John Feather

John B. Feather (Yankton Sioux)

A Wisconsin native, John Feather is deeply connected to his Sioux heritage. One of his strongest influences was the church at the Saint Paul Catholic Indian Boarding School. He found that the artwork in the interior created a resplendent oasis among all the hard, sterile corners of the school’s campus. He studied at the Institute of American Indian Arts in 1977, 1978, and 1983, the Minneapolis College of Art and Design in Minneapolis in 1979, and the University of Minnesota from 1987-1989.

Artist Statement:   Freedoms End is a spokesman for Native and non Native America.  He has four things that weigh heavy on his mind constantly.  These four things are the Doctrine of Discovery, oppression, suppression and repression and all apply to Indigenous cultures worldwide.   His disposition is to be forever at the End of the Trail.  Exactly how he got into that situation used to be a mystery and was left up to the viewer to come to their own conclusions. 

Freedoms End wants the world to know he wouldn’t exist if it were not for the Doctrine of Discovery ( 1452-1493) and the fact that the Doctrine of Discovery is the cornerstone of Federal Indian Law.  It is still used by the USA in the International Court of Law. We cannot have the racist Doctrine of Discovery without my re-contextualized victim, Freedoms End.  They are inseparable.  We are all End of the Trail Indians.  This becomes obvious as the billionaires and their corporations seek to privatize, plunder and terminate American Freedom out of existence.