Cherokee By Blood

Artist / Maker Emily Arthur (American)

MediumScreen print

Dimensions30 × 11 in. (76.2 × 27.9 cm)

ClassificationsPrints and Printing Plates

Credit LinePurchased by University Museums with Neva Petersen Endowment. In the Art on Campus Collection, University Museums, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa.

Object numberU2019.7

Status

On view

Collections

CultureAmerican

Label TextFrom the University Museums Collections Hanbook, vol. 2, 2025: Emily Arthur is a contemporary artist and associate professor at the University of Wisconsin−Madison. Working with scientists and Indigenous scholars, Arthur makes use of historical material to create collages and prints that generate conversations around the interplay of the environment and social history. In the print Cherokee by Blood, silhouettes of natural objects such as birds both living and dead, branches, and butterflies are overlayed in a collage over historical documents to explore human’s relationship and interactions with land and its flora and fauna. In this print, birds fly high in the background, while a small empty nest is balanced in the branches of a tree. A historical text with an illustration of a Native man forms the foreground with the title “Cherokee by Blood” calling to mind the forced eviction during the Trail of Tears. The artist states: “My fine art practice is informed by a concern for the environment, displacement, exile and the return home from dislocation and separation. I seek the unbroken relationship between modern culture and ancient lands which uses tradition and story to make sense of the enduring quest to understand our changing experience of home.”

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