Engendering status and value in the powwow art market

Abstract

This article examines the relationship between people and objects in the powwow arts and crafts market. Over the past century, the field of Indian art developed a system of valuation that employs the “negative relationship” to create a hierarchy of people, objects, and markets. Central to this system are regimes of value associated with art and commodity. I argue that the presence of the mass-produced makes it possible for artisan-vendors to employ the negative relationship to define, value, and make sustainable the artistic in the powwow market context. Ultimately, this marks artisan-vendors and mass-produced vendors as position-takers within the Indian art field.