Indian arts

Magazine Antiques, April, 2001 by Allison Eckardt Ledes

Two exhibitions at the George Gustav Heye Center of the National Museum of the American Indian in Lower Manhattan celebrate the extraordinary decoration lavished on objects used by American Indians in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. One, entitled Beauty, Honor and Tradition: The Legacy of Mains Indian Shirts, is on view through November 4. The other, which may be seen through May 27, is entitled Gifts of Pride and Love: Kiowa and Comanche Cradles.

Plains Indian shirts and jackets were made by women and worn by men. The forty-eight examples in this exhibition are drawn from the museum's extensive collection, and are displayed in a thematic installation that highlights their beauty and power, history, iconography, construction, and the materials used to make them. The curators of the exhibition, George Horse Capture and his son, Joseph Horse Capture, both Gros Ventres, provide insight into the various meanings that are embodied in these garments and relate to their ceremonial use. The shirts and jackets, which honored warriors and tribal leaders, were used by spiritual leaders, and were thought of as vehicles for acquiring spiritual power. The decoration fashioned in beads, paint, and quillwork served to summarize the common values of the wearers--generosity, honor, and bravery.

Cradles, sometimes called cradleboards, were also the product of women's work. Between about 1870 and 1920, the Kiowa and Comanche among the southern Great Plains tribes preferred to make lattice cradles. which provided a way to transport infants while leaving the mother's hands free to accomplish other tasks. The ingenious design, consisting of a hide (later canvas and wool) cradle attached to two boards joined in a V configuration, enabled the mother to prop the cradle against a tree trunk, fence post, or other stationary object without fear of it toppling over. The cradle's height also allowed the infant to be at eye level with a seated adult. Infants were always included in adult activities, a concept that the cradleboard fostered.

The first depiction of a lattice cradle located by Barbara A. Hail, the curator of the exhibition and the editor of the accompanying catalogue, appeared in an 1867 issue of Hwper's Weekly--the same year a treaty was signed that relegated the Kiowa, Comanche, and Kiowa-Apache to a reservation around the United States Army's Fort Sill, in southwestern Oklahoma.

As explained in the catalogue, it is difficult to distinguish Kiowa from Comanche cradles because the two tribes shared the same reservation and presumably traded, sold, or gave cradles to one another. Some motifs traditionally are associated with a single tribe, such as the leaf, which was used as a central motif by Kiowa women.