“Rez Races” by Dolores Purdy.
Dolores Purdy began researching her tribe and stumbled into sheaves of ledger paper.
The Caddo (Oklahoma)/Winnebago (Nebraska) artist unearthed a depth of cultural history inspiring her to create a feminine version of what has been traditionally a male art form.
“Chasing the Buff” by Dolores Purdy.
For nearly two decades, she has produced what is often called “warrior art” on antique ledger paper in her studio north of Santa Fe.
Purdy was one of many artists shuttered when the Santa Fe Indian Market closed during the pandemic. She often injects a note of humor into her work, knitting together traditional imagery with contemporary forms, always immersed in her Native American heritage. Traces of Pop artist Peter Max and the psychedelic poster movement influence her work, as well as the Art Deco movement and Japanese textiles.
Jackrabbits snuggle in the grass before colorful teepees. Mountains stand sentinel before prickly pear-studded valleys. Feathered figures race Cadillacs across the rez.
“She Walks in Beauty” by Dolores Purdy.
Purdy trained in watercolor before she discovered ledger art while researching family genealogy. The contemporary version uses the same medium with modern twists. Ledger art began as a pictographic story told within a village or society without written language. It depicted warrior heroes on teepees and hides. European contact brought the paper and colored pencils/watercolors to the Plains tribes.
In the late 1990s, Purdy discovered the story of a Caddo warrior imprisoned in Fort Marion, Florida, in 1875.
Today she honors her chosen art form by scouring antique malls and shops for old ledgers, inscribing them with her imagination through the magic of colored pencils.
“I fell in love with it – how it’s read, the center focus, the glyphs on their heads and how they dressed so you know which warrior it was,” she said. “A lot of females appreciated the fact that I was bringing a female perspective to this genre.”
Hunting down ledgers is part of the fun; Purdy has unearthed them from boxes and bins across the U.S. She turns over anything of historical significance to museums.
“Home” by Dolores Purdy.
“She Walks in Beauty” grew from the Caddo turkey dance.
“The Caddo women wear floral dresses and they do the turkey dance,” she said. “I like to pop these colors against each other. I wanted the sense of a woman feeling very content with who she is.”
The turkey dance is a celebration of warriors or hunters returning home to the tribe. Purdy added the imagery to ledger paper documenting a clerk’s accounts of warrants. The word “coffin” beneath the figure’s umbrella reveals a $6 price tag.
“That was for the asylum in Missouri,” Purdy said.
“Home” features a trio of colorful teepees towering over a meadow. A lone jackrabbit peaks through the foliage on the lower left. Purdy wove the piece from old sheet music and an 1847 doctor’s ledger.
“You can see the concoctions he wrote on there,” she said, “he had some chamomile and how they’re paid. One guy (paid him with) 28 bushels of oats. There was a lot of bartering back then.”
Purdy’s stylized teepees include motifs often used in ledger art. A hunter galloping after a buffalo centers the central structure; a four directions symbol anchors the top.
The purple teepee represents peyote. Both the Caddo and the Winnebago tribes are ritual users.
“The peyote is an hallucinogenic,” Purdy explained, “to have visions of strength during the Ghost Dance.”
Close-up of “Home” by Dolores Purdy.
“Mountains Speak,” with its rolling cotton cloud scape, emerged from her admiration of Max.
“Peyote Bird” by Dolores Purdy.
“Peter Max and ‘Keep On Truckin’ and the whole psychedelic stuff in the ’60s and ’70s I’ve always loved,” Purdy said. “I always thought his work was fun and I wanted to do something with dimension.
“The mountains look like they’re standing guard,” she said. “They’re sentinels. They will speak if they have to.”
Purdy shows her work at Santa Fe’s Morning Star Gallery and at dolorespurdy.com and swaia.org. She is one of four women ledger artists featured in Richard Pearce’s “Women and Ledger Art” (2013, University of Arizona Press). Her work is in the collections of the National Museum of the American Indian, the White House and more. She is a past member of the Santa Fe Indian Market standards committee.
"artist" - Google News
December 13, 2020 at 02:02PM
https://ift.tt/2INxGl0
Contemporary visions: Artist Dolores Purdy transforms antique ledger paper into art - Albuquerque Journal
"artist" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2FwLdIu
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Contemporary visions: Artist Dolores Purdy transforms antique ledger paper into art - Albuquerque Journal"
Post a Comment