Pochoda, Elizabeth, “The Unexpected Art of Mary Sully,” The Magazine Antiques, February 24, 2020 https://www.themagazineantiques.com/article/mary-sully-art/

 

Radsken, Jill, “A colorful figure,” The Harvard Gazette, July 11, 2019, 

https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2019/07/in-sioux-aunts-work-historian-finds-art-on-fringes-of-modernism-tradition/

 

Pochoda, Elizabeth, “Mary Sully’s Astonishing Art Pictures American History through Indigenous Eyes,” The Nation, September 27, 2024. https://www.thenation.com/article/culture/mary-sully-native-american-artist-metropolitan/

Ahlberg-Yohe, Jill. “Mary Sully: Ahead of Her Time”. In Hearts of Our People. Exhibition catalogue. Organized by Mia, June 2019, p.103

 

Deloria, Phil. Becoming Mary Sully. Toward an American Indian Abstract. University of Washington Press, 2019. 

Norman Akers, Interference and a Tiny Spot of Hope, 2019

Here are some resources to learn more about Norman Akers and his work:

There is some good information in the label, to at least discuss the elk’s presence:
Interference and a Tiny Spot of Hope is a presentation of the past, present, and future. Akers combines flat imagery with illusionistic space to provide an immersive and yet open-ended experience into personal, historical, and cultural issues, such as identity, disruption, dislocation, and belonging. In his paintings, Akers uses Osage stories as metaphors over illustrations, and complexity over a singular, fixed interpretation. The most prominent figure in the painting, the suspended or falling elk, is an important figure in Osage cosmology and becomes a symbol to represent ideas of being between two worlds (Osage and non-Osage), and the precarious place of being between the earth and sky, a fundamental Osage principle of balance in the world. Wind turbines found within the painting and within Osage homelands disrupt the spatial order and space between the earth and sky, and according to Akers, “obscure[d] the horizon….and the blades cut into the earth”. Other features within the painting, including tree stumps and skeletal remains along the riverbed, reference the environmental and cultural disruptions within Osage landscapes.

And here is an article about the artist:
https://www.kansan.com/arts_and_culture/theme-of-lost-identities-within-boundaries-ingrained-in-art-professor-norman-akerss-exhibit-contested-territories/article_93fade32-5e4d-11e5-864f-fb3c6c82acc4.html

And there is this video, and a painting that seems to have some similar themes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9MCaPpLxTCI

Americas gallery rotations 2019

Here is a link to Curator Jill Ahlberg Yohe’s lecture:

Americas rotations 10.24.19

Here is the lecture PowerPoint:

Docent Training Americas 2019

11.2.19 Native American Art Training Questions JAY

From the Saturday training, there was a question on the symbolism of the head profiled in the center medallion of Carla Hemlock’s “Boomin’ Out.” Here is the answer from Jill, who asked Carla directly, “For Carla’s work from Carla : No Buffalo head! The three feathers atop the head is in acknowledgment of the Kanienkehaka People. The People of the Flint. What is now commonly known now as the Mohawks.”

Some queries also came for the words on Jeffrey Gibson’s punching bag:

Each Time You Love
Love as deeply as
If it were forever
Nothing is eternal

 

Hearts of Our People: Teachers’ Guide

The teachers’ guide developed for Hearts of Our People has some excellent information on objects within our permanent collection:

Mia_HOOP_Teacher_Guide_2019

Here are the objects covered in the guide:

Hohokom artist, Bowl
Ancestral Pueblo artist, Pot
Anishinaabe (Ojibwe) or Dakhóta artist, Dance Blanket
Maȟpíya Boğá wiŋ (Nellie Two Bear Gates), Suitcase
Jamie Okuma, Adaptation II
Dyani White Hawk, Untitled (Quiet Strength I)

Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists

Welcome to the exhibition resource page for Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists.

