Image courtesy of The Frist Art Museum.
Frist Art Museum
7:00–8:00 p.m.
Presented by Daniel H. Usner, PhD
To what extent is Jeffrey Gibson’s work seen in The Body Electric influenced by aesthetic styles and historical subjects rooted in Native American expressive culture? To what extent might Gibson also be mobilizing his individual aesthetic voice against how Indigenous art has been treated by the art world? Is he perhaps reclaiming its Indigenous place within the wider history of American art?
Historian Daniel Usner will consider these and other questions as he explores how Jeffrey Gibson’s multimedia art—particularly his use of materials, motifs, and patterns—represents a breakdown of multiple barriers that have been imposed upon Indigenous art by the Western art establishment for centuries.
