The Lawrence 'Larry' James Beck papers, located in the Cultural Resource Center of the National Museum of the American Indian, contain biographical materials, sculpture portfolios, art shows, notes, sketches and drawings, publications, correspondence and visual material including photos, slides and negatives of Larry's art.
Scope and Contents:
The Larry Beck papers contains materials that span his career as an artist. The bulk of the material in this collection dates from the late 1960's until his death in 1994 and includes, but is not limited to, biographical materials, sculpture portfolios, correspondence relating to his artwork and his family, sketches and drawings as well as visual materials of Beck's artwork which including prints, slides and negatives. Additionally, publications regarding subjects that interested Beck are also included in this collection.
Arrangement:
The Lawrence 'Larry' James Beck Papers are arranged into seven series:
Series 1: Biographical and Personal, (undated, 1938-1994)
Series 2: Correspondence, (undated, 1966-1994)
Series 3: Sculptures and Shows, (undated, 1966-1994)
Series 4: Sketches, Drawings, Notes and Ideas, (undated)
Series 5: Publications and Graphic Materials (undated, 1966-1995)
Series 6: Miscellaneous Material, (undated)
Series 7: Visual Material, contains photographs, negatives and slides
Biographical / Historical:
Lawrence 'Larry' James Beck was born in Seattle, Washington on May 20, 1938. Beck's father was American and his mother was Norwegian and Yup'ik from Alaska. Larry was raised in Seattle and in 1956 graduated from Ballard High School. He then attended college at the University of Washington from1957 to 1959, where he first studied engineering. However, he decided that art was more in his future so between 1960-1961 he attended the Burnley School of Professional Art in Seattle, now known as The Art Institute of Seattle. In 1962 Larry was given the opportunity to attend the University of Arizona's Guadalajara Summer School and study art abroad. Upon his return in 1962, he resumed his studies at The University of Washington and in 1964 he earned a B.A. in painting and a M.F.A. in 1965. While at UW, Larry was taught by George Tsutakawa and Everett Du Pen and visiting New York artist Gabriel Kohn. His art reflects the influences of sculptor David Smith, Mark di Suvero and Inuit artist Gariel Kohn.
During the 1966-1967 academic year, Larry was a visiting instructor of sculpture at the University of Oregon, in Eugene. During this time Larry participated in an exhibit called the Great Northwest Sausage Company Art show. This show included artists such as Morris Yarowsky, Dan Solomon, Gertrude (Trudie) Pacific-Beck, David Cotter, John Haugse and Marcella Rawlinson. The years between 1967-1968 were spent at the University of Southampton, England as a Fine Arts Fellow. His wife at the time, Trudie also accompanied him and also studied art while in England. When Larry and Trudie returned to the States, they settled in Skagit Valley Washington.
During the late 1960s and 1970s, Larry focused on his large scale, abstract sculptures and established his reputation as a sculpture. Larry's early works were comprised of found metals and objects assembled in a lyrical but humorous manner. Larry also was apart of the Shazam Society with Tom Robbins among others, which produced performances and happenings. During 1975-1980, he installed projects for Golden Gardens Park in Seattle, Highline Community College and Boeing (King County Airport). He also worked on a piece for the Occidental Park site in Seattle, but due to circumstances of the city it was never installed.
Although Larry was not raised around his ancestral homelands, like his Mother, in the mid 1970s Larry visited the Alaskan coast. It was then that he realized he understood the Yup'ik culture. In 1973 Larry started to produce a new series of pieces called "Inukshuk", which is Inuit for sculpture presence. This term was also used for three major commissions that later followed. Larry continued to use Inuit terminology in his work. This was the first sign that Larry started to embrace his multicultural heritage in his artwork. Larry experimented with making bronze and aluminum small castings of traditional Inuit masks, but he felt uneasy that these masks represented a complete contradiction to his western art training.
After the 1980 install of the Boeing sculpture, Beck experienced what he would call his sculpture career crisis. He became disappointed with public art. This is when Larry received his calling to start working on his abstract Inuit Inua (spirit) masks. Larry embraced the idea of using the ancestral ways of his Mother's people of finding natural objects and turning them into masks or art pieces. Larry utilized this method and found contemporary objects within junkyards and hardware stores to create his contemporary Inua masks. From this time on, Larry focused the remaining years of his life working on Inua masks. He participated in shows at art galleries and loaned artwork out for traveling exhibits that where exhibited from the United Nations in Switzerland to all over the United States, including his ancestral homelands of Alaska. Also from the mid 1980s till the end of his life in 1994, he spent more time with his children.
On March 27th 1994, Larry died of a heart attack in his home in Washington. His artwork still lives on today in many museums and private collections. He turned Native American Art into something that kept historical cultural ties while also embracing a contemporary look.
