The town reached out to Danielle SeeWalker in early January to offer the Lakota painter and muralist a studio and stipend, but backpedaled after residents complained about the politics of one of her paintings after it was posted to her Instagram.

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Three days after the news release hit the town’s website, it was removed and replaced with a statement, emphasizing the fact that her art had turned from focusing on Native Americans to the crisis in Gaza.

“I tried to explain my position, tried to understand more about the community’s concerns, but they just talked over me and ended the call,” SeeWalker said. The call lasted “a minute and a half, tops. And that was probably the most disappointing part of the whole thing,” she said. “The disrespect.”

SeeWalker said she painted “G is for Genocide” in recognition of the parallels between the plight of Native Americans in the U.S. and the crisis in Gaza.

“It’s about erasing a culture, about taking land. Me as an Indigenous person, this is what happened to my ancestors,” SeeWalker said. “The piece is not about taking sides, it’s about humanity, it’s about not destroying a culture and letting people live.”

But she never had a chance to explain that, nor will she. The whole experience has soured her to the residency in Vail. “I was just blindsided. No chance to understand or explain. After that, even if they wanted to offer me a residency, I wouldn’t take it

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