Dana Claxton

Fellowship Artist

Fellowship: Diversity And Dialogue (2007)

Cultural Affiliation: Hunkpapa Lakota

Claxton is a descendent of the band of Hunkpapa Lakota led by Sitting Bull, who sought safe passage into Canada after defeating General George A. Custer and his Seventh Cavalry at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. As an enrolled member of the Wood Mountain First Nation, she grew up in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan but now lives in Vancouver. She received her Master of Arts in Liberal Studies from Simon Fraser University in 2007. In 2003, Claxton taught journalism at the University of Regina as the Global Television chair, and from 2009 through 2010, she was the Ruth Wynn Woodward Women’s Studies Chair at Simon Fraser University. She is currently an associate professor at the University of British Columbia’s Department of Art History, Visual Art, and Theory. Her photographs, video installations, and performance pieces are critical commentaries that counter popular misconceptions of Native peoples and genders and inspire viewers to consider her perspective, her voice.