Home/Land: Wahzhazhe Artists Speak
Aug. 18, 2026–July 24, 2027
Does the land on which you were raised shape your concept of home? What if you live in diaspora? How do you name “home”? In their art, Wahzhazhe (Osage) artists Norman Akers, Anita Fields and Ryan RedCorn consider the significance of land, language and culture in shaping ideas about “home.” The ancestral homelands of the Wahzhazhe once encompassed lands that are now part of Kansas, Missouri, Arkansas and Oklahoma. In the 19th century, U.S. government policies forced the Osage from much of that land and onto a reservation in present-day Oklahoma. In the generations that followed, the Osage Nation has continued to defend its sovereignty and cultural identity. Sharing their stories, Akers, Fields and RedCorn invite others to reflect on how history and landscape shape their own notions of home, land and belonging.
Home/Land is part of the initiative Home Is Where We Are: Art of First Americans, led by the Beach Museum of Art. Spanning institutions across the Great Plains, it marks a coordinated focus on contemporary Indigenous art. Each participating organization presents a distinct project that contributes to a broader collective effort amplifying Indigenous perspectives. Participating institutions in Kansas include the Chapman Center for Rural Studies, Kansas Studies Institute, Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, Mid America All-Indian Museum, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Salina Art Center, Ulrich Museum of Art, and Volland, A Place for Art and Community—together positioning the region as a destination for experiencing the art of First Americans.
Home/Land offers unique encounters with the work of Akers, Fields and RedCorn. The exhibition is presented bilingually in English and Wahzhazhe, made possible through the translation work of Chris Côté. Four paintings by Norman Akers, created during his 2025 artist residency at the Tyler School of Art in Philadelphia, are presented here for the first time outside their city of origin. A poem by Ryan RedCorn best known for his monumental photographic portraits of contemporary Wahzhazhe—highlights another dimension of his artistic practice. In addition to being a visual artist, RedCorn is a writer who co-founded the comedy troupe 1491s with filmmaker Sterlin Harjo and co-wrote the second season of the acclaimed series Reservation Dogs. Home/Land also brings to Kansas a major installation by Anita Fields, Wa-No’-Bree (Call to Eat), on loan from the Heard Museum in Phoenix, Arizona. Featuring more than forty ceramic sculptures and incorporating earth from Oklahoma, the installation reflects Field’s deep engagement with memory and community. In the Hyle Gallery, visitors experience art and commentary by Akers, Fields, and RedCorn that responds to the question, “What inspires your work?”
This year, the Beach Museum of Art and K-State’s Indigenous Faculty and Staff Alliance collaborate on programming for K-State Indigenous Peoples Day. Home/Land artists Norman Akers and Anita Fields will deliver keynote addresses during an online program. Nokosee Fields, creator of a sound piece in an Anita Fields work in the exhibition, will perform and speak at the in-person closing event at the museum.
Sustaining Sponsors: Dick and Gloria, Delich Anderson
Contributing Sponsors: Art Bridges, Daniel and Beth Bird, Terry and Tara Cupps, David and Melinda Weaver
This exhibition was also made possible through the generosity of the following academic units: The Chapman Center for Rural Studies and the Social Transformation Studies Department at Kansas State University; the Dow Center for Multicultural and Community Studies at K-State Libraries; and the Kansas Studies Institute at Johnson County Community College.
Related events
Beach Museum of Art
Free and open to the public
Home/Land: Art, Culture, and Place-Making
A partnership between the K-State Indigenous Faculty and Staff Alliance and the Beach Museum of Art on Indigenous Peoples’ Day
Monday, October 12, 2026
10 a.m.-3:30 p.m. online programs, 5-7 p.m. in-person event
Registration is required
Indigenous Recordings Listening Party
Featuring DJ Bad Alaskan (Aleut/Unangax tribe of Alaska) and Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art Librarian of Wonder Thomas Bell
Thursday, October 29, 2026, 5:30-7 p.m.
BMA Friends Gathering with special guest Ryan RedCorn
Thursday, November 12, 2026, 5 p.m.
Home/Land exhibition artist bios:
Norman Akers is an Osage artist and educator from the Grayhorse District who taught Visual Art at the University of Kansas. His artwork addresses concepts of place through multilayered visual images, forming narratives that bridge a personal understanding of Osage culture and experiences with contemporary issues. Norman's artworks act as maps of culture, memory, and place. The intersecting lines that serve as the background for his images are clearly cartographic; using visual symbols and iconography, Akers creates forceful visual statements about cultural identity, environmental issues, and the impact of colonialism on Native land. He states, "Through color, line, and visual form, I express deeply felt concerns regarding removal, disturbance, and the struggle to reclaim cultural context."
Akers' work has received national recognition, including solo exhibitions at the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Overland Park, KS; Temple Contemporary, Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, PA; and group exhibitions in Indigenous Identities: Here, Now & Always, Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick, NJ; New Terrains, Phillips Auction, New York City, NY; Rivers Flow/Artist Connect, Hudson River Museum, Yonkers, NY; and the traveling exhibition Exploding Native Inevitable, Bates College Museum of Art, Lewiston, ME. In spring 2025, Norman was the inaugural artist for the Edgar Heap of Birds Family Artist Residency program at Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He is also a recipient of the Joan Mitchell Painters and Sculptors Fellowship.
Photo by Rogelio Esparza
Her sculptures have been featured in many exhibitions, including the 2024-2025 The Shape of Power: Stories of Race and American Sculpture, Smithsonian Art Museum, Counterpublic 2023 St. Louis Triennial, St. Louis, Missouri, Form and Relation: Contemporary Native Ceramics, Hood Museum, Dartmouth College, the 2018-2020 Hearts of Our People, Minneapolis Institute of Art, and the 2018 Art for A New Understanding: Native Voices, 1950’s to Now at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and Pottery by American Indian Women at the National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington DC. Her work can be found in several collections, such as the Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian, the Museum of Art and Design, New York City, the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Dartmouth College, New Hampshire, and the Heard Museum, Arizona.
Fields is 2017-2023 Tulsa Artist Fellowship alumni. She was named a 2021 National Endowment of the Arts Heritage Fellow and received a 2021 Anonymous Was a Woman award. In 2022 she received a Francis J Greenburger award. In 2025 she was elected into the Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Ryan RedCorn (Osage) is a writer, filmmaker, actor, and photographer whose work often uses aspects of Indigenous humor to create commentary on the various issues facing Native communities. He is a founder of the Native American comedy troupe the 1491s and a writer for the hit television show Reservation Dogs. His photography explores his community through images that honor their identity and vitality. With his approach to image-making, RedCorn provides a broader scope or view of the complexity and diversity of Indigenous people that makes them more human. He believes the more people see you as human, the more they will treat you with respect.