Key Works

Carl Beam’s artistic practice was not restricted to any single medium or creative approach. Over the course of his career, he worked in many media and modes, ranging from painting, printmaking, and drawing to sculpture and ceramics, and from photography and performance art to adobe brick construction. In all his work, Beam treated significant issues that have affected Indigenous peoples on Turtle Island since European contact in the fifteenth century. He was committed to exposing stereotypes and prejudices, and through the use of complex visual fields, he challenged viewers to grapple with the ideas in his work and to be active participants in meaning-making.