Looking Forward

The Heard Museum presents an uplifting exhibition that points to the future by remembering the past.

After the many struggles of the past year or so, The Heard Museum is responding with their remarkable exhibition of Native American artists in Remembering the Future: 100 Years of Inspiring Art. The museum has chosen significant pieces from their permanent collection, beginning in 1920 through today, that “largely reflect an artistic response to the challenges and opportunities of the decade in which it was created,” stated in the show press release.

Patrick DesJarlait (Ojibwa, 1921-1973), Chippewa Fishing Camp, 1970, watercolor on board, 14 x 11½”. Heard Museum Collection, 3675-1.

Co-curator Ann Marshall furthers, “We’re looking at how voices from the past and the present join together in a way that looks forward to the future. It gives us things to think about, along with inspiration coming from a very difficult time, looking forward to better times.”

Organized by Marshall, Diana Pardue, chief curator, and David M. Roche, director and CEO, Remembering the Future started with a look back at the Shared Visions Symposium the museum exhibited many years ago. It brought together renowned, seasoned artists, along with younger artists, at the time. “After going over the transcripts from the show,” says Marshall, “it started our director, Roche, thinking. The Native community has something to offer the world. It has a medicine to give and this resonated with him. We have such a rich collection that it feels great to bring it out and celebrate what the artists have had to say over the years.”

Oscar Howe (Yanktonai, 1915-1983), Ghost Dance, 1960, watercolor on paper, 25 x 30½”. Heard Museum Collection. Gift of Mr. Edward Jacobson, IAC85.

Voices by artists such as Patrick DesJarlait (Ojibwa, 1921-1973) in Chippewa Fishing Camp, celebrate the beauty and richness of the Chippewa land and life. The piece showing two Native figures stringing up fish in his unique style that has been compared to Mexican mural paintings, also celebrates the connection to a “healthy” land, that Marshall notes is a prevalent theme for the artist.

Ghost Dance by artist Oscar Howe (Yanktonai, 1915-1983), is also a watercolor that depicts colorful, rising flames engulfing abstracted figures, and really contributes to the theme of the exhibition. “The painting is Howe looking back at a horrible time in history,” Marshall explains. “The Ghost Dance was created in the 1870s (a time of great upheaval for Native people). [The dance, or ceremony] centered around the revival of Native culture and the decent of Anglo culture. Native people were having their land taken from them and put on reservations, and so, the Ghost Dance emerged.”

Pop Chalee (Taos, 1906-1993), Enchanted Forest, watercolor on paper, 19¾ x 25¾.” Heard Museum Collection. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Read Mullan, IAC347.

Howe, one of the first artists to move away from realistic depictions of ceremonies, wanted the freedom to paint his personal vision. In Ghost Dance, he “went with his vision of the flames enveloping and consuming these ghost dancers,” Marshall furthers. “The abstraction evokes the spirit of the ceremony.” It’s also noted that Howe’s piece is a response to the massacre at Wounded Knee in 1890.

Pieces such as Red Totem by George Morrison (Ojibwa, 1919-2000), and Enchanted Forest by Pop Chalee (Taos, 1906-1993), are also remarkable items to watch out for in the exhibition, as they also honor a connection to land in powerful representations.

George Morrison (Ojibwa, 1919-2000), Red Totem, 1980, cedar and stain, 145 x 30 x 30”. Heard Museum purchase with funds provided by the Koll Company and Beta West Company, IAC2231. Photo: Heard Museum, Craig Smith.

Opening October 23, Remember the Future “features more than 80 works that illustrate a progression of ideas and aesthetic expressions...,” notes the Heard. The collection also serves to uplift the spirit by recounting trying times, from which, Native American culture has persevered. “…In remembering the history of American Indian art, we are also remembering the future.”

October 23, 2021-January 2, 2023
Remembering the Future: 100 Years of Inspiring Art
Heard Museum
2301 N. Central Avenue
Phoenix, AZ 85004
(602) 252-8840, www.heard.org