RezMade: Photographs by student photographers from Our Community Record Two Eagle River School

Justice Antone

Featuring: Jamian Adams, Talon Addison, Justice Antone, Alexis Arlee, Carla Jade Baker, Maxe Bell, LaSean Big Day, Rydell BigKnife, Cheyenne Corral, Toki Einspahr, Lochlyn Finley, Vivika Finley, Lucous Joseph, Natyzah Herman, Gracelyn Kenmille, Tamryn LaFromboise, Vincente LaRoche, Chrome Louie, Joseph Mahkuk, Arorah MadPlume, Jodessa McGreevey, Layla Mykell, Malakai Placid, Payton Perry, Kaidyn Phoenix, Malacye Piapot, Brandon Rider, ZeiRin Ridgley, Liam Shepard, Emma SpottedEagle, John Xsus Stevens, Sarah Still Smoking, Meira Swaney, Antone Takes Horse, Keke Tenas, Sean Trahan, Lathan Pretty Weisel.

Our Community Record Two Eagle River School, which is central to our work at A VOICE, is a collaborative project between photographer David J. Spear and Two Eagle River School in Pablo, a Tribal middle and high school serving Native American students living on the Flathead Nation in Northwestern Montana. Through storytelling and photographic studies, Our Community Record teaches these students to explore and document their community, culture, and history. Our Community Record has run each academic school year since January 2002 and continues to evolve within the structure and foundation established in earlier years of the project. An exhibition of student work is displayed at the school at the end of each of term. Students learn about visual communication and photographic technique through classroom instruction, camera work, and field trips. Image lectures on photography include special emphasis on social chroniclers of culture. Students are encouraged to reflect upon family and community and become their own chroniclers, incorporating their unique views into their creations. Each year students visit area galleries and museums and meet with local photographers who show and discuss their work. Our Community Record maintains an archive of the original work produced each year by Tribal youth, which serves as an enduring chronicle and documentary resource for the community.

About the Artists

Maxe Bell
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Maxe is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work and plays sports.

Malakai Placid
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Malakai is a senior at Two Eagle River School, where his work is shown. Malakai photographs sports events and makes portraits.

Meira Swaney
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Meira’s work has been shown at Two Eagle River School and at the Lewistown Art Center in Lewistown, Montana.

Chrome Louie
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Chrome’s work has been shown at Two Eagle River School. He is fluent in the Salish language.

Sean Trahan
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Sean is senior at Two Eagle River School, where he shows his work. Sean is a caring person: “I want the best for each person in the world even if I can’t give this to them in person.”

Brandon Rider
Tribal Affiliation: Blackfeet
Brandon is a sophomore at Two Eagle River School, where he shows his work. Brandon believes that success is not about being the best; it’s about being better than you were yesterday.

John Xsus Stevens
Tribal Affiliation: Salish, Cree
Xsus is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where he shows his work. “When in the moment, I use my senses to sort through thoughts to find the photograph lurking in my head. It’s like finding the apricity on the coldest day of winter.”

Joseph Mahkuk
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Joseph is a senior at Two Eagle River School, where he shows his work. “I like what photography can do for me.”

Toki Einspahr
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Toki is a sophomore at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work. “My first name is Japanese, my last name is German, and my Indian name is Little Blue Bead.”

Kaidyn Phoenix
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Kaidyn, a junior, has shown her work at Two Eagle River School.

Emma SpottedEagle
Tribal Affiliation: Blackfeet & Oglala Sioux
Emma is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she has shown work. “I dance for my people and for the ones who couldn’t.”

Arorah MadPlume
Tribal Affiliation: Blackfeet-Piikani
Arorah is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work. Proverb 27:19 – “As water reflects the face, so one’s life reflects the heart.”

Alexis Arlee
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Alexis is junior at Two Eagle River School. “I may be small, but my dreams are big.”

Talon Addison
Tribal affiliation: Salish, Northern Cheyenne, Arapahoe, Sioux
Talon is a sophomore at Two Eagle River School, where he plays basketball and shows his work. “Have good intentions, embrace the opportunities that come your way, reconnect with your higher self, and limit the bad habits and negative thoughts.”

LaSean Big Day
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
LaSean is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where he plays basketball and shows his work. He says, “Outer beauty attracts, but inner beauty captivates.”

Vivika Finley
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Vivika is a senior at Two Eagle River School. “I love photography. It means so much to me; I love capturing the moment and just knowing it’s there forever.”

Lochlyn Finley
Tribal Affiliation: Salish, Kootenai, Chippawa Cree, Pend d’Oreille, Coeur d’Alene
Lochlyn is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where his work is shown. “Dreams are bigger than the mountains.”

Lucous Joseph
Tribal Affiliation: Kootenai
Lucous is a senior at Two Eagle River School, where his work is shown. “You can’t drown your sorrows.”

Natyzah Herman
Tribal Affiliation: Colville
Natyzah is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where her work is shown. “Even the biggest inspirations can be tiny.”

Lathan Pretty Weisel
Tribal Affiliation: Crow
Lathan is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where he is an athlete and where his work is shown. “There’s always room to grow.”

Gracelyn Kenmille
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Gracelyn is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work. “If you look for the light, you can often find it. But if you look for the dark that is all you will ever see.”

ZeiRin Ridgley
Tribal Affiliation: Kootenai, Northern Arapahoe, Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa
ZeiRin is a junior at Two Eagle River School. “You like to act as if you care about nothing and if you carry on like that then you are going to drown in the abyss you have imagined for yourself.” – Alice Oseman, Solitaire

Jamian Adams
Tribal Affiliation: Salish
Jamian is a senior at Two Eagle River School. In 2022, he placed third in track at Montana state finals. “Whether you think you can or think you can’t you are probably right.”

