LIFESTYLES
Young artists
go solo for
festival/2C
Seattle artist
new addition
to scene/3C
WEEKEND, MAY 20-21, 2017
Explore
Oregon’s
caves/8C
Cutting
between
worlds
Staff photo by E.J. Harris
Prints dry as students fi ne-tune their work.
A
Nixyaawii students learn
to create linocuts exploring
tribal identity in modern world
By ANTONIO SIERRA
East Oregonian
fter they’re cut, inked and
run through a press, the
prints made by Nixyaawii
Community School students at Crow’s
Shadow Institute of the Arts reveal more
than just art.
Traveling from one Umatilla Indian
Reservation institution to another on May
12, four Nixyaawii students in the studio
that day were diligently working on their
linocuts — carvings made into linoleum
blocks resembling giant stamps.
Crow’s Shadow print master Frank
Janzen moved from student to student,
smoothing out a carving on one of the
linocuts, teaching a new color technique
and offering reminders that time was of
the essence. This was their last day in the
studio before their showcase.
“It’s right down to the wire,” he said.
Nixyaawii senior L’Rissa Sohappy
had multiple linocuts in the print she
was working on, requiring multiple runs
through the press.
With each pass through, a new element
of the print would be revealed, the dark
background, a star, a sun.
Sohappy said her inspiration for
the print just popped into her head, but
another print had more concrete origins.
Sitting on one of the work tables was
a linocut with an elk carved into it. In
immaculate cursive below the elk was
the name of Sohappy’s late father and
the phrase “Yánwa inmí tamnápa,” or
“Forever in my heart” in Umatilla.
Janzen remarked that Sohappy’s cursive was
the best he’d seen in a linocut.
On the opposite end of the studio, Nixyaawii
sophomore Helena Peters was trying a new
coloring technique Janzen had just taught her.
On a table, Janzen painted different shades
of blue in lines that were spread out vertically.
Janzen put a metal roller over the paint and
applied it to Peters’ lincout of a clouded sky,
creating a color gradient effect that made it look
like the clouds were above a dawning horizon.
“Clouds are like my favorite thing in the
entire world,” she said.
Peters said she originally drew the clouds
from her home patio and found the whole
printmaking processing relaxing. With it being
her fi rst year at Nixyaawii, Peters said she was
excited to continue taking classes at Crow’s
Shadow.
A passion for printmaking could even follow
a student outside of school.
Sohappy plans to enlist in the military once
she leaves high school, but she’s considering a
return to printmaking once she’s out.
Michelle Van Pelt, a career/post secondary
counselor at Nixyaawii, said it’s not unusual for
the Nixyaawii studio time to stoke a passion for
art in students.
In its third year, Van Pelt said Crow’s
Shadow essentially acts as an advanced art
class at a school that doesn’t have the funding
to offer a robust arts curriculum.
After making prints at Crow’s Shadow, Van
Pelt said some students have been inspired
to go to art school or even become a print
master.
For tribal students, there’s also a cultural
component. As a part of a portfolio,
Nixxyaawii students were asked to create a
print based around the theme of “Walking
Between Two Worlds,” refl ecting on the
challenge of negotiating tribal identity with
the modern world around them.
Van Pelt said the students struggled to
identify with the theme until they received a
visit from a tribal elder, Antone Minthorn.
Minthorn told them about his childhood
growing up on the reservation, where he
would speak English at school before
returning home to speak Nez Perce.
The class culminates in the Nixyaawii
Community School Student Print Exhibition,
which will feature work from all six students
that participated in this year’s class.
The students get to price their own work
and keep any proceeds made from sales, and
it’s not unusual for non-family members to
purchase some of their prints.
Van Pelt said students often use the
money they make from print sales for
summer programs like Upward Bound, a
college prep program.
“They’re investing in themselves with the
money,” she said.
Crow’s Shadow will host an open
reception at their 48004 St. Andrew’s Road
gallery on Tuesday from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. The
work will continue to be featured at Crow’s
Shadow through June 30.
Staff photos by E.J. Harris
TOP: Nixyaawii senior L’Rissa Sohappy checks to see the quality of the linocut
prints she was working on recently at Crow’s Shadow Institute for the Arts out-
side of Mission. ABOVE: Sophomore Ermia Butler rolls ink on her print matrix.
BOTTOM LEFT: Helena Peters, a junior, watches as master printer Frank Janzen
demonstrates how to make a “rainbow” gradated ink pattern while working on
linocut prints. BOTTOM RIGHT: Freshman Tyanna Broncheau rolls out ink onto a
roller in preparation of making a print.