How a Kansas City Mermaid Became Will Cotton’s Muse

Most people don’t think of Kansas City, Missouri, as a hotbed of mythologizing. But the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art is currently showing “Raven Halfmoon: Ride or Die,” which showcases new commissions from the Caddo Nation sculptor known for forcing Indigenous women into the foreground of American history, their ceramic visages glazed in shades of tar, smoke and blood. There, she elevates cowgirls over cowboys as protective totems lording over the prairie. This past August, living legends...