Native Voices: People of the Great Basin and Colorado Plateau

FAIN: GI-50169-10

University of Utah (Salt Lake City, UT 84112-9049)
Rebecca T. Menlove (Project Director: August 2009 to August 2012)

Implementation of a long-term exhibition focused on the history, geography, linguistics, and contemporary life of the indigenous people of Utah.

Native Voices is a permanent exhibition slated to open in 2011 at the new Utah Museum of Natural History. Native Voices will focus on the history, geography, linguistics, and contemporary cultures of indigenous people of Utah whose traditional homelands and relations reach well beyond the state's boudaries. Here, traditions persist and culture endures for five distinctive but rarely represented native nations: Shoshone, Ute, Navajo, Paiute, and Goshute. The project will result in an exhibition of 3,300 square feet of indoor interpretive space and an outdoor amphitheater. More than 500 objects from UMNH ethnographic collections and multiple acquisitions of new works by contemporary indigenous artists will combine with audio narratives (in both English and native languages), historic and contemporary photographs, film components, and live programming to create an exchange of ideas and opportunities for broad cultural understanding for native and non-native visitors alike.