a museum exhibit in Salem Massachusetts [View all]

Yesterday I and my wife went to the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts. One of the exhibits there (for a while longer) is titled "Shapeshifting: Transformations in Native American Art". The pieces shown are mostly modern, often of modern materials, by Native artists from various tribes. A few are hundreds of years old.

I was surprised to see an abstract bronze sculpture - by an Apache artist! Another constructed a large whale skeleton - out of pieces of plastic lawn chairs. Indian heritage had clearly influenced the art, even though much was made from "non-Indian" materials. There was a cartoon of Uncle Sam fastening a chain to the ankle of an Indian, with a caption something like "after two or three hundred years, you won't even feel it" (I don't remember exactly how it went).

I was surprised to see a decorated seashell several hundreds of years old, because it had been part of a burial. I had thought Indians strongly objected to digging up and displaying such artifacts.

The exhibit is at the museum until April 29. So if you are in the Boston area, you may want to hurry and see the exhibit while you still can.

http://www.pem.org/exhibitions/135-shapeshifting_transformations_in_native_american_art includes some short videos about some of the art, and discussions by the artists.