Reimagining Classical Pasts for Native Futures. A digital exhibition. Where Southwest Native arts and the ancient Mediterranean meet in cross-cultural borderlands.
Curated by Kendall Lovely, M.A. (Diné)
Dziłth'na'o'dithłe is a small community and sacred site just north of Chaco Canyon. Dziłth'na'o'dithłe is mentioned by name in our songs, ceremonies, and countless traditions. As a small girl, my dad imparted the sacredness of the place, which made me infuriated by the sight of cell phone towers littering the mesa, oil rigs in the distance, and nearly no indication of the preciousness of this beautiful place. Dziłth'na'o'dithłe, as well as our sacred ancestors Changing Woman and White Shell Woman, represent Diné womanhood. Aphrodite, adorned by shells as the Goddess of Sexuality, Love, and Beauty, is loved, respected, revered, and preserved by her home in the hearts of artists, admirers, curators. When creating this piece, I wanted to imagine Aphrodite treated in the same way as ours--- loved and dressed carefully by our people, but with little regard or notice from the outside world.
Jessie Weahkee is a Pueblo, Navajo, and Chicana graphic designer and artist based in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Her artist name, "Sleepyrock" pays homage to her father's clans and upbringing. Through art, Sleepyrock tries to shed light on Native life, spirituality, trials, and family. You can follow her graphic design work here: www.sleepyrock.com
Curatorial Note: Weahkee’s digital painting questions the role of sacredness as embedded in land, still-living ancient sites, and materials. In centering Chaco Canyon, a site of colonial dispossession through archeological resource extraction as well as colonial development and extractive energy industries such as fracking and uranium mining which have ruined lands, Weahkee’s work underscores how these forms of ongoing colonialism are linked and continue to degrade the sacred. At the same time, through evoking Aphrodite, a symbol of objectifying male gazing, Weahkee presents a critical subversion of viewing the sacred as a commodity to be gazed upon or consumed. Through her Indigenized re-imagining of Aphrodite, Weahkee asserts another form of sacredness out of care and protection, which should be extended in regards to sacred womanhood and the land. As land and body violence are entangled and gendered, a problem deeply entrenched with the extractive industries that affect the Navajo Nation, protecting the sacred is about care and stewardship rather than destructive forces of objectification and (dis)possessiveness.
“Dziłth'na'o'dithłe,” 2021
Jessie Weahkee (Sleepy Rock), Cochiti, Diné (Navajo), Zuni & Chicana
Digital Painting on Framed Poster (16"x20")
This portrait draws from the Western or “classical” fine art tradition of portraiture that centers people of importance. Through his contemporary mixed-media style, Arnoux’s portraiture asserts Indigenous presence in representing Indigenous people of importance. “Niina Mekaisto” (2023) depicts the Kainai Nation (Blackfoot Tribe) leader Niina Mekaisto (Chief Redcrow). Arnoux also includes in this portrait the sacred site Chief Mountain in the background and the big dipper (wolf's trail) in the sky. Similar to tipi designs, the horizontal stripped lines represent the horizon.
"Niina Mekaisto" (2023)
Joeseph Arnoux, Piikani (Blackfeet), Sp'q'n'i (Spokane)
Mixed media portrait
Activist and Indigenous artist Jacob Johns was shot by Ryan Martinez on September 28th, 2023. Jacob was protecting women and children at a ceremonial event, where Ryan instigated the shooting which left Jacob fighting for his life in the hospital.
The original portrait can be purchased here and 100% of proceeds will go to Jacob Johns during his operations and recuperation in the hospital. You can also donate to his recovery fund directly here.
Joeseph Arnoux is enrolled in the Piikani (Blackfeet Nation) and a descendant of the Spokane Tribe of Indians (Sp'q'n'iʔ). He currently resides in Albuquerque, NM where he creates art, mentors youth, and manages WARPONYBMX. A premier, nationwide Indigenous bicycle motocross community creating space for mental and physical health. Arnoux has built capacity in the local region and beyond, collaborating with such establishments as Intercultural Leadership Institute (2023), Portland Public Schools (2023), Gonzaga University (2022), New Mexico Community Capital (2021), and CABQ Arts & Culture Dept (2022). This past year he was awarded the “Johnson Leighton: Artist of the Year Award'' from Northwest Native Development Fund (2022). He recently graduated from Institute of American Indian Arts (Santa Fe, NM) with an AFA in Studio Arts (2022). His artistic focus encompasses two and three dimensional works in various mediums such as illustration, design, printing, painting, murals, and jewelry. You can support his work here: https://the-rezult.square.site/
Curatorial Note:
Artists such as Kehinde Wiley, Harmonia Rosales, and Kent Monkman are famous for inserting Black and Indigenous presence into Classical paintings and portraiture. Joeseph Arnoux brings a mixed-media contemporary art approach to Indigenizing portraiture work, which he infuses with sacred meaning both through his tribal heritage and community relations as an activist and artist currently working and living in New Mexico.
