Institute of American Indian Arts

The Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) — the birthplace of contemporary Indigenous American art — is an Indigenous-centered college in Santa Fe, New Mexico.  IAIA’s mission is to empower creativity and leadership in Indigenous arts and cultures through higher education, lifelong learning, and community engagement.  The IAIA Research Center for Contemporary Native Arts (RCCNA) supports this mission through its dedication to advancing scholarship, discourse, and interpretation of contemporary Indigenous arts for regional, national, and international audiences.  Hauser & Wirth Institute’s grant of $87,500 supported the RCCNA in digitizing their Native Artist Files (NAF), the most student-used asset and a general starting point for researchers in the IAIA Archives.  Established in 1971, the NAF contains nearly 7,500 biographical vertical files that include slides, resumes, news clippings, photocopies, and materials documenting individual artists and their careers.

“The Native Artist Files is an invaluable collection that documents the biographies and art practices of thousands of Native American artists through primary and secondary source documents,” says RCCNA Director Dr. Lara Evans (Cherokee Nation).  “We’re thrilled to undertake the project of digitizing this invaluable resource, so that students and researchers outside of IAIA will have access to the collection.”

For more information on IAIA’a research center, please visit their website.