Cones, 24 x 34, original Acrylic on canvas, by Leana Asher.

Cones is inspired by  the abstract quality of the cones, the prayers each of these cones carry and the sound of rain the cones make when the dancer moves.

• The Jingle Dress Dance began with the northern tribe Ojibewea in the early 1900s and became prevalent in the 1920s in Wisconsin and Minnesota in the US, and in Ontario in Canada.The story is that the dress was first seen in a dream. A medicine man’s granddaughter grew sick, and as he slept his spirit guides came to him and told him to make a Jingle dress for her. They said if she danced in it the dress would heal her.
• The Jingle Dress, also known as a Prayer Dress, is considered to bring healing to those who are sick. As mentioned above, the dance gets its name from the rows of ziibaaska’iganan (metal cones) sowed to the dresses. These cones are traditionally made from rolled snuff can lids and hung from the dress with ribbon close to one another, so they make a melodic sound as the girls and women dance. Nowadays, these cones are often machine-made.