Plateau Center to be co-managed

 

SPOKANE – The Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture and Washington State University have announced a plan for the collaborative management of the MAC’s Center for Plateau Cultural Studies program and WSU’s Plateau Center for American Indian Studies.

 

Under the agreement, Michael Holloman, director for the MAC’s Center for Plateau Cultural Studies program for the past nine years, will also become director of WSU’s Plateau Center for American Indian Studies.

 

Ron Rector, executive director at the MAC, said the collaborative effort is intended to expand resources and opportunities for the American Indian Plateau student population and other ethnic groups.

 

“Having Michael Holloman in this shared position with WSU opens up tremendous opportunities to expand cultural program and the collections for the Plateau Tribes and other diverse groups”, said Rector.

 

Recognized as one of the nation’s treasured American Indian cultural and historical resources, the MAC’s collection of 18,000 cultural objects represents peoples from all over the Americas. In addition to the vast collection, the cultural center houses a Sacred Room, workrooms for conservations, a U.S. Bank computer and information resource center and a gathering space for the traditional and cultural use of the collections.

 

A special recognition ceremony will be held at the MAC on July 29 to honor the new partnership and highlight the Museum’s new exhibit, Mestizo: Collections and Cultural Fusions, which will open July 31 and run through Dec. 4.

 

The exhibit focuses on the fusion of the indigenous peoples of the Americas since the beginning of the Spanish conquest of Central America and the southern region of North America more than 500 years ago. It explores how the conquest did not just create a hybrid of these two disparate cultures, but a unique singular identity known as “Mestizo”, a distinct blend of the two cultures.

 

Highlighted are a multitude of historic objects from the American Indian collections that focus on the Southwest, Mexico and Central America, including pre-Columbian materials, brightly painted Mexican masks and stunning religious artifacts from the era of early Christian contact with the indigenous peoples of these regions.

 

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