6 Indigenous Artists Win $50,000 Prizes for Creative Visions of Justice

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Indian Country Today correspondent Joaqlin Estus first reported this news: Six Indigenous artists have won $50,000 prizes for their “bold artistic vision,” and each is honored for “inspir[ing] curiosity, empathy, and action toward building a more honest and just world.”

Cannupa Hanska Luger—who installs ceramics, video, sound, fiber, steel, and repurposed materials for “political action to communicate stories about 21st-century Indigeneity”—joins Nathan P. Jackson, Kawika Lum-Nelmida, Geo Soctomah Neptune, Delina White, and Emily Johnson.

As Luger notes, it’s important to see the awards in context with the outsize impact of the pandemic on Native communities: “I’ve returned to my studio practice and taken active steps to protect the health of my loved ones and our Indigenous communities who are being affected by this pandemic disproportionately.”

COVID-19 is killing one in 475 Native Americans, a higher and faster death rate than in any other community, according to new analysis by APM Research Lab published by the Guardian and posted by Mother Jones as part of our Climate Desk partnership. The pandemic’s grip makes it both harder and more urgent to surface stories of strength right now. While creative funding is by no stretch a substitute for immediate pandemic fixes, it’s an all-of-the-above effort—art as amplifier, and material medical solutions as demand—that tells the fuller picture.

See all the prize-winning artists’ work and read their stories. Share your own at recharge@motherjones.com.

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THE FACTS SPEAK FOR THEMSELVES.

At least we hope they will, because that’s our approach to raising the $350,000 in online donations we need right now—during our high-stakes December fundraising push.

It’s the most important month of the year for our fundraising, with upward of 15 percent of our annual online total coming in during the final week—and there’s a lot to say about why Mother Jones’ journalism, and thus hitting that big number, matters tremendously right now.

But you told us fundraising is annoying—with the gimmicks, overwrought tone, manipulative language, and sheer volume of urgent URGENT URGENT!!! content we’re all bombarded with. It sure can be.

So we’re going to try making this as un-annoying as possible. In “Let the Facts Speak for Themselves” we give it our best shot, answering three questions that most any fundraising should try to speak to: Why us, why now, why does it matter?

The upshot? Mother Jones does journalism you don’t find elsewhere: in-depth, time-intensive, ahead-of-the-curve reporting on underreported beats. We operate on razor-thin margins in an unfathomably hard news business, and can’t afford to come up short on these online goals. And given everything, reporting like ours is vital right now.

If you can afford to part with a few bucks, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones with a much-needed year-end donation. And please do it now, while you’re thinking about it—with fewer people paying attention to the news like you are, we need everyone with us to get there.

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