NOTE: This post is to introduce you to the 52nd episode of François Matarasso’s and my monthly podcast, “A Culture of Possibility.” It will be available starting 16 May 2025. You can find it and all episodes at Stitcher, iTunes, and wherever you get your podcasts, along with miaaw.net‘s other podcasts by Owen Kelly, Sophie Hope, and many guests, focusing on cultural democracy and related topics. You can also listen on Soundcloud and find links to accompany the podcasts.
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I was very excited to interview Lori Lea Pourier, Founder and Senior Fellow of the First Peoples Fund (FPF), based in Rapid City, South Dakota, in the Black Hills—”He Sapa” in Lakota, the language of one of the Native peoples who have made the region their home for a very long time. Here’s how the FPF website describes their work: “Rooted in the traditional values of generosity, wisdom, respect, integrity, strength, fortitude and humility, First Peoples Fund sustains culture and cultivates entrepreneurial initiatives and community development programs for and alongside Native artists.”
I first met Lori quite a few years ago, and we’ve mostly run into each other at gatherings that include funders, where she is a notable and valued presence, especially given that there are very few funding organizations focusing on Native work, let alone cultural work. Lori’s strong and steady voice is appreciated, as you will learn from listening to this episode.
Lori told us she was born and raised on the Pine Ridge Reservation, about the size of Connecticut. “That’s where I grew up, riding horseback and living in the community of Pine Ridge, as well as my father’s community, the Porcupine community. My mother was from the neighboring community in Kyle.” (Where FPF has established the Oglala Lakota Artspace.)
“My entire work trajectory,” Lori told us, “is centered around community development and tribal communities. I started off at the First Nations Development Institute fresh out of college. I was actually studying in France right before that, at the Paris Fashion Institute, then came and worked for First Nations Development Institute, a financial project located out in the beltway around Washington, DC. Their early work centered around self-sufficiency models for tribal communities, and I worked there for quite a bit. We did a market study and launched the first micro loan fund in this country on the Pine Ridge Reservation. It is still there today, and a partner with our current work at First Peoples Fund.
“By 1998 I was recruited by Jennifer Easton from the Tides Foundation based in San Francisco; it’s basically a house of social justice funders. Jennifer Easton was the founder of this organization called First Peoples Fund, a donor-advised fund at the Tides Foundation. She had learned about our earlier work at First Nations Development Institute. I always say that the work comes from a long line of teachers and networks of folks that helped us to build this wonderful organization we now have in 2025. Since 1998 to today I’ve been with First Peoples fund, and I always gauge that on the age of my daughter who is now 26.”
Jennifer Easton’s idea was that FPF would always spin off to be independent, led by Native people. “I always jokingly say she probably knew more Native folks than I knew at the time, because she had really done her homework, so it was easy to say yes when she asked me to come work for her. She was also supporting the work of the Indigenous Women’s Network, where I was the first executive director. We did a lot of international work, national work, and community-based work with Native women leaders and emerging leaders around mostly tradition keepers of tribal communities. They were tirelessly working in their communities to sustain culture and restore generations of knowledge. I come from an area in the Great Plains region which is a lot different than where you where you live, Arlene, in the Southwest, where four or five generations have been trading and marketing their work. We wanted to see how we could help individual artists from this region make a living from their art. Many of our artists were coming from the tribal reservations across this Great Plains region. It was very similar to my previous work experiences, self-empowerment and supporting individuals who want to support their family.
“Early on in the work, we wanted to just help artists grow their business within tribal economy. We had this whole approach around what we call the three stages of entrepreneurship. How do we help build artists who are organizing in the shoe box to artists who are now graduating into Excel spreadsheets and then on into QuickBooks—that was the financial education side, aligned with the Native Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs). When I started, Lakota Funds was the first one. Now there’s probably about 60 or 70 in tribal communities around this country. In the current climate we’re in are being threatened by the cancellation of the CDFI funds through the Treasury Department. We’re going to be feeling that hit here.”
FPF’s work is particularly impressive because its programs touch on so many aspects of artmaking and culture bearing. They are holding both the individual artist or tradition keeper and the larger culture as the ground they are cultivating. I asked Lori to share an example or two of their work.
This was a really rich conversation, going deep into the legacy of culture bearers and tradition keepers who resisted the federal government’s and other authorities’ attempts to erase Native cultures and ways of being. FPF’s Community Spirit Award honors culture bearers who are deeply rooted in their communities and have a demonstrated commitment to their art over at least 10 years. Click around to see the impressive body of awardees.
In this episode, Lori painted a vivid picture of the region and its history. From her window, she “can see the Badlands all the way to the reservation, the most western side of the entry into Pine Ridge, which is about a half hour down the road. And if I look to the right, I can see those four large faces on Mount Rushmore. I’m sitting in my original territories, and my backyard is this horrible view, which is lit up at night.” That’s one story, and she tells others about her ancestor Black Elk and other illustrious family members, about ceremonies and sacred sites that carry on despite efforts to destroy them. Listen as she shares her understanding of the Indigenous arts ecology, ecosystems within each community networking together, and how they’ve grown and evolved over the last few decades.
It was sobering to hear Lori talk about how the destruction wrought by the MAGA regime’s cultural interventions is already being felt. FPF had just produced a major 25th anniversary event at the Kennedy Center when Trump it fired leadership and installed himself as chair. Shelly Lowe, the first Native American to head up the National Endowment for the Humanities, had just lost her job. A National Endowment for the Arts grant to support short films featuring Community Spirit awardees had been cut just before we recorded this podcast. Lori explained how the different status of Native communities ought to be upheld, treaties being contractual agreements with the U.S. government that are supposed to provide guarantees. But will they? “I feel like our community is going to really suffer these next four years, and our tribes are going to have to stand up and fight for those trust responsibilities. They went through Project 2025 at our last tribal treaty council meeting.”
On the podcast, Lori shares a lot of what she is learning about how these cuts are affecting excellent groups across the country. She is grateful that FPF received a grant from MacKenzie Scott. “If she didn’t make those awards two years ago, we would really be in a harder place.”
Please tune in. I know you won’t want to miss it.
“So It Is” by Indigie Femme, a duo of Native musicians, one of whom, Tash Terry, received a Native Performing Arts Fellowship this year.