Memory Threads
How do we discover the multicultural life around us?
Friends,
After a recent family reunion in Tennessee, I remembered how important history is to orient ourselves to who we are in the present. When I got back to Minneapolis, I decided to do more digging. Where exactly am I living? What is this place, and who are the people who live there? I knew that there was a strong indigenous community here, but other than a vague sense of empathy, I didn't actually know much. After a quick online search, a world I was ignorant of started to expand. Like following a single thread of a whole fabric, I'm discovering a rich tapestry of art and culture and history.
Usually in these weekly Still Life letters, you're getting the results of that research. I put many hours a week into exploring, discovering, and integrating what I find. But while it takes time, it's not hard to do. I hope we all take proactive interest in the worlds and cultures and communities around us. So this week I thought you might like to see my ongoing learning process as I discover the multicultural life of Minneapolis. It started with a question: who are some local indigenous poets I should read?
I found a short list online and discovered that one of them is the inaugural poet laureate of Minneapolis: Heid E. Erdrich. Perfect. I knew the last name from Birchbark Books, one of the few indigenous-owned bookstores in the US. As poet laureate, I also knew she'd be both writing from her Ojibwe perspective and advocating for the local scene. I found my starting point.
I searched the catalog of my local library and quickly discovered that Heid is a prolific writer, curator, and advocate in the Twin Cities. I checked out her poetry books, and many, many more she wrote, edited, or contributed to: an indigenous cookbook, a massive book celebrating native women artists, a book on the artist Jim Denomie, and an anthology of race in Minnesota. One page at a time, my world expands: I discovered manoomin (wild rice), local art institutions like the Bockley Gallery and All My Relations, ongoing poetry projects, and more. Each one of these discoveries lead to whole worlds I can continue to explore; I followed a single thread, and it led to twenty more.
I kept searching. I'm also a big fan of podcasts, since you can almost always find a good introduction to a topic there. I searched Heid's name and found the lovely series Native Minnesota. I highly recommend listening to her interview on poetry and our creative voice. One part in particular caught my attention (edited for clarity):
What advice do you have to our educators who want to better represent Native history, culture, and civics in our classrooms?
I always start with two things. One is to start using the present tense. “Native people are” not “Long-ago Native people, or Dakota people did, or Ojibwe people did this or that.” But just get yourself to always use the present tense. We are always here, we weren't here, and then our bones discovered. We continue. And then also be able to say “the future.” For example, one of the things Dakota people are working on for their future is returning bison. When educators talk to students, don't just be historical. Who's working in math and sciences now? What are some of the ways that we're part of every part of life in Minnesota and in the world right now?
And then the second thing I do is ask people to say Native American peoples or indigenous cultures. Because they might enjoy the Native American culture, but I'm often wondering, which one are you talking about? There are hundreds of us! Although we're neighbors in Minnesota, the Ojibwe and Dakota people are very different, with very different ways of being in the world. So I think it's really a big step to be able to say “cultures.” Then use the name of the people you're talking about. Are you talking about Dakota people? Are you talking about Ho-Chunk people? Who are you talking about? And if you don't know, find out. It's not hard to get that information.
So I think it's really important to be specific. So those are the two things I start with. And then I ask people to think about using the arts as a way of teaching in every place across the curriculum, if you can, because it's an open access point. It's a point by which we want ourselves known. We love our arts. We treasure our artists.
Ding, ding, ding! The arts are an “open access point” to specific and living communities. I wanted more of those access points, and I was intrigued by Jim Denomie's artwork, too. I knew that the Minneapolis Institute of Art had a permanent exhibition of indigenous artists, so I took myself on an art field trip.
I've walked through that indigenous gallery plenty of times, but this time I slowed down and took my time. Now that I had a bit more context, these artworks felt less distance to me, more present in a “web of relations” I was only just starting to develop in my own mind.
