Museum Minute: Beaded bag is ‘both art and utility’

The Plains Indian Museum has a beaded bag by Northern Arapaho and Cattaraugus Seneca artist Ken Williams Jr.

Museum Curator Hunter Old Elk said Williams uses a hyper realistic bead embroidery style.

“ Some artists choose to paint with beads and so they are taking this form of bead work, of flat bead work, and using colors to create realistic images,” she said.

The bag features a portrait of a Shoshone woman wearing traditional clothing.

“Ken has used different colors to basically sculpt her figure and sculpt the contours of her body, the contours of her dress and create it in this style.”

Old Elk added, “ It really takes a special kind of eye to be able to use the colors of a beads and create shading and create contouring that produces these images in bead work form.”

Old Elk said the bag is not only artistic, but also functional.

“First and foremost, they’re a utilitarian item, and so we can put any number of our personal property in them, but also I think a bag is such a status symbol, and we see that with any kind of adornment. When you have something that is depicting these beautiful images, it’s both art and utility.”