Artist, Dana Claxton: The idea was to show the beauty and the bounty of Indigenous aesthetics, but to also show the skill it takes to make these cultural belongings.
My name is Dana Claxton, and I live in Vancouver, British Columbia. My home reserve is Wood Mountain Lakota First Nations.
The Headdress series is thinking about what are Indigenous aesthetics and how are Indigenous aesthetics worn on the body. I've taken handmade beadwork from several Indigenous nations and made these headdresses that are covering the face. In the image of Dee, there's Anishinaabe beadwork. There's Cree, there's Sioux, there's Lakota, some Okanagan work. There's a bit of everything.
Headdress - Connie, they’re all beaded barrettes. Connie has made thousands of barrettes for people all over British Columbia. None of her work is ever for sale. She either trades or gifts them.
Connie is Shadae's auntie, when Shadae was a little girl, Connie made all Shadae's regalia. With the image of Shadae, most of those things have been gifted to her or she has made. On her head, there's a few beaded baseball caps. Those baseball caps, to me, always represent the future and the youth. We don't want to completely disregard our traditional historical culture, but how do we bring that forward?
If we think about the complex history of Native Americans, our cultures were criminalized. You couldn't sing or dance or even wear your traditional clothing in public. There was laws against that. So the fact that we still have our ceremonial life, that languages still exist, and that our Indigenous aesthetics are still alive, I'm very grateful for that. This is what makes us us.