David Emmett Williams

David Emmett Williams (Tonkawa name: Tosque; August 20, 1933 – November 8, 1985) was a Native American painter, who was Kiowa/Tonkawa/Kiowa-Apache from Oklahoma. He studied with Dick West (Southern Cheyenne) at Bacone College and won numerous national awards for his paintings. He painted in the Flatstyle technique that was taught at Bacone from the 1940s to the 1970s.

Background David Emmett Williams (Tonkawa name: Tosque) was born on August 20, 1933, in Lawton, Oklahoma, to singer and leather-worker Emmett Williams (Tonkawa/Kiowa Apache) and his Kiowa wife, Jennie Sahkoodlequoie, who was descended of Satanka (Sitting Bear, and later at Bacone College with fellow Native American painters, Joan Hill (Muscogee/Cherokee) and Doc Tate Nevaquaya (Comanche) under Dick West. All of the artists of this period at Bacone were taught the Bacone style, a Flatstyle painting style, which was often showcased at the Philbrook Museum of Art's Indian Annual, a competitive juried art show. Philbrook and Bacone had an agreement in the 1940s through the 1960s period whereby student's work would be hung and offered for sale, with the school garnering one third of the profits of any sale.

Art career Williams participated in the annual competitions in the early 1960s. He also won, during the same time frame, the national competition held at the Bismarck National Indian Art Show in Bismarck, North Dakota.

In 1961, Williams married Norma Jean Eubanks William's first solo exhibition was at the Heard Museum in Phoenix, He had other solo shows at the Southern Plains Indian Museum and Craft Center in Anadarko, Oklahoma, the Southwest Museum of the American Indian in Los Angeles and the Tryon Gallery in London.

During his lifetime, Williams had multiple and profitable exhibitions throughout the United States including at the Arizona State Museum at the University of Arizona in Tucson; the First Annual National American Indian Art Exposition in Charlotte, North Carolina; the Laguna Gloria Art Museum of Austin, Texas; the McCombs Gallery at Bacone College in Muskogee, Oklahoma; the Owensboro Museum of Fine Art in Owensboro, Kentucky; among many others. He also won awards at the American Indian Exposition of Anadarko and the Inter-Tribal Indian Ceremonials in Gallup, New Mexico.

Death Williams died on November 8, 1985 of complications of diabetes.

Selected works Woman Dancer, 1960 Plains Indian War Dance, 1963 Burial at Night, 1964 Kachina Dance, 1966 Comanche Rider, circa 1970s Empty Saddles: Return of War Party, circa 1970s Male Dancer, 1972 Kiowa Fancy Dancer, 1972 Kiowa Medicine Man, 1973 The Five Civilized Tribes, 1974 Hunter with Rifle, 1974 Visions to Come, 1974 The Last Remembrance, 1975 Pursued, 1979 Warriors Salute, 1979