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Unknown Maker, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe)

Bandolier Bag

Maker

Unknown Maker, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe)

Culture

Anishinaabe (Ojibwe), Native North American

Title

Bandolier Bag

Year

1875-1899

Medium

  • Linen plain weave and cotton velvet with glass-bead embellishment

Materials/Techniques

Techniques

  • Linen plain weave and cotton velvet with glass-bead embellishment

Materials

glass, linen, wood, cotton

Dimensions

121.9 x 36.8 cm (48 x 14 1/2 inches)

Credit / Object Number

Credit

Gift of Margaret McCarthy

Object Number

1991.027

Type

  • Costume Accessories

Publications

  • Journal

Manual / Issue 15: Green

RISD Museum’s Manual 15 Celebrates Green

New life is always shown to us through mokingpu, the color green-the light green stems of rabbitbrush, one of the few colors seen the winter; the tender green shoots of new corn that emerge in the spring against the backdrop of the dry brown earth. Green offers hope. Green represents life.

-Susan Sekaquaptewa

A welcome splash of color after a long winter, the RISD Museum’s fifteenth issue of Manual is awash in shades of green, celebrating the color's myriad associations with nature and growth, environmentalism and sustainable practices, newness and hope (as well as poison and currency) and delving into the histories of specific pigments and processes. Manual 15 opens with an introductory essay by Hopi grower Susan Sekaquaptewa, who details the soft hues of the flora of Northern Arizona. “You appreciate plants more when you develop a relationship with them,” she explains.

This issue of Manual is supported in part by a grant from the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts, through an appropriation by the Rhode Island General Assembly and a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. Additional generous support is provided by the RISD Museum Associates and Sotheby’s.

Exhibition History

“Insnared with flowers, I fall on grass"
Jun 10, 2014 – Mar 08, 2015

Label copy

Bandolier bags, modeled on European shot pouches, were worn by Native men on formal or festive occasions. Also called friendship bags, they often were made as gifts to other groups. This exuberant piece from the upper Midwest features highly stylized vegetal and floral motifs expertly crafted in glass beads imported from Italy or Czechoslovakia. Floral beadwork motifs were introduced into the Native American design vocabulary by French nuns who established themselves in Quebec in the early 17th century and moved westward.

Form, Pattern, and Function
Design in American Indian Art
Dec 04, 1992 – Jan 24, 1993

Label copy

One of the results of European contact with Native Americans was the introduction of floral beadwork and embroidery motifs into their traditional design repertoire. As traders moved West so too did missionaries who established schools to instruct the Indians. By the 1860s schools were established in the Subartctic region, around trading posts along Hudson's Bay and farther west. Missionary nuns instructed Indian girls in needlework and introduced them to floral styles which were adapted for their own uses. The mittens in this case are an example of the type of work being done by the Cree Indians living near the Hudson's Bay posts. Floral motifs were strongest in the decorative arts of the Indians around the Great Lakes as is evident in the Chippewa bandolier bag and mittens exhibited in this case. As floral styles moved westward they became more stylized as can be seen in both the man's vest, a clothing style also adopted from the Europeans, and in the pipe bag which shows how this floral style was adapted by members of the western Plains Ojibwa.

Image use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use.

Public Domain This object is in the Public Domain and available under a CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

Tombstone

Unknown Maker, Anishinaabe (Ojibwe)
Bandolier Bag, 1875-1899
Linen plain weave and cotton velvet with glass-bead embellishment
121.9 x 36.8 cm (48 x 14 1/2 inches)
Gift of Margaret McCarthy 1991.027

To request new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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