page_title: Quillwork
section_title: Today
hierarchical_section_title: Quillwork / Today
caption_attribution_description: English: Contemporary quillwork design on birch bark, by Ferdy Goode
context_page_description: Quillwork is a form of textile embellishment traditionally practiced by Native Americans that employs the quills of porcupines as an aesthetic element. Quills from bird feathers were also occasionally used in quillwork.
context_section_description: Quillwork never died out as a living art form in the Northern Plains. Some communities that had lost their quillwork tradition have been able to revive the art form. For instance, no women quilled in the Dene community of Wha Ti, Northwest Territories by the late 1990s. The Dene Cultural Institute held two workshops there in 1999 and 2000, effectively reviving quillwork in Wha Ti.
  The art form is very much alive today. Examples of contemporary, award-winning quillworkers include Juanita Growing Thunder Fogarty, (Sioux-Assiniboine) artist; Dorothy Brave Eagle (Oglala Lakota) of Denver, Colorado; Kanatiiosh (Akwesasne Mohawk) of St. Regis Mohawk Reservation; Sarah Hardisty (Dene) of Jean Marie River, Northwest Territories; Leonda Fast Buffalo Horse (Blackfeet) of Browning, Montana; and Deborah Magee Sherer (Blackfeet) of Cut Bank, Montana.
  Northern Lakes College of Alberta, Canada teaches a college-level course in quillwork art.
caption: Contemporary quillwork design on birch bark, by Ferdy Goode
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