Balzer Contemporary Edge Gallery
Institute of American Indian Arts
Santa Fe . New Mexico
I’m honored to be invited to organized an exhibition at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) for their MFA program. It was a joy to meet the MFA candidates and to learn more about their work and their creative process. I asked myself after all the virtual studio visits – what’s the through-line to all the works? I wrote a poem as a response. It paved way for contextualizing the exhibition.
– – –
“New moon rises above an open field.
Shadows become shadowless.
Crickets’ and night frogs’ callings echo the forest grounds.
Raindrops tap-dance from one leaf to another.
Fireflies flicker glimpses of our inner gems,
while we catch a restful sleep through the night.”
WAYS OF BECOMING is a group exhibition exploring our resiliency to become, to rise above despite the weight of cultural amnesia, longing, loss, and grief. These inner emotions stem from forced takings from those in power, the changing climate, and our disabilities. Akin to nomadic roots, the works in the exhibition find ways to keep moving, recovering, regenerating, and becoming. The exhibition’s multidisciplinary projects translate to an insurmountable act of building, resisting, imagining, reclaiming, re-matriating and returning to our ancestral ways.
Exhibiting artists include Lozen Haozous (Fort Sill Apache), Erin Ggaadimits Ivalu Gingrich (Koyukon Athabascan & Iñupiaq), Leah Mata Fragua (yak titʸu titʸu yak tiłhini (Northern Chumash)), Graci Horne (Sisseton Wahpeton Oyate and Standing Rock Nation), Daisy Trudell-Mills (Xicana, Santee Dakota, Jewish), Mekko Harjo (Shawnee, Muscogee, Seminole, Jewish and an enrolled member of the Quapaw Tribe of Oklahoma), Kéyah Henry (Diné), and Joely BigEagle-Kequahtooway (Nakota/Cree and Saulteaux from White Bear First Nations).
14 Jul – 04Aug 2023
Opening Reception: Fri 14 Jul 2023 5p-7p
Gallery Hours: Mon-Fri 10a-4p
秉宏 