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About

There's a lot of public art in the Portland Metro region that is made by Native American artists. Because much of it was hard to find, poorly marked, and often non-existent online, Price Schaffer created a map and this website to teach folks about this part of Oregon culture. He worked with PSU historian Dr. Tracy Prince to identify and locate over 100 sites of Native art. Native artists from Oregon use their art to tell tribal stories and as reminders of Indigenous homelands. Over 100 artists are featured, including: Lillian Pitt (Warm Springs), Rick Bartow (Wiyot), Greg Robinson (Chinook), Travis Stewart (Grand Ronde), James Lavadour (Walla Walla from Umatilla), Toma Villa (Yakama), Wendy Red Star (Crow), and rock art from 10,000 years ago.

Price Schaffer is a twice selected UW Whiteley Scholar (2022 and 2024) and a Stanford University student. He created this project and began researching for the map with the idea that this project is a way to use data science in the humanities. As a Data Science specialist, he is interested in how data is hidden, perhaps unknown to people, and can be mapped, quantified, digitized, put online for everyone to access, and brought to life in a way that makes people more aware. Dr. Prince is a Research Professor at Portland State University's Department of Curriculum and Instruction & Whiteley Scholar (2022 and 2024). She uncovered much forgotten Native American history while researching her books-Portland's Goose Hollow, Portland's Slabtown, and Notable Women of Portland. She is also the author of Culture Wars in British Literature. She has given hundreds of talks on Oregon's Native American Art throughout the state–first as a featured speaker for Oregon Humanities, then for Oregon Parks Department. Schaffer and Prince were shocked to find that, for 40% of the art of Schaffer's map, there were no previous photos online. Even public art funded by taxpayers often had no online description, did not list the artist's name, or had no photo. They made many trips to public parks and civic buildings to take photos. Then, Price posted these on his map.

Photos above: The Grand Ronde tribe in traditional canoes, at the ceremonial installation of Travis Stewart’s eel sculpture in Lake Oswego. R-L Lillian Pitt’s sculpture in South Waterfront Park along the Willamette River. Cathlapotle Longhouse in Ridgefield, Washington (where Chinook Nation holds ceremonies). Rick Bartow sculpture at N. Interstate Ave (Ainsworth Greenspace). Tsagaglalal "She Who Watches" (petroglyph and pictograph at Columbia Hills Historical State Park). Wendy Red Star print (featuring her and her daughter) at Portland State University’s Fariborz Maseeh Hall. Toma Villa mural at NE 42 & Holman, and Lillian Pitt pole sculpture of salmon at PSU’s Native American Student and Community Center.

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Places where artwork is unmarked include: the Rosa Parks MAX Station (Yellow Line on Interstate) and Portland State University's Native American Student & Community Center. Because the art has no label to note the artist, you might never know that you are looking at incredible museums of artwork by Native Americans from Oregon and the region. The Rosa Parks Max Station contains art by: (1) Rick Bartow (Wiyot) “Always Looking” crow sculpture, (2) Lillian Pitt (Warm Springs) “Watchful Eyes” sculpture, (3) Gail Tremblay (Mi'kmaq and Onondaga) “The Ghost of Salmon,” and (4) Ken MacIntosh (non-Native) “ Salmon Essence.” The steel electrical panel has porcelain enamel art (top right) “Scaffold” by James Lavadour (Umatilla) and “Little John” by Joe Cantrell (Cherokee).

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Portland State University’s Native American Student & Community Center is an incredible repository of Native Art, especially Native Art of Oregon. The NASCC contains art by: Lawrence “Ulaaq” Ahvakana (Inupiaq), Rick Bartow (Wiyot), Jim Charlie (Salish), Edgar Heap of Birds (Cheyenne), Doug Hyde (New Perce), Jim Jackson (Klamath), James Lavadour (Umatilla), Truman Lowe (Winnebago), Lillian Pitt (Warm Springs), Sara Siestreem (Coos), (Preston Singletary (Tlingit), Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee), Marie Watt (Seneca), and many others.

