1970s Native American Kiowa/Caddo Peoples Woodcut in Colors "New Indian Art" Pop Art

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This woodcut in colors is a famous 1975 artwork titled "Grandmother Gestating Father and the Washita River Runs Ribbon-Like" by … Read more This woodcut in colors is a famous 1975 artwork titled "Grandmother Gestating Father and the Washita River Runs Ribbon-Like" by the renowned Native American Kiowa and Caddo artist T.C. Cannon (Tommy Wayne Cannon, 1946–1978). The woodcut is signed and dates from 1975.

This very powerful image depicts a pregnant Native American woman walking under an umbrella and references his grandmother pregnant and carrying his father, underlining the resilience of the Native People.
The title references the Washita River, which holds deep historical weight as the site of the 1868 Washita River Massacre, where General Custer’s cavalry attacked a peaceful Cheyenne camp. Cannon juxtaposes this tragic history with a vibrant, forward-looking celebration of life and ongoing generations.
T.C. Cannon was a leading figure in the contemporary Native American art movement. He famously combined traditional indigenous subjects with vivid, expressive colors and patterns heavily influenced by European modernists like Vincent van Gogh & Henri Matisse.
This striking original woodcut in colors having a band of abstract symbols to the right side: referring to ancient native cultural symbols representing the elements and geographical markers. The artwork is signed by the artist in two places and is numbered "76/999", this is an early low numbered image that is very crisp.
Condition is excellent, the artwork is housed in a gilt-wood frame under UV glass with archival materials, it is ready to hang on your wall and grace your space.
This woodcut sold at Santa Fe Art Auction 14th November 2020 for $7,020

Artist's Biography:
Kiowa/Caddo artist T.C. Cannon, born Tommy Wayne Cannon, grew up in an Oklahoma farming community where they were the only Native American family in the town. Cannon started making art from a young age, but his artistic approach developed during his education at the newly-formed Institute for American Indian Art in Santa Fe in 1964-66. At this school, Native students learned both traditional Native arts as well as Western art styles. This education would allow artists like Cannon to pave the way for a new kind of contemporary Indigenous art. Instead of painting portraits that suggest Native Americans as primitive or part of a disappearing culture, Cannon’s artwork makes the case that Native people are still present, enduring efforts for generations on the part of non-Natives to integrate them into American culture. This painting is typical of his artistic style, using bold, rich, colors as well as combining visual elements of Native culture, such as the female subject’s hide leggings and decorated moccasins, with non-Native elements like her red parasol and polka-dot dress. In painting his grandmother pregnant with his father, Cannon pays respect to family lineage, ancestors, and the importance of grandmothers and mothers in passing down cultural traditions. Women’s roles in carrying Native culture forward and nurturing the second generation became critical in an environment that sought to erase Native cultural heritage. With his pregnant grandmother as his subject, Cannon makes a monument to the Native women that helped keep Indigenous culture alive.

At sight 14.25 Height x 11.25 Wide See less