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January 30, 2003

Art Show and Reception to Honor Oscar Howe Family

SIOUX FALLS - The Center for Western Studies at Augustana College today announced a reception in honor of Mrs. Heidi Howe and her daughter, Inga Dawn Maresh, will be held from 4:30-5:30 p.m. Wednesday, February 12, in the Fantle Building.

The reception also marks the official opening of the Center's latest art show, “American Indian Life in Art.” The exhibit features 11 originals, prints, and lithographs by the late Oscar Howe, and 72 additional pieces from the Center's permanent collection. At 5:00 p.m., Professor John Day, dean of fine arts at the University of South Dakota, will give a short gallery talk about Howe's art.

Howe, a Yanktonai Sioux from the Crow Creek Reservation, was South Dakota's Artist Laureate for 23 years, having been named in 1960 by Governor Lars Herseth. Of his own work, Howe said, “A person is better for knowing and...also experiencing two cultures. Art provides the meeting ground as a medium of communication.”

Pieces from the Center's permanent collection on display in the Nelson and Elmen Galleries, and elsewhere on the main floor, include a painting and a pencil sketch by Arthur Amiotte, once of student of Howe's, and artwork by Andrew Standing Soldier, Alfred Ziegler, Harvey Rattey, Larry De Couteau, Marvin Helper, Lorenzo Black Lance, Fred Beaver, Herman Red Elk, Bud Boller, Clarence Ellsworth, O.C. Seltzer, L. Lova Jones, Jules Tavernier, and Thomas McKenney.

Two large collections are featured in the Nelson and Elmen Galleries. There are 24 reproductions of engravings by Seth Eastman, the artist who began painting the Dakota Sioux at Fort Snelling in Minnesota in 1830 and produced an unequalled body of work showing ordinary Dakota men and women at their everyday lives. A second group of reproductions, 18 pieces in all, represents the work of Elbridge Ayer Burbank, known as a painter of Indian chiefs. In watercolor, oil and crayon, Burbank painted more than 1,200 portraits from 125 tribes.

“American Indian Life in Art” will be on display through mid-April. Admission to the show is free. Hours for the Center for Western Studies are 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. and 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Saturdays.