White Buffalo Horn Ladle

Label

Kevin Pourier is one of only a few artists today working with incised buffalo (American bison) hornas a medium, and because buffalo do not shed their horns, his ability to work with this material is limited. Creating spoons and vessels, Pourier reinvigorates an artistic practice rooted in Lakota subsistence lifeways with his detailed carvings. The addition of complementary materials introduces striking imagery to inspire thought, growth, and learning. 

Most buffalo ranchers raise their buffalo for meat and discard everything else. Additionally, the large bulls are kept as herd bulls, and if they are butchered, their heads are usually kept as trophies. Traditionally, Northern Plains peoples used every part of the buffalo . . . nothing went to waste. The hides were used to make drums and Tipis, the horn caps were used to make horn spoons, cups, and adornment. The bones were used to make sleds, children’s toys, and game pieces. —Kevin Pourier

From the 2022 exhibition Unbroken: Native American Ceramics, Sculpture, and Design, curated by Dillen Peace '19, Native American Art Intern and Sháńdíín Brown '20, Native American Art Intern 

Both objects in this case are made with parts of bison, one of the most distinctive North American species. For millennia, Plains tribes relied on bison as a crucial aspect of the regional ecosystem. Traditionally, they used every part of the animal for food, shelter, clothing, and tools. This way of life came under attack in the late 19th century, when the US government offered settlers a bounty to hunt and slaughter bison with the goal of furthering westward expansion. As a result, bison became nearly extinct, with the population declining from nearly sixty million to just 1,500 by 1895. Today, there are nearly 500,000 bison in the United States, and tribal governments work to maintain their connection to the surrounding land and communities.

From the 2026 exhibition Nurturing Nationhood: Artistic Constructions of America, 1790-1940, curated by Haely Chang (Jane and Raphael Bernstein Associate Curator of East Asian Art), Evonne Fuselier (Hood Museum Board of Advisors Mutual Learning Fellow), Michael Hartman (former Jonathan Little Cohen Curator of American Art), Elizabeth Rice Mattison (Andrew W. Mellon Curator of Academic Programming and Curator of European Art), and Ashley B. Offill (Curator of Collection

Course History

ANTH 3.01, Introduction to Cultural Anthropology, Sienna Craig, Winter 2022

Writing Program 5.24, Photographic Representations, Amanda Wetsel, Winter 2023

Writing Program 5.25, Photographic Representations, Amanda Wetsel, Winter 2023

Exhibition History

Nurturing Nationhood: Artistic Constructions of America, 1790-1940, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire; February 7-August 29, 2026.

Unbroken: Native American Ceramics, Sculpture, and Design, Ivan Albright Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, January 22, 2022-March 12, 2023.

Provenance

Purported to have belonged to Crazy Horse (1840-1877); collected by Glover Street Hastings III, West Newton, Massachusetts and Bridgeton, Maine, 1920's-1930's; bequeathed to his daughter, Carlena Hastings Redfield (1888-1981), 1949; bequeathed to present collection [under the terms of her father's will], 1981.

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