PAINTING CHIEF DAN GEORGE

Levi Nelson, Chief Dan George After Warhol,

 2023. 23.75 x 49 inches. Acrylic, gouache, and silkscreen on canvas.
The artist and one of my professors at Emily Carr University, Jennifer Whey, prompted me to further explore my interest in fame; coupled with my fascination with what Marcia Crosby calls the Construction of the Imaginary Indian, I look to Hollywood as one of the sources for building a fantasy around the myth of the American Indian.

The Oscar-nominated Chief Dan George of Tsleil Waututh is also an icon whom I admire (and reminds me so much of my late Papa Albert Nelson).
Levi Nelson is an artist from the Lil’wat Nation located in Mount Currie, BC, Canada. After completing his undergraduate degree from Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver, Levi continued to focus on visual arts and learning. 

Levi is a student at Columbia University, in the Masters of Fine Arts program. He splits his time in his studio on the Lil’wat Nation territory of Mount Currie and New York City. Nelson’s work can best be described as contemporary First Nations art, where he fuses Aboriginal elements and ideas concerning Indigeneity, with pop culture imagery through the traditional Western practice of oil painting, in addition to mixed media; integrating silkscreen, paint, and collage on canvas.