Leaving her own legacy

By Frances Vanderploeg

Thursday, Oct. 2, 2008 | midnight

Rhonda Holy Bear was 4 years old when she made her first doll. When she showed it to her grandmother, she was told a story that has motivated her ever since to make an art form of the playthings.

Angeline Holy Bear and the child of a tourist were playing with a Lakota doll her own grandmother had made for her. When it was time to go home, the visitor refused to leave without the doll, and her parents bought it. It was clear, Holy Bear said, that her grandmother still missed that doll.

Holy Bear, now a Henderson resident, was encouraged to gather scraps and continue making dolls. At first, her efforts were to provide herself with toys her family could not afford to buy.

Now her creations are considered pieces of art and are shown in museums around the world, including the Museum of American Folk Art in New York City, the Montclair Art Museum in New Jersey and the Denver Art Museum.

And her passion is to bring to life the characters of her youth through her art.

She focuses on the faces and hands, remembering the strong faces of her relatives.

"My grandmother has such a powerful, spiritual face," she said. "And the hands. The hands are just as important as faces for emotion."

Holy Bear was born on the Cheyenne River Indian Reservation in South Dakota, where she lived with her grandparents until she turned 14. From there she moved to Chicago, followed by New Mexico and finally Southern Nevada.

With no children to carry on her legacy, Holy Bear has found herself making dolls for the past 30 years with one goal in mind: to uphold the honor and dignity of her Sioux heritage.

The transition to her current dolls began while living in Chicago, where the Rev. Peter Powell, a scholar and historian, helped Holy Bear gain access to artifacts in the Chicago Field Museum. She was able to look through each artifact at her leisure, taking notes and, more importantly, feeling the spiritual power radiating through each piece, she said.

One newer element in Holy Bear's work is the use of basswood or balsawood to reflect the Sioux story of creation through her pieces.

As the story is told, a great flood swept the lands, devouring everyone in its path except one girl, who was saved by the big eagle when he picked her up and placed her in the highest tree. The red blood of those who died turned into red pipestone, making it sacred in the tribe.

The wood she uses represents the tree the girl held onto. She paints it red to represent the sacred pipestone.

"It took my dolls to the next level," she said. "No one else was doing that."

She said the next step plans is to carve the doll faces out of clay, which she thinks would allow her to convey more emotion. Using clay should not remove any of the spirituality her dolls convey, she said.

"Clay comes from the earth, too," she said. "I'm looking for more. I want to get that emotion. … I think that's what I've always been looking for."

Holy Bear said the most important thing for her is that her dolls and the stories behind them live on after she dies.

"It's an art that allowed me to look into the past and, through that, help in the restoration of our family's dignity," she said. "I want something that's going to be everlasting."

Now that she is nearing 50 years old, Holy Bear said, she would also like to return to her reservation and teach the children her craft so they can carry it on.

Frances Vanderploeg can be reached at 990-2660 or [email protected].