The Driehaus Museum is characterized by a rich history and an impressive wealth of architectural styles. The site of the Museum, the Gilded Age-era Samuel Nickerson Mansion, offers a rare opportunity to map important and often overlooked histories and genealogies. While the unique design and architecture of the Mansion have been documented and studied, A Tale of Today: Materialities proposes to investigate more deeply the materials that comprise the very fabric of the building.
The materialities of objects and architectural features can link past to present histories in original and compelling ways. They connect different cultures and define cultural boundaries. Never inert, materials are inherently political. They are active participants in the ongoing negotiations that build our present and define our futures. There is a new prominence of materiality in art and it is a clear manifestation of our growing awareness that humans no longer are the undisputed centers of everything and that our world is the result of collaborative processes with other living and non-living, human and more-than-human agents.
Materialities invites artists to select a specific material from the Driehaus Museum to engage in a new materialist dialogue with it. In conversation with guest curator Dr. Giovanni Aloi, the artists will research the histories of their chosen material to produce an engaged, critically aware, integrated response designed to uncover hidden cultural, historical, and ecological networks that bind the very fabric of the house to distant shores, peoples, skill sets, traditions, ideologies, and economic forces.
The exhibition is accompanied by a mobile guide that includes audio commentaries by the curator and all of the participating artists, sponsored by Bloomberg Connects.
Dáda’ak’ehgo łitso
(there are yellow fields all around)
This body of work explores the concept of yellow as a color and a memory, considering its abstraction of cultural and material significance. I am re-contextualizing the term abstraction from its modernist formalities, and I approach my process in a linear form as our worldview is layered, stacked, and ever-evolving within my culture, with value often placed on the materiality of objects and never on the complex exchange of ideas and memories.
Very little is written on the importance of color within Indigenous communities, much less on the significance of specific colors pertaining to Diné art and the stories it is connected to. Yellow is a prominent color that can be achieved naturally in many ways, from the subtle tones of Sagebrush to the intense hues of Osage orange. For myself, this color signifies change, lifecycles, and the evolution of my work.
For each piece, there is significance in the quiet moments of creation. Whether that is the slow stitching to create marks, the stacking of beads on velvet, or the brush strokes across the watercolor paper, these moments build to the final expression within the color yellow itself. The materials used also share stories of Diné expression and history. Each material originated from early trade and was often used as currency, which informs our relationship with the land and references our innovation and environmental adaptation. These materials generated the language of design that we know today and the trade relations created for Indigenous communities. For myself, it is within these moments that the repetition of movement becomes part of the work, creating a sense of interconnectedness not only in culture and design but also in the memory of places in which they evolve.
It is an ephemeral installation exploring the memory and materiality of yellow that activates the space within the Driehaus Museum. Much like nature, the Driehaus Museum has seen many changes to its interior and references many unique designs and cultures. What stands out is the focus on Moorish architecture and the profound influence of Anglo-Japanese design elements. The pieces created mimic nature, bringing shared languages of these traces of memory. The inspiration for design within the house came from a place of purely aesthetic pleasure, where often the stories of the designs are lost. Still, it is a chance to acknowledge the movement, the stories shared, and the inherent values placed on cultural exchange.
The space, closed to nature, is its most prominent inspiration within many rooms. There is a need to bring back nature within these spaces, which exist only within the designs of the walls, the intricate woodwork, and the ornamental furnishings. I invite my audience to step into yellow, embrace its warmth, and clarify. To see yellow from an Indigenous perspective, one that is deeply informed by my relationship with place and memory, and to embrace the influence of nature that surrounds us all.