{"id":12197,"date":"2020-11-16T14:36:19","date_gmt":"2020-11-16T21:36:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/windriver.org\/?p=12197"},"modified":"2026-03-31T17:08:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T23:08:07","slug":"perceptions-of-native-america-adjust-your-expectations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/windriver.org\/es\/blog\/perceptions-of-native-america-adjust-your-expectations\/","title":{"rendered":"Percepciones de Am\u00e9rica Nativa: Ajusta tus expectativas"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Casey Adams, art by Robert Martinez<\/p>\n

Wind River Country artist Robert Martinez is on a mission to adjust your expectations. Of Native art, of Native Americans, of art as a whole.<\/p>\n

\u201cHaving grown up on the [Wind River Indian] Reservation, and being part of the Northern Arapaho tribe gives me an outlook on how people view Natives and how professional non-Native artists use Native imagery,\u201d Martinez explained. \u201cThere\u2019s often a romanticized or stereotypical version of what they paint\u2014you know, Indian on horseback, stoic, in a mountain setting \u2026 an Indian princess with wolves and some feathers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Martinez\u2014Northern Arapaho, Latino, and Anglo\u2014doesn\u2019t do that.<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to depict something that\u2019s true to us but also is what I consider an abstraction.\u201d<\/p>\n

The most dramatic way in which he turns the expected inside-out is the loud color in his acrylic-and-oil paintings. Monochromatic and dual-chromatic airbrushed portraits catch viewers\u2019 eyes and stare at them, forcing them to confront the stories behind the paint.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had an instructor who told me, \u2018Never use pure color.\u2019 Well, you can see I listened to that,\u201d Martinez chuckled.<\/p>\n

\"Black<\/p>\n

In his latest series, Martinez\u2019 subjects look boldly out from under headdresses. Not your typical feathered representations, they are lined with wifi, cellular data, and Bluetooth-connectivity graphics. The faces are dramatic shades of purple, red, green. Martinez titled the series \u201cStrong Signal\u201d and sees it as a tool for starting important conversation about the Native issues that he finds people have an inclination to separate from Native art.\"A\u201cThe NODAPL stuff \u2026 and Keystone\u2014we\u2019re always talking about mascots \u2026 you\u2019re always seeing that stoic Native face,\u201d he said, but the stories aren\u2019t being processed. \u201cSo you get these signals on your phone\u2014you\u2019re putting out a strong signal but you\u2019re not listening, you\u2019re not seeing.\u201d
\nAnother series of paintings in the same brightly colored style puts forth Captain Native America, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>\u201cIn Indian Country we don\u2019t have a lot of highly visible heroes. So I created a whole series of Native super heroes,\u201d Martinez explained. It will reside in the permanent collection at the Red Cloud Museum in South Dakota, adding to the long list of museums, art galleries, and art shows across the nation who display his work.<\/p>\n

Martinez\u2019 portraiture isn\u2019t typical or realistic, but they guide the viewer to a fresher understanding of his Native American subjects. He\u2019s interested in the story behind the story and in painting that story behind the face on the canvas.<\/p>\n

\u201cI heard from a priest or a pastor or one of my elders something to the effect that if God or Creator gives you a talent, it is a shame\u2014if not a sin\u2014not to use that talent,\u201d Martinez said of the story behind his face, the motivation behind his brush. \u201cSo I have this talent, and if I don\u2019t do something with it\u2014and even more to the point if I don\u2019t use it to speak about something, that\u2019s a waste.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"A<\/a>Martinez has also injected his contemporary commentary into the genre of ledger paintings, a style which, by its very nature, demands an eye on history\u2019s truths. In the late 1800s as Native Americans were being migrated to reservations, they couldn\u2019t hunt in the way they had before, and in turn they couldn\u2019t paint their stories on hides in the winter. Instead, they turned to trading for old ledgers to paint upon. Rather than the more traditional flat figures that remain popular to this day, Martinez reminds his viewers of who America\u2019s Natives are today.<\/p>\n

For example, on an old map, with the Wind River Indian Reservation outlined near-center, Martinez has drawn man in a track suit and headdress breakdancing on Wyoming territory.<\/p>\n

Working his way through a stack of his contemporary ledger-style pieces, Martinez pulled out another, black text on off-white paper with an added sepia-toned illustration:<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is on \u2018Laws Relating to Indian Affairs,\u2019 so you turn that upside down and then you draw all over it,\u201d Martinez said before moving on to a land grant document augmented by his hand with the face of a Native child. \u201cThis is me putting an actual face on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

His dedication to his craft and his people is paired with dedication to his family. His youngest daughter, 7, spends her days with him, and she and her big sister, 10, join him in his studio for their own crafts.<\/p>\n

Social media has become a powerful utensil to that end, and you can engage in his conversations on Facebook<\/a> and on Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Better yet, you can purchase his art at www.martinezartdesign.com<\/a> and play a role in adjusting expectations. \u201cNon-Native artists painting Native images have better careers and make more money painting those images and perpetuating those type of thoughts than actual Natives doing the same work,\u201d Martinez observes. \u201cI\u2019d think that a collector who wants Native artwork would lean more toward a Native artisan.\u201d<\/p>\n