MARKING RESILIENCE: INDIGENOUS NORTH AMERICAN PRINTS. MFA BOSTON

Resilience often manifests in work by Indigenous North American artists, for example in its content or simply by increasing visibility to combat erasure in representation. Some Native artists have used the collaborative medium of printmaking as a way of reclaiming their histories and addressing the challenges their communities face today.

Celebrating a growing area of the MFA’s collection, “Marking Resilience: Indigenous North American Prints” features 30 newly acquired works—all sharing resilience as a theme—by Indigenous artists from the United States and Canada. Mostly created through residencies at print studios such as Crow’s Shadow Institute of the Arts, Tamarind Institute, and High Point, these prints represent artistic forays into a medium outside their creators’ typical practices as an opportunity to experiment and reconceptualize significant subjects.

Both emerging and established artists are featured, including Dyani White Hawk, James Luna, Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, Marie Watt, and Jeffrey Gibson. Beyond making art, some, like Smith, are also activists, driven by a desire to improve cultural and political representation for Native Americans and the conditions of their homelands. Rooted in their specific communities, these prints demonstrate the creativity and experimentation of diverse contemporary artists.

This exhibition is organized in collaboration with artist and professor Duane Slick (Meskwaki/Ho-Chunk). It will be followed by a second exhibition of Indigenous North American prints, one exploring ancestry and place, in May 2024.

https://www.mfa.org/exhibition/marking-resilience-indigenous-north-american-prints