Virginia Snake-Bumann

I am a 21-year-old Ho-Chunk/Sicangu woman, academic, dancer and artist. Growing up on the Winnebago reservation, I’ve always had a great love and respect for my people and where I come from. I left the reservation at 14 to pursue my education and quickly learned that being Native in non-Native spaces would be difficult without a proper understanding of my identity and a connection to my home… Now in college, and residing in Northern Ho-Chunk territory, I use my craft and ‘hobbies’ to balance myself and stay rooted to where I come from.

~Rooted in Love: Finding Home in Each Other~

My art piece is a digital work imitating the beautiful ledger art done by so many before me. This work is of my companion and I dancing the potato dance at the Indigenous Peoples Day powwow here in Madison, WI. Though we live in the city, we can find a home and community with each other and within the Native Community as a whole. Home is not only a place, but a feeling that you can have when you are surrounded by those you love, doing the things you love.