Exploring American-Indian art: making a parfleche.

Exploring American-Indian art: making a parfleche. The Plains People comprised indigenous groups that occupied thearea between the Mississippi River Mississippi RiverRiver, central U.S. It rises at Lake Itasca in Minnesota and flows south, meeting its major tributaries, the Missouri and the Ohio rivers, about halfway along its journey to the Gulf of Mexico. and the Rocky Mountains Rocky Mountains,major mountain system of W North America and easternmost belt of the North American cordillera, extending more than 3,000 mi (4,800 km) from central N.Mex. to NW Alaska; Mt. Elbert (14,431 ft/4,399 m) in Colorado is the highest peak. . These groupsincluded the Blackfoot, Cheyenne, Crow, Kiowa, Pawnee and the SiouxNations. These people were generally nomadic See nomadic computing. and had no permanentsettlements. They followed the yearly migrations of their main foodsources--buffalo, deer and migratory fowl, like ducks and geese. Theyoccupied traditional territories, traveling and hunting within them. Nature provided everything that the Plains People needed tolive--from food and shelter to tools. The meat of buffalo and deer was asource of food, while the hides provided rawhide Rawhideseries depicting cowboys as cattle-punchers along the Santa Fe trail. [TV: Terrace, II, 235]See : Wild West and buckskins forteepee covers, blankets, clothes and parfleches. The bones of theseanimals were made into the scrapers, needles and punches needed to workthe hides into useful items. Tough sinew sinew/sin��ew/ (sin��u) a tendon of a muscle.weeping sinew? an encysted ganglion, chiefly on the back of the hand, containing synovial fluid.sin��ewn. was made from their tendons forstitching the heavy hides together. Pigments for the paints and stains used in the art of the PlainsPeople were also found in nature. Sources for pigments were animals,plants and minerals. Pigments were prepared by grinding (minerals) orboiling (plants, animals). The powder or rendered liquids were thenmixed with water. Sometimes animal fat was used to thicken paint. Stainswere made from dyes that resulted from boiling certain plants. Because of the nomadic lifestyle of the Plains People, theirpossessions had to be lightweight and portable. These possessionsincluded teepees, sleeping mats, blankets, clothing, cooking tools,moccasins and weapons. Constant traveling inspired the Plains People todevelop a form of luggage known as "parfleches." These werecarrying bags made of buckskin buckskinbody coat color in horses, varies from yellow to almost brown; the points, including mane, tail, lower limbs are brown to black. or rawhide and were used to carryclothing, food and all the little objects that the people accumulated. The Plains People also developed a distinctive art style anddecorated everything from teepees to moccasins with their designs. Thisart style is typified by geometric, angular or figurative designs. Thecolors of the designs were generally green, red, yellow and black. Studying one small part of the lives of the Plains People seemed tobe an interesting way to introduce a multicultural lesson about theindigenous people of North America North America,third largest continent (1990 est. pop. 365,000,000), c.9,400,000 sq mi (24,346,000 sq km), the northern of the two continents of the Western Hemisphere. to my seventh- and eighth-grade artstudents. The parfleche par��fleche?n.1. An untanned animal hide soaked in lye and water to remove the hair and then dried on a stretcher.2. An article, such as a shield, made of this hide. was selected as a suitable article to study. Parfleches were made in several styles, from folded wraps toenvelope-like pouches, to accommodate a variety of carried items. Forour project, we created envelope-style parfleches, which would have beenused to hold food on hunting trips. A discussion of the Plains People and of the materials used to makeparfleches opened the lesson. With 150 students in six classesparticipating in the project, using actual buckskin or rawhide was outof the question. Since our parfleches were for display and not actualuse, a suitable substitute was brown butcher paper or brown papergrocery bags. Raffia raffia(răf`ēə)or raphia(rā`fēə), fiber obtained from the raffia palm of Madagascar, exported for various uses, such as tying up plants that require support, binding together vegetables was substituted for sinew. For colors, water-basedmarkers worked nicely. Each student was provided with an 8" x 18" sheet of brownpaper. To simulate the look of buckskin, the paper was crumpled uptightly and then carefully opened and laid flat. Using an electric iron,the sheets were pressed flat. Ironing does not remove the wrinkles, butcauses the material to lay flat so that it can be folded and worked. After flattening, each edge was folded over about 1/2 inch andglued. This reinforced the edges (real buckskin would not have beenfolded at the edges). Then the sheet was folded up about 7 inches fromthe bottom. The remaining portion formed the top flap of the parflecheand was folded down. The flap was reinforced by folding the comers overto form a pointed tip, which was then folded down and glued in place. Students were provided with a variety of visual sources fordesigns. Many chose to use the traditional Plains-style designs as asource of inspiration for their own. On a separate sheet of paper, theydeveloped their designs. Using rulers and pencils, they laid out theirdesigns on the front of their parfleches. The designs were to cover the front of the parfleche, extendingunder the flap. The part of the design that was covered by the flap wasto be repeated on the flap so that the entire design would be visiblewith the parfleche opened or closed. The pencil lines were then tracedover by fine-tipped markers, and color was added. The color of thematerial was to be included as one of the colors of their designs. With the design completed, the students folded the parflechetogether, leaving the flap up, and measured for holes through which tostring the raffia/sinew. The holes were laid out 1/2 inch in from eachedge and 1/2 inch apart along both sides. Holes were punched with standard hole punches, but blunt tapestryneedles could be used to punch more realistic holes in the material. Twoholes were then punched in the flap 1/2 inch from the end and about 11/2 inches apart. Corresponding holes in the front of the parfleche werepunched with a tapestry needle. One strip of raffia about a foot long was slipped through the holesin the front of the parfleche from the inside, pulled even and gluedinto place. This would form the tie that would hold the parfleche closedon those long treks. Using a plastic tapestry needle as a substitute fora bone needle, the sides of the parfleche were stitched with raffiausing any number of stitching techniques. Making a parfleche provided a small glimpse into the lives of thesefascinating people. Additionally, this project gave my students theopportunity to begin to understand and value the rich cultural diversityof their world. MAKING A PARFLECHE 1. Fold edges of 8" x 18" wrinkled brown paper over about1/2 inch and glue along the sides. 2. Fold ends over the same and glue in place. This will reinforcethe edges of the paper. 3. Fold the bottom up to form the pouch portion of the parfleche(about 7 inches square). Do not glue. 4. Fold the flap down Verb 1. flap down - throw violently; "He slammed the book on the table"slamthrow - propel through the air; "throw a frisbee" over the pouch. Fold the ends of the flap,forming a point, and glue. Then fold the point down and glue in place. After folding, lay the parfleche out flat and decorate. Afterdecorating, hold the pouch portion together and punch holes about every1/2 inch along each side using a hole punch or a blunt tapestry needle.Do not punch holes in the flap! Stitch the sides of the pouch together using raffia strands. Leavesome raffia dangling at the bottom for embellishment. Add decorativeknots. Add a tie to secure the flap by running a strand of raffiathrough two holes in the front of the pouch that line up with two holesin the flap. Don Gruber, Ed.D., teaches art at Clinton Junior High School inClinton, Illinois Clinton is a city in DeWitt County, Illinois, United States. The population was 7,485 at the 2000 census. It is the county seat of DeWitt CountyGR6.The city and the county are named for DeWitt Clinton, governor of New York, 1817-1823. , and is the great-grandson of a Lakota Sioux.