Jodessa McGreevey
Tribal Affiliation: Navajo Nation, Salish, Kootenai
Jodessa is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she is an athlete and shows her work. “We must let go of the life we have planned, so as to accept the one that is waiting for us.”

Layla Mykell
Tribal Affiliation: Kootenai
Layla is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she is an athlete and where her work is shown. “I don’t want a good year; I want a great year.” – Sonny Burke

Malacye Piapot
Tribal Affiliation: Salish, Kootenai, Chippewa Cree, Nez Perce, Qlispé
Malacye is an athlete and photographer at Two Eagle River School. “Heart is what separates the good from the great.”

Antone Takes Horse
Tribal Affiliation: Crow
Antone is a junior at Two Eagle River School. “To capture the land is to capture nature.”

Cheyenne Corral
Tribal Afflation: Salish & Kootenai
Cheyenne is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work.

Rydell BigKnife
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Rydell is a sophomore at Two Eagle River School, where his photographs are shown.

Liam Shepard
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Liam is a freshman at Two Eagle River School, where he plays sports and shows his work. Written on the board behind his desk reads, “Uploading technology into tradition… because culture is wireless.”

Sarah Still Smoking
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Sarah is a senior at Two Eagle River School. In addition to photography, they have become known for design and beadwork.

Tamryn LaFromboise
Tribal Affiliation: Blackfeet
Tamryn is a senior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work. “Accepted love and rose above.” –Saul Blackweasel

Keke Tenas
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Keke is a sophomore at Two Eagle River School, where she plays sports and shows her work. “Big dreams start with small steps.”

Payton Perry
Tribal Affiliation: Salish, Kootenai, Gros Ventre
Payton is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where he has shown his work. “Friends come out of nowhere.”

Katie Medicine Bull
Tribal Affiliation: Northern Cheyenne
Katie is a senior at Two Eagle River School, where her work has shown. Her work was also part of “Reconnecting With,” a 2022 exhibition at the Getty Museum in Los Angeles.

Justice Antone
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Justice is a junior at Two Eagle River School, where she shows her work. Francine Antoine, her grandmother, is her hero: “She is selfless, never says a bad thing about anyone, and is strong.”

Vincente LaRoche
Tribal Affiliation: Salish & Kootenai
Vincente is a junior and shows his work at Two Eagle River School.

Carla Jade Baker
Tribal Affiliation: Salish, Kootenai, Chippewa Cree
Carla, a junior at Two Eagle River School, is an athlete and sports photographer

Organizations

A VOICE – Art Vision & Outreach In Community Education

The primary goal of A VOICE-Art Vision & Outreach In Community Education is to foster excitement and confidence in youth who may not otherwise have this opportunity. It is our hope that the skills and self-confidence nurtured in visual arts learning will provide tools for young people to aid them in their decisions and endeavors, and to guide them toward success. We carry out projects in rural Tribal communities. We amplify our work through partnerships with community leaders and teachers. We provide them the tools to become expressive art makers, moving storytellers, and engaged citizens. In addition to our daily work in local schools and communities, we collaborate with organizations beyond the beautiful Flathead Valley so the young people we serve can experience other peoples, landscapes, and cultures and share their work with wider audiences. In everything we do, we are committed to reach out to and have a positive impact on each young person we serve. A VOICE was incorporated on June 21, 2006 by photographer David J. Spear and Polson, Montana native Jill L. Erickson. Jill and David, who have provided arts programming for decades in Montana and New York City, have a rich history of collaboration with other local non-profit organizations and educational institutions. In 2002, they founded Our Community Record Two Eagle River School, an ongoing partnership with the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes, which has been funded through A VOICE since the fall of 2006.
Photoville

Founded in 2011 in Brooklyn, NY, Photoville was built on the principles of addressing cultural equity and inclusion, which we are always striving for, by ensuring that the artists we exhibit are diverse in gender, class, and race.

In pursuit of its mission, Photoville produces an annual, city-wide open air photography festival in New York City, a wide range of free educational community initiatives, and a nationwide program of public art exhibitions.

By activating public spaces, amplifying visual storytellers, and creating unique and highly innovative exhibition and programming environments, we join the cause of nurturing a new lens of representation.

Through creative partnerships with festivals, city agencies, and other nonprofit organizations, Photoville offers visual storytellers, educators, and students financial support, mentorship, and promotional & production resources, on a range of exhibition opportunities.

For more information about Photoville visit, www.photoville.com
PhotoWings

We’re honored to continue our partnership with Photoville for our 8th consecutive year, and to celebrate Photoville’s 13th edition! Each year Photoville provides so many rich, unique, and diverse experiences in and around photography–PhotoWings is thrilled to help enrich this community as Education Partners.

Our mission is to highlight and help facilitate the power of photography to influence the world. We help photography to be better understood, created, utilized, seen, and saved. We are dedicated to utilizing the power of photography to further deep thinking, communication, and action.

The PhotoWings Outreach Program and our extensive media archive have myriad educational applications and possibilities, including projects from partners that cross disciplines, generations, and cultures. We also create toolkits/curricula for replication, adaptation and/or inspiration.

PhotoWings has partnered to document the Photoville Talks for the past five years, to expand the ways the global community can be a part of these important dialogues. Explore the collection of Photoville Talks today!

Be sure to check out all the Photoville Resources that have been supported in partnership with PhotoWings

And for more information about PhotoWings, you can visit http://photowings.org/