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An Island of Redbuds on the Cimarron / Brummett Echohawk

Essay/Description

“This is a place where the Echohawk family grew up, this horseshoe bend in the river here. . . . Every man, woman, and child in the family received an allotment. . . . The family was camped down here in the valley near the Cimarron River, with the rest of our Kitkahahki Band of the Pawnee Nation. . . . [This land] probably reminded them of our aboriginal homeland up in Nebraska. Most of our villages were along rivers of the region . . . this is reminiscent of that country.”
—Walter Echohawk, nephew of Brummett Echohawk

Brummett Echohawk’s vibrant impressionistic oil painting An Island of Redbuds on the Cimarron captures a serene moment on his family homestead on Pawnee treaty land. The Echohawk family owns a number of Indian allotments along the Pawnee Nation reservation boundary. On the southern side of the property, the prairie grassland meets the Cimarron, a sandy-bottomed river with no dams. During the rainy season, the water reaches from bank to bank. During dry seasons, the Cimarron becomes a wide swath of sandbars spotted with islands of plant growth such as this eastern redbud. Echohawk’s father grew up on this land, and the family connections are intact and still strong today.
—Jordan Poorman Cocker, Henry Luce Foundation Curatorial Scholar for Indigenous Painting Collection Research, 2021

This text was developed from an interview with author and attorney Walter Echohawk, nephew of Brummett Echohawk, by Jordan Poorman Cocker, June 21, 2021
Visit Smarthistory Video – Brummett Echohawk, An Island of Redbuds on the Cimarron

Joel Echohawk Reminisces about Brummett Echohawk

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Title(s): 
An Island of Redbuds on the Cimarron
Creator(s): 
Brummett Echohawk (Artist)
Culture: 
Native American; Pawnee
Date: 
1968
Materials/Techniques: 
oil on canvas
Classification: 
Object Type: 
Credit Line: 
Gift of Maxine Zarrow
Accession No: 
01.2596
Previous Number(s): 
TL2018.25.6
Department: 
Not On View

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