Pine Ridge native Joe Pulliam helps create safe, collaborative space for local artists

STORY BY MICHELLE PAWELSKI // PHOTOS BY ANDY GREENMAN

In fourth grade, Joe Pulliam drew a whiskey bottle with spider legs for a competition focused on raising awareness of alcoholism — a disease that plagued his home on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. The bottle represented a trickster or “Iktomi” in Lakota. “It tricks people into that lifestyle of destruction and death,” he explained.

Unfortunately, Joe fell to the Iktomi.

For more than two decades Joe struggled with substance abuse. Motivated through art and a desire to support others on the reservation, Joe, an Oglala Sioux Tribal member, is now going on five years of sobriety and using his story, his talent, and his business savvy to help others find an artistic outlet.

Joe, along with local artist Billy Janis, recently opened the Tusweca Gallery in downtown Rapid City — a space they hope becomes a creative, collaborative space for other artists. “It has been quite the journey. The steps I am doing right now are not only empowering for me, but I am trying to help people empower themselves too.”

Tusweca, which is dragonfly in Lakota, symbolizes a transformation into something good, Joe explained. “It has a lot of cultural meaning (for the Lakota people). There is so much positive energy the dragonfly represents. He starts his life underwater, gets to a certain point and climbs up on a reed, breaks out of that larvae shell, grows these wings and within minutes he is a master of another world.” The gallery also signifies his transformation from a life as an alcoholic to one of sobriety, and from life on the reservation to one of “chasing the American Dream,” he added.

Homeless for years, Joe moved to Rapid City two years ago, right before the pandemic. He lived with his girlfriend for a few months and eventually found housing near downtown. With his entire life devoted to art, he had hoped to continue that passion.

One afternoon, Joe was walking with his daughter downtown when they passed by a vacant building. He mentioned the space would be ideal for a collaborative effort between the Tribal government and local artists. “It was such a pipe dream,” Joe said.

A few months later the dream, although slightly different, became a reality.

Billy knew the owner of another building on the corner of Seventh and Main streets, and it happened to be available. “It was two opportunities coming together right there,” Joe said. “It was June when we started cleaning and putting the dream together.”

The goal is to provide a space to showcase Indigenous artists and provide a bridge to the Rapid City community. “We are hoping to create a safe area where the creativity flows,” Joe describes. “We are thinking of an artist-in-residence program, workshops, and music events. We want to work with the other galleries and bring more people in, especially in the off-season. It feels great to be accepted and to have an opportunity to be a part of (not only) the budding art scene but also a part of the community.”

THE ENTRANCE TO TUSWECA GALLERY LOCATED AT 631 MAIN STREET.

Currently, the Tusweca Gallery features pieces from two Pine Ridge artists in addition to works from Billy and Joe. However, the owners are looking to add more artists and diversity. The gallery’s first exhibit, The Best of the Reservation, is a people’s choice show and will run through December 1. Community members can vote at the gallery or online.

The Tusweca Gallery is not Joe’s first attempt at creating a collaborative art space for Native Americans. He helped start the Seven Council Fires Native Art, a nonprofit created to empower and promote Native American artists and crafters and to preserve Native arts traditions. And, in 2017, he helped open the Whiteclay Makerspace, a former bar in Whiteclay, Nebraska, transformed into a safe place for locals to create. “To really get a chance to utilize this building that was destroying our people, turn it around and empower our people with art and music, give them ways to obtain affordable art materials, and educate them on marketing, business plans, and practices. These are the things I was searching for when I was on the reservation,” he reflects.

Art has always been an escape for Joe. With his mother and father part of the Bureau of Indian Affairs relocation program, Joe spent the first years of his life in St. Paul. The family moved back to Pine Ridge when Joe was 10. “There was just nowhere to let that energy flow,” Joe said of the resources on the reservations. “There were not many community centers or libraries on the Rez like I was used to in the city.”

He began painting and drawing on anything he could find including paper bags. To this day, he still repurposes old documents and papers. “I like to use a lot of these things that would normally be trash. They really represent so much history,” Joe said of using old food stamps and pages out of ledger accounting books. “I like to think I am carrying on the tradition of the original ledger artists – the early artists of that period where they were using art to preserve our history and culture.”

Joe has big plans for the Tusweca Gallery. “We want other events that will bring people in to bring some more creative energy.” After expanding the spot in downtown Rapid City, he intends to return to Pine Ridge and continue helping with the efforts on the reservation. “It is way more promising now and a lot more hope,” he said. “It’s really all about helping people help themselves. I am an alcoholic, but I just choose not to drink today. It’s an everyday struggle, but it is worth it to be a father to my kids, to be an inspiration to other artists, and to hold down this corner in downtown Rapid City.” ▤