NEWSLETTER
Plattsburgh, N.Y. – The Clinton County Historical Association is the recipient of a 2025 Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership Making of Nations Interpretive Theme Grant. The $9,000 award is for “the creation of the “Witness Tree at Union Road Traveling Exhibition,” which features commissioned ceramic art by Natasha Smoke Santiago based on Revolutionary War-era Haudenosaunee historical figures and material culture such as significant wampum belts.
An Akwesasne resident, Smoke Santiago is a Turtle Clan woman of the Haudenosaunee or People of the Longhouse, also known as the Iroquois Confederacy. She has been an artist as long as she can remember and works in many mediums, including acrylics, clay, and an array of materials. Her focal point in the arts has been mainly works with clay, creating traditional Mohawk pottery, pipe making, and sculpture. Her work is heavily influenced by her heritage, and she incorporates Haudenosaunee history, culture, and teachings within her designs.
The project’s commissioned tiles will be featured in a solo exhibition at the Akwesasne Cultural Center later this year as as well in the documentary-in-progress, “Witness Tree at Union Road,” directed by Robin Caudell, which chronicles the John Haff family of Peru, NY for more than three generations in the Champlain Valley.
Caudell is a Founding Board Trustee of the North Country Underground Railroad Historical Association, which operates the North Star Underground Railroad Museum at Ausable Chasm.
The traveling exhibition and documentary is part of the Association’s America250 Semiquincentennial programming.
###
Image Courtesy of Natasha Smoke Santiago