Felt Knowledge Festival celebrates Indigenous culture and traditions
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Artist in Residence Jonathan Thunder began the day by creating drawings based on prompts from children at the Children’s Learning Center. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Artist Naneque LaTender teaches a finger weaving workshop in which participants created yarn belts. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Student dancers and musicians, along with staff and faculty from the Indian Community School’s Teyukhilihwakhwá-sehez perform in the Student Union. The group then invited the audience to join. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Lizz Stachura of Tootsie’s Tea sells painted teacups, blended teas and tea accessories to UWM students. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
The Oneida Hymn Singers of Milwaukee perform. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Oneida Social Dancers perform in the UWM Student Union. Social dances, such as the round dance, rabbit dance, old moccasin dance and canoe or fishing dance, are for the enjoyment of all people.(UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Malia Chow, a native Hawaiian, teaches a workshop and creates “eyelash forever” leis with UWM students. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Laverne Whitebear, quillwork artist, speaks with UWM students about her work and her journey as an artist. Whitebear situated the students in a large circle to maximize the experience. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Jeremy Red Eagle teaches a group of staff, faculty, students and presenters traditional hand games. In addition to playing and teaching the hand game Red Eagle spoke about how the development of physical endurance, coordination, dexterity, quickness and strength is as important to health now as it was in the past. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Kinsale Drake, a poet, editor and playwright, and Lily Painter, a multidisciplinary creative, advocate and storyteller, speak with a large audience of UWM students. The two artists also talked about the NDN Girls Book Club, which aims to amplify native and Indigenous literature and encourage reading among native youth. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
The last performance of the festival was the Hale O Malo – History of Hula. Na Hale Cultural Arts Center teaches traditional Polynesian dance, including hula, and other cultural offerings. Pictured are audience members that volunteered to learn a hula dance. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
Representatives of the UWM American Indian Student Center, Electa Quinney Institute and Sociocultural Programming pose for a photo at the end of the festival. From left are Celeste Clark, Maurina Paradise, Sharity Bassett, Sam Krueger, Mark Freeland and John Contreras. (UWM Photo/Elora Hennessey)
The Indigenous Felt Knowledge Festival brought a celebration of Indigenous culture and traditions to the UWM Student Union last week.
The festival featured Indigenous food, native vendors, craftmakers, workshops, a range of performances from singing to spoken word, and live painting from Artist in Residence Jonathan Thunder.
The festival was put on by the UWM American Indian Student Center, Electa Quinney Institute and Sociocultural Programming.
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