by K.J. Lincoln
Maria Rosario Jackson, PhD, chair of the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) traveled to Alaska for visits to Anchorage, Bethel, and Juneau, August 21-23, 2024. Chairwoman Jackson visited all three locations as an opportunity for the NEA to listen and understand the different needs of artists and local arts organizations and the impact of the arts in their communities. She focused her visits on exploring the integration of arts and culture in multiple areas, including health and well-being, to support both individuals and communities.
NEA Chair Jackson was accompanied by Alaska State Council on the Arts Chairman Benjamin Brown, NEA Public Affairs Specialist Allison Hill, Creative Forces Director Bill O’Brien, Special Assistant for Chair Initiatives Katherine Bray-Simons, NEA Attorney Jean Choi, and NEA Chief of Staff Ra Joy.
During their visit to Bethel, the group stopped at the Yupiit Piciryarait Cultural Center for a meet and greet with Southwest Alaskan artists, arts leaders, and local civic leaders. Chair Jackson provided brief remarks.
She said that they are there to help people in communities by offering opportunities for the arts and to help them understand their own creative power on how to make, how to do, how to teach, and how to learn, and to recover the arts that were lost.
“The idea of recovering culture is so important for our well-being as a nation and for individual cultures and the diversity that we prize so much. The ability to have these different expressions – especially the expressions that have been harmed in some ways, or restricted, or tampered with. The recovery of that is so important,” she said. “I have a big interest in understanding how it connects with wellness and health, arts are a critical element of having a healthy life and what it is to be well. Arts are an important part of that.”
She thanked everyone at the Bethel gathering for their work with arts and culture.
Cama-i Festival coordinator Linda Curda gave a history of the Cama-i Dance Festival, covering the resurgence and revitalization of Yup’ik Eskimo Dance in southwestern Alaska which is celebrated each year at in the spring in Bethel.
Afterwards, everyone was invited to tour the Yupiit Piciryarait Cultural Museum, to view the collection of historical Yup’ik Eskimo art.
The group also visited the Yukon Kuskokwim Health Corporation to honor local artist John Oscar as the visit’s featured artist, who created the “All a One” mural at the Yukon Kuskokwim Delta Regional Hospital.
NEA Chair Jackson and her entourage also visited a Yup’ik grass sewing class in progress hosted by the Southwest Alaska Arts Group. They saw firsthand grass sewing students, many who have never sewed grass before, mingqiiqing and working on their grass projects in the southwestern Yup’ik Eskimo style with grass that was harvested in Bethel.
In Juneau, the Chair Jackson and her staff walked along the Kootéeyaa Deiyí (Totem Pole Trail), which is a project supported by an FY 2022 NEA grant. The group also toured the Atnané Hit: House of art through the Sealaska Heritage Institute.