(Link to the map)

Artists

  • Lawrence Ahvakana (Inupiaq/Inuit)

    • Glass Doors and Wooden Carvings (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • OHSU Native Art Collection, Inuit Drummer

  • Rick Bartow (Wiyot)

    • ​“The Responsibility of Raising a Child”

    • "Sentinel Pole"

    • "Young Hawk"

    • “Po’ok Deer, PlegIt, Old Man on the Hill”

    • "CS Spegi" Lithograph (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "Always Looking"

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Ainsworth Greenspace, “Crow”

    • "Crows" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • David Boxley (Tsimshian)

    • OHSU Native Art Collection, Wooden Carving​

  • ​Derek No-sun Brown (Shoshone-Bannock, Anishinabe)

    • “Sound of Blessings”

  • Joe Cantrell (Cherokee) 

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "Little John"​

  • Phillip John Charette (Yup’ik)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

  • Jim Charlie (Salish)

    • ​"Eagle Mask" (PSU Native Student Center)

  • Chinook Nation

    • Chinook Plankhouse (Ridgefield)

  • Pat Courtney Gold (Warm Springs)

    • “Cylinder Bag” (Portland Art Museum)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

  • Ka'ila Farrell-Smith (Klamath and Modoc)

    • “After Boarding School: In Mourning” (Portland Art Museum)

    • “Vision Quest Mythology”

  • Joe Feddersen (Colville)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Portland Art Museum, various works

  • Ryan Feddersen (Colville)​

    • ​"Inhabitance"

  • Justin Finkbonner (Lummi)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

  • Jaque Fragua (Jemez Pueblo)

    • Untitled Mural​

  • Nicholas Galanin (Tlingit/Aleut) and Jerrod (Tlingit/Unangan) Galanin who work together under the name Leonard Getinthecar

    • ​"Space Invaders"

    • "Natural Resources"

  • Jeffrey Gibson (Choctaw and Cherokee)

    • ​“One for the Other”

    • “ALIVE!”

  • Edgar Heap of Birds (Cheyenne and Arapaho)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • "Neuf for Modoc" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • ​Allan Houser (Apache)

    • "Desert Harvest" (Portland Art Museum)

    • Unnamed Sculpture

  • Richard Hunt (Kwakwa̱ka̱ʼwakw Nation of Canada)

    • ​"Welcoming Pole"

  • Doug Hyde (Nez Perce, Assiniboine, and Chippewa ancestry)

    • ​Statue of Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce Family Sculpture

  • Jim Jackson (Klamath)

    • ​"Emerging Figures" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • Tony A. Johnson (Chinook)

    • "Guests from the Great River”

    • “Transom Canoe"

    • “Wapato"

    • Chinook Plankhouse (project coordinator + art)

    • “Chinook Door"

    • "Ancestor"

    • “Nicháqwli Monument”

  • Spencer Keeton Cunningham (Colville) 

    • Untitled Mural​

  • Brian Krehbiel (Grand Ronde)

    • ​"The Story of how Coyote and Meadowlark Created Willamette Falls"

  • James Lavadour (Umatilla)

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "Scaffold"

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Multnomah County Courthouse Exhibition, various works

    • "Like Rain"

    • "Late Summer #3"

    • Untitled Landscape

    • Portland Art Museum, various works

    • "Ghost Camp" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • Truman Lowe (Winnebago)

    • "Wana Napt" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • Jessica Mehta (Cherokee)

    • LHS Mural, “Revitalize the Indigenous language…”

  • Bobby Mercier (Grand Ronde)

    • ​"Carver"

  • Lillian Pitt (Warm Springs)

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "Watchful Eyes"

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Multnomah County Courthouse Exhibition, various works

    • Ainsworth Greenspace, “She Who Watches”

    • OHSU Native Art Collection, sculpture

    • "River Guardian"

    • "Voices"

    • Basalt Carvings

    • "Riverbed"

    • Vancouver Land Bridge Art

    • “Cultural Totem”

    • "Salmon Cycle Marker" (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • “Petroglyph Column” (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • “Roof Journey Guardians" (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • "Sound Baffles" (Petroglyph Drawings, PSU Native Student Center)

    • "She Who Watches" (PSU Native Student Center)

  • Wendy Red Star (Crow)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • "Rez Car 2"

    • “Apsáalooke Feminist #2”

  • Greg A. Robinson (Chinook)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Multnomah County Courthouse Exhibition, various works

    • "Chinook Power Board"

    • "We Have Always Lived Here"

    • Tayi ("Headman") Stone

    • LHS Mural, Frog Graphic

  • Sara Siestreem (Hanis, Coos)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • "Common Threads"

    • "Salmon House" (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • "Permanent Marker System" (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • LHS Mural, "All Indian Land"

    • Portland Intenational Airport Exhibition, various works

  • Preston Singletary (Tlingit)

    • ​"Entry Doors" (PSU Native Student Center)​

    • “Tlingit Dancing Staff”

  • Dan “Lelooska” Smith (Cherokee descent)

    • ​"Totem Pole"

  • Travis Stewart (Grand Ronde)

