A new exhibit at the Blanton Museum of Art in Austin aims to highlight the work of Indigenous artists across a range of mediums.
Curated by Portland, Oregon-based visual artist and recently-named MacArthur Fellow Wendy Red Star, in collaboration with the New York City-based Aperture foundation, “Native America: In Translation” features nine artists who “offer contemporary perspectives on memory, identity, and the history of photography.
Rebecca Belmore, “matriarch,”
2018, from the series
“nindinawemaganidog (all of my
relations),” Photograph by Henri
Robidea, archival pigment print,
56 x 42 in., Courtesy of the artist
Red Star says the idea for the exhibit stemmed from an issue of the Aperture magazine that she was asked to curate in 2020 called “Native America.”
“I was very honored,” Red Star said, “but I also gave them a warning and told Aperture if I was to guest at it, that I would be primarily focusing on artists who utilize photography and more unconventional ways of working with photo images and the camera. And they said, ‘Great, that’s what we want.'”
One such artist is Martine Gutierrez, who Red Star says focus their photo series on a fictional – “but not really” – magazine entitled Indigenous Woman, in which Gutierrez serves as both model and journalist. Red Star says Gutierrez takes that role to create an image that she hadn’t seen reflected in magazines like Vogue.
Red Star says taking “Native America” on the road has helped to connect the artists with audiences in different communities who might find something in their work they can relate to.
Another such artist is Guadalupe Maravilla.
“His background story is incredible,” Red Star said. “He, as a young child, traveled with coyotes into the states, and he is very much about that kind of communication between the borders.”
