Teri Greeves, a Kiowa artist, celebrates her husband's Anishinaabe culture in this artwork through beaded designs inspired by aesthetics and dance traditions indigenous to the Great Lakes region. Floral motifs and contemporary jingle-dress dancers in complementary colors adorn a pair of high-heeled sneakers, a riff on the traditional knee-high moccasins worn by Kiowa women. Along with glass and bugle beads, the designs are made with chonchos and cabochon shells, which add a three-dimensional element to the work, and Swarovski crystals. Greeves says, "I found a way to use the materials and techniques of the old masters and mix them up with new materials and techniques for my generation, all in an attempt to interpret this twenty-first century world I live in."
This work recently came back on view, you can find it in the American Art galleries.
Posted by Elizabeth Treptow Teri Greeves (Kiowa, born 1970). Great Lakes Girls, 2008. Glass beads, bugle beads, Swarovski crystals, sterling silver stamped conchae, spiny oyster shell cabochons, canvas high-heeled sneakers. Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Stanley J. Love, by exchange, 2009.1a-b. Creative Commons-BY
