Oscar Howe
Oscar Howe is recognized as a pivotal figure in Native American art, often referred to as "the father of the new Native American art." His artistic journey began under the mentorship of Dorothy Dunn at the Santa Fe Indian School and continued with Oscar Jacobson at the University of Oklahoma. Throughout his career, Howe achieved significant recognition, including multiple awards and honors such as the Philbrook's Grand Award and the prestigious Waite Phillips Award. He served as a professor at the University of South Dakota and held the title of Artist Laureate of South Dakota.
Despite facing numerous health and social challenges, including a facial skin disease and tuberculosis, Howe's art remained a powerful expression of Sioux culture, focusing on themes of storytelling, hunting, and mythology. His stylistic evolution is notable; before WWII, he employed pastel colors and linear shapes typical of the Santa Fe style, transitioning to bold reds and a more dynamic line work post-war. While some have described his later works as cubist, Howe himself attributed his inspiration to traditional Plains Indian hide painting. In addition to paintings, he created several murals, further contributing to his legacy in the art world.
Oscar Howe
Fine Artist
- Born: May 13, 1915
- Birthplace: Joe Creek, South Dakota
- Died: October 7, 1983
- Place of death: Vermillion, South Dakota
Category: Painter
Tribal affiliation: Yanktonai Sioux
Significance: Howe successfully eschewed the prevailing Native American style with his modernist canvases, initiating the movement of contemporary Native American art
Oscar Howe has been called “the father of the new Native American art.” His painting career began under Dorothy Dunn at the Santa Fe Indian School and continued under Oscar Jacobson at the University of Oklahoma. In Howe’s career he was a commissioner for the Works Progress Administration, five-time winner of the Philbrook’s Grand Award, professor at the University of South Dakota, 1966 Waite Phillip’s Award recipient, Artist Laureate of South Dakota, and holder of several honorary doctorates. Howe’s life was a tapestry of difficulties. Health problems included an ugly facial skin disease, trachoma, and tuberculosis. Social problems included ostracism, loneliness, slow advancement through schools (he started high school at age twenty), joblessness, and shyness.
His artistic subjects were stories, hunts, and myths of the Sioux—images shaped by his use of line and color. Before World War II, he painted in the Santa Fe style, using pastels and shapes bounded by lines. After the war, he moved away from pastels to use bold reds, and he painted straight lines between points in addition to sinuous lines. His stylized postwar art has been called cubist, which Howe denied, explaining that his influence was, instead, Plains Indian hide painting. Howe also painted a number of murals.