me@marlenamyl.es

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Marlena Myles Art & Design

Recent Posts

Designing a Puppet in Adobe Character Animator
If This Bluff Could Talk
Curated Case @ Minneapolis Institute of Art
Illustrator debut for Thanku: Poems of Gratitude
American Flag in Plains Tribes’ Art

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the art of marlena myles

Marlena is a self-taught digital artist located in St. Paul, Minnesota. She uses her art to celebrate her Indigenous culture and language (Spirit Lake Dakota, Mohegan. Creek). She is the illustrator of Thanku: Poems of Gratitude and is currently creating her first Dakota culture coloring book, to be published early 2020.

email: me [at] marlenamyl.es

mylesdesigns

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"Dakota Floral Fragility 1"
Etching on glass, 2020.

Experimenting with etching on glass for a solo show next month at @macrostieart center.

It's impossible to photograph without getting a reflection 🙃🤗 #nativeart #dakotafloral #marlenamyles #glassetching

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Excited to begin the research on my upcoming solo show that will be at the Museum of Russian Art. The area I'll be studying will be the Alaskan Natives and Russian America historical period in Alaska from 1732 - 1867.
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I've worked on many pieces that speak to Dakota history and interactions between the land, the Indigenous folks and Europeans, so I'm excited to expand my horizons with this exhibition.
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On a more personal note, while growing up in a small town in South Dakota, Russian history, literature and culture was my favorite to study in my free time at the library. I felt much empathy for their people -- the oppression, forced relocations and also their ability to survive; as a Native person, my history isn't entirely different. Anyway, I never imagined I would be showing my art at a Russian art museum and I'm very excited for this project.

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My art I created for the city of Red Wing's "If this bluff could talk" community art project made the front page of the Republican Eagle, the newspaper for Goodhue County, MN/Pierce County, WI.

You can check out the art in person at the RW city hall and read the article through the link in bio. #dakotamakoche #hemnican

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"Morning Dawn Bloom"
Cinema 4D animation, 2020.
Just welcoming Dakota florals into the future age.
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#dakotafloral #dakotamakoche #ocetisakowin #nativeart #digitalart #3dart #cinema4d #c4danimation #marlenamyles

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"Darkest Dreaming Star"
Demo animation in Cinema 4D. I'm just a beginner, thus this is my first animation in the program. 🥰

#marlenamyles #c4d #c4danimation #ocetisakowin #morningstar

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A piece I created as part of a series of flags that will be displayed at the Met Council's Ice Shanty during the Art Shanty Projects in January 2020.
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The flag colors are the diversity of our city, coming together as inner hoops through the movement of the Indigenous "whirling log" geometry, which represents humanity and healing. The center morning star and floral designs are the knowledge and growth we gain through (re)building positive relationships and connections with Nature.
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Motivated by what I learned after curating a case for the Minneapolis Institute of Art about the use of the American flag to Dakota/Lakota people over the centuries, I realized it could be said that my ancestors had inadvertantly "decolonized" the flag when it was first given to them by applying their Indigenous understanding of "Stars" and "Stripes", which were already existing artistic and religious symbols in our cultures.
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So when tasked with this project, I thought about the importance of reclaiming our traditional imagery, including the "whirling log" symbol, which has been used on flags in the past with a totally different meaning. I know other Native artists such as @codyedgewater are leading the way in symbolic reclamation and I really respect that courage, of not shying away from being authentic to our cultures.
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#mnregionalparks #futureforest #loveregionalparks #marlenamyles #dakotamakoche

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"RETURN OF WAKÍŊYAŊ", 2019
Vector illustration

This piece is on display during @allmyrelationsarts exhibition "Foresight: 20 years of Mitakuye Oyasin" which celebrates the past, present and future of contemporary indigenous art. Happy to be included amongst these great artists -- I highly recommend checking out this show, one of the best Native art shows I've seen anywhere. On display until February 2, 2020.

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10 minute speed coloring using digital pastels of Adam Ant to play with colors.

Can't use real life pastels without feeling like I just wasted a piece of paper 😂 #adamant #digitalart #digitalillustration #digitaldrawing #rebelle @adamantofficial

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My digital #Halloween costume for 2019, y'all living in the past 😂
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When I make these puppets in Adobe Character Animate, I have to give it 14 different sets of mouths for the syllables needed to lipsync, which it can do automatically to any audio I put into it. You see those visemes here at the bottom of the screen; some sounds get the same lip set like S-Ch-J-Z-Sh since if you were reading lips, those would look similar?
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The controls on the right lets me fine tune the puppet more, including how bouncy the dangles will be (things like his hair -- whatever moves when I move my head). It's all pretty fun to mess around with. I use a new set of eyelids style that I haven't used before that I'm still fine tuning.
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I don't usually record head and eye movements at the same time like in this recording since it's just too much to keep track of when I watching the screen as well. It lets me delete and redo portions if I'm not happy with it.

Website / artwork © 2019 Marlena Myles

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