Minisa Crumbo-Halsey is one of only a few female interdisciplinary artists in the Gilcrease’s collection of Indigenous paintings, and her oeuvre includes painting, basket making, and pottery. Born and raised in Oklahoma, she is the daughter of renowned artist Woodrow Wilson “Woody” Crumbo. Her earliest lessons in art began at home, while her father was an artist-in-residence for Gilcrease. Crumbo’s 1976 mixed-media self-portrait The Pueblo Dress is deeply connected to the process-based art instruction she received from her father. In this self-portrait, the artist wears a finely woven wool Pueblo dress.

“For every piece that he ever did, every etching, every silkscreen, every oil, [my father] did a finished, full-size drawing of that piece. . . . Those were the first things I saw him produce, and now my very first love is draftsmanship. . . . Charcoal, pencil, and mixed media . . . represent that draftsmanship training that I received from him early.”¹
— Minisa Crumbo-Halsey

—Jordan Poorman Cocker, Henry Luce Foundation Curatorial Scholar for Indigenous Painting Collection Research, 2021

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¹ Minisa Crumbo-Halsey, interview by Teresa Miller, Writing Out Loud, OStateTV, Oklahoma State University, March 6, 2018, 3:05–3:40 min. The interview is available online at the OstateTV website.