Native artists working with Minnetonka Moccasin to reclaim appropriated designs

NINA MOINI: The Minnesota-based footwear brand Minnetonka Moccasin has been around since 1946. The company made its mark in the shoe industry by appropriating Native footwear and designs. Since issuing a public apology in 2021 for decades of profiting from Native culture, the company has been working to reconcile with Native American tribes.

Their newest initiative is the Minnetonka Reclamation Collaborative. It brings together Native artists to redesign the company's appropriated designs, create new products, and reclaim cultural narratives. It launched at the beginning of the month. Reconciliation advisor Adrienne Benjamin leads the effort. She's a member of the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe, and she joins me now. Thanks for your time today, Adrienne.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Hi. Thanks for having me.

NINA MOINI: Tell us a little bit more about this Reclamation Collaborative. What is the mission?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: So, since the apology and the acknowledgment of appropriation that Minnetonka put out in 2020, we've really been working to come up with a lot of different ways that we can uplift Native artists and advance industry education around best practices and to actually redefine Native representation, not just in footwear, but also in a bigger lens.

And also a big part of this is to expand on the commitment to the ethical collaboration and have a cultural representation in a company that hasn't had it in the past.

NINA MOINI: Tell me a little bit, if you would, Adrienne, about take me back to when the apology was issued. Do you have a sense for why at that time and what was going on then?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Sure. So it was actually during the time of the murder of George Floyd, and I think that a lot of not just companies, but people were doing a lot of internal work and looking inward at that time. Specifically, Minnetonka wasn't responding to a specific callout. It really was on their own terms and something that they had been wanting to do for a long time.

And when I was introduced to them, one of the words that I think that I've learned has been very interesting, and I think in other companies that I've worked with as well, they felt paralyzed and not knowing what the right next move was to make at that time, how do you do something correctly? And so I think they made the right choice in asking the community, what does that option look like?

NINA MOINI: Yeah. And then we know that in the last five years, a lot of companies and individuals who made promises like that have gone back on them, or eliminated them or scaled them back. So it's interesting to see this continuing, this collaboration. How are some of the artists involved selected?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Yes, so that's been something that I'm probably the most proud of of all the things that we've done.

NINA MOINI: Aw.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: When I thought about it, I do quite a few people, but one thing that was very easy was wanting to focus on Minnesota artists specifically first because Minnetonka is from here and has roots in this area. So I feel like in a reconciliation lens, that should be the focus. And also, it was to bring up people who hadn't already had a visible light on them as artists.

And one of the really amazing things about the artists that are in this collaborative and that are working with Minnetonka is that they're not just artists, they're actually people doing really important and amazing work in community. One of our artists is a community educator and will just recently left the job, but was the Indian Education Director for Onamia Public Schools for over 10 years. So it's people doing incredible work, and on top of that, being artists, and so it was important to me to bring in great people as well.

NINA MOINI: Yeah. Did you, Adrienne, have any people who were reluctant to participate or any people who feel like what you all are doing is perhaps not worthwhile? Like, why don't we just go do our own thing? What do you think about that?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: I mean, I think that all of us that have worked in this realm have had our own fears. I know had to think about it before I took on this role, but in the end, I thought about, I do believe heavily in allyship, and I believe that to get somewhere and to heal and be even just as people to take it into a micro aspect, we need that.

And this country or these companies or anything like-- isn't going to move forward without some type of collaboration and effort and learning and education. And that was what really pushed me forward, and I think that was a big part of wanting to form this collaborative as well. Each artist that came forward, even as myself coming out as the reconciliation advisor, every time a product launched, it made that the effort stronger, it made it feel more real.

And I think reconciliation is a process that isn't on a time scale, and I think that Minnetonka has given us as artists and other people in the community proof in the pudding, especially to the point that you just said, there are companies that are rolling back and pushing those efforts to the back of their list of importance.

And I think the fact that Minnetonka is staying true to the course is really telling, and it really makes me feel good as someone who's working as a part of that process to know that it's real and it's authentic, and I think that they have and they are doing the hard work that's really important in any of this reconciliation work or understanding the changes that need to happen in business and in the world.

NINA MOINI: Yeah. And your point is so just good that it takes time, you can't really put a timeline on something like that. I'm curious to know what the collaboration looks like. Is it designs? Is it other things? How collaborative is the process?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Sure. So each artist-- there are certain things that are in the Minnetonka's inventory that when I first got there, we kind had this whole thing as like, what do you think here that's appropriate? And we knew obviously one of the main ones was the thunderbird, and that was one of the first things that was redesigned by Anishinaabe artist Lucie Skjefte. And that's a really great story, too, because-- and to go back to your previous question, at first, she was a little bit hesitant.

NINA MOINI: Sure.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Only I had been pushed forward as an artist and working in this process, but her son's name is Animikii, which is the word for "thunderbird" in Anishinaabe. And so she was really pushed forward, and her and I had this just amazing conversation about, for so long, our grandmothers or other people would buy Minnetonka moccasins because that was what was available, while our people were still reclaiming our own art and our own handwork and beadwork and all of those things.

And we had this beautiful conversation about, well, now a grandma, if that's the case, can go somewhere and pick up that same shoe and feel a sense of pride knowing that you designed that thunderbird. And it's authentic now and you doing that instead of just picking up something that wasn't.

NINA MOINI: And if you could--

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: That was really--

NINA MOINI: Yeah. That was--

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Go ahead.

NINA MOINI: No, I was just going to say, forgive me that I don't know, but would you like to tell our audience just the significance of the thunderbird?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Sure. So in Anishinaabe-- and not just Anishinaabe, but across other tribes, which are very different in their own nations, but for us, the thunderbird signifies the bringer of the rain, and takes care of the Earth and cleanses it through its actions. And it's definitely a mystical being, but it's powerful and it's something that we respect and cherish as Anishinaabe people.

NINA MOINI: Beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. Adrienne, what is next for this work? And what do you hope that people-- Native folks and other people can take away from this collaboration?

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: I hope that we become an example of what authentic and meaningful collaboration can be. Right now, there are a lot of products that we're hoping to redesign, even down to specific buttons that just had a generic Indian-inspired or Native-inspired design.

And then we've talked about, what is an actual having an artist work with their internal designers to actually create what would an Anishinaabe pucker-toe moccasin look like if it was going to be something that was sold en masse? And how would that be designed? So we've been talking about a lot of different things. A big part of this has always been philanthropy, and the artists get to choose a percentage of their profits that go to a community initiative.

NINA MOINI: Nice.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: And that's been really fruitful and beautiful, too. And then, yeah, so there's a lot of different things that are in the works. And I think right now, we're really focused on this part of it, which is furthering the education, and I think have really pushed Minnetonka and I haven't had to push hard, they've been great about it.

But just getting out there as an ally and saying, hey, we're doing this, this is how we've done it, this is what we've learned, and this is how you can do it, too, and what you can do to do better. And one thing that I'm the most proud of is the way that this company has stood in it, through the apology, through the acknowledgment--

NINA MOINI: The discomfort, yeah.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: --like you said, through the discomfort.

NINA MOINI: Yeah.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Through this era of people pulling back on it, they're still standing strong in that, and to me, I think that's really meaningful, and I'm proud to do the work and to push forward other artists, and it's really quite rewarding.

NINA MOINI: Thank you so much, Adrienne, for coming by and sharing your work. Really appreciate your time.

ADRIENNE BENJAMIN: Yeah. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.

NINA MOINI: That was Adrienne Benjamin, Minnetonka Reconciliation Advisor.