The Only Certain Way: Faith

"The Only Certain Way: Faith asks the viewer to consider the historical divide between acceptance and resistance, speaking to what is forced upon as opposed to what is created as a response." —Joe Harjo

Towels bearing designs drawn from Native American cultures are thoughtfully displayed in memorial flag cases—a housing typically reserved for US flags to honor military service. Instead, this sculpture is a powerful monument to Indigenous cultures and ancestors. The work’s title references a journal entry by sixteenth-century Spanish conquistador Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca. Discussing the need for religious conversion and assimilation, he wrote: “[Native Americans] must be won by kindness, the only certain way.” In Harjo’s work, this notion is challenged and the historic weaponization of kindness is revealed.

Joe Harjo is a multidisciplinary artist from the Muscogee Creek Nation of Oklahoma. Through photography, sculpture, performance, and installation, Harjo explores Native American identity, debunks stereotypes, and asserts the vibrant, contemporary presence of Native communities.