Ten years ago, Starr Hardridge accidentally discovered the style that now defines his work. A citizen of the Muscogee Creek nation, he was invited to submit work for the Return from Exile show, which was planned to spotlight artists from the Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee Creek, and Seminole tribes.
Hardridge had been studying the basketry, pottery, and beadwork designs that those tribes had done before they were relocated to Oklahoma. He discovered that much of the traditional beadwork of his Muscogee ancestors was left behind when they left the Southeast. He wanted to resurrect that tradition in his painting for the show.
“I thought that I could make it look like beadwork,” he says. “So, I did this big piece, a Trail of Tears picture, based on images defined by a flat contour line and black-and-white abstract space. Inside the figures you saw these bright beadwork patterns.”
Read the full article in the September/October 2025 issue.
The Three Sisters
acrylic
36″ by 48″
Till the End of the Trail
acrylic
20″ by 16″
