Title: The Stone Coats

Artist: Jeremy Dennis

Tribal Affiliation: Shinnecock Indian Nation

Year Completed: 2014

Medium: Color Photograph, Unframed

Dimensions: 20 x 30 inches

Description/Inspiration:

Based on an Iroquois story called "The Stone Coat Woman," that describes giant stone figures who once occupied the forest
competing with human over game animals. One day a hunter's wife meets a Stone Coat Woman, and they both plot to defeat the cruel Stone Coat Men who occupy the woods. Victorious, the Stone Coat Woman gifts a piece of animal skin with various animal hairs. She says that pulling one hair will guarantee a successful hunt that day, and the gift lasted for many years after that. Unframed.

Artist Bio/Statement:

Jeremy Dennis (b. 1990) is a contemporary fine art photographer and a member of the Shinnecock Indian Nation. In his work, he explores indigenous identity, assimilation, and tradition.

My photography explores indigenous identity, cultural assimilation, and the ancestral traditional practices of my tribe, the Shinnecock Indian Nation.

Though science has solved many questions about natural phenomena, questions of identity are more abstract, the answers more nuanced. My work is a means of examining my identity and the identity of my community, specifically the unique experience of living on a sovereign Indian reservation and the problems we face.

Digital photography lets me create cinematic images. Nowhere have indigenous people been more poorly misrepresented than in American movies. My images question and disrupt the post-colonial narrative that dominates in film and media and results in damaging stereotypes, such as the "noble savage" depictions in Disney's Pocahontas.

As racial divisions and tensions reach a nationwide fever pitch, it's more important to me than ever to offer a complex and compelling representation of indigenous people. I like making use of the cinema's tools, the same ones directors have always turned against us (curiously familiar representations, clothing that makes a statement, pleasing lighting), to create conversations about uncomfortable aspects of post-colonialism.

Despite four hundred years of colonization, we remain anchored to our land by our ancient stories. The indigenous mythology that influences my photography grants me access to the minds of my ancestors, including the value they placed on our sacred lands. By outfitting and arranging models to depict those myths, I strive to continue my ancestors' tradition of storytelling and showcase the sanctity of our land, elevating its worth beyond a prize for the highest bidder.

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