American Indian Art at the DMA

Yesterday with relatives in town we checked out something our daughter has been asking to see—the Dallas Museum of Art’s first Native American exhibition in nearly twenty years. Works of American Indian art, precisely 111 of them, are in town on loan from the renowned collection of Eugene and Clare Thaw at the Fenimore Art Museum in Cooperstown, New York. The exhibit is magnificently displayed with rooms arranged by geographic culture areas. The range of time they cover goes from European contact to the present, and the range of artifacts from clothing to weapons to decorative pieces. We marveled at the tininess of basket stitches and the precision of porcupine-needle pieces cut up and used almost like beads. Ancient ivories, masks, sculptural arts, headdresses, Southwest blankets, baskets from California and the Great Basin, the famous beaded works of the Plains—this exhibit had it all. My favorite was a beautiful Arctic windbreaker-like parka that, as it turns out, was made entirely from seal intestines! The Thaw Collection is considered one of the most significant of American Indian art in the world. The Thaws began collecting these works twenty-four years ago after moving to Santa Fe. They made their purchases based on the pieces’ visual impact, superb artistry, and exceptional aesthetic qualities. In Mr. Thaw’s words, “Indian material culture stands rightfully with ancient art, with masterpieces of Asia and Europe, as their equivalent.” Seeing this sample of his collection will leave you nodding in agreement. The exhibit is in town till September 4.