Recent Additions | Fresh Perspectives

This textile draws upon South Carolina fiber artist Susan Lenz’s spring 2023 experience as an artist in residence at the Sam D. Hamilton Noxubee National Wildlife Refuge in Mississippi. Established in 1940, the refuge’s upland hardwood forests, cypress swamps, and wetlands provide key habitat for migratory birds, overwintering waterfowl, and the endangered red-cockaded woodpecker.

Lenz created this complex piece from layers of polyester stretch velvet fused and backed on repurposed black synthetic packaging felt. To represent tree leaves in the refuge, she used a free-motion sewing machine to embroider the leaf outlines in black cotton thread. In a technique developed by Lenz, exposing the artwork to a burst of intense heat from a heat gun causes the spaces between the fabric shapes to melt away while still retaining the connective threads. She likens the process to controlled burns done in the refuge for maintaining healthy forests, saying, “It transforms the area into something new and beautiful.” Lenz chose her colors to reflect ones seen on her many walks at the refuge: the greens, yellows, and pinks of budding dogwoods and blooming redbuds, as well as the light blue that appears at dawn over 800-acre Bluff Lake.

While Su’a Uilisone Tupuola Fitiao is perhaps best known as a traditional Samoan tattoo master (Tufuga ta Tatau), he is also a skilled siapo artist, incorporating patterns from hand-tapped Tatau into his work, as shown in this piece.

Resembling a large cloth, siapo mamanu is actually hand crafted from the inner bark of a paper mulberry tree (u’a, in the Samoan language) and decorated freehand using plant-based dyes. Here, the brown dye (o’a) is made from the bark of the Blood Tree (Bishofia javanica); it will darken over time and is the common ingredient for all the other dyes. The black dye (lama) is created by mixing o’a with soot from a burned candlenut kernel. The red dye (loa) is achieved by combining o’a with crushed seeds from a Lipstick Tree (Bixa orellana).

Francis Vallejo is a Detroit-based illustrator, associate professor, and two-time participant in Voices of the Wilderness, an artist-in-residence program sponsored by the U.S. Forest Service, National Park Service, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The initiative pairs artists with wilderness specialists and has them assist in research, monitoring, and educational projects in various remote Alaskan locations. In July 2022, Vallejo spent seven days as the resident artist among a team of 11 biologists at the Canning River Bird Camp, an avian research station located in the far northwestern corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Vallejo sketched and photographed his experience as a visual journal ultimately published the following year as an 88-page zine with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

This original drawing reproduced in that publication depicts a red-necked phalarope (Phalaropus lobatus). Because this small shorebird winters in tropical open waters, it is only readily observable when in its summer breeding grounds in the Arctic. Vallejo’s time at Canning left a powerful impression. Said Vallejo, “Now that I am back home in Detroit, I am working to connect Detroit youth to Alaska and expose them to the Alaska wilderness and refuge systems!”

Ian Kuali‘i pays tribute to his Kanaka Maoli (Native Hawaiian) and Mescalero Apache ancestry in his work as a self-taught, multi-disciplinary artist. Influenced by hip hop and his experiences as a graffiti artist, Kuali‘i is widely known both for his public art installations and for his intricate hand-cut paper compositions like this one. Using only an X-Acto blade and a single sheet of paper, Kuali‘i blends bold, traditional patterns with delicate linework in what he describes as “a meditative process of destroying to create.”

Here, he has rendered a portrait of Prince Jonah Kūhiō Kalaniana‘ole (1871–1922), heir to the throne of the Kingdom of Hawai‘i and prince of the House of Kalākaua. There are strong linkages—past and present—between Prince Kūhiō and the work of the Department of the Interior. For the benefit of the Hawaiian People, Prince Kūhiō conceived of the Kahikinui Hawaiian Homestead Association through the Hawaiian Homes Commission Act of 1921, setting aside land for Native Hawaiian homesteaders. Additionally, while serving as Hawai‘i’s non-voting territorial delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives (1902–1921), he introduced legislation in 1916 to create Hawai‘i National Park and in 1919 presented the first bill proposing Hawai‘i statehood. In Hawai‘i, March 26 is celebrated as Prince Kūhiō Day, honoring his birthday and legacy. 

Originally from Texas, Darryl Baird worked for two decades as a commercial and editorial photographer and earned his Master of Fine Arts degree in photography. He then embarked on a 25-year professorship in art at the University of Michigan–Flint. Now semi-retired and living in Oregon, Baird was awarded an artist-in-residence position at the Bureau of Land Management’s Yaquina Head Outstanding Natural Area in Newport, Oregon. For three and a half weeks during the summer of 2023, Baird found Yaquina Head’s interplay between land and sea to be both a “formidable subject” and a source of humbling inspiration. In this image, he captures the site’s famous lighthouse that has been in operation on the Pacific coastline since 1873 and is the tallest in the state at 93 feet. The photograph is paired with medallions commemorating the lighthouse’s 150th anniversary celebrated the same year as Baird’s residency. 
 

Renowned photojournalist and documentarian Manny Crisostomo grew up in Sinajana, Guam, but he left the island to pursue his degree in journalism from the University of Missouri–Columbia. Although his career has since taken him around the world and earned him the highest of accolades, he has remained an advocate and chronicler of the indigenous peoples of the Pacific, including CHamorus living in the Marianas and in the diaspora.

Maintained by the historic Inalahan Foundation, Gef Pa’go is a cultural attraction in Guam’s coastal town of Inarajan. In a village-like setting, visitors can learn the history of the island’s first people, witness demonstrations of traditional arts and crafts, and experience the “Chamorro spirit” by participating in a variety of hands-on activities. The Natibu Dance Academy’s performance captured by Crisostomo in this photograph is one of many ways in which local culture is preserved and passed down to younger generations.