AIO Ambassador Andrea Hanley has organized some wonderful events taking place at MoCNA this weekend in Santa Fe. Ambassadors are using the Thursday and Friday evening events as a meet up place!
All events are free to the public.
Thursday, August 17
Summer/Fall Exhibitions Opening Reception
5-7p.m. | Allan Houser Art Park
Green chili stew, wonderful exhibitions and DJ Celeste Worl!
Friday, August 18
Moving Pictures: The Current State of Native American Animation Panel + Reception, 5-7p.m. | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
Animation has always played a part of everyday life in mainstream American society and Native American communities. Today, we are seeing a reflection of the state of diversity by the acknowledgement and production of culturally diverse animation. Contemporary Indigenous artists, animators, actors, directors, producers, and script writers, now more than ever, offer audiences a new angle on American Indian culture and have been developing animation to voice Indigenous narratives both present and traditional for the past two decades. Who are the players in this field, and how do they shape overall Native American discourse? This panel will discuss how institutions and artists are supporting, mentoring, and bringing animation to the forefront of Indigenous creative vision and imagination. Sponsored by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian and the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts. Moderated by Andrea R. Hanley, (Navajo) MoCNA’s Membership and Program Manager. Panelists include: Kalikolehua Hurley (Native Hawaiian), Community Relations Manager, MOANA, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Steven Paul Judd (Kiowa), Artist and Filmmaker, and Cindy Benitez, Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, Film Programmer.
Saturday, August 19
Artist Gallery Sessions, 9:15-10:15 a.m. | Anne & Loren Kieve Gallery
Join artists Marlowe Katoney (Navajo), Merritt Johnson (Mixed descent/Mohawk/Blackfoot/Non-Indigenous), Indigenous art collective desert ArtLAB, featuring April Bojorquez (Chicana/Rarámuri) and Matthew Garcia (Chicano), MoCNA curators Tatiana Lomahaftewa-Singer (Choctaw/Hopi) and John Joe (Navajo) in the museum galleries as they discuss their current exhibitions and practice. Introductions by Manuela Well-Off-Man, MoCNA’s, Chief Curator.
Panel: IAIA at documenta 14, 10:30a.m.-12noon | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
With funding from the Ford Foundation, IAIA offered two students an opportunity to travel to Kassel, Germany in June to attend documenta 14. Founded in 1955, documenta is a contemporary art exhibition which takes place every five years. The first documenta featured artists who are generally considered to have had a significant influence on modern art (such as Picasso and Kandinsky). The more recently documenta features art from all continents; mostly site-specific works of art. Moderated by MoCNA Director, Patsy Phillips (Cherokee), panelists include Lara M. Evans, PhD (Cherokee), Associate Professor of Art History, Museum Studies Department, Manuela Well-Off-Man, MoCNA’s Chief Curator, and IAIA students Carmen Selam (Yakama) and Jonathan Loretto (Walatowa and Kotyi-ti).
Performance: desert ArtLAB’s Mobile ECO-STUDIO, 1-2p.m. | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
Join current exhibition indigenous art collaborative, desert ArtLAB and their Mobile ECO-STUDIO, which acts as a portable native ecology site distributing restorative indigenous flora to share a message of ecological decolonization. Through street side workshops, The Mobile ECO-STUDIO reacquaints Santa Fe residents and visitors with the growth, preparation and tasting of cactus based foods, re-establishing community relationships with disappearing indigenous desert ecologies.
Panel: Connective Tissue: Featuring Performance by Merritt Johnson + Nicholas Galanin, 3-5p.m. | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
Join Connective Tissue exhibition artists Merritt Johnson (Mixed descent/Mohawk/Blackfoot/Non-Indigenous), Melissa Cody (Navajo), and David Gaussoin (Picuris/Navajo/French) for a panel
discussion on recent developments in Native fiber art. This conversation explores the place of fiber art in contemporary art and Native art, current themes, processes, challenges, and the future of fiber art. Moderated by Manuela Well-Off-Man, MoCNA Chief Curator, this event will also feature a live performance by Merritt Johnson (Mixed descent/Mohawk/Blackfoot/Non-Indigenous) and Nicholas Galanin (Tlingit/Unangax). Johnson and Galanin are multidisciplinary artists who incorporate performance art into their practice to address contemporary issues. Their performance Re-Move is a “free clinic” geared toward removing “tribal tattoos” and “Native inspired tattoos” in addition to offering tattooed lines of separation and their removal.
Sunday, August 20
Panel: Bending Backwards for Benefactors, 11a.m.-12noon | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
In April of 2017, John Joe (Navajo), Museum Collections Registrar and Ryan Flahive, IAIA Archivist packed a rental van and headed to Washington D.C. to pick up a significant donation from Suzan Shown Harjo (Cheyenne/Hodulgee Muscogee), American Indian activist, lobbyist, policy maker, and 2011 recipient of an IAIA Honorary Doctorate. After six days and 4,100 road miles, they returned with over sixty works of art and one hundred boxes of Harjo’s personal and professional archives. This experienced panel will discuss the collecting journey, the content of the donation, the logistical challenges presented by this gift, as well as a general discussion of donor relations at IAIA. Moderated by Museum Director Patsy Phillips (Cherokee Nation). Panelists include: Museum Curator of Collections,Tatiana Lomahaftewa-Singer (Choctaw/Hopi), Museum Collections Registrar John Joe (Navajo), and IAIA Archivist Ryan Flahive.
Contemporary Indigenous Discourse Series - Native Voice
Scholarship on Indigenous Self-Representation in Museums and the Arts, 1-2p.m. | MoCNA Allan Houser Art Park
This panel will offer commentary on the need of critical writing focused on the role of art discourse and scholarship in the contemporary Native American/Indigenous museum world. It will explore the complexities of writing about Indigenous museums and the arts that moves beyond the celebratory and descriptive literature that dominates the field. Native scholars and writers need to play a leadership role in developing critical scholarship on Native museum practices and the arts. This discussion will address both the successes and ongoing challenges that remain in developing this important area of scholarship. Moderated by Andrea R. Hanley (Navajo), MoCNA’s Membership and Program Manager. Panelists: Yve Chavez (Tongva), Andrew W. Mellon Fellow, Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, Deana Dartt (Coastal Band Chumash), Independent scholar, curator, activist, Anne Ray Fellow, School of American Research, 2017-2018 and Tony Chavarria (Santa Clara Pueblo), Curator of Ethnology, Museum of Indian Arts and Culture.
Saturday - Sunday, August 19-20
Film: American Traditional War Songs: The Ethnopoetic Videos of Sky Hopinka, 9a.m.-5p.m. Daily Screenings | 68 minutes | Helen Hardin Media Gallery
MoCNA is pleased to present the digital works of filmmaker Sky Hopinka (Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin/Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians). Hopinka’s work is both multifaceted conceptually and formally with involved tiers of images and narratives. Beautiful and mysterious, thick with color and gesture. His films are filled with notions and confluences around tribal identity, language and land. Most recently Hopinka’s work could be seen in the Whitney Museum of Art’s 2017 Biennial.
