February 2009
 Ryan Red Corn (Osage) is the co-chairman of NVision, a Native run non-profit youth media organization headquartered in Denver. In 2008 Red Corn participated in ReelNative, a traveling training workshop for new directors that is a project of the We Shall Remain documentary series produced by WGBH’s American Experience. He has also appeared for the first time on screen in film, in the feature Barking Water (d. Sterlin Harjo). Red Corn attended the University of Kansas, where he graduated in 2003 with a B.F.A in graphic design. In his work with Demockratees, a political T-shirt company, and his design firm, Red Hand Media, Red Corn integrates Native American imagery to produce work that is both specific to the tribal culture he is representing and contemporary in design and message. He currently lives and maintains his graphic arts business in Pawhuska, Oklahoma.
“As indigenous artists, the responsibility to re-brand our community to ourselves and the world at large rests largely on our shoulders, and is contingent upon an uncompromising volume and quality of work that will wrest control from non-Native story-tellers.
As to my indigenous identity, I am a product of my environment. I know of no other way to speak (than) from that which is the culmination of my life experience. Culture and experience are indistinguishable threads of the same fabric.”
Screened by NMAI
Image credit:
Ryan Red Corn - courtesy of the filmmaker
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