Contemporary Voices: A Native Artist Panel Discussion

Leading contemporary Native artists dive into their art-making & process.

In this insightful panel discussion, leading contemporary Native artists dive into what drives their art-making and process. Panelists include Sterlin Harjo (creator behind the award-winning FX series Reservation Dogs), Tommy Orange (Oakland based novelists and finalized for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize) and Danielle SeeWalker (artist, writer, activists and co-founder The Red Road Project). Moderated by Jackie Keliiaa.

About the Panelists:

Sterlin Harjo
Sterlin Harjo (Seminole/Muscogee) is an award winning filmmaker from Holdenville, Oklahoma. Harjo is the co-creator and showrunner of FX’s Reservation Dogs, winner of the 2022 Peabody award, 2022 Television Academy Honors award, 2022 Independent Spirit Award for Best Comedy Series, and an honoree of the American Film Institute Awards among other accolades.

Harjo has several projects in development, among them is the series Poster Girls (FX), which he co-wrote with bestselling novelist Jonathan Lee, Yellowbird (Paramount+) which he is co-creating with Erica Tremblay, based on Sierra Crane Murdoch’s novel of the same name, and Rezball (Netflix) a series Harjo co-wrote with Sydney Freeland in production with LeBron James’ company SpringHill.

Over his career, Harjo has created and directed five feature films, three narrative dramas and two documentaries. His most recent feature, “Love and Fury,” is a documentary chronicling the work and intersection of over a dozen contemporary Native American artists. “Love and Fury” was acquired by Ava DuVernay’s ARRAY and released on Netflix in December 2021.

Harjo is also a founding member of the Native sketch comedy troupe, the 1491s, and he co-wrote the group’s play, Between Two Knees, an intergenerational comedic love story/musical set against the backdrop of true events in Native American history. Between Two Knees was commissioned in 2018 by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and New Native Theater and recently completed a run in 2024 at the Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC). @sterlinharjo (Instagram)

Tommy Orange
Tommy Orange is an author and filmmaker born and raised in Oakland, California. His debut novel, There There was a New York Times bestseller and named as one of the paper’s 10 Best Books of the Year for 2018. Its many honors include the 2018 PEN America Hemingway Award, The National Book Critics’ Circle John Leonard Prize and the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize; it was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in fiction. His newest release, Wandering Stars, a follow up to There There, is a prequel and sequel following the lives of the beloved characters centered in his debut novel. He earned his MFA at the Institute of American Indian Arts, where he now serves as faculty. Orange is an enrolled member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma.

Danielle SeeWalker
Danielle SeeWalker is a Húŋkpapȟa Lakȟóta citizen of the Standing Rock Sioux Nation in North Dakota. She is a mother, artist, writer, curator, activist and businesswoman and is currently based in Denver, Colorado. Her visual artwork often incorporates the use of mixed media and experimentation while incorporating traditional Native American materials, scenes, and messaging. Storytelling is an integral part of her artwork and pays homage to her identity as a Lakȟóta wíŋyaŋ as well as her passion to redirect the narrative to an accurate and insightful representation of contemporary Native America while still acknowledging historical events.

Danielle is also a freelance writer and recently published her first book, “Still Here: A Past to Present Insight of Native American People & Culture.” She is very dedicated and involved in the Native American community and has served the past two years as Co-Chair for the Denver American Indian Commission. Through her work on the Commission, she has been involved in several pieces of legislation impacting the Native American community including; a law to abolish derogatory Native American mascots (2021) and an effort to create an Office and Liaison for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Relatives (MMIR) investigations (2022 and 2023). Danielle considers herself an “artivist” as she is able to voice many important topics through her artwork and also be boots on the ground to make change happen. Danielle’s exhibition Re-Discovering Native America: Stories in Motion with The Red Road Project runs from April 13 – June 23, 2024 at the Lesher Center for the Arts Bedford Gallery. @seewalker_art (Instagram)

 
Jackie Keliiaa (Moderator)
 Jackie Keliiaa (Yerington Paiute & Washoe) is a comedian, writer, and actor. She has been featured on Comedy Central, Team Coco, Amazon Prime’s First Nations Comedy Experience and she voiced the character Bubble on Spirit Rangers (Netflix). Jackie wrote for the web series You’re Welcome America and was featured in the book, We Had a Little Real Estate Problem. She produces and hosts Good Medicine, an all-Native comedy show which has sold-out theaters in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond. Jackie is a regular at Bay Area venues and has performed at San Francisco SketchFest, Punch Line San Francisco and Cobb’s Comedy Club. @jackiecomedy (Instagram/X)