I was fascinated to see that Garth Greenan Gallery is presenting a major show of paintings by Fritz Scholder (1937-2005)—and somewhat puzzled by the critique of Scholder’s work in the New York Times, that reads, in part:

“…The irony of Scholder’s colors is that they heighten scenes of moral defeat. He borrows the horror-core of Francis Bacon for two canvases from 1970 that imagine the Wounded Knee massacre, where in 1890 American troops killed about 300 Lakota people. Scholder scrunches corpses to the top of each canvas, ingloriously. From one body, clothed in tropical green and pink, a fountain of red rains down. Another is rendered in the colors of meat and bone.

“It gets worse, though the gallery does Scholder the favor of sampling his breadth beyond mere depravity. The works here range from sarcasm — in “Indian on Red Horse” (1969), a Ralph Steadman-like cowboy raises an American flag with a blank, almost deathly scowl — to Pop appropriation. Even nobility….

“With his unflinching and monumental types, Scholder seems to have sought — as Jasper Johns did with the American flag — a portrait of the modern mind contemplating these Native origin stories, as much as he depicts those stories themselves.”

We live at a time when identity politics seems to have so inflected cultural dialogue that unless an artist makes work that actually reverses the effects of climate change, they had better be “talking” about indigeneity, race, gender or personality disorders in their work. 

The NYTimes commentary reminds me of the time when I was editing Strong Hearts: Native American Visions and Voices (Aperture 1995). Images from this publication subsequently became a traveling exhibition that toured for four years, opening at the Smithsonian’s Ripley Center. The process of making this happen landed me squarely in Indian Country—looking down the barrel of a Colt 45.

This was during a time when Native American cultures were at war, with post-colonial rage gaining traction in the aftermath of the 1992 Columbus quincentenary. and factions that ranged a gamut that promised: danger ahead. Fortunately, the first person I reached out to for the lead essay was Paul Chaat Smith, co-author (with Robert Allen Warrior) of Like a Hurricane: The Indian Movement from Alcatraz to Wounded Knee (The New Press 1996), and now serving as Curator at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian since 2001.

In the process of producing Strong Hearts, Paul became a trusted advisor, helpfully suggesting alternate sources when it looked as if I might be wading into big trouble. With that in mind, I am excerpting a section of his essay, Ghost in the Machine, below. You can read the entire essay at Aperture’s archive.

“We approach the millennium as a people leading often fantastic and surreal lives. The Pequot, a tribe all but extinct, run the most profitable casino in the country, and tribe members are becoming millionaires. But guess who’s still the poorest group in North America? Vision-quest retreats and sweat-lodge vacations are offered in the pages of Mother Jones, and one of our so-called best friends in the entertainment industry bankrolls fawning documentaries on us but refuses to rename the Atlanta Braves, and that Dances With Wolves—I’m warning you don’t get me started—NOT JUST THE NOVEL BUT EVEN THE SHOOTING SCRIPT SAID IT WAS ABOUT COMANCHES AND THEY ONLY CHANGED IT BECAUSE THE PRODUCTION MANAGER COULDN’T FIND ENOUGH BUFFALOES IN OKLAHOMA AND THEY MADE THE COMANCHES SIOUX JUST LIKE THAT—POOF—AND EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY LIKED IT ANYWAY!!!!

“The brilliant Palestinian intellectual and troublemaker Edward Said, author of Orientalism, wrote that “in the end, the past possesses us.” Okay, Eddie, I get it. But is it supposed to possess us this much? The country can’t make up its mind. One decade we’re invisible, another dangerous. Obsolete and quaint, a rather boring people suitable for schoolkids and family vacations, then suddenly we’re cool and mysterious. Once considered so primitive that our status as fully human was a subject of scientific debate, some now regard us as keepers of planetary secrets and the only salvation for a world bent on destroying itself. (Above: Zig Jackson, from the Indian Man in San Francisco series; below: Jeff Thomas, Amos Keye, Iroquois Confederacy, 1983 (left); Richard Poafpybitty Applying Facial Paint, Comanche/Omaha Nation, 1983 (right); all from Strong Hearts

“Heck, we’re just plain folks, but no one wants to hear that.

“But how could it be any different? The confusion and ambivalence, the amnesia and wistful romanticism make perfect sense. We are shape-shifters in the national consciousness, accidental survivors, unwanted reminders of disagreeable events. Indians have to be explained and accounted for, and somehow fit into the creation myth of the most powerful, benevolent nation ever, the last best hope of man on earth.

“We’re trapped in history. No escape. Great-uncle Cavayo must have faced many situations this desperate, probably in godforsaken desert canyons against murderous Apaches and Texans. Somehow, I know what he would say: Get the best piece you can find and shoot your way out.”

Fritz Scholder Paintings 1968-1980 continues through August 9 at Garth Greenan Gallery, 545 West 20th Street, New York, NY Info