Below is the video link to the training lecture on May 2/4:

HoOP Training May 2

Here is a PDF of the gallery layout, as of May 2, 2019:

HoOP 24×36 050219

Here are the gallery panels and labels for objects:

AAA190008_HOOP_Panels_Themes_26x26

AAA190008_HOOP_Panel_Intro_54x34

HOOP_Wall_Labels_17May19

HOOP_Deck_Labels_16May19

Regarding the multi-linguistic approach, here is a brief story by Juline Chevalier, Head of Interpretation and Participatory Experiences:

Why We Translated an Exhibition’s Labels Into Dozens of Native Languages

Pronunciation Guide:

Native Nations pronun guide

Here is the audioguide transcript:

TRANSCRIPT HOOP AUDIOGUIDE

Here is a FAQ developed for VE volunteers, with lots of great information on the exhibition:

Hearts of Our People FAQ

These three documents were given to the VE volunteers and staff who are working the exhibition, with some top FAQs and also information on microaggressions to be aware of while giving tours or when you are within the galleries:

FAQ Top Five

Microaggression HoOP2

Say this, not that

Here is the special edition of the Docent Muse, devoted to the exhibition:

HOOP Muse May, 2019

From your colleague Angie Seutter: I heard a great interview with Dakota Hoska on KFAI, along with two MIA guides. They talk a lot about HOOP and the Native American collection in general. It starts around the 75 minute and runs until the end mark of 120 minutes.

From your colleague Elizabeth Winga, an article on the origins of the jingle dress:
And from Kathleen Steiger, an additional article on the Jingle Dress:
From your colleague Margi Crone: TPT will be airing original productions that share stories of Native Americans in Minnesota. This collection of programs and events gives everyone the opportunity to learn more about themselves, their neighbors and their world.
An article on Rose B. Simpson, and her El Camino:
An article written by Rose B. Simpson, discussing her journey to becoming an artist:
And here are some fun facts directly from the artist Rose Simpson:
From Ann Isaacson, a resource on trauma from Native Hope:
Various articles from national publications on the exhibition:
Ian Frazier, Staying Native. Review of The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present
by David Treuer, in New York Review of Books. HoOP artist Joan Hill’s work is embedded in the article.
Here is the Native community’s video on visiting Mia to see HoOP:
Mia’s Teachers’ Guide:

Bdote Memory Map project (Dakota)

From Susan Jacobsen, Multi-Generational Learning at Mia:

“These videos and audios are from Bdote Memory Map. The deep mapping project created by Allies: media/art is a partnership project with the Minnesota Humanities Center.  The website was created several years ago to help citizens of the area now called Minnesota know where they are, and to learn from the Dakota that this place and the river is not a resource, but rather a relative.”

Learning from the Dakota: Water and Place

Horse Nation video

From Dakota Hoska, here is some information on the video currently playing in Horse Nation:

“The man dancing is paying homage to  his beloved horse who has passed away.  After the horse passed (I’m not sure how the horse died), the man created his dance regalia to honor the horse and he also dances wearing the regalia to honor his horse at ceremonies and pow wows.  The tail on the back of his regalia is the actual horse’s tail. The regalia itself can be seen at All My Relations Arts, so the docent can encourage visitors to go there to see the outfit.
This exhibition is in 3 places, ours display is up the longest, but it is also at All My Relations and Two Rivers.
This is part of a train of thought that is specific to many Native tribes.  When you wear something you are imbued with the characteristics of the person who wore the item before you or the animal that is represented.  It is possible that the man is taking on some of the characteristics of his horse, although I haven’t spoken to that artist so this may not be definite for his regalia.  However, it is possible.
Also, it shows how we believe that all living beings are gifts not commodities.  They are people (nations) with their own agency, their own purposes, and they teach us and provide for us out of pity for our inabilities.  None of us can survive without the animals we rely on.  Horses were a great gift for us for friendship, for battle, for hunting.  They were allies.  This man is dancing to honor his horse because of all of these things.”

