Curating the West

What event (gallery show, museum exhibit, etc.) in the next few months are you looking forward to, and why?

I’m excited about the

Autry’s Dress Codes & China Poblano, which will deconstruct some of the most basic fashion items in your closet, such as the plaid shirt, jeans and, of course, those cowboy boots. Turns out that each of these items have a long and rich history; from functional origins, each of these basic garments is adapted and appropriated by a whole range of groups for a fascinating variety of cultural and political statements.

What are you reading?

Antisocial: Online Extremists, Techno-utopias and the Hijacking of the American Conversation by Andrew Marantz. It’s about how our collective inattention and naïveté when it comes to what we read online has become a sinister force in society, and is fundamentally changing the way we think of and speak to one another for the worse.

Interesting exhibit, gallery opening or work of art you’ve seen recently.

One of the best shows I’ve seen in recent months was Terry Allen: The Exact Moment It Happens in the West at LA Louver Gallery in Venice, California. He’s an amazing musician, but I had no idea what an amazing artist he is as well!

What are you researching at the moment?

Mostly working on a couple different potential shows that have a contemporary Native art dimension as well as historical context, including one on landscape and technology, and another on a secret topic yet to be revealed!

What is your dream exhibit to curate? Or see someone else curate?

There are a couple ideas, each of which speaks to the impact of frontier legacies on the present, and imagining the future, but in different ways. So, while the contemporary West needs to be contextualized in terms of its past, there is much work to be done on the West of today, and tomorrow.