On Native Land - January 7 – March 24

This exhibit features the photography of Joseph Allen (Rosebud Sioux), Manidoikwe Devlin (St. Croix Nation), David Manuel (Red Lake Nation), and E. Jourdain Jr (Red Lake Nation). These images celebrate the diversity and importance of land to Indigenous communities.

Plus: We are inviting photographers everywhere to submit work for this exhibit. Enter via social media, where our juror will select pieces to be part of an evolving collage on one wall of the exhibit. Post your submission to your personal Instagram or Facebook page using the hashtags: #OnNativeLand #WatermarkArtCenter. You must use both hashtags to enter. Submissions will be accepted throughout the duration of the show, but work must be submitted by January 29 to be up in time for the artist reception. If your piece is chosen, our juror will send a Direct Message and arrange for you to email the file to Watermark for printing. We encourage all people with a relationship to land to enter.

Artist Statements:

Manidoikwe Eninatik Devlin (St. Croix Band of Chippewa) – I walk in our world, wandering about so, trying to capture that beauty that is given to us every single day. Growing up I was lucky to have a parent who had me stop, listen, see, and feel that beauty all around us. We would stop and just stand, just be. Listening to those leaves clap just for us. Music is everywhere in nature. The sounds of the wind blowing through the treetops, the sounds of crickets as they chirp so, the sound of the leaves as they clap back and forth. My home, my heart is in our woods, with our water and with our trees and plants. There is an incredibly sense of healing in the woods, in nature. She gives us medicine, she gives us music, she gives us our ability to exist. We are the lucky ones here on this earth, in this beauty. I want to show what I see and what I feel when I'm out in that pretty world.

David Manuel is an enrolled member of the Red Lake Nation and seeks to preserve the visual poetry of his surroundings and actions of others. His relationship with the camera began about ten years ago when his wife, Laura, bought him one as a gift. Originally taking photos for his own edification, he began to share them on his Facebook page, where he was encouraged to continue the endeavor. His first camera was a Canon, but it broke. He now uses a Nikon he bought from Walmart.

E. Jourdain, Jr. (Red Lake Nation: A man with a camera capturing life and Mother Nature in all her beauty, as well as other scenes in society such as concerts, events and community gatherings. As a lifelong resident of rural northern Minnesota, it's only natural that nature is my favorite subject to photograph as we have that beauty here in front of us every day. Photography is my anti-anxiety medication. I am most relaxed when it's just me and my camera. I am at my most focused when I am looking at a subject through my viewfinder.

https://watermarkartcenter.org/2018/12/17/on-native-land/?fbclid=IwAR3G-WVXRgwF2mTA2iLRSNyYjd5JS1jjUaoDk89kJ2Mvg37_lVycm-3krsk