When Tailyr Irvine was at the Standing Rock prayer camp in North Dakota she noticed that many of the other photographers there — who had come to photograph protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline — were concentrating on people on horseback or those wearing headdresses. While many of the photographers were well meaning, she said, they relied on overly dramatic visual clichés that gave a distorted view of native people like her.

“Our traditions are important to me,” she said. “But I’m also authentically Indian when I’m just wearing sweatpants.”

Ms. Irvine is a member of the Salish and Kootenai tribes who was born and raised on the Flathead Reservation in northwest Montana. While her family followed native traditions, she rarely saw meaningful stories on Native Americans. The photos she saw were usually based on stereotypes that she calls the four D’s — drumming, dancing, drinking and death.