Photo: Celebrating the Native Fashion Movement at Peabody Essex Museum

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The first, large-scale, traveling exhibition of contemporary Native fashion will run at the Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, from November 21, 2015 through March 6, 2016 before heading to other museums in Oregon, Oklahoma and New York City.

The exhibit is titled “Native Fashion Now,” and Karen Kramer, the museum’s curator of Native American Art and Culture, is excited. “The game is on!” she told ICTMN. Modern Native designs are expected to shatter stereotypes and bring attention to issues facing Native people today. The work of the 75 indigenous designers in the show prove this is no anthropology study. This is here and now fashion, presented as a modern Native art form.

Items in the show reflect aspects of being Native that often go unspoken. The influence of other cultures on some pieces reminds viewers that Native life is not what it used to be. Artist Toni Williams created a kimono with Plains ledger scenes as a nod to her friend’s daughter’s Japanese heritage and her own Northern Arapaho culture. A sleek gown by designer Orlando Dugi, Navajo, mixes an African porcupine headpiece with a Native inspired, embroidered wool cape.

The opening weekend will feature panel discussions and workshops with some of the exhibit’s artists.

The exhibit will travel to the Portland Art Museum in Portland, Oregon; the Philbrook Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma; and finally to the Smithsonian Museum of the American Indian in New York City. For more information, call 866‐745-1876 or visit the Peabody Essex Museum website.

RELATED: Native Fashion Movement Celebrated at Peabody Essex Museum

This image was featured in this week’s Indian Country Today Media Network newsletter.