OSCAR HOWE

- OSCAR HOWE -

Yanktonai Sioux, 1915-1983

Oscar Howe was one of the most significant and influential American artists of the 20th century. Howe is cherished for his innovative approach to traditional Native American art. His contributions to the development of contemporary Native American painting cannot be overstated. Howe, a Yanktonai Dakota artist, was born on the Crow Creek Indian Reservation in South Dakota. His early life was marked by traditional Dakota values, which deeply influenced his artistic vocabulary. 

Howe's career gained national recognition in 1958 when his work was controversially rejected by the Philbrook Art Center’s Native American art competition. The artist’s submission was deemed too "non-traditional." In response, Howe wrote a passionate and defiant letter defending his artistic style and the right of all Native artists to evolve beyond stereotypical forms. Howe began the letter “Who ever said, that my paintings are not in the traditional Indian style, has poor knowledge of Indian Art indeed.” He went on to say, “I only hope the Art World will not be one more contributor to holding us in chains.” Oscar Howe’s strident defense of artistic freedom made waves in the art world and fundamentally shifted perspectives on what Native American art could or “should” be. 

There have been solo exhibitions of Oscar Howe’s work at institutions including the Joslyn Art Museum in Omaha, as well as a retrospective organized by the University of South Dakota that traveled to the Gilcrease Museum and the Heard Museum. In 2022, Dakota Modern: The Art of Oscar Howe was organized by the Portland Art Museum and traveled to the National Museum of the American Indian in New York and the South Dakota Art Museum. This last retrospective was an astonishing assemblage of Howe’s career and met with unbridled national and International acclaim.

Major institutions in the U.S. hold iconic examples of Oscar Howe’s work in their collections, including the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, the Portland Art Museum, Denver Art Museum, South Dakota Art Museum, Montclair Art Museum, Philbrook Museum and the Nelson-Atkins Museum, among many other prominent institutions.