Amerindian Arts Native American News & Information: Crazy Horse Memorial, will it be completed?, 'Native artist' defined, Think ''Dances with Wolves'' with a Spanish accent

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Headlines, exhibits, powwows listed below: (access past headline archives for 2004-2006 here)

Surprising Portrait of Fritz Scholder

Crazy Horse Memorial, will it be completed?

American Indian festival benefits Boys & Girls Club

NightDancers Honored

Native American pow wow coming Oct 4th & 5th-Honolulu

Tiffany window depicting Minnehaha to be auctioned

'Native artist' defined

Missouri cave paintings give prehistoric timeline

Honoring great women of the Pueblos

Apache artist Craig Dan Goseyun

Think ''Dances with Wolves'' with a Spanish accent.

Forbes::AG accuses Santa Fe stores of lying about jewelry

Business is strong at Totah Festival

Native history shared at Green Corn Festival

Buying pottery

NEW YORK — An exhibit of 55 dresses from tribes in the Plains, Plateau and Great Basins regions opens Sept. 26 at the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian.

The show is called "Identity by Design: Tradition, Change and Celebration in Native Women's Dresses."

Oka Kapassa: Return to ColdWater Indian Festival, Sept. 12-13. American Indian festival honors the original Americans with two days of traditional crafts demonstrations, Indian foods, arts, colorful dancers, games, storytelling. Tuscumbia, Ala., 800-344-0783, www.colbertcountytourism.org.

The Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian in New York, the George Gustav Heye Center opens "Remix: New Modernities in a Post Indian World," a spirited multimedia survey of 15 emerging Native artists June 7. A joint presentation from the museum and the Heard Museum in Phoenix, the exhibition closes Sunday, Sept. 21.

Storyteller Gene Tagaban, an Alaskan native of Tlingit and Cherokee heritage, uses traditional instruments, masks and dance, will appear at The Eiteljorg Museum of American Indians and Western Art from 7 to 8 p.m., and the 21st annual Printing Partners Hoosier Storytelling Festival, a program of Storytelling Arts of Indiana supported by the Indiana Historical Society, Oct. 8-11 at Military Park. Tickets may be purchased in advance at www.storytellingarts.org, at the Indiana Historical Society by calling (317) 232-1882. Advance tickets are $10 for adults and $5 for children per session. Cost (per session) at the gate is $12 for adults and $6 for children per session.

Additional information about the festival, including a detailed schedule of events, and related workshops offered on Saturday are available at www.storytellingarts.org or by calling the Indiana Historical Society at (317) 232-1882 or (800) 447-1830.

(Through Feb 3, 2009) BEYOND TRADITION Beyond Tradition: The Pueblo Pottery of Tammy Garcia is on display at the National Museum of Women in the Arts through February. One of the most recognizable figures in Southwestern ceramics, Garcia is known for infusing a two-thousand year old tradition with modernity. Examples of her most important pots are featured, with intricate designs, and bold shapes delicately carved into the clay.

Recent Books of Interest

''Canyon Gardens: The Ancient Pueblo Landscapes of the American Southwest (University of New Mexico Press: 2006). Editors V.B. Price and Baker H. Morrow have assembled 15 essays on the millennium-old Puebloan landscape.

"Being Lakota", Book by Larissa Petrillo

"American Indian Nations: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow", Book by George Horse Capture

Spokane artist George Flett, well kown for his depictions of ledger art, announcing forthcoming book "The Ledger Art of George Flett"

Po'pay, Leader of the First American Revolution, Clear Light Publishing, 2006, new book by Herman Agoyo (Ohkay Owingeh)

Luther Standing Bear - Lakota

Chief of the Oglala, Lakota (1905-1939)

"We did not think of the great open plains, the beautiful rolling hills, the winding streams with tangled growth, as 'wild'. Only to the white man was nature a 'wilderness' and only to him was it 'infested' with 'wild' animals and 'savage' people. To us it was tame. Earth was bountiful and we were surrounded with the blessings of the Great Mystery."

"If today I had a young mind to direct, to start on the journey of life, and I was faced with the duty of choosing between the natural way of my forefathers and that of the... present way of civilization, I would, for its welfare, unhesitatingly set that child's feet in the path of my forefathers. I would raise him to be an Indian!"

"Praise, flattery, exaggerated manners and fine, high-sounding words were no part of Lakota politeness. Excessive manners were put down as insincere, and the constant talker was considered rude and thoughtless. Conversation was never begun at once, or in a hurried manner.

"No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation."

"From Wakan Tanka, the Great Spirit, there came a great unifying life force that flowed in and through all things -- the flowers of the plains, blowing winds, rocks, trees, birds, animals -- and was the same force that had been breathed into the first man. Thus all things were kindred, and were brought together by the same Great Mystery.

"Kinship with all creatures of the earth, sky and water was a real and active principle. In the animal and bird world there existed a brotherly feeling that kept the Lakota safe among them. And so close did some of the Lakotas come to their feathered and furred friends that in true brotherhood they spoke a common tongue.

"The animals had rights -- the right of man's protection, the right to live, the right to multiply, the right to freedom, and the right to man's indebtedness -- and in recognition of these rights the Lakota never enslaved an animal and spared all life that was not needed for food and clothing. For the animal and bird world there existed a brotherly feeling that kept the Lakota safe among them."

"This concept of life and its relations was humanizing and gave to the Lakota an abiding love. It filled his being with the joy and mystery of living; it gave him reverence for all life; it made a place for all things in the scheme of existence with equal importance to all."

"The Lakota could despise no creature, for all were of one blood, made by the same hand, and filled with the essence of the Great Mystery. In spirit, the Lakota were humble and meek. 'Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth' -- this was true for the Lakota, and from the earth they inherited secrets long since forgotten. Their religion was sane, natural, and human."

"The old Lakota was wise. He knew that a man's heart away from Nature becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon lead to a lack of respect for humans too."

"The old people came literally to love the soil and they sat or reclined on the ground with a feeling of being close to a mothering power."

Blue Panther Keeper of Stories

Zuni fetish updates from Amerindian Arts