Toward this end, Arnoux’s portrait of Jacob Johns is meant to support the work of a fellow Indigenous activist by raising awareness of Johns’s recovery from violence sustained through a hate crime in Northern New Mexico. It is important to heed that actions addressing the colonial harm embedded in racist monuments continue to be embroiled in violence. Community organizer and historian Lyra D. Monteiro has written a powerful overview of the relationship between such monuments. The violence which activists including Johns have survived reveal that, whether carved from white marble or cast in bronze in the classical tradition, colonial monuments perpetuate white supremacist violence. Please read the statement written by Johns’s family and consider donating to his Go Fund Me linked above.
“Jacob Johns” (2023)
Joeseph Arnoux, Piikani (Blackfeet), Sp'q'n'i (Spokane)
Mixed media portrait on wood panel canvas board (3’x4’)
My work references the cross-cultural use of Arctic light within “manifest destiny” concepts (historically used to advance tourism and economics) to re-imagine and reclaim the Arctic light for indigeneity of the past, present, and future. As a visual metaphor, projections of beadwork and Indigenous imagery become the light that moves through everything, embodying continuity in relation to past and present technologies. Digital, traditional, and upcycled materials form hybrid objects that represent an imagined and ancestral potential. If humans perceive and are therefore active participants in the optical viewing of phenomena, my work speculatively asks, “What is seen when imagining the future?”
As a multi-heritage, Alaska Native (Koyukon Athabascan), I document natural light in the Alaskan and Californian terrain to reimagine perception as Indigenous, subliminal, and theoretical. The work insists that perception is as much a simple act as it is a subjective creation. “False light” permeates my pieces and may appear artificial and, at other times, genuine. Light itself is not objective; it bends and twists, invoking the unsolvable particle-wave paradox in quantum mechanics. This shifting and unresolved framework guides my physical and experiential image making.
Like this exhibition, which dismantles cultural hegemonies within European culture and its current academic reception, my work critiques the non-Native dominance of artistic interpretations of the American West and American frontier within the last several centuries in nature paintings and nature photography by interjecting imagery of indigenous craft (beadwork) within a naturalistic setting (such as the aurora borealis). I hope to remind viewers of deeply intrinsic, indigenous connections to the arctic and subarctic regions that have been historically overlooked
Copyright: School for Advanced Research, photos provided by artist
Untitled (Athabascan Aurora Light Test 20), 2023
Janna Avner (Koyukon Athabascan)
Projector, mirror, refraction gradient, digital video, family archival materials
Copyright: School for Advanced Research
Janna Avner’s current practice focuses on dislocation, technology theory, and Indigenous futurism. Janna was the Eric and Barbara Dobkin Native Art Fellow at the School for Advanced Research in 2023, which brought her work into dialogue with Acoma Pueblo pottery from the Southwest region. She lives in the Bay Area, CA, and as an Alaska Native (Koyukon Athabascan), she travels to and from Alaska to fish the Yukon River and visit with family. Janna graduated from Yale University in 2012 and received her Master’s in Visual Art from California State University, Northridge (2022). Her work can be followed at: https://www.instagram.com/janna_avner/?hl=en
Curatorial Note: Avner’s work represents a dialogue between Indigenous technologies and futurity through an innovative experiential presentation as exemplified by her recent installation work at the School for Advanced Research. Indigenous Arts Research Center at SAR has its roots in being established as a complement to the archeological schools in Athens, Rome, and Palestine of the Archeological Institute of America. As noted by SAR’s website: “The unveiling of the treasures of Troy, Ephesus, and the Valley of the Kings held the world spellbound. But as the United States expanded westward, a new science sprang up in the native soils of the New World. Explorers, cowboys, missionaries, settlers, and entrepreneurs became fascinated with the remains of early Indian civilizations in the American West.” However, work such as Avner’s supports a subversion of this early imaginary and narrative surrounding the American (South)west toward reasserted Indigenous relationships between ancient and future worlds and across landscapes in the American West.
