Gerald White,
Anishinaabe artist and educator from the Leech Lake Band of Pillagers, grew up in Chi-achaawbawning and graduated from Deer River High School. He has been teaching introductory Ojibwe language, history, and cultural classes, including Ojibwe woodworking at Deer River School District for the past 17 years. He has been a visual artist his whole life but has been painting, mostly in watercolor, over the last 30 years. He credits Carl Gawboy, another Anishinaabe painter, as the artist who inspired him to start watercolor painting. Primarily a self-taught painter, his images depict the traditional form of dance common to the Leech Lake area, which is the Jingle Dress and Men’s Woodland. Gerald was an artist in residence at the Minnesota Historical Society in 2019, where he researched powwow regalia specific to the Woodland style.
