Viki Eagle—Photography

Real Life Indian

“Real Life Indian” started out as a photography project led by Viki Eagle in 2011. The project’s original intent was to document Native American students and display the “modern Indigenous person”. It was to showcase the identities and complexities of living in two worlds; where our inherited culture meets the mainstream society. The goal is to continue to show the conflicts and harmonies of being a human being but in particular the complicate the meaning of a “Real Life Indian.” The entire collection can be viewed at reallifeindian.wordpress.com

Viki Eagle is a member of the Sicangu Lakota Nation from her father, and is half Japanese from her mother. She graduated with an MA from the University of Denver in Colorado where she created her own photography project titled “Real Life Indian” (2011). Conscious of the low numbers of Native American students enrolled in higher education, she created a project to showcase the many Native students that are attending college. After graduation she worked as a high school multimedia teacher at Red Cloud Indian High School on the Pine Ridge Reservation, where she taught photography courses to students throughout the year.