Research Catalog

Title

Painful beauty : Tlingit women, beadwork, and the art of resilience / Megan A. Smetzer.

Author

Smetzer, Megan A.

Publication

• Seattle : Bill Holm Center for the Study of Northwest Coast Art, Burke Museum : University of Washington Press, [2021]
• ©2021

Items in the Library & Off-site

Details

Description

xiii, 221 pages : illustrations (some color), map; 26 cm.

Summary

"For over 150 years, Tlingit women artists have beaded colorful, intricately beautiful designs on moccasins, dolls, octopus bags, tunics, and other garments. Painful Beauty suggests that at a time when Indigenous cultural practices were actively being repressed, beading supported cultural continuity, demonstrating Tlingit women's resilience, strength, and power. Beadwork served many uses, from the ceremonial to the economic, as women created beaded pieces for community use and to sell to tourists. Like other Tlingit art, beadwork reflects rich artistic visions with deep connections to the environment, clan histories, and Tlingit worldviews. Contemporary Tlingit artists Alison Bremner, Chloe French, Shgen Doo Tan George, Lily Hudson Hope, Tanis S'eiltin, and Larry McNeil foreground the significance of historical beading practices in their diverse, boundary-pushing artworks. Working with museum collection materials, photographs, archives, and interviews with artists and elders, Megan Smetzer reframes this often overlooked artform as a site of historical negotiations and contemporary inspirations. She shows how beading gave Tlingit women the freedom to innovate aesthetically, assert their clan crests and identities, support tribal sovereignty, and pass on cultural knowledge. Painful Beauty is the first dedicated study of Tlingit beadwork and contributes to the expanding literature addressing women's artistic expressions on the Northwest Coast"--

Series Statement

Native art of the Pacific Northwest: A Bill Holm Center series

Uniform Title

Native art of the Pacific Northwest.

Subject

• Tlingit beadwork > Northwest, Pacific
• Tlingit women > Northwest, Pacific
• Tlingit artists > Northwest, Pacific
• ART / Native American
• HISTORY / United States / General
• Tlingit artists
• Tlingit beadwork
• Tlingit women
• Pacific Northwest

Bibliography (note)

• Includes bibliographical references and index.

Call Number

JFF 21-691

ISBN

• 9780295748948
• 029574894X

LCCN

2020055821

OCLC

1202755342

Author

Smetzer, Megan A., author.

Title

Painful beauty : Tlingit women, beadwork, and the art of resilience / Megan A. Smetzer.

Publisher

Seattle : Bill Holm Center for the Study of Northwest Coast Art, Burke Museum : University of Washington Press, [2021]

Copyright Date

©2021

Type of Content

text

Type of Medium

unmediated

Type of Carrier

volume

Series

Native art of the Pacific Northwest: A Bill Holm Center series

Native art of the Pacific Northwest.

Bibliography

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Other Form:

Online version: Smetzer, Megan Alice. Painful beauty Seattle : University of Washington Press, [2021] 9780295748955 (DLC) 2020055822

Research Call Number

JFF 21-691