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Red Cloud, Sitting Bull, and Rain in the Face, 2021
A Mixed Media by William Talenti
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The original and more abstract version of Red Cloud, Sitting Bull, and Rain in the Face was completed in 1996 using only stolen oil paint scraped at night from unsuspecting palettes left at Tyler School of Art's Elkins Park studio in Philadelphia. This reworking completed in Tampa, Florida (2013) depicts three significant Native American leaders who each defeated the U.S. Army in battle. The mixed media painting is made from latex, acrylic, and oil paints, along with spar urethane and interlaced digital collage patterns of organic chaos with wheat, sunsets, ancient Roman streets, and crop circles. Concentric structure is provided with arrow heads, and references fluid geometry from Piet Mondrian's 1914 painting Ocean 5.
An oversimplification has emerged and has evolved a consensus for indigenous belief systems which includes astral projection, extraterrestrials, sacred grounds, and respect for animal spirits and the holy Great Spirit-often overshadowing innumerable casualties and tragic loss of sovereignty. Subsequent treaties including Fort Laramie in 1851 forced men, women, and children on the Sioux reservation to hypocritical education and subjugated religious thought.
These portraits seek to celebrate the Lakota's past and present spiritual contributions to the American experience but also reflect an admonition of deep pain and a didactic of resistance.