Native American artist uses bright colors to paint portraits with self-determination
A Museum Minute
By Olivia Weitz
Wyoming Public Media
December 19, 2024
A 1-minute audio snapshot highlighting a museum object from the collection of the Buffalo Bill Center of the West.
T.C. Cannon was one of the most influential modern Native American artists in the 1960’s and 70’s.
Assistant Curator of the Whitney Western Art Museum, Dr. Ashlea Espinal, said the portraits he painted presented people as they are—often with self determination and assertiveness. She described Cannon’s piece, “Buffalo Medicine Keeper.”
“The figure references the Sundance ceremony, which is one of the most sacred ceremonies amongst the Plains nations,” she said.
Espinal added, “through his use of brightly colored circles in the background of the painting, Cannon references the sun spots that the Sundance participants see. And the very bright colors and the bold composition combine modernist aesthetics and Cannon’s Native culture to create a very compelling portrait of an individual.”
Cannon was one of the first students to study at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Sante Fe, New Mexico. Espinal said he played a critical role in pushing the boundaries beyond the styles and subjects that had been expected of Native American artists in the past.
“Cannon’s work in particular blends multiple different influences, including Native cultures and histories, Euro American artistic traditions, and aesthetics from modern and contemporary art, particularly pop art, which was really exploding at the time when he was a student and beginning his artistic career,” she said.
Cannon’s painting “Buffalo Medicine Keeper” is part of an exhibition opening in May at the Whitney Western Art Museum that looks at how Western art and pop art intersect.
Pop! Goes the West is supported in part by a grant from the Wyoming Cultural Trust Fund, a program of the Department of State Parks and Cultural Resources.
