Megan A. Smetzer Awarded the 36^th Annual Eldredge Prize for ​“Painful Beauty: Tlingit Women, Beadwork and the Art of Resilience”

The Smithsonian American Art Museum has awarded the 36th annual Charles C. Eldredge Prize for Distinguished Scholarship in American Art to Megan A. Smetzer for her book Painful Beauty: Tlingit Women, Beadwork and the Art of Resilience (University of Washington Press, 2021). Through extensive archival and museum research, Smetzer shows how beaders countered repressive colonial systems and sustained cultural practices through innovative artistic visions deeply connected to the environment, clan histories and Tlingit worldviews.

This is the first academic monograph that centers contemporary Indigenous community-based knowledge about Tlingit beadwork. Smetzer’s research for Painful Beauty was supported by many Tlingit artists, scholars and knowledge keepers.

Aldona Jonaitis, director emerita of the Museum of the North, University of Alaska, who nominated Painful Beauty described it as “one of the most original and important publications on Northwest Coast Indigenous art history in the last 20 years” and “a model of sensitive and ethical writing that should be emulated by the discipline.” 

Jurors for the $3,000 prize were Karen Mary Davalos, professor of Chicano and Latino studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities; Amy M. Mooney, professor of art history at Columbia College Chicago; and Laura Kina, Vincent de Paul Professor at the Art School at DePaul University.

The independent jury stated that they “deeply appreciated Smetzer’s relational approach, a strategy from Indigenous studies that is becoming essential in the 21st century. Her close readings counter settler-colonial perspectives and convey the memories, histories and clan affiliations embedded in the designs of moccasins, beaded regalia, dance collars and contemporary designs. Painful Beauty integrates contextual material, attentive object-based interpretations informed by Tlingit aesthetics, extensive archival research, first-hand interviews and historiography in an accessibly written text that offers deep connections across the past and to the present. Through her study of previously ignored women’s contributions and the matrilineal history of Tlingit culture, compelling intergenerational connections are brought forth. Smetzer’s work is a timely, cross-disciplinary revitalization of American art history.”

Smetzer is an instructor of art history at Capilano University in North Vancouver, British Columbia. Her research and teaching focus on historical and contemporary Indigenous artwork and cultural belongings, primarily those made by women in the Pacific Northwest. Smetzer’s previous awards include fellowships from the Terra Foundation of American Art, the Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts at the National Gallery of Art, and the Luce/ACLS program. She earned a doctorate from the University of British Columbia, a master’s degree from Williams College and a bachelor’s degree from Smith College.

In conjunction with the award, Smetzer will present the annual Eldredge Prize Lecture in person and online, Thursday, March 13, 2025. Details and more information will be available online.

Shortlisted titles for the 2024 prize were: Emilie Boone, A Nimble Arc: James Van Der Zee and Photography (Duke University Press, 2023); Lisa Gail Collins, Stitching Love and Loss: A Gee’s Bend Quilt (University of Washington Press, 2023); David J. Getsy, Queer Behavior: Scott Burton and Performance Art (University of Chicago Press, 2022); and Faye Raquel Gleisser, Risk Work: Making Art and Guerrilla Tactics in Punitive America, 1967–1987 (University of Chicago Press, 2023).

The Eldredge Prize, named in honor of the museum’s former director (1982–1988), is sponsored by the American Art Forum, a patrons’ support organization. This annual award, initiated in 1989, recognizes originality and thoroughness of research, excellence of writing and clarity of method. Single-author, book-length publications in the field of American art history appearing within the previous three calendar years are eligible. The deadline for nominations for the 2025 prize is Jan. 15, 2025.  

Recent Eldredge Prize recipients include Caitlin Meehye Beach (2023) for Sculpture at the Ends of Slavery, Vivien Green Fryd (2022) for Against Our Will: Sexual Trauma in American Art Since 1970 and Cherise Smith (2021) for Michael Ray Charles: A Retrospective. A complete list of past winners is available on the museum’s website.