The Edge
Left: One of Myles’ fabric prints for sale, pattern 1 from series Dakota Deco
Marlena Myles
The Fusion of Art & Fashion: Marlena Myles Plenty of artists have made moves into the fashion world, and vice versa. We spoke with digital artist and illustrator (turned fabric designer) Marlena Myles about her experience of fusing digital art with style and the inspiration behind some of her iconic fashion patterns.
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ike other millennials, Marlena Myles (Dakota, Mohegan, Muscogee Creek) developed her knack for digital arts on a computer with dial-up internet. "I got into making my own websites, drawing comics, and creating graphics of my favorite musicians," she says. "So, my passion for computer-generated art started at an early age." Myles, originally from the Spirit Lake Dakota Tribe in North Dakota, is also self-taught since she grew up alongside the growth and progress of technology and the net. "The programs and software have gotten a lot better since then, and there are so many 24 NATIVE MAX MAGAZINE | SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2020
fun ways to explore your imagination with technology these days." Myles grew up in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and Rapid City, South Dakota; all on the traditional homelands of the Oceti Sakowin (Dakota, Lakota, and Nakota tribes). Myles' accomplishments are impressive: she's created works for children's books, coloring books, animations and has fine art in galleries such as the Minneapolis Institute of Art, Red Cloud Heritage Center, the Minnesota Museum of American Art, the South Dakota Art Museum, and the Museum of Nebraska Art, to name a few. She creates her digital art using nativemax.com
