Living Arts of Tulsa Podcast

A Deep Conversation With Cherokee Artist And Educator Candessa Tehee

September 22, 2020 Tulsa Podcast Lab
Living Arts of Tulsa Podcast
A Deep Conversation With Cherokee Artist And Educator Candessa Tehee
Show Notes

TO WATCH A VIDEO OF THIS INTERVIEW AND TO SEE HER ARTWORK THAT SHE SHOWS, GO TO INSPIRING CONVERSATIONS PODCAST CHANNEL ON YOUTUBE OR VIEW DIRECTLY AT  https://youtu.be/Y47enNAK38g

Jeff sits down with Cherokee artist and educator Candessa Tehee as she shares very deeply about the connection between her artwork, her work teaching American Indian Studies and coordinator of Cherokee Language Education and Cherokee Cultural Studies Programs at Northeastern State University, and how this is all integrated within a life spent serving her community.

She shares some of her artwork and a story about how she learned finger weaving and the oblique form and about how she has been teaching this centuries-old art form to others as well.

Honored for her finger weaving, Candessa Tehee has helped resurrect this nearly forgotten art form, winning several finger-weaving awards since she began in 1999. She has mastered both the warp and weft form of finger weaving and the oblique form. In 2015, Tehee was an apprentice to Cherokee National Treasure Dorothy Dreadfulwater Ice.

Currently, she serves as an assistant professor of American Indian Studies and coordinator of Cherokee Language Education and Cherokee Cultural Studies Programs at Northeastern State University.

Candessa Tehee received the honor of Cherokee National Treasure in 2019.

Before joining NSU, Tehee managed Cherokee Nation’s Cherokee Language Program and oversaw the Language Technology Department, Translation Department and Community Languages Program.