One artwork that caught my attention was Rose B. Simpson’s recent sculpture “Groundbeing: Resonance.” It’s a towering clay figure, equal parts pottery and totem and musical instrument. Like the Romantics and their aeolian harp, this artwork expressed a desire for the “winds” of life pour through the body, for the personal to reconnect with the land and history and people (“Not I, not I, but the wind that blows through me!” —D.H. Lawrence). The wall text asked: “How do we listen to the subtle sounds and vibrations of our Mother Earth, and how can we attune ourselves to the resonances in everything around us?” That’s a question to answer with a whole life, isn’t it?
Around one corner, I was struck by an artwork by the Lakota artist Dyani White Hawk titled “Quiet Strength.” It’s square, with a gold background, and it has repeated vertical marks in natural shades of white, bone, and ivory. The whole effect reminded me of Agnes Martin. But where Martin's journey into the desert was an attempt to strip away personal history, White Hawk grounds her painting in it—a Lakota history of quillwork. She plays with the language of abstraction while refusing to extract art from history and place and people.
When I got home, I started looking for an artwork to share in this Still Life letter. I flipped through that book of native women artists and stopped at the essay “Memory Threads,” the Osage artist Anita Fields' reflection of growing up in museums and reconnecting to her heritage there. Here’s a quote from Anita that resonates (in the spirit of Heid's “present tense” I changed the tense of the quote from a recollection to a present reality):
The encased articles hold the language of another time and place. It is the time about which our elders still told stories. The objects on display tell the story of our relationship to nature and the cosmos. The materials used in these objects are symbolic of our worldview and philosophies and how we see ourselves within the earthly and spiritual realm of existence. They are the manifestations of thoughts and prayers and represent the divisions of the earth, sky, and water. The material culture stored behind the glass are articles that have sustained us for generations, that allow us to survive—and they are also the thread that links our past, present, and future.
Isn't that great? More than only historical or aesthetic information, walking through MIA introduced me to threads linking the past, present, and future of indigenous life together. A living tapestry.
When I was back home preparing this letter, I went back to the book of native women artists to look for an artwork to share. Ramona Sakiestewa's lush, abstract handwoven tapestries stopped me in my tracks. And then I looked further: they're part of her “Nebula” series, tapestries depicting images from the Hubble space telescope and woven by a heritage of Hopi weaving to be, in the artist's words, “visual echoes of what has gone before, the reappearance of ancient light.” Past and present and future, the personal and the cosmic, ancient craft and scientific technology—all woven together.
Even as I write you, I feel I'm only looking at one square inch of living and vibrant cultures, but how exciting is that? There's so much more to learn, so much more expansion of the mind and heart to go. Or, to riff on Langston Hughes' poem for a minute:
…They’ll see how beautiful I am
And be ashamed—I, too, am America.
Yes, there's shame and embarrassment (“how did I not know about this??”). But there's also excitement and wonder too. Self-education isn't a grim duty—it's a gift. Following all of these threads leads to a larger world, one filled with art and poetry and history and resilience and beauty and good food. Maybe even friendship.
Take care,
Michael
p.s. Don’t take my word for it—If you’re reading Still Life from Austin or Cincinnati or St. Louis or Atlanta, there are whole histories and cultures waiting for you to discover, too.
“Our Words Are Not Our Own” by Heid E. Erdrich
We never write alone, but by a grace,
a blue silk threads our words,
makes our work both ancestor and elder,
descended of one through the other,
bound by ties that tug through time.
My words are not my own.
My words are never mine alone.
I never write, but writing comes
ink blue or pale as the spirit of the stories
ho spines out a voice, a call I answer.
Place tangles with their words,
repeats them in rock's colors.
The shapes of rivers print
what we find we tell in turn,
and all unknowing, call it our own.
We never write alone, but by a ghost:
a blue spirit tangles our words
makes our work sister and brother,
releated through strings we tie and tug
to pull us through the years.
Language breathes like breeze, blows words
we hear or ignore or wish we could.
We are nets and words our catch.
Or are we caught in word-woven webs,
where we tremble strings to the unknown?
Our words are not our own
We never write alone.10 essential spiritual jazz albums
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I love this article! I just finished reading Poet Warrior by Creek/Mvscogee poet Joy Harjo and so much of what you've written here resonates with that reading. Looking forward to chasing down more memory threads.
There is so much I love about this piece Michael. I want to tuck it in my heart.