By FREDERIC J. FROMMER, Associated Press
WASHINGTON (AP) - The way the Smithsonian's new Museum of the American
Indian tells the story of native people is as varied as the people it
celebrates. The museum houses 8,000 objects from across the Western
Hemisphere. There are movies and music; paintings, photographs and
sculptures; masks, weapons and animals; jewelry and medals; even food
and plants.
"Visitors will leave this museum experience knowing that Indians are
not part of history," said the museum's director, W. Richard West Jr.,
who is of Southern Cheyenne extraction. "We are still here and making
vital contributions to contemporary American culture and art."
The museum, which opens Tuesday, is expected to draw 4 million visitors
a year. While an occasional drilling sound could be heard during a
preview tour Wednesday, the museum is almost in opening-day
shape.
Smithsonian Institution Secretary Lawrence Small called the five-story
building a visually stunning edifice that offers a blend of nature and
technology, of symbolism and significance.
"It's a living tribute to the first inhabitants of this nation," he
said.
The museum sits on a four-acre site between the Capitol and the
Washington Monument, and takes up the last remaining spot on the grassy
National Mall. It is surrounded by 700 trees and fronted by a wetlands
area with plants such as wild rice and yellow pond-lily.
Its exterior, made from Kasota limestone quarried from Minnesota, is
rounded to reflect the curves of the earth, sun and moon, and the
inside features a skylight topping off a series of narrowing concentric
circles that make up the building's ceiling.
A good place to start a visit is at the 125-seat Lelawi Theater on the
fourth floor, where viewers can get a museum overview by watching a
13-minute presentation called "Who We Are."
Simultaneous images are beamed at viewers from three places: small
video screens in the center, a 40-foot planetarium-like dome on the
ceiling, and a rock-shaped projector on the floor, which starts out as
a storyteller's fire.
The film shows Indians working, praying and hunting, along with
landscapes from South Dakota's Black Hills to the Alaskan coast, and
animals such as elk and whales.
The museum opens with three permanent exhibits: "Our Universes,"
featuring tribal philosophies and world views; "Our Peoples," a look
at historic events from a native peoples' perspective; and "Our
Lives," which focuses on native people today.
The "Our Peoples" exhibit tackles some issues of interaction with the
U.S. government and its European predecessors. It includes highlights -
such as U.S. currency with the faces of American Indians - as well as
lowlights, from treaties violated by the government to weapons used to
kill Indians.
Next to a display of European swords, for example, the text grimly
notes that these weapons "easily penetrated Indian shields and allowed
Europeans to kill their opponents at arm's length."
But there is only a passing acknowledgment of tribes' relatively recent
involvement in gambling casinos, income generators for nearly 40
percent of the 562 federally recognized tribes. In "Our Lives," a panel
titled "Hard Choices" talks about the deep division over gaming within
Native America.
Tribes made wealthy from gaming revenue contributed $33 million toward
the museum's $214 million cost.
There is also a changing exhibition gallery, which will feature the art
of American Indian artists George Morrison and Allan Houser in its
inaugural exhibit, "Native Modernism."
Visitors can also check out interactive displays as they make their way
from one exhibit to the next. In one such display - a collection of
animals made of wood, ceramic and other materials - visitors can touch
a computer screen that brings up information about each one.
Associated Press Writer Lolita C. Baldor contributed to this
story.
