The film Contrary Warrior: The Life and Times of Adam Fortunate Eagle will be shown Sunday, November 7 at 2:00pm as part of the American Indian Cinema Showcase at the Oklahoma City Museum of Art, 415 Couch Drive, Oklahoma City, OK 73102
Contrary Warrior is an intimate first-person account of the life and work of Red Lake Reservation Minnesota-born American Indian activist, artist, ceremonial leader, and author Adam Fortunate Eagle. Although best known for orchestrating the American Indian take-over of Alcatraz Island in 1969 that led to significant social reforms for all Native Americans, Fortunate Eagle is an accomplished sculptor, author and ceremonial pipe maker. Often with wit and humor he recalls his life from childhood, his ten years in an Indian Boarding school, becoming an urban Indian, to his present life on the reservation where he is a celebrated artist and author. Director: John Ferry 2010 USA 82min. NR digital HD
In his book Pipestone: My Life in an Indian Boarding School Fortunate Eagle offers an unforgettable memoir of his years as a young student at Pipestone Indian Boarding School in Minnesota. In this rare firsthand account, Fortunate Eagle lives up to his reputation as a “contrary warrior” by disproving the popular view of Indian boarding schools as bleak and prisonlike. Telling this story in the voice of his younger self, the author takes us on a delightful journey into his childhood and the inner world of the boarding school. Along the way, he shares anecdotes of dormitory culture, student pranks, and warrior games. Although Fortunate Eagle recognizes Pipestone’s shortcomings, he describes his time there as nothing less than “a little bit of heaven.”
Adam Fortunate Eagle, an enrolled member of the Ojibwe Nation, is also the author of Heart of the Rock: The Indian Invasion of Alcatraz. He currently resides on the Fallon Indian Reservation in Nevada.
For more information about Oklahoma City Museum of Art contact info@okcmoa.com (405) 236-3100 or (800) 579-9ART
