Fritz Scholder

Fritz Scholder

Fritz Scholder

          Fritz Scholder was a widely known artist, who achieved his fame by making many kinds of art that portrayed his personal American Indian heritage in a nontraditional way.
          Scholder was only one fourth Native American, so he considered himself white. His ancestors were Luiseno, which is a tribe in California. Others called him a “New Indian” because although he lived like a white person, he kept his ties to Native American culture as well. He was known to be a very reclusive person, always using drawing as an escape from people. In an interview, Scholder said, “If I couldn’t paint, I would be out on the street shooting people”. He was inspired by his father and his mother personally. When it comes to his work, he was inspired by Picasso, Goya, Matisse, Bonnard, and Francis Bacon. He was born in Breckenridge, Minnesota on October 6, 1937 and died at 67 on February 10, 2005 from diabetes.
          From the beginning of his life, Scholder knew he wanted to be an artist for several reasons. First, he didn’t want a boss. Also, he wanted the freedom to do what he wanted when he wanted and he didn’t want to waste his life with a job he hated. His career lasted 50 years, but the most well-known period was in the 

1960’s, which was when he did most of his American Indian works. He broke traditions and brought pop art and Indian art together, creating something totally new for the art world. 
It got a great response, landing his works in the Museum of Modern Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Bibliotheque Nationale de France, the Hirschhorn Museum, the Sculpture Garden, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He loved painting the most, but he also branched out into sculpting, prints, and photography. His most commonly used subjects were women, isolation, and mortality. Indianwork went from very solemn, faded paintings to something exciting, with vibrant colors and deeper meaning thanks to Fritz Scholder. 
           Scholder described making art as a “turn-on”, and said ““But it’s also terribly serious, because it is in a way one of the universal rituals of making a mark on something that will last longer than you”. Fritz Scholder’s confidence and innovation changed Indian painting forever.

Works Cited

1.     "Fritz Scholder: Indian/Not Indian." National Museum of the American Indian. National Museum of the American Indian, 2008. Web. 18 Oct. 2013. <http://nmai.si.edu/exhibitions/scholder/introduction.html>.

1.     Brockman, Joshua. "Indian Or Not? Fritz Scholder's Art And Identity." NPR. NPR, 24 Dec. 2008. Web. 18 Oct. 2013. <http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98694678>.

1.     Scholder, Fritz. "On the Work of a Contemporary American Indian Painter." MIT Press. N.p., 1973. Web. 25 Oct. 2013. <http://www.jstor.org/stable/1572685?&Search=yes&searchText=Scholder&searchText=fritz&list=hide&searchUri=%2Faction%2FdoBasicResults%3Fla%3D%26wc%3Don%26fc%3Doff%26vf%3Dall%26bk%3Doff%26pm%3Doff%26jo%3Doff%26ar%3Doff%26re%3Doff%26ms%3Doff%26Query%3Dfritz%2BScholder%26sbq%3Dfritz%2BScholder%26si%3D1%26aori%3Da%26so%3Drel%26hp%3D25%26Go%3DGo&prevSearch=&item=1&ttl=204&returnArticleService=showFullText&>.

1.     Hogeland, Kim. "Fritz Scholder Inducted into the California Hall of Fame." N.p., 2010. Web. 25 Oct. 2013. <http://search.proquest.com/ethnicnewswatch/docview/217817884/1415559D5ED7D727932/3?accountid=45883>.

1.     Brockman, Joshua. "Fritz Scholder, Painter of American Indians, Dies at 67." New York Times. New York Times, 14 Feb. 2005. Web. 28 Oct. 2013. <http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/14/arts/design/14scholder.html?_r=0>.

"      Fritz Scholder Interview." -- Academy of Achievement. N.p., n.d. Web. 31 Oct. 2013. <http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/sch1int-1>.