#thunderbird arts

[neechees]

Some traditional Cree hairstyles. Top row are usually worn by men & male or masculine aligned people, while the bottom row (except for 6 and 7) are usually worn by women or women aligned or femme people. 9 is gender neutral (As is the classic two braids style, not shown here). Trans people who are neither men/women may wear any hairstyle they think fits their gender expression.

3 braids, two behind ears and one at the top of the head and hanging behind head

two braids with cropped bangs

pompadour style, with two braids in front of ears

low twin braids with side bangs, and side part

two small braids worn at side of face while rest of the hair hangs loose

twin braids tied together in the front

twin braids tied and plaited together in the back

twin braids looped behind the ears

mourning style: short hair cropped at neck line, and worn loose and messy

[kate-komics]

New batch of Hellboy meeting cryptids and legends is in!

Other Hellboy has cryptids art:

Her e’s one

Here’s another

And another

[reasonsforhope]

Article Link

"Minnetonka first started selling its “Thunderbird” moccasins in 1965. Now, for the first time, they’ve been redesigned by a Native American designer.

It’s one step in the company’s larger work to deal with its history of cultural appropriation. The Minneapolis-based company launched in the 1940s as a small business making souvenirs for roadside gift shops in the region—including Native American-inspired moccasins, though the business wasn’t started or run by Native Americans. The moccasins soon became its biggest seller.

[Photo: Minnetonka]

Adrienne Benjamin, an Anishanaabe artist and community activist who became the company’s “reconciliation advisor,” was initially reluctant when a tribal elder approached her about meeting with the company. Other activists had dismissed the idea that the company would do the work to truly transform. But Benjamin agreed to the meeting, and the conversation convinced her to move forward.

“I sensed a genuine commitment to positive change,” she says. “They had really done their homework as far as understanding and acknowledging the wrong and the appropriation. I think they knew for a long time that things needed to get better, and they just weren’t sure what a first step was.”

Pictured: Lucie Skjefte and son Animikii [Photo: Minnetonka]

In 2020, Minnetonka publicly apologized “for having benefited from selling Native-inspired designs without directly honoring Native culture or communities.” It also said that it was actively recruiting Native Americans to work at the company, reexamining its branding, looking for Native-owned businesses to partner with, continuing to support Native American nonprofits, and that it planned to collaborate with Native American artists and designers.

Benjamin partnered with the company on the first collaboration, a collection of hand-beaded hats, and then recruited the Minneapolis-based designer Lucie Skjefte, a citizen of the Red Lake Nation, who designed the beadwork for another moccasin style and a pair of slippers for the brand. Skjefte says that she felt comfortable working with the company knowing that it had already done work with Benjamin on reconciliation. And she wasn’t a stranger to the brand. “Our grandmothers and our mothers would always look for moccasins in a clutch kind of situation where they didn’t have a pair ready and available to make on their own—then they would buy Minnetonka mocs and walk into a traditional pow wow and wear them,” she says. Her mother, she says, who passed away in 2019, would have been “immensely proud” that Skjefte’s design work was part of the moccasins—and on the new version of the Thunderbird moccasin, one of the company’s top-selling styles.

[Photo: Minnetonka]

“I started thinking about all of those stories, and what resonated with me visually,” Skjefte says. The redesign, she says, is much more detailed and authentic than the previous version. “Through the redesign and beading process, we are actively reclaiming and reconnecting our Animikii or Thunderbird motif with its Indigenous roots,” she says. Skjefte will earn royalties for the design, and Minnetonka will also separately donate a portion of the sale of each shoe to Mni Sota Fund, a nonprofit that helps Native Americans in Minnesota get training and capital for home ownership and entrepreneurship.

Some companies go a step farther—Manitobah Mukluks, based in Canada, has an Indigenous founder and more than half Indigenous staff. (While Minnetonka is actively recruiting more Native American workers, the company says that employees self-report race and it can’t share any data about its current number of Indigenous employees.) Beyond its own line of products, Manitobah also has an online Indigenous Market that features artists who earn 100% of the profit for their work.

