COMMUNITY FORUM
About Us
This website and community forum are for to everyone who participated in the 'Centering Indigenous Practices in Museums' conference in September 2023. We invite you to sign up, share your resources, and contribute your thoughts to continue fostering the relationships and networks we started at the conference!
Blue Lodge Sky, drawing by Jason Wesaw (Potawatomi)
It brought together knowledge-sharers, including Indigenous and non-Indigenous curators, artists, scholars, and community members who have contributed to transforming museum practice using Indigenous-informed methodologies.
Presentations, discussions, and workshops were grounded in specific approaches and experiences to illuminate pathways for ongoing work.
Themes of collaboration and reciprocity, challenges in artistic practice, and confronting colonial legacies guided the conference sessions and activities.
Buffalo Dancers Study, 2016, acrylic on canvas, Frank Buffalo Hyde
Kelly Church (Odawa and Pottawatomi), Sustaining traditions–Digital Memories, 2018. Black ash, sweetgrass, Rit dye, copper, vial EAB, flash drive with black ash teachings.
2023 CIPiM CONFERENCE
Planning Committee
This conference is made possible by a collective effort between staff from the Field Museum and Northwestern University's Center for Native American and Indigenous Research and Block Museum of Art. You can learn more about us and our organizations and institutions below.
We look forward to meeting you!
The Field Museum
The Field Museum’s mission is to connect all of us to the natural world and the human story. Founded in 1893 as an outgrowth of the World’s Columbian Exposition, our collections have grown to nearly 40 million artifacts and specimens over more than 125 years. In addition to the exhibition and preservation of our treasured collections, we inspire curious minds through education programs focused on preK-12th grade, and work globally to understand and protect the natural world through our scientific research and environmental conservation efforts.
Alaka Wali
Curator Emeritus,
North American Anthropology
Senior Environmental Social Scientist
Center for Native American and Indigenous Research, Northwestern University
The Center for Native American and Indigenous Research (CNAIR) has its origins in student activism in 2013 and was established in 2017 as Northwestern University’s primary institutional space dedicated to advancing scholarship, teaching, learning, and artistic or cultural practices related to Native American and Indigenous communities, priorities, histories, and lifeways. The Center operates as an intellectual hub for multi-disciplinary, collaborative work informed by and responsive to Native American and Indigenous nations, communities, and organizations, engaging faculty, students, staff, and community members.
Menominee, Oneida
Associate Director,
Community Outreach
and Engagement
Isleta Pueblo, Filipina & Italian
Program Assistant
Oneida
Associate Professor of History
Block Museum of Art, Northwestern University
Founded in 1980, the Block Museum of Art enriches teaching and learning on the Chicago and Evanston campuses of Northwestern University and in their surrounding communities by presenting art across time, cultures, and media; convening interdisciplinary discussions in which art is a springboard for exploring current issues and ideas; and collecting art that amplifies the Northwestern curriculum. As a crossroad between campus and community, the Block creates an environment where all visitors feel welcome to participate. Free and open to all, the museum reaches national and international audiences through traveling exhibitions, publications, media coverage, and digital presence. The Block’s collection of over 6,000 works, accessible online, serves as a teaching and learning resource across and beyond Northwestern.
Associate Director of Curatorial Affairs; Professor of Practice in Anthropology
Steven and Lisa Munster Tananbaum Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art
Thank You to Our Sponsors and Partner Organizations