Copyright: School for Advanced Research
Copyright: School for Advanced Research
School for Advanced
Research Lecture &
Open Studio, May 2023
Untitled (Aurora Light Test)
Projected image of Acoma Pueblo pottery from Indian Arts Research Center Archives.
Copyright: School for Advanced Research
Growing up, I always saw my old Navajo grandma wear jewelry, whether it was silver-work or beadwork. One piece I remember her always wearing was a 5-strand coral tube necklace with turquoise jaclas hanging down. I never knew it was valuable. I was so used to seeing it. But that changed when I started beading my own pieces. I familiarized myself with coral. Italian coral to be exact. It’s expensive. One strand can cost up to $150. Or even more. But I was so set on beading my own piece. I saved up and bought 9 strands of Italian coral. It turned out so beautiful, I gifted it to my mother for Christmas that winter of 2021. She was blessed with a gem that will now be a family heirloom. As well as my grandmothers. Italian coral is a prized possession. Some even say, it is worth more than turquoise.
Bah Bigman is a Diné woman who has been creating Navajo jewelry for over 10 years. She hopes to bring more cultural revitalization, self-empowerment, and honor to her Diné people by traditional beading and storytelling through beadwork. You can follow her work at: https://www.instagram.com/baashilhozho
Curatorial Note: Bigman’s multi-strand red coral Diné yóó (necklace) with turquoise jaclas (loops fastened into earrings or as pendants) is an exemplary piece that shows the integration of this Mediterranean-derived natural material integrated with native stones like turquoise. Bigman’s story of obtaining the material and creating this piece with her family in mind emphasizes the meaning of creating these pieces beyond craft or market exchange. Beyond the monetary value understood by Bigman, these strands of red coral are integrated through the generations of Bigman’s Diné family, from grandmother to mother and fashioned by a (grand)daughter mindful of keeping this work for her family’s future generations.
Natural 10-strand Italian Coral Yóó (necklace), 2021
Bah Bigman, Diné (Navajo)
Beads, natural materials
"Diné Wonder Woman,” 2020
Shaun Beyale, Navajo (Diné)
Digital art
Growing up on the Navajo Nation, I was surrounded by strong women like my mom, grandmother, and aunts. Being a matrilineal society, women were respected and held power in the household. I read comic books and Wonder Woman reminded me of the women in my life who were true warriors raising kids, taking care of the home, livestock raising and making sure everyone was okay. Superheroes protect and inspire people to be their best and the women in my life did just that. They inspired me to use my power of art to share and inspire others. "Diné Wonder Woman" represents the strength of the Indigenous women in our communities who go above and beyond to protect and inspire their people.
Shaun Beyale was born in Shiprock, New Mexico, on the Navajo Nation. As a child a strong interest in comic books sparked a passion drawing his favorite superheroes in his free time. Eventually he started to create his own comic book characters in high school, like an early version of "Ayla The Monster Slayer," a Diné Superhero Warrior who protects her homeland and her people. After graduating Farmington High School and completing a year of Job Corps, he attended The Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, NM. Graduating with a BFA (Studio Arts), he started his journey as a full-time artist in 2015 and has showcased his art in many forms across the world in comic books, art galleries, magazines, video games and he has been busy in the art world. Currently based out of Bloomfield, NM, with his wife and daughter, he creates and shares his empowering art with hopes to inspire future generations to find their inner "Monster Slayer" to face life’s challenges. You can find his work here: https://www.instagram.com/shaunbeyale?igsh=NzBmMjdhZWRiYQ== .
Curatorial Note: Beyale takes inspiration from D.C. Comics’ famous Amazon warrior superhero and renders Wonder Woman through an Indigenized portrayal, which imagines her as a Diné warrior woman. Features such as a crown with the Navajo Nation seal as a Miss Navajo Nation pageant winner wears, a squash blossom necklace, and silver and turquoise bow guards signify that this version of Wonder Woman is Navajo. Beyale also characterizes her as a distinctly Navajo matriarchal figure at the center of Navajo society, defining what a warrior woman means from a Diné perspective.