White Bear Moccasins, a Native-owned-and-made brand in Montana, makes moccasins from bison hide. Each custom pair can take six to eight hours to make; the shoes cost hundreds of dollars, though they can also be repaired and last as long as a lifetime, says owner Shauna White Bear. In interviews, White Bear has said that she wants “to take our craft back,” from companies like Minnetonka. But she also told Fast Company that she doesn’t think that Minnetonka, as a family-owned business, should have to lose its livelihood now and stop making moccasins.

The situation is arguably different for other fashion brands that might use a Native American symbol—or rip off a Native American design completely—on a single product that could easily be taken off the market. Benjamin says that she has also worked with other companies that have discontinued products.

She sees five steps in the process of reconciliation. First, the person or company who did wrong has to acknowledge the wrong. Then they need to publicly apologize, begin to change behavior, start to rebuild trust, and then, eventually, the wronged party might take the step of forgiveness. Right now, she says, Minnetonka is in the third phase of behavior change. The brand plans to continue to collaborate with Native American designers.

The company can be an example to others on how to listen and build true relationships, Benjamin says. “I think that’s the only way that these relationships are going to get any better—people have to sit down and talk about it,” she says. “People have to be real. People have to apologize. They have to want to reconcile with people.”

The leadership at Minnetonka can also be allies in pushing other companies to do better. “My voice is important at the table as an Indigenous woman,” Benjamin says. “Lucie’s voice is important. But at tables where there’s a majority of people that aren’t Indigenous, sometimes those allies’ voices are more powerful in those spaces, because that means that they’ve signed on to what we’re saying. The power has signed on to moving forward and we agree with ‘Yes, this was wrong.’ That’s the stuff that’s going to change [things] right there.”"

-via FastCompany, February 7, 2024

[edorazzi]

Due to scheduling conflicts we're celebrating Tintin Day early this month! 🥳

Someone said in tags that they could totally see Tintin needing International Rescuing at some point. What better way for the Hood to put iR's integrity on the line than revealing all to a world-famous reporter? Would the Tracys jeopardise their whole operation to save just one life?!

(Un)fortunately Tintin hasn't shown up at work since 1929, so the only sacrifice here will be an old man's dignity. Again. 🪦

[wellwatersurprise]

they never really acknowledged it, but i know in my heart he missed his wings.

(inspired by thunderbird by they might be giants)

[sarathrwizard]

I finally got it done!

Thunderbirds are go 2016/ROTTMNT crossover!

(Big Explosion Sound💥)

[idontknowreallywhy]

Kayo!

I commissioned the wonderful @maxyartwork to bring to life a little headcanon I have about what our Kayo might get up to in her spare time… and it’s glorious and I’m so excited to share it!! 😍

Thank you Maxy - it’s FAB!!

[mspaintbladie]

mozeren but yukopified

[masterrainb0w]

I think the Peachyville horror might be the husbands that made us along the way.

[neon-wonderlands]

Artist: andyokay

[waty-art]

When it’s 1:00 AM and you just want to go to sleep, but your two younger brothers start arguing.

[neechees]

[image description: digital art piece of a brownskinned, Native woman holding a pale baby. The Native woman has dark eyes, and dark hair pulled into a half ponytail, wearing a neutral expression. She has an off the shoulder blouse with two layers of large frills along the breast and shoulder line, and a black underrbust corset. The baby wears a white dress, also with frilly shoulders, and moccasins with blue, red, and white beadwork. The baby has auburn hair and green eyes and freckles. end image description.]

AU basically but Chickadee and her Metis (Irish/Cree) baby

[emaadsidiki]

Fortresses Under Fire🎨 Keith Ferris🖌️ Thunderbirds🛩️

[thunderforsty]

Scott Tracy (shapeshifter) Commission for the dear @the-original-sineater ❤️❤️Thank you!!

[edorazzi]

More Thunderbirds Are Go comics! 🚀✨

It's been a while but I've had the first two lying around for months waiting to post a full set! In which neurodivergent John sets off people's AI detectors, gets bullied for his fashion choices, and Penelope battles with her conflicting standards when it comes to Gordon...

[thatkidwholikesthunderbirds]

No snarky caption. Just Gordon.