On view in “Life, Liberty, Los Angeles” at The Autry Museum of the American West

Students from the Sherman Indian High School in Riverside, California painted this angel for the “Community of Angels” public art project.  Between 2001 and 2002, 150 angels were exhibited across Los Angeles. The students designed this angel as a collage of Native American creation stories from more than one hundred different tribes.

Starting in 1956, federal policies pushed Native families to leave tribal reservations and rural areas and move to cities like L.A. By 1970, L.A. had become home to the largest and most diverse Native American population in the nation. These waves of Native migration created a community dispersed across L.A. and led to new forms of pan-Indian identity and activism.