Honor the Treaties

I was driving around West Seattle the other day, and I noticed a series of posters that have been put up on 35th and Avalon.  They were Native American pride posters that were beautiful. I was really curious about whether or not these were from a local artist, or maybe they were a part of a nationwide poster "bomb."  Anyways, when  I looked it all up it turned out that there was an interesting story behind these posters as well.  Below is a "TED" talk on the photographer, Aaron Huey.  He spent five years visiting with the Lakota Nation on their reservation and taking photographs of their lives and the land that they live on.  Huey reminds us that the history of Native Americans is the result of the white man's cruelty which resulted in colonization, forced migration and the systematic destruction of indigenous culture (and population) in the United States.  I really encourage anyone reading this to watch this video, it is eye opening to the problems which still occur on Native American reservations everyday.

edit: Unfortunately, the embed process on this video didn't work on blogger (because it's not a youtube video).  So, here is the link to see the TED video on Aaron Huey's project: http://www.ted.com/talks/view/lang/eng//id/1004

At the end of his time taking pictures of the destruction and poverty of the Native American reservations of the Lakota people, Aaron Huey realized that it would not give justice to put out an installation of photographs, or to write another art book about his time on the Black Hills.  Instead, he got together a few illustrators, including Shepard Fairey (of Obama's hope image, and OBEY) and put together some posters which were to be put all over the nation.  These posters were the ones that I saw by the bus stop of 35th and Avalon, in Seattle - below are the posters.

"We Are Still Here", By Shepard Fairey

"We Belong to the Land! The Land Does Not Belong to Us.", by Ernesto Yerena

"Honor the Treaties", by Ernesto Yerena


These ideas made me think about how the history of the past, while it seems so far away (especially in regards to Native American policy in the United States) that often mistakes can be corrected, and the people who need our help the most can be helped. These "collaborative illustrations" are fascinating because they remind us that we have the power to change what we do not wish to see in the world any longer.