Skip to main content

Photographs of Dakota Access Pipeline Protests in North Dakota

 Collection
Call Number: WA Photos Folio 186

Description of Photographs

Photographs created by John Willis during six trips from September through December 2016 that document a resistance movement based near Cannon Ball, North Dakota, and eastern edge of the Standing Rock Indian Reservation protesting the Energy Transfer Partners project to construct a petroleum pipeline known as the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) at the site and through North Dakota and South Dakota as well as across Iowa into Illinois. The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe led the protest with support a grassroots resistance movement known as "Mní Wičóni" (Lakota for “water is life”) and NoDAPL (No Dakota Access Pipeline). Many images also appear in John Willis, Mni Wiconi - Water Is Life Honoring the Water Protectors at Standing Rock and Everywhere in the Ongoing Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty (Staunton, Virginia: George F. Thompson Publishing, 2019).

Images printed as 224 inkjet color prints document spiritual ceremonies related to the water as well as resistance actions at the proposed drilling site as well as at Bismarck and Mandan in North Dakota. Additionally, many images document temporary camps established by protestors, chiefly the Oceti Sakowin camp (Očhéthi Šakówiŋ is Dakota for "Seven Council Fires" or peoples known by the exonym of Sioux), as well as portraits of activists.

Individual prints are 32.8 x 48.2 centimeters and 61 x 78.7 centimeters. Titled and signed and dated by the photographer on versos of prints. Dates indicate the time of image capture rather than physical creation of the print.

Titles in this guide are from the inscriptions by the photographer on versos of prints. Variant titles from Mni Wiconi - Water Is Life Honoring the Water Protectors at Standing Rock and Everywhere in the Ongoing Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty (Staunton, Virginia: George F. Thompson Publishing, 2019) as well as from Willis' website, jwillis.net, accessed in April 2021.

Dates

  • 2016

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

The John Willis, Photographs of Dakota Access Pipeline Protests in North Dakota are the physical property of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University. Literary rights, including copyright, belong to the authors or their legal heirs and assigns. For further information, consult the appropriate curator.

Immediate Source of Acquisition

Purchased from John Willis on the Walter McClintock Memorial Fund, 2017.

Arrangement

Organized into two series: I. Inkjet Prints, 13 x 19 inches (32.8 x 48.2 centimeters), 2016. Inkjet Prints, 24 x 31 inches (61 x 78.7 centimeters), 2016.

Extent

26 Linear Feet (13 boxes)

39 broadsides

Language of Materials

English

Catalog Record

A record for this collection is available in Orbis, the Yale University Library catalog

Persistent URL

https://hdl.handle.net/10079/fa/beinecke.willisdapl

Abstract

Photographs created by John Willis during six trips from September through December 2016 that document a resistance movement based near Cannon Ball, North Dakota, and eastern edge of the Standing Rock Indian Reservation protesting against the Energy Transfer Partners project to construct a petroleum pipeline known as the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) at the site and through North Dakota and South Dakota as well as across Iowa into Illinois. The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe led the protest with support a grassroots resistance movement known as "Mní Wičóni" (Lakota for “water is life”) and NoDAPL (No Dakota Access Pipeline). Many images also appear in John Willis, Mni Wiconi - Water Is Life Honoring the Water Protectors at Standing Rock and Everywhere in the Ongoing Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty (Staunton, Virginia: George F. Thompson Publishing, 2019).

John Willis (born 1957)

John Willis is a documentary photographer and emeritus professor of photography at Marlboro College in Marlboro, Vermont. His monographs include Recycled Realities, co-authored with Tom Young (Center for American Places, 2002), Views from the Reservation (Center for American Places, 2010), and Mni Wiconi - Water Is Life Honoring the Water Protectors at Standing Rock and Everywhere in the Ongoing Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty (Staunton, Virginia: George F. Thompson Publishing, 2019). Willis has photographs in the permanent collections of the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, among others. He is also a co-founder with Bill Ledger of the In-Sight Photography Project, a photography outreach project to youth in Brattleboro, Vermont.

Processing Information

Collections are processed to a variety of levels, depending on the work necessary to make them usable, their perceived research value, the availability of staff, competing priorities, and whether or not further accruals are expected. The library attempts to provide a basic level of preservation and access for all collections, and does more extensive processing of higher priority collections as time and resources permit. These materials have been arranged and described according to national and local standards. For more information, please refer to the Beinecke Manuscript Unit Processing Manual.

Many discrete images share the same title throughout the collection.

Titled, signed, and dated by the photographer on versos of prints.

Titles in this guide are from the inscriptions by the photographer on versos of prints. Variant titles from Mni Wiconi - Water Is Life Honoring the Water Protectors at Standing Rock and Everywhere in the Ongoing Struggle for Indigenous Sovereignty (Staunton, Virginia: George F. Thompson Publishing, 2019) as well as from Willis's website, jwillis.net, accessed in April 2021.

Each folder in the collection contains a single inkjet print.

Source

Title
Guide to the John Willis, Photographs of Dakota Access Pipeline Protests in North Dakota
Status
Completed
Author
by Matthew Daniel Mason
Date
April 2021
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description note
Finding aid written in English.

Part of the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library Repository

Contact:
P. O. Box 208330
New Haven CT 06520-8330 US
(203) 432-2977

Location

121 Wall Street
New Haven, CT 06511

Opening Hours

Access Information

The Beinecke Library is open to all Yale University students and faculty, and visiting researchers whose work requires use of its special collections. You will need to bring appropriate photo ID the first time you register. Beinecke is a non-circulating, closed stack library. Paging is done by library staff during business hours. You can request collection material online at least two business days in advance of your visit, using the request links in Archives at Yale. For more information, please see Planning Your Research Visit and consult the Reading Room Policies prior to visiting the library.