Art that carries stories
Apache visual art sits between two worlds that are often kept apart: the handwork of Apache crafts such as beadwork and basketry, and the studio work of painters and sculptors. In practice the boundary is thin. Many artists work in more than one medium, and many of them describe their subjects as stories drawn from family, homeland and history. This article focuses on visual art by named Apache artists, with particular attention to beadwork, painting and sculpture.
Apache storytelling has long been an oral art, so visual work often acts as a companion to it. A picture, a beaded design or a carved figure can point to a story without retelling it, and the full story remains with the people who have the right to tell it.
Beadwork
Glass seed beads, obtained through trade, became a major material for Apache makers. Apache beadwork appears on moccasins, bags, belts, cradleboards, necklaces and ceremonial items. The look differs by nation and period. Plains Apache beadwork, for example, shares much with neighboring Plains traditions, while Western Apache and Mescalero work has its own design habits.
Individual beadworkers are often known within their communities and at regional markets, though many are not widely documented in books. Because no reliable published list covers every working artist, this article does not try to name them. The best way to find current beadworkers is through the official cultural offices and art markets of the nations themselves.
Painting
Apache painting in the gallery sense developed mostly in the twentieth century. In the 1930s a painting program at the Santa Fe Indian School, often called the Studio and led by Dorothy Dunn, trained a number of young Native painters. It encouraged a flat, clear style that became widely recognized, and later artists both used and pushed back against it. Many Apache painters since then have moved between figurative work, abstraction and contemporary themes, and Apache artists activism, along with identity, is a theme in some contemporary work.
Allan Houser
The most widely known Apache artist is Allan Houser, also written Haozous, a Chiricahua Apache born in Oklahoma in 1914. His family belonged to the Chiricahua community that had been held as prisoners of war for more than two decades, and the history of that confinement shaped his upbringing. He studied painting at the Santa Fe Indian School, completed a mural for the Department of the Interior building in Washington in the late 1930s, and later turned increasingly to sculpture.
From the early 1960s he taught at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, where he influenced a generation of Native artists. He worked in stone, wood and bronze, and his sculpture is often described as combining figurative traditions with modern abstraction. He received the National Medal of Arts in 1992 and died in 1994. His work is held in museums and public collections in the United States and elsewhere.
Houser often returned to Apache subjects, but he also made work that was not tied to a single theme, and critics have noted that he resisted being labeled only as a “Native artist.” His example is a reminder that Apache artists decide for themselves how their work relates to their heritage.
Bob Haozous and others
Allan Houser’s son Bob Haozous, also a Chiricahua Apache, is a sculptor known for large metal works. His pieces often address contemporary social and political questions and are in a very different style from his father’s. Other family members and artists have also continued to work in sculpture and painting, but this page names only artists whose basic facts are well documented.
Beyond the best-known names are many Apache artists who work in jewelry, photography, printmaking, ceramics and digital media. The Native American art market Apache artists belong to includes juried shows, gallery representation and online sales, and each venue has its own expectations about authenticity and labeling.
Reading the art carefully
A few cautions help when looking at Apache art.
- Symbols are not a universal code. A motif in one community may carry a meaning that is not shared in another, and many designs are purely decorative.
- Not every work is for public display. Some objects are tied to ceremony and are not displayed or sold.
- Labels matter. Work sold as “Native made” should be made by an enrolled member of a recognized tribe or a certified artisan under federal law, and buyers can ask for the artist’s name and nation.
- Artists are individuals. Apache artists differ widely in style, subject and view, and no one speaks for the whole community.
Seeing the work in person, through tribal museums, regional museums and markets, usually teaches more than any short summary can.