04 Oct 2009, Posted by admin in the category

Artist Profiles

Louie Gong

Louie Gong is a Native American of mixed heritage (Nooksack, Chinese, French, Scottish) who was raised by his grandparents, father, step-mom, and extended family both in Ruskin, B.C. and in the Nooksack tribal community.  He currently lives in Seattle, where he drinks iced Americanos every morning and remembers his grandparents every night as he falls asleep.

Since graduating from Western Washington University’s School Counseling program in 1999, he has worked as a teacher, child and family therapist, and counseling program coordinator. In all these roles, and in his current position as Education Resource Coordinator for Muckleshoot Tribal College, Louie’s work reflects the need to recognize the dynamic realities of modern life while maintaining a strong cultural identity. This value is also interwoven into his work as adjunct faculty for Northwest Indian College and Evergreen State College, where he often teaches classes such a “The Native American Higher Education Experience” and “Mixed Heritage: Thinking outside the box about tribal communities.”

Louie is also a veteran of the nonprofit hustle, and he currently serves as President of the MAVIN Foundation, one of the nation’s leading institutional advocates for mixed heritage people and families. In his work with the MAVIN Foundation, Louie is co-developer of the Mixed Heritage Center, the largest online resource for mixed heritage people and families in the nation, and the guy who kicked off “What are YouTube?,” an online challenge to people of mixed heritage to reclaim the question “What are you?”  His commentary on issues related to the racial identity has appeared in dozens of major news media, including Indian Country Today, MSNBC, Blur Digital, New York Times, Chicago Tribune, San Francisco Chronicle, Education Week and many others.

Louie discovered the power of art to express ideas when he effectively used crude but well placed graffiti as a tool for wooing a girl. Around the same time, he started seriously exploring Coast Salish art by painting drums in preparation for the 2006 Canoe Journey.  From that point forward, he started seeing the world in crescents, ovals, and formlines.

In 2009 he found his groove as an artist when – on a whim – he took a sharpie to a pair of Vans.  The resulting merger of Coast Salish art and a pop culture icon like Vans was the perfect statement to represent his complex cultural identity.  When many other folks also recognized the message carried by the shoes, Louie realized he had stumbled upon a new way to spark dialogue about identity. While many are drawn to his shoes because they represent the confluence of multiple worlds, others simply appreciate Coast Salish art or the shoes’ freshness and originality.  Either way, Louie feels honored  that people are finding value in something he loves to do.

His work can be view at www.eighthgeneration.com

Dana Arviso

As a Diné woman in higher education, I understand what it means to have to live in and between the borderlands of cultures.  As a child and a young adult, I’ve lived in a wide array of places: from the red earth and rocky mesas of the Navajo Indian Reservation in Arizona to the cold and icy suburbs of Anchorage, Alaska and to the high mountain desert terrain of the Bishop Paiute Indian Reservation in California.  In order to pursue my college degrees, I’ve had to migrate to places like the college town of Davis in central California and finally to rainy (but vibrant) Seattle, Washington.  In each location I’ve succeeded in creating a home and a space for myself in school and the community while simultaneously adapting to these new cultural landscapes along the way.  While these experiences have certainly contributed to my own sense of adaptability and appreciation of multiculturalism, these experiences also provided me with firsthand knowledge of what it means to “live between two worlds” and not only survive, but thrive.

I am currently pursuing a PhD in Education at the University of Washington, where my focus is on the out-of-school literacy experiences of Native American youth. I am especially interested in how Native youth gain opportunities to play with media and technology and how this exposure may help them to become more literate in this digital era. I’m also a writer, college instructor, amateur photographer, avid facebooker, nonprofit bookkeeper, and a volunteer at a number of social justice-oriented nonprofit organizations. I’m honored to be a part of Seattle’s urban Indian community and to know and collaborate with “First Expressions” featured artists, who are also my dear friends.

Clarita Begay

Ya’at’eeh! I’m Clarita Lefthand Begay, a member of the Dine’ Nation. I am of the Manygoats (Tl’izilani) clan, born for the One-Who-Walks-Around (Honaghaahii) clan. My maternal grandfather is of the Bitterwater (Todichiinii) clan and my paternal grandfather is of the Edgewater (Tabaahi’) clan. My maternal family is from Tonalea, AZ and my paternal family is from Pine Springs, AZ. Today, I live in Seattle, WA. Finding my way in the world has been adventurous, challenging and fulfilling. Overall, my goals have been directed toward healing, health and knowledge. I try to accomplish these by chasing my dreams, fostering my spiritual and emotional growth and making observations about my life inside and outside of various boxes. So far my dreams have manifested into a scientific research career, a Native community environmental justice instructor, of sorts, with a sprinkle of amateur photography. I’m also a sister of 6 brothers, a daughter of boarding-school-taught parents, an auntie to three beautiful souls and a wife to a creative number theorist. I take photos because I love colors, emotions, and because I have a strong respect for time. With a camera in my hand, I can document my life and the world in way that I have yet to achieve with words. The photos here capture a story about Native identity, urban culture, and creativity in the 21st century. Today Native Americans continue to strive everywhere. Our Movement continues to free ourselves from governmentally constructed boundaries, 500 years of genocide, hate induced stereotypes, de-culturation, de-humanization, so that we may heal, grow and honor our ancestors and our future children and grandchildren for eight generations past and present.

Tracy Rector

Tracy Rector (Seminole) attended Antioch University’s First Peoples Program for her Masters in Education. She specializes in Native American approaches to learning and documentary film, in addition Tracy is a student of traditional plant medicine. As a Native Education specialist, Tracy offers unique insight to her projects. Her vision is to bring traditional and contemporary education together on a foundation based in environmental stewardship.  As the co-producer of the award-winning films Teachings of the Tree People, March Point and numerous short videos including Bunky Echo-Hawk: A proACTIVE ARTist, Tracy has developed an awareness and sensitivity to the power of media and film as a modern storytelling tool. Her work has been featured at National Geographic’ All Roads Film Project, the Smithsonian’s Museum of the American Indian and on the PBS series Independent Lens. She has also been recognized as the recipient of the prestigious Native American Public Telecommunications Producers grant and the Horace Mann Award.  In addition, Tracy has worked on such projects as the Seattle Art Museum’s  international exhibition S’abadeb-The Gifts: Pacific Coast Salish Art and Artists and to the development of curriculum for IslandWood, an environmental education center. She is the Co-founder and Executive Director of Longhouse Media and a proud mother of two boys.

For more information about Longhouse Media: www.longhousemedia.org

Victor Pascual

Victor Pascual (Navajo/Mayan), As an accomplished artist, illustrator and graphic designer, Victor’s work focuses on the contemporary struggles of being indigenous in an urban environment. He has had the opportunity to work with some of the most inspiring individuals and organizations within the Native community today while building a sizable portfolio, which also includes corporate clients and institutions, including Microsoft, Northwest Folklife Festival, National Indian Gaming Association, and National Indian Child Welfare Association.

His work can be viewed at www.dnvjostudio.com

Matika Wilbur

Matika Wilbur, a graduate of Brooks Institute of Photograpy in Santa Barbara, California and a native of the Swinomish and Tulaiip Nation is an artful storyteller whose images epitomize the old adage, “a picture is worth a thousand words.” Matika’s images have been published in several magazines. Her work is being shown in galleries throughout the United States, and she has upcoming exhibits planned for the international market.

She states, “I have been lucky in my experience and responsibility as a professional photographer to specialize in personal portraiture, a creative and revealing branch of photography that has allowed me to create and exchange of identities and culture among peoples.”

Her work can be viewed at www.matikawibur.com