Form & Relation: Contemporary Native Ceramics ed. by Jami C. Powell

Abstract

Reviewed by: Form & Relation: Contemporary Native Ceramics ed. by Jami C. Powell Shanna Ketchum-Heap of Birds (bio) Form & Relation: Contemporary Native Ceramics edited by Jami C. Powell; with contributions by Morgan E. Freeman, Courtney M. Leonard, Sequoia Miller, Anya Montiel, Rose B. Simpson, Roxanne Swentzell University of Washington Press, 2020 FORM & RELATION: CONTEMPORARY NATIVE CERAMICS was published to coincide with an exhibition of the same title that took place at the Hood Museum of Art and focuses on six Indigenous contemporary ceramics artists (Anita Fields, Courtney M. Leonard, Cannupa Hanska Luger, Ruben Olguin, Rose B. Simpson, and Roxanne Swentzell) from various regions in the United States. As editor Jami C. Powell mentions in the introduction, the works made of clay embody the relationship of the Indigenous artists to the land, not only in terms of the medium's materiality but also the "knowledge embedded within it" (15). Powell's adept discussion of the broad philosophical underpinnings of the clay medium, and its utilitarian and aesthetic forms, provides the necessary context for creating a dialogue with viewers about "the power of intergenerational community, cross-community connections, and even international collaboration" (19). Thus, it is through a broad, global lens that the six Indigenous artists are introduced, their works discussed and critically analyzed by scholars in the field, and the complexity of their practices clarified in enlightening conversations with the artists. In the chapter Memory, Landscape, Knowledge: The Clay Practices of Indigenous Artists, contributing essayists Anya Montiel and Sequoia Miller collaborated to determine the state of the field by situating Indigenous ceramic traditions within mainstream, Western systems of meaning. In so doing, Montiel and Miller cite the visibility of several exhibitions within the last fifteen years that evidence "the ongoing dissolution of the traditional hierarchies of Western art that has created wider audiences for contemporary Indigenous art" (23). What is then considered are recent theorizations of Indigenous sovereignty and self-determination that Native American art historians and artists, such as Montiel and Miller, respectively, have forged to highlight Indigenous worldviews "regarding land, knowledge, gender, and [End Page 178] agency" (22) within the wider field of contemporary Indigenous art, theory, and practice. Consequently, Anita Fields's (Osage/Mvskoke) clay figures and sculptural pieces are described as evincing Osage epistemologies encompassing "the life-sustaining concept of duality" (86) through techniques of layering, texture, and coloration that "convey the balance and duality that characterize the relationship between the earth and sky as well as our relationships to one another as earth people or sky people" (15). In the chapter Bound To: On Lineage, Place, and Futurity, the mother-daughter collaborations of Santa Clara Pueblo artists Roxanne Swentzell and Rose B. Simpson resonate in cocurator Morgan E. Freeman's conversations with the artists about their family lineage as well as their "depictions of the self through sculpture" (44). Their collaborative works are showcased in monumental pieces, multisite ceramic installations, as well as individual works that, according to Montiel and Miller, have literal and metaphorical meanings associated with clay such as "land, body, water, and blood memory" (23). Furthermore, Montiel and Miller draw attention to the diversity of ceramic works made by multidisciplinary artists Cannupa Hanska Luger (Mandan/Hidatsa/Arikara/Lakota/Austrian/Norwegian) and Ruben Olguin (Nambé Pueblo/Mexican/Spanish) whose processes are understood by way of Christine DeLucia's concept of "memoryscapes" as a place-based notion that "transform[s] blank or neutral spaces into emotionally infused, politically potent spaces" (27). In particular, Luger's piece entitled Every One (#MMIWQT Bead Project) uses social collaboration workshops to produce a project that responds to "the crisis of missing and murdered Indigenous women, girls, and queer and trans community members (MMIWQT)" (16–17) by enlisting those affected by this type of violence to participate in making clay beads, which represent a MMIWQT person lost to this crisis. In comparison, Olguin's creative approach "connects his interest in traditional ceramic practices, including adobe and hand-built vessels, to digital and audio technology" (29). Olguin's Retablos are made of clay and pigments in order to comment upon the history of Spanish retablo art forms employed as "tool[s] of conversion and assimilation" (16). Artist Courtney M. Leonard [Shinnecock...