Edgar Heap of Birds
Edgar Heap of Birds’s artistic creations and efforts as an advocate for Indigenous communities worldwide are focused on social justice and personal freedom to live within the tribal circle as an expressive individual.
His works include multidisciplinary forms of public art messages, large-scale drawings, Neuf-series acrylic paintings, prints, glasswork, and monumental porcelain enamel on steel outdoor sculptures.
The artist received his BFA from the University of Kansas, Lawrence, and an MFA from Philadelphia’s Tyler School of Art and conducted graduate studies at the Royal College of Art, London.
He was named a USA Ford fellow in 2012 and distinguished alumnus, University of Kansas, in 2014. Honorary doctor of fine arts and letters degrees have been awarded by the Massachusetts College of Art and Design, Boston (2008); Emily Carr University of Art and Design, Vancouver, Canada (2017); and California Institute of the Arts, Valencia (2018). In 2020, Heap of Birds was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences as a member of the Humanities & Arts class, with a specialty in visual arts.
Project 270 - Oklahoma
I participated in the vote project to express my sentiments towards the lack of respect, nonadherence, and racism concerning broken Native tribal treaties which recognized Indigenous tribes as individual sovereign nations. This so- called US democracy does not allow tribal citizens to be represented adequately due to the dispersed demographic of First Nations people across this land. Native candidates are often zero. The true sovereign relationship Tribal Nations should experience in the US is a nation-to-nation system and protocol of mutual respect.