IPE CE: Lecture on Mesoamerican and Andean art

Here is a link to the video of Dr. Meghan Tierney’s lecture on the Art of the Americas:

Art of the Americas

Here is a copy of her PowerPoint, some of which we covered in gallery discussion. (The PPT had to be split into segments as it was too large to post in its entirety on the website.):

Tierney part 1

Tierney part 2

Tierney part 3

Tierney part 4

Tierney part 5

Tierney part 6

Tierney part 7

Tierney part 8

Tierney part 9

Tierney part 10

This is a link to the database of Justin Kerr rollout photos of Mayan vessels that Dr. Tierney mentioned in her talk:

Justin Kerr database

And here is an article Dr. Tierney recommended we read:

Saunders_Catching the Light_2003

Robert Rauschenberg, Opal Gospel, 1971 installation

From your colleague Josie Owens, some information on the current installation in Gallery 261 of Robert Rauschenberg’s Opal Gospel:

“On 24 January 2018, I met with Jill, Deb, Kara, and Ann at the Opal Gospel.
 
·      Jill explained the process for the installation. She said that Rauschenberg did not use his Native American background as Jimmie Durham had. However, there were some issues around it. She gave us some information about the Cherokee people and their regulations for self-identification. There has been a problem with many celebrities wrongfully claiming Cherokee heritage. She said that this exhibit was supposed to make one think about how picking when to self-identify is a luxury that Native Peoples do not have.  
·      She said that 5 scholars couldn’t identify Rauschenberg’s Cherokee ancestry. However, sometimes Cherokees would claim to be white in order to buy land and that this could be a possibility for his grandmother. There had not been a decisive conclusion that she wasn’t.
·      Then she shared her interaction with the director of the Rauschenberg Foundation, Kathy Halbreich. Kathy had seen the images of the installation with the quotations.  Jill said that she told Kathy that she thought that Rauschenberg would have liked this as he enjoyed the discussion and debate. Kathy agreed.
·      I then mentioned that I wished that there were more explanation. I said that I felt that there was so much Cherokee information when in fact the texts used by Rauschenberg were all by other Native American people. I worried that this was a bit misleading. Jill was immediately receptive and suggested that more labels be added identifying the writings themselves.
·      Jill even shared that she felt that Boney, who had known Rauschenberg and liked him, had a more inclusive statement than Tehee. She seemed to agree with my concern that Tehee’s comment did not help with an open discussion.
·      Then we all discussed that if the purpose of the installation was to ask the question what is cultural appropriation and if this is an example or not, then perhaps a sign with that idea should be added. We said that this would help the average viewer especially without a docent.
·      Jill was eager to do and said it could be similar to what is happening in period rooms. She suggested something that said that this is a curatorial decision and only one of many approaches.
·      We left it that Jill would speak with Juline and circle back.
·      The other suggestion Jill had was to get the image of the beautiful metal box that the Opal Gospel comes in. I will do this and share.
Jill was so approachable and open-minded. It was a wonderful discussion and helped so much with my ability to use the art.”

Americas Galleries Rotations, June 2017

Tobie Miller has shared these rotation documents with you so everyone can prepare for the changes in the Americas Galleries. With the gallery construction beginning on May 24, Gallery 261 will be impacted right away, with objects deinstalled in the south wall cases.

According to Tobie, “The rotation is happening during the month of June, but we never know how registration will start so any piece could move throughout the month. Additionally, the South wall cases in 261 will be deinstalled next week for construction of the doorway between 261 and 262 and we will be heading right into the rotation.

The spreadsheets attached are broken down by gallery and install/deinstall.
These are not complete because Jill is currently working with members of the Cherokee and Dakhota communities to curate two cases – one being the Dakhota case on the north wall of 259 and the other being interpretation of the Rauschenberg going into 261 south wall case (currently the Arctic). As well, Andrea Carlson is guest curating the case that juts out from the wall in 259 and that list is attached.”
As additional information comes in, it will be posted. Please note that some objects are merely being moved (e.g., Arctic objects, from 261 to 260) and reinstalled in another gallery, so look through all documents. (G261a, The Frank Big Bear collage will be deinstalled after June 20th.)
Here are the documents from Tobie: