Julie Buffalohead
{{short description|Indigenous American artist}}
Julie Buffalohead (born 1974) is a contemporary Indigenous artist from the United States and member of Ponca Tribe of Indians of Oklahoma.{{Cite web |title=Julie Buffalohead {{!}} CV {{!}} Jessica Silverman Gallery |url=https://jessicasilvermangallery.com/julie-buffalohead/cv/ |access-date=2024-04-19 |website=jessicasilvermangallery.com}}{{Cite book |last1=Campbell |first1=Suzan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=D2vqAAAAMAAJ&q=Julie+Buffalohead |title=The American West: People, Places, and Ideas |publisher=Rockwell Museum of Western Art |year=2001 |isbn=9781889921143}}{{Cite web |last=Combs |first=Marianne |date=15 January 2015 |title=Artist Julie Buffalohead uses animals to tell unsettling stories |url=https://www.mprnews.org/story/2015/01/15/julie-buffalohead |access-date=2019-05-11 |website=www.mprnews.org}}{{Cite web |date=2015-01-08 |title=St. Paul artist Julie Buffalohead explores Native American themes |url=https://www.twincities.com/2015/01/08/st-paul-artist-julie-buffalohead-explores-native-american-themes/}} Her work mainly focuses on themes of racial injustice, indigenous rights, and abuse of power.{{Cite web|url=https://iaia.edu/event/truth-stories-julie-buffalohead/|title=The Truth About Stories: Julie Buffalohead > Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA)|website=Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA)|language=en-US|access-date=2019-05-11}}{{Cite news | url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/31/arts/design/native-american-women-art.html |title = The Hand of Native American Women, Visible at Last|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 2019-05-31|last1 = Thackara|first1 = Tess}} She creates paintings with stories told by anthropomorphic animal characters who have agency as individuals. Buffalohead conflates the mythical with the ordinary, the imaginary, and the real, and offers a space into which viewers can bring their own experiences.{{Cite web |title=Storytelling: Julie Buffalohead {{!}} Minneapolis Institute of Art |url=https://new.artsmia.org/exhibition/storytelling-julie-buffalohead/ |access-date=2024-04-19 |website=new.artsmia.org}}
Early life and education
Born in Minnesota in 1974, Buffalohead grew up around academia, as both of her parents were college professors.{{Cite web |last=Smith |first=Beverly Hall |date=July 9, 2020 |title=Looking at the Masters: Julie Buffalohead |url=https://talbotspy.org/looking-at-the-masters-julie-buffalohead/ |access-date=May 7, 2024 |website=The Talbot Spy}} Notably, her father, Roger Buffalohead, was one of the first professors of the American Indian Studies department at the University of Minnesota. With a Native American father and white mother, Buffalohead but she explores her mixed-race identity within her art.{{Cite web |last=Regan |first=Sheila |date=February 16, 2015 |title=Julie Buffalohead’s Theater of Animals |url=https://hyperallergic.com/182986/julie-buffaloheads-theater-of-animals/ |access-date=May 7, 2024}} In 1995, she received her Bachelor in Fine Arts from the Minneapolis College of Art and Design before going on to get her Master of Fine Arts from Cornell University in 2001.{{Cite web|url=http://bockleygallery.com/artist_buffalohead/index.html|title=Bockley Gallery :: Artists :: Julie Buffalohead|website=bockleygallery.com|access-date=2019-05-11}} Buffalohead has stated that her time working with elementary school students while in graduate school caused her to change the way she looked at her Native heritage, which led her to create art about Indigenous history.{{Cite web|url=https://mcad.edu/125/alumni/julie-buffalohead|title=Julie Buffalohead|website=mcad.edu|language=en|access-date=2019-05-11}} She currently resides in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Artistic style and influences
File:You are on Indian Land, 2017, Julie Buffalohead at NGA 2023.jpeg in 2023]]
Buffalohead's art focuses on Indigenous experiences and stories, often subverting imagery of Indigenous people used in popular culture, including Disney's Pocahontas.{{Cite web|url=http://collections.artsmia.org/art/120375/pocahontas-cessation-julie-buffalohead|title=Pocahontas Cessation, Julie Buffalohead ^ Minneapolis Institute of Art|website=collections.artsmia.org|access-date=2019-05-11}} She often uses metaphors and allegorical images in her work to critique social issues including gun violence. Her work may include whimsical imagery like tea parties and cartoon characters, Buffalohead claims that the work is intended to be unsettling. Buffalohead's work also incorporates the use of anthropomorphic animals, mainly coyotes.{{Cite web|url=https://www.fictionunbound.com/blog/personal-narratives-julie-buffalohead|title=Personal Narratives and the Eye of the Beholder: Julie Buffalohead at the Denver Art Museum|website=Fiction Unbound|date=7 December 2018 |language=en-US|access-date=2019-05-11}} Buffalohead is a mixed media artist, and works with many different mediums, including oil painting and printmaking, and includes materials like birch bark and porcupine quills in her pieces.
Solo exhibitions
- 2000 - Offerings From the Heart at Carl N. Gorman Museum in Davis, CA.
- 2003 - Alice P. Rogers Gallery at St. Johns University in Collegeville, MN.
- 2008 - Expecting at the Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.
- 2010 - Julie Buffalohead at the Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.
- 2012 - Julie Buffalohead at the Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.
- 2012 - Julie Buffalohead, Let the Show Begin at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian George Gustave Haye Center in New York, NY.{{Cite web | url=https://americanindian.si.edu/explore/exhibitions/item?id=665 |title = Julie Buffalohead: Let the Show Begin | National Museum of the American Indian}}
- 2014 - Julie Buffalohead: Uncommon Stories at the Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.
- 2014-2015 - Julie Buffalohead: Coyote Dreams at the Minnesota Museum of American Art in St. Paul, MN{{Cite web | url=https://www.minnpost.com/artscape/2014/12/julie-buffalohead-coyote-dreams-first-3-winter-native-american-exhibits/ | title='Julie Buffalohead: Coyote Dreams': First of 3 winter Native American exhibits| date=2014-12-18}} and the Plains Art Museum in Fargo, ND.
- 2015 - The Truth About Stories: Julie Buffalohead at Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM.
- 2015-2016 - Entwined: New Prints by Julie Buffalohead at Highpoint Center for Printmaking in Minneapolis, MN.
- 2017 - Julie Buffalohead at the Bockley Gallery in Minneapolis, MN.{{Cite web | url=http://www.startribune.com/animal-tricksters-rule-in-julie-buffalohead-s-narrative-artworks/464425023/ | title=Animal tricksters rule in Julie Buffalohead's narrative artworks| website=Star Tribune}}
- 2018 - Julie Buffalohead: You and I at Western Carolina University Fine Art Museum, John W. Bardo Fine and Performing Arts Center in Cullowhee, NC.
- 2018-2019 - Eyes On: Julie Buffalohead at the Denver Art Museum in Denver, CO.{{Cite web | url=https://www.santafenewmexican.com/pasatiempo/art/animal-dreams-julie-buffalohead/article_a92c398b-70e6-5095-bf8c-76e955d66dc2.html |title = Animal dreams: Julie Buffalohead| date=17 August 2018 }}
- 2019: Storytelling: Julie Buffalohead, Minneapolis Institute of Art, MN
- 2022: Julie Buffalohead, Perlman Teaching Museum, Carleton College, Northfield, MN
- 2022: Noble Coyotes, Jessica Silverman, San Francisco, CA
- 2023: Decolonize Indigenize, Visions West Contemporary, Denver, CO
Group exhibitions
- 2019 - Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists at Minneapolis Institute of Art in Minneapolis, MN.{{Cite book|title=Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists|publisher=Seattle : University of Washington Press|year=2019|oclc=1105604814}}
- 2020 - Indelible Ink: Native Women, Printmaking, Collaboration. University of New Mexico Art Museum in Albuquerque, NM.{{Cite web|title=Indelible Ink: Native Women, Printmaking, Collaboration – UNM Art Museum|url=https://artmuseum.unm.edu/exhibition/indelible-ink-native-women-printmaking-collaboration/|access-date=2021-03-31|language=en-US}}
- 2021 - Shared Ideologies at the Muscarelle Museum of Art in Williamsburg, VA.{{cite web | url=https://muscarelle.wm.edu/exhibition_record/shared-ideologies/ | title=Shared Ideologies }}
Honors and awards
Collections
Her work is included in the collection of the Walker Art Museum{{Cite web|title=Julie Buffalohead|url=http://walkerart.org/collections/artists/julie-buffalohead|access-date=2021-03-31|website=walkerart.org|language=en-US}} and the Muscarelle Museum of Art.{{cite web | url=https://proficio1.campus.wm.edu/ProficioWebModule/Results.aspx?pS=Julie%20Buffalohead&db=objects&dir=MUSCAREL | title=Web Module - Results Page }}
References
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Category:Minneapolis College of Art and Design alumni
Category:Cornell University alumni
Category:21st-century American women artists
Category:21st-century Native American women
Category:21st-century Native American artists