Powerful Because They're Different, by Jeffrey Gibson, may be instantly recognizable to many viewers. It is based on one of the most frequently reproduced images of an Indigenous American, a work titled The End of the Trail, by James Earle Fraser. The original Fraser sculpture shows a slumped over rider on the back of a horse, in a position suggestive of exhaustion or defeat. In his adaptation of the work, Gibson deftly re-imagines the essence of the figure, altering the original spear into a flag bearing a message of empowerment, and covering the entire form in a luminous, melting, multicolored glaze. In this new manifestation, the figure and horse may be taking a bow or dancing, captured in a moment of introspective delight.

Gibson (b. 1972, USA) is a member of the Chocktaw and Cherokee nations. His aesthetic position is rooted in the spaces where narratives collide. The work recontextualizes relationships between popular culture, identity politics, personal experience, memory, and canonized versions of history, inviting viewers to question the myths and assumptions that empower contemporary social structures.

Major exhibitions of Gibson's work include Jeffrey Gibson: When Fire is Applied to a Stone It Cracks, Brooklyn Art Museum, New York, NY, USA; Jeffrey Gibson: CAN YOU FEEL IT, Kavi Gupta, Chicago, IL, USA; She Never Dances Alone, Times Square Arts, New York, NY, USA; Jeffrey Gibson: This Is the Day, Blanton Museum of Art, Austin, TX, USA; Wellin Museum of Art, Clinton, NY, USA; Jeffrey Gibson: The Anthropophagic Effect, The New Museum, New York, NY, USA; Jeffrey Gibson: Like a Hammer, Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO, USA; and Love Song, ICA, Boston, MA, USA. Gibson is a recipient of numerous awards, notably he was honored as the Premier Artist in the 2021 Art Basel Conversation Series; he recieved the MacArthur Foundation Fellowship (2019); Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Award (2015); and Creative Capital Foundation Grant (2005). Gibson’s work is included in the collections of the Smithsonian Institution, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Rose Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Denver Art Museum, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, the Eiteljorg Museum, and the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, among others.