"INDIANS ON HORSES IN THEIR NATURAL HABITAT"
Oil on found painting on canvas.
2019.
18”x24” oil on canvas.
My newest series titled “Western Art” takes a look at how a whole genre of creativity and faction of the “West” seeks to honor and or capitalize on nostalgic stereotypical imagery of those people who came from before, before the western term “Indians” or the Indigenous Peoples of what is currently known as the North American Continent.
For me, this series is presenting visual and literal scenes which many non-native and native alike or just “western” artists employ to build portfolios and whole careers from. It is asking questions of cultural appropriation and “inter-cultural appropriation.”
The questions hover around the definition between artists who are working to present aesthetics that aim to provide an authentic cultural/historical context, pay homage or exploit the image of the “noble savage” for personal gain or somewhere in between in the gray area. For most, the end of the road comes down to personal and interpersonal intention. The next step exists in the perception of the viewer and consumer, which almost always ruminates in a continued secondary imposition of misperception. Many western renditions of “Indians on Horses, In their natural habitat” contain misnomers and inconsistency of culture and behavior, which in turn create fallacies consumed by the general stereotype.
I'm not aiming this at any one person or artist, yet this observation acts as a confrontation of the practiced paradigm. I chose an actual oil painting from an antique store for a reason, this issue is an uncontrolled conflagration, which in any other sense in our contemporary society, argues as the theft of copyright, intellectual property, and even trademark. We all need to question, we can’t possibly grow with out it.
This work is available for purchase, buy the stereotype👌🏽
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