Description

The Autry Museum of the American West (AMAW) and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (MFAB) have been invited to apply for a Museum Partnership for Social Justice grants under the AAP sub-program which aims to support museums committed to learning and disseminating ethical practices and project models. AMAW will join the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, (MFAB) in a set of dialogues, reciprocal visits, and case studies, to advance the MFAB’s stewardship, interpretation, and presentation of its Native American collections, and its conversations and collaborations with Native communities. In its mentoring role, AMAW’s team will be led Joe Horse Capture, Vice President of Native Collections, and LaLeña Lewark, Vice President of Exhibitions, Collections, and Conservation. They will draw on AMAW’s recent, Luce-funded Native Collections Unpacking and Reorganization Project, through which they revised their study and storage procedures to foreground community identities and cultural priorities, and to increase access to the holdings for tribal study, consultations, and collaboration. AMAW will share the ways in which their new policies and procedures traverse museum operations and build relationships with tribal communities. Since the 2018 Luce-funded exhibition, “Collecting Stories: Native American Art,” MFA has sought to deepen its understanding of its Native holdings and establish mutually fruitful interactions with Native communities. Mentorship by the AMAW team will support Dr. Marina Tyquiengco, the MFA’s first curator of Native American Art, in advance of the 2026 reinstallation of MFA’s 18th century American galleries, where the cultural histories and voices of Native peoples will be shifted from the periphery to the center.   
These grants align with AAP strategic goal 1b: To expand the community of museums committing to anti-racist practices and projects that advance representation and equity, in their museums and for the partners and communities they engage and serve.