Visual Voices: Contemporary Chickasaw Art

02/17/2021

Visual Voices Chickasaw artist Brenda Kingery has an excited year ahead! Among other events, her works will be exhibited in a solo exhibition this fall on Cape Cod at the Cahoon Museum of American Art!

Brenda Kingery: Weaving Messages October 6 - December 19 Brenda Kingery: Weaving Messages presents a series of narrative abstract paintings whose vivid expressions draw from the artist’s Chickasaw heritage. Kingery has traveled widely and influences on her work include the artists of the Ryukyuan ...

01/31/2021

VISUAL VOICES Chickasaw artists are busy! Margaret Wheeler and Erin Shaw will exhibit artworks along with other artists among numerous artifacts in the exhibit SPIRO, beginning Feb. 12, at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum in OKC. The Spiro site in eastern Oklahoma is one of America’s most important, but little known, ancient cultural and religious centers, and once contained twelve mounds with a population of several thousand inhabitants. The quality, quantity, and variety of works found at Spiro are staggering. Thousands of objects were excavated from the site in shell and stone carvings, clay, wood, and copper, including useful objects, weaponry, and imagery of people, deities, animals, religious rituals and hybrid creatures.

The Spiro people, and their Mississippian peers, are nearly forgotten in the pages of North American history, yet they created one of the most exceptional societies in all of the Americas.

12/31/2020

12/31/2020

Margaret Roach Wheeler and colleague Taloa Underwood bring Chickasaw arts, culture and entrepreneurship forward in the Smithsonian Magazine!

11/11/2020

As the weavers tie together handspun threads into shawls and fabrics, their labors remind us of our connections and how we are bound together, stronger than alone. Though their practices have a timeless history, these artists resist allowing us to rest on technique alone. Margaret Roach Wheeler asks us to consider the role of genetic testing in the construction of our cultural identities in her work, Ancestry.com. Using historic methods, Tyra Shackleford pushes the boundaries of what forms can be considered Chickasaw. These questions and investigations are part of what has characterized our tribal aesthetic, often defying simple identification.
-heather ahtone ( )
Excerpt from her essay 'In the Summer We Dance: Aesthetic Renewal and Gratitude for the Visual Voices catalogue
Slides 1-3:
Margaret Roach Wheeler
Ancestry.com, 2016
Artist's embroidered hair on handmade cotton paper, stamped ink

Slide 4:
Tyra Shackleford
Detail of Shimbolish (Spirit), 2016
Finger woven, dyed bison hair yarn

11/11/2020

Chickasaw artist Brenda Kingery discusses her colorful works in abstract representing many tribes in the dance and regalia of powwows. These and other works are currently on view at The Briscoe Western Art Museum in San Antonio.

Visual Voices artist Brenda Kingery discuses her art on view at the Briscoe Western Art Museum.

11/02/2020

Chickasaw author Linda Hogan discusses the stories that influence our contemporary Chickasaw cultural practices in her essay titled Turning Earth, Circling Sky for the Visual Voice catalogue.

10/26/2020

In this excerpt from our catalogue introduction, Chickasaw artist and Visual Voices Board Member Kristen Dorsey discusses how our unique exhibit came to be, and what we hope our work teaches visitors. Read this piece and other works from contributing First American authors in our exhibit catalogue available via our website.
Visual Voices is now on view at the

10/26/2020

Visual Voices artist Kristen Dorsey describes her fascinating art practices as a metalsmith and jewelry designer.

Chickasaw metalsmith, Kristen Dorsey, connects her love of craft to the pride she has for her tribal identity when she creates her jewelry.

10/23/2020

Thank you First Americans Museum for celebrating the beauty of COLOR DAY!

10/14/2020

Goddesses in the gallery ✨
captured Kristen Dorsey jewelry on models Sivan Alyra Rose, Kinsale Hueston & Charelle Brown for the latest issue of
Background art by Brenda Kingery and Joanna Underwood-Blackburn. Photographed at last year during
The exhibit is now on view at the

10/12/2020

Today is and for us here in the Chickasaw Nation, we celebrate and honor Chickasaw Leader Piominko.

Piominko served Chickasaws during the 18th century. He was born around 1750 at Chokkilissa' - Old Town, Mississippi. Piominko was a pre-removal leader who acted as a diplomat in order to protect Chickasaw sovereignty. Piominko met with other southeastern tribes, governors of states and President George Washington to reach agreements that benefitted his people. One of his greatest achievements was the signing of the Treaty of Hopewell in 1786, which formalized the tribe's alliance with the U.S. government. (Source: ) Learn more about Piominko and many other prominent Chickasaw citizens at