Community Initiative 2012
In collaboration with community members and facilitation by master artists, non-reservation urban Indian youth were initiated into intertribal powwow culture through dancing, singing, drumming, song writing, and creating regalia and hand drums.
The project engaged 20 local Native youth ages 5 to 17 who live in Sonoma County, California in creating and delivering a theatrical performance designed to illuminate local Native cultural maintenance and social issues and build awareness and understanding of Native cultures.
This digital arts media program trains economically underserved and technologically disconnected young people to express their public voice and preserve the legacies of underrepresented communities and cultures.
Funding for the project supported the collaboration between master Lummi carver, David Wilson, and Chehalis Tribe community members, who joined the artist in the experience of carving a new canoe for the Tribe’s annual Salmon Ceremony. the canoe was launched as part of an annual Salmon Ceremony in summer of 2012.
Funding supported the 10th gathering of ukulele and slack key guitar masters at the Kahilu Theatre and provided a multi-day Institute comprised of eight public performances, four on-site training workshops with over 100 students, and eight youth shows at four schools.
The Organized Village of Kake (OVK) collaborated with Mike A. Jackson, a local professional artist, in the design and creation of Tlingit style carved panels that depicted the families that still reside in their traditional territory.
Funding for the project reconnected the Poarch Band of Creek Indians’ community with the utilitarian art of traditional rivercane basketry.
Funding for the project supported a collaboration between Narragansett tribal members and Narragansett wampum artists, Allen Hazard, who has been creating wampum art for over 35 years, and Lorén Spears, a traditional bead artist. Traditionally the creation of wampum belts was a collaborative effort. As a cultural practice, the wampum belt depicts the stories of the Narragansett people.
This project was a collaborative effort that brought three eminently qualified Navajo potters and culture bearers to teach the art of Navajo pottery making to Navajo Nation potters in the Four Corners Area of New Mexico.
This project identified and gathered new Alaska Native playwrights, provided them instruction and mentorship by noted professional North American Native theater artists and nurtured them through the process of creating stage-ready scripts.
Students from fourth to twelfth grades premiered “Ulu Tree”, a newly commissioned original 120 minute, two-act opera, showcased in July of 2012, composed by Herb Mahelona, Jr. accompanied by a small nine-piece orchestra.