Provenance:
These research materials were donated to NMAI in March 2009 by Nikolai Beck and Alex Beck.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Rights:
Single photocopies may be made for research purposes. Copyright is vested with Nikolai Beck and Alex Beck and will not transfer to the National Museum of the American Indian until 2018. Researchers seeking publication use, must obtain permission directly from the donors by contacting NMAI Archives (nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); Lawrence 'Larry' James Beck Papers, Box and Folder Number; National Museum of the American Indian Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
This collection contains materials documenting George Conner (Tse-da-ha; Osage) and his time as a student at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania. The collection contains 3 photographs of Conner circa 1884-1896, as well as Carlisle Indian School booklets and correspondence circa 1900-1914.
Arrangement:
This collection is arranged in 5 folders.
Biographical / Historical:
George Conner, also known as Tse-dah-ha (Buffalo Hide), was born on the Osage Reservation in Kansas in 1870. His parents were Wah-kon-tah Shinka (Little Doctor) and Le-ah-tsa, both of the Little Osage tribe. Le-ah-tsa was the daughter of Wa-caba-shinka (Little Bear) who was the Principal Chief of the Little Osage.
Kansas Militia killed George's father on a return hunting trip shortly after George was born. George's mother married William Conner (Oh-hunka-moie) and approximately five years later, she was also killed. William Conner played a prominent role in reformulating the Osage government in the new Oklahoma Reservation and helped write the first Osage Nation Constitution.
William sent George to live with his Aunt Margaret "Maggie" Lawrence on her ranch west of Grainola. He attended Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania from 1885-1890 and was re-admitted in 1896 and stayed until 1899. During his last years at Carlisle, George assisted with the physical education of fellow students including exercise drills using 3.5-pound Spaulding Indian clubs, a set of which he brought home (now held in NMAI's collection). He also assisted with coaching younger boys in baseball and other athletics at Carlisle. While at Carlisle the second time, he learned harness making and saddle repair. He also participated in Carlisle's "outing" program, which placed student on neighboring Pennsylvania farms in the summer.
Upon return to the Osage Reservation at age twenty-nine, George moved from his boyhood home on the Lawrence ranch to the Osage Nation capital, Pawhuska. There he opened a harness shop and met his wife Lillian House, a matron at the Osage Girl's school. They had five children Letha, Adelia, Victor, Lester, and Don. George served as the Osage National Council Secretary for a number of years.
George and his step-father William also got involved with Osage resistance to the U.S. Government's Allotment Act, otherwise known as the Dawes Act of 1887. This law was designed to open up remaining Indian land in the West to white settlement, by dividing large reservations among the tribal members. Each would receive a small parcel and then U.S. made the remaining "surplus" land available for settlement. The Osage opposed this and William, George, and the tribe worked collectively for nearly two decades to prevent the reservation from allotment. In 1906, U.S. Congress passed the Osage Allotment Act, making the Osage one of the last tribes in Oklahoma to accept allotment. The tribe was also able collectively to retain the mineral rights of the reservation.
George and Lillian moved from Pawhuska, started farming west of Grainola, Oklahoma, and remained on the farm the rest of their lives. George died in 1936 at the age of 66 years old.
[Biography written by Dr. Joe L. Conner (George Conner's grandson) in 2012 and edited by E. Moazami (NMAI Assistant Head Archivist) in 2018.]
Related Materials:
The Archives and Special Collections at Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania also holds collections related to the school.
Separated Materials:
The museum also purchased two objects with this collection: a Carlisle Indian School uniform owned and worn by George Conner and a set of exercise jugggling pins used by Conner when he assisted with physical education at Carlisle (object #s 268789 and 268790).
Provenance:
This collection was purchased by the museum in 2012.
Restrictions:
Access to NMAI Archive Center collections is by appointment only, Monday - Friday, 9:30 am - 4:30 pm. Please contact the archives to make an appointment (phone: 301-238-1400, email: nmaiarchives@si.edu).
Rights:
Permission to publish materials from the collection must be requested from National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center. Please submit a written request to nmaiphotos@si.edu. For personal or classroom use, users are invited to download, print, photocopy, and distribute the images that are available online without prior written permission, provided that the files are not modified in any way, the Smithsonian Institution copyright notice (where applicable) is included, and the source of the image is identified as the National Museum of the American Indian. For more information please see the Smithsonian's Terms of Use and NMAI Archive Center's Digital Image request website.
Identification of specific item; Date (if known); George Conner Carlisle Indian School collection, NMAI.AC.250; National Museum of the American Indian Archive Center, Smithsonian Institution.