“-but I can show you.” 2023
Do’wal Sehi (Sunshine), Karankawa Kadla Hawk Clan
Collage on Wood Panel
The similarities of oppression and genocide between Palestinians and Indigenous “Americans” is hauntingly similar. This relationship is formed out of the solidarity that exists between peoples who know firsthand what it is like to die for their homeland. I take Eurocentric religious iconography that historically maintains ties with Anglo European colonizers and juxtaposition it alongside imagery of a Palestinian woman holding their child who has passed. The kicker is it isn’t that much a juxtaposition. Jesus was a houseless Palestinian born under oppression. The Madonna figures exist under arms, rifles that are specifically used in the Israeli military. The piece shows us how not only does history repeat itself, but eventually, oppressors will claim they were oppressed.
Do’wal Sehi or Sunshine (in English) is an Indigenous educator and resistance artist from the Karankawa Kadla Hawk Clan. She currently works as a Specialist for a Health and Wellness Resort where she is inspired by Karankawa spirituality and ideology to hold space for and educate others to reconnect to the natural world, undo harmful colonial rhetoric, and find peace within themselves and the Mother Earth. You can find more of her work at: https://www.instagram.com/karankawachicharra?igsh=OGQ5ZDc2ODk2ZA==
Curatorial Note: The study of Mediterranean and Southwest antiquity are entwined. In between founding American schools in Athens and Rome and founding its Santa Fe school (School for American Research, now operated as School for Advanced Research), the Archeological Institute of America founded a school in Palestine for “Oriental” or Biblical research (now ASOR). The parallels in imperial and colonial interests in the ancient past both in the American Southwest and Palestine underscore the urgency of addressing ongoing colonial violence and dispossession. As a member of the Karankawa Kadla community, who persist despite genocidal efforts including through Christian missionization and U.S. occupation, Do’Wal Sehi uses Biblical iconography subversively to raise awareness of the oppression and current crisis of those in Palestine who are being violently displaced through the U.S.-supported Israeli military. Both the Karankawa Kadla community in the U.S. Southwest (Texas gulf coast) and Palestinians face similar struggles for liberation and Land Back, amid oil and other resource extractive interests.
Please see these letters of support from Indigenous peoples and classicists and ancient historians and consider other ways to stand in solidarity and support a free Palestine as well as Indigenous liberation in the United States.
The inspiration for the piece came from the turn of the century—1800s/1900s. A James Earle Fraser sculpture, End of the Trail, is an iconic image and silhouette that has been utilized in so many different ways—posters, replica mass-produced sculptures, etc. Essentially, it is a Native man holding a spear that is hunched over his horse in a sign of defeat.
The Fraser imagery became the starting point for this sculpture and my initial desire was to flip it completely on its head— to show the strength and power of Native women as not being the complete opposite. In the past couple of years there has been a movement on social media with Native women calling themselves “matriarchs.” It’s an idea that is meaningful and important, but it is also something in our contemporary landscape where people laugh or joke when someone is trying to be a super Native or overly spiritual. The piece is meant to be provocative, funny, and multi-layered.
"SHE MUST BE A MATRIARCH,” 2023
Anna Tsouhlarakis Diné (Navajo), Creek, Greek
Fiberglass, Resin, and Plaster Sculpture, 8’ x 15’ x 4’
Anna Tsouhlarakis works in sculpture, installation, video, and performance. She received her BA from Dartmouth College with degrees in Native American Studies and Studio Art. She went on to receive her MFA from Yale University in Sculpture. Her work has been part of national and international exhibitions at venues such as Rush Arts in New York, the Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University, Crystal Bridges Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, and the National Portrait Gallery. Tsouhlarakis has participated in various art residencies including Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Yaddo, and was the Andrew W. Mellon Artist-in-Residence at Colorado College for the 2019-2020 academic year. She was awarded a Creative Capital Grant in 2021 and recently received a 2022 Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation Award. Tsouhlarakis lives in Colorado and Maine. You can find more of her work here: https://www.naveeks.com/
Curatorial Note: Tsouhlarakis takes an iconic monumental sculpture which has long bolstered the settler-colonial romance of the American frontier alongside the tragedy of the purportedly vanishing Indian race. James Earle Fraser’s End of the Trail (1894/1915). Although some view this piece as critical of the United States’ destruction of Native peoples or as a reinforcement of defeat, the inherent image of decline or vanishment is central to Tsouhlarakis’ subversion. Additionally, Tsouhlarakis asserts Native survival over a century later through feminine gendered presence and underscoring both strength and humor, while utilizing some conventions of monumental sculpture and turning other conventions on their heads.
More content coming soon!
This is phase one of the exhibition; check back weekly for additional artists featured on the homepage, blog posts, and more.