Working with Native-led national service organizations and an interagency federal working group, the Arts Endowment has carried out strategic outreach to Native communities and artists since 2016. Outreach includes nation-to-nation work with tribal governments in Washington, DC, reservation communities, Tribal Colleges and Universities (TCUs), and at conferences and convenings of Indigenous leaders and organizations. Outreach also includes steady recruitment of Native artists and community leaders to participate as panelists to review grant applications.

One outcome of this ongoing outreach was Native Arts & Culture: Resilience, Reclamation, and Relevance, a first-of-its-kind national convening that was hosted by the National Endowment for the Arts, National Endowment for the Humanities, and Native Arts & Cultures Foundation in February 2020. U.S. Poet Laureate (and NEA Literature Fellow) Joy Harjo (Mvskoke) was the keynote speaker for the convening, which included break-out panels to discuss some of the issues affecting Native arts and culture today, such as the need to use language, arts, and historic preservation to revitalize Native communities; the role of indigenous arts in social change; advancing the truth about Native culture through research and cultural resources; and reimagining Native visibility and identity in urban areas. Members from more than 40 tribal nations participated in the convening, as well as the heads of several federal agencies, and important nation-to-nation work in the arts was accomplished.

The Native Arts & Cultures Foundation produced a report on the convening in March 2021, which includes a summary of the proceedings and recommendations to strengthen the Native arts, cultures, and humanities fields.