Vertical lanes of beadwork, in place of the typical horizontal configuration, give this dress its distinctive character. The U-shaped motif at the lower center represents Turtle, a symbol of power relating to women’s health. Like most bead workers in the mid-nineteenth century, this maker favored tiny glass Venetian seed beads over the larger pony beads popular in earlier periods. Today, women wear elaborately beaded dresses reminiscent of this one for the Women’s Traditional Dance, one of several categories in powwow competitions.
- The Metropolitan Museum of Art
This is significant to graphic design history because of how beadwork was used to represent different objects and communicate information to others.
