Cradleboard

ca. 1890
Not on view
Returned to lender
This work of art was on loan to the museum and has since been returned to its lender.
Multicolored depictions of horses, flags, and Thunderbirds adorn this heavily beaded cradleboard. Created in pairs, the images relate to both the physical and the spiritual worlds. The artist used the typical Métis spot-stitch beading technique for the figures and geometric motifs, and filled the white background with parallel lines in lane (or lazy) stitching. Although the beadwork resembles the artistry of Kiowa women, the cradleboard’s construction identifies it as Lakota. The American flag signifies tribal patriotism and family pride.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Cradleboard
  • Date: ca. 1890
  • Geography: United States, North or South Dakota
  • Culture: Lakota (Teton Sioux)
  • Medium: Wood, rawhide, glass beads, native-tanned leather, muslin, brass tacks, silk ribbon, cotton cloth
  • Dimensions: Length: 43 in. (109.2 cm)
  • Classifications: Wood-Implements, Hide-Implements, Beads
  • Credit Line: Collection of Berte and Alan Hirschfield
  • Curatorial Department: The Michael C. Rockefeller Wing

Audio

Cover Image for 9812: Plains Beadwork

9812: Plains Beadwork

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AMBER-DAWN BEAR ROBE: Art and culture is a living and breathing entity and never stuck in a nostalgic past, which I think you can really see in beadwork.

TANTOO: This is Amber-Dawn Bear Robe, an art historian and curator originally from the Siksika Nation in the Plains region of Canada. She notes that beaded works often embrace a multitude of historical, contemporary, personal, and regional influences.

Take a moment to study the details on the beaded piece displayed here – also from the Plains region. Although it’s now shown in a museum, it was made to be used and cherished.

AMBER-DAWN: Each work of art that you see in a museum was made by an individual artist, and the time and the technique and the skill that has been passed down from generations, thousands of years of generations, is unimaginable.

My grandmother was an avid bead worker, bead artist. She beaded all the regalia for my father, my grandfather, myself, and my auntie, and she did not make this beadwork that was something to be sold or to be displayed in a museum. Rather, all the hard work and the technique and the skill and the time and the patience to all the beadwork that she created was for family.

TANTOO: Beadwork remains a rich and expressive practice across many Indigenous cultures today. Amber-Dawn sees firsthand the vast range of beadwork that’s still being created. She organizes one of North America’s largest Indigenous fashion shows, at the annual Southwestern Association for Indian Arts in Santa Fe.

AMBER-DAWN: You will see beadwork that is used for powwow regalia, but you will also see beadwork that is used in high fashion couture designs or big bling-ed earrings and beaded medallions.

Cradleboard - Lakota (Teton Sioux) - The Metropolitan Museum of Art