Community/Nation/Tribe: enrolled citizen of the Kuruk tribe
Materials/Processes: digital illustration
Themes: Indigenous identity, culture, and assimilation
Online Resources:
- https://www.instagram.com/jearicafountain_designs/?hl=en
- https://www.instagram.com/jearicafountain/?hl=en
Statements/Bios in Artists’ Words:
I create art that actively decolonizes and breaks down the colonial borders that we have. … I get to find out a new medium of expressing myself through art, and that’s something I’ve been actively working toward, finding other mediums of Native storytelling. I’ve always done art. It’s just have been my medium of choice, it’s how I’ve expressed myself. These days, I use my art for empowering Indigenous people. I think that’s one big thing, is to see ourself in a positive light. We are still here. We are a happy, joyous community, and I want to portray that. The most important thing about our story is that we tell it. I think it’s very important for us to now say, “Hey, we share our narrative. We share our stories so that you can get an accurate understanding of who we are and what we’ve been through and where we’re going.”
(source)
My art comes from community need and community impact. Across the country, Native Americans and other US citizens are being detained by ICE. All the tactics they are using, all have been done on indigenous people, especially here in Minnesota. From the Starlight tours to withholding food rations or threatening to withhold food rations, assistance, this is wrong. This is not okay. and we need to end this.
I just never really thought of [political art] that way until so many people were like, “No, your art is a form of resistance. It’s historical.” And that’s where it kind of like grew into me to realize it is a form of resistance.
(source)