We Remember Your Sacrifices, You Are Not Forgotten: The Story and Art of the Stewart Indian School
Carson City, Nev. – The Truckee Parks and Recreation Community Center opened a new traveling art exhibit called “We Remember Your Sacrifices; You Are Not Forgotten: The Story and Art of the Stewart Indian School.” This new display is a partnership between the Stewart Indian School Cultural Center & Museum; Nevada Indian Commission; Visit Carson City; and Great Basin Native Artists Collective. This exhibit, located in Carson City, Nevada, is displayed from July 13-Oct. 20.
The exhibit tells the story of Stewart Indian School, a federal government boarding school located south of Carson City, where Native American children of the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California, Western Shoshone, Northern Paiute, and Southern Paiute were removed from their families and land to learn English and job skills. Eventually, Native children from over 200 tribal nations attended the school between 1890 and 1980.
While at Stewart, many students studied art and expressed their creativity by learning stone masonry, which is found in the beautiful buildings on campus. The students were taught by Hopi stonemasons from Arizona, and their artistry is demonstrated in the 65 buildings still existing on the 110-acre campus. In addition to the stone masonry, students painted murals in some of the buildings and left behind much of their artwork in the form of paintings, wood carvings, baskets, and beaded work.
The artwork continues today in the contemporary work by Great Basin Native Artists Collective, managed by Melissa Melero-Moose (Fallon Paiute/Modoc) and displayed at the museum’s Great Basin Native Artist Gallery. Some of this contemporary art is displayed in the Truckee exhibit demonstrating the continuity of traditional Native art in contemporary forms.
The vision of the Stewart Indian School Cultural Center & Museum is to honor the children at Stewart, tell their stories through museum exhibits and first-person accounts on touch screens, and help the living alumni, their families, and tribal communities to heal. This exhibit invites visitors to come to Carson City and learn from stories shared by Stewart alumni of how the school evolved from the early boarding school days with the cruel assimilation policy into a high school that Native students wanted to attend.
The Stewart Indian School Cultural Center & Museum (SISCCM) is located at 1 Jacobsen Way, Carson City, Nevada, and is open Monday-Friday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and closed on state and federal holidays. For more information about SISCC&M, contact Bobbi Rahder, Museum Director, at 775-687-7606, or [email protected], or visit: www.StewartIndianSchool.com. For more information about the Great Basin Native Artists Collective, visit http://www.greatbasinnativeartists.com/.