    • ​"The Man from Kosh-huk-shix"

    • "Wapato Woman"

    • “Coyote”

  • Gail Tremblay (Mi'kmaq and Onondaga)

    • "Voices" (wrote the text)​

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "The Ghost of Salmon"

  • Unknown

    • "She Who Watches" Petroglyph and Pictograph (rock art)

    • Willamette Falls Petroglyph

    • Clackamas River Petroglyph

  • Toma Villa (Yakama)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • Multnomah County Courthouse Exhibition, various works

    • “Pushing the Darkness Back Up Into the Sky”

    • "Chief Joseph"

    • "Grandmother's Prayers"

    • "Spirit Pole"

    • “Friendship Band”

    • Unnamed Mural

    • Unnamed Mosaic

  • Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee)

    • ​"Bearpaw Battlefield I"

  • Marie Watt (Seneca)

    • Portland City Hall Exhibition, various works

    • "Skywalker (Range of Light)"

    • "Omphalos and Portal" (PSU Native Student Center)​

  • ​Terresa White (Yup’ik)

    • "Owl and Lemming"​

    • "Immersed"

    • Unnamed Sculpture

  • Elizabeth Woody (Warm Springs)

    • ​"Coyote and Woman"

  • ​Shirod Younker (Coquille/Coos)

    • Unnamed Mural​

Non-Native artists who depicted Native subjects:

  • Alice Cooper

    • “Sacajawea sculpture”

  • Travis Czekalski

    • “Chinook Nation mural”

  • Eric Jensen

    • “Ilchee sculpture”

  • Travis London

    • “Occupied Illahee mural”

  • ​Ken MacKintosh

    • Rosa Parks Max Station Exhibition, "Salmon Essence"

    • Ainsworth Greenspace, “Salmon”

  • ​ Adam McIsaac

    • "Guests from the Great River" (with Tony Johnson)

    • “Transom Canoe" (with Tony Johnson)

    • "Ancestor" (with Tony Johnson)

    • “Nicháqwli Monument” (with Tony Johnson)

A note from Dr. Tracy J. Prince about how artists were picked to be featured on the map:

The focus of this list is on enrolled tribal members. Since there is a federal law prohibiting the marketing of Native art designs by non-Native people, it was important to be selective about which art to include on the map.

 

If a person is of Native descent (not an enrolled tribal member, but claims connections through ancestry), their tribal affiliation is listed as “descent.” Adoption into a tribe, while meaningful to tribal families, does not denote legal (enrolled) status in either the US or Canada. Enrolled tribal members are listed with the name of their tribe (many are confederations of different tribal bands). Native subjects depicted by non-Native people are listed as such. Most non-Native artists are included because their art was made in deep collaboration with Native artists who contributing to the design and/or the creation. The Sacajawea Statue (by non-Native artist Alice Cooper) is included because of this statue’s importance to the Women’s Suffrage movement, because a photo of Native women was used as the model, and because Oregon women raised money to erect this statue to make sure that Sacajawea was acknowledged as a heroine during Portland's 1905 Lewis and Clark Expo where the men's exploits were being heralded.

 

Oregon has an epidemic of Native art designs by non-Native people, including hundreds of totem poles made by Boy Scouts or non-Native artists. Totem poles were not part of Oregon’s tribal histories. Because of this history, and because of the federal law cited above, such totem poles are not included on the map. Totem poles are cultural traditions for tribes in parts of British Columbia, Alaska, and Northwestern Washington State, where rights to carve particular icons on totem poles are passed through family lineage. Oregon also has many totem poles carved by unenrolled Native artists who do not descend from a tribe with totem pole carving traditions. (Most of America’s 574 federally recognized tribes do not have totem pole carving traditions.) Such art has been de-emphasized on the map — in respect for specific tribal lineage rights to carve totem poles. The hope is that the map brings more attention to Oregon’s historic tribal iconography and to contemporary Native art traditions in Oregon.

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Many artists on the map are from Oregon tribes. However, there are also artists from other tribes in the region and throughout the US and Canada, many who live in the Portland region, where there is a large Urban Indian population. This map shows the location of reservations for the nine federally recognized tribes in Oregon.

 

This map (showing which tribes were in the Portland area) was created by Dr. David Lewis (Grand Ronde member and OSU Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Ethnic Studies & Indigenous Studies).  Portland is the homeland of several Chinook-speaking bands (the Multnomah, Cascades-Watlala, Clowwewalla, and Clackamas) and the Tualatin band of the Kalapuya people. 

As published in "History of Native Uses of the Land, Portland Audubon Wildlife Sanctuary"

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