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Art for an Undivided Earth: The American Indian Movement Generation

by Jessica L. Horton

Duke University Press, 2017
eISBN: 978-0-8223-7279-0 | Cloth: 978-0-8223-6954-7 | Paper: 978-0-8223-6981-3
Library of Congress Classification N6538.A4H678 2017

ABOUT THIS BOOK | AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY | REVIEWS | TOC | REQUEST ACCESSIBLE FILE

ABOUT THIS BOOK

In Art for an Undivided Earth Jessica L. Horton reveals how the spatial philosophies underlying the American Indian Movement (AIM) were refigured by a generation of artists searching for new places to stand. Upending the assumption that Jimmie Durham, James Luna, Kay WalkingStick, Robert Houle, and others were primarily concerned with identity politics, she joins them in remapping the coordinates of a widely shared yet deeply contested modernity that is defined in great part by the colonization of the Americas. She follows their installations, performances, and paintings across the ocean and back in time, as they retrace the paths of Native diplomats, scholars, performers, and objects in Europe after 1492. Along the way, Horton intervenes in a range of theories about global modernisms, Native American sovereignty, racial difference, archival logic, artistic itinerancy, and new materialisms. Writing in creative dialogue with contemporary artists, she builds a picture of a spatially, temporally, and materially interconnected world—an undivided earth.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Jessica L. Horton is Assistant Professor of Art History at the University of Delaware.

REVIEWS

"Horton’s study is scholarship as advocacy and a significant contribution to the ongoing discussion about how to develop a truly global perspective in the study of contemporary art.... This is a scholarly book with the usual apparatus and takes into account a range of theoretical approaches but is written clearly enough to offer something to serious general readers."

-- Andrea Kirsh Artblog

"At last an art book that recognizes Native American art as mainstream, and takes it seriously and interprets it with the same care and scrutiny given to art created by white people.... The research behind Art for an Undivided Earth is deep and reaches not only into Native roots but also across the ocean to European influences. The plentiful color illustrations enhance the points Horton makes, and the narrative is thorough and well written.... Essential. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty and professionals."

-- A. Wirkkala Choice

"The book is well-illustrated, with color plates focusing on the main artworks discussed. The author has clearly done extensive research, in some cases communicating with the artists themselves, and compiled a very thorough bibliography. The index to the book is also thoughtful, providing nuances for broad topics. In all, this book is a worthwhile read."

-- Amy Lazet ARLIS/NA Reviews

"The book ... comes alive through the author’s creative reinterpretation of the art, along with the author’s cogent primary data consisting of participant observation and interviews.... A widespread interdisciplinary audience ... likely will find plenty of insights in this interesting book."

-- Tim Kubal American Indian Culture and Research Journal

“Horton offers a model of contemporary art scholarship that is informed not only by wide-ranging critical theory but also of the historical traditions of Native American art. It adheres to the highest standards of scholarship while also engaging a constructive and hopeful intercultural dialogue.”

-- Ruth Phillips European Journal of American Culture

"Jessica L. Horton’s book is a carefully and lovingly collected archive of stories, images, and histories that draw one closer to the artists discussed."

-- Lindsay Nixon Art Journal

“Art For An Undivided Earth is perhaps the most involved and in-depth study of Native Modernism to date. . . . Horton’s work is a valuable resource for advanced undergraduates through professional-level academics, but is a required read for anyone pursuing Native American scholarship in museum studies, archival studies, and art history, or any other discipline which calls for a deeper investment than the identitarian/ethnographic approach which too often reigns supreme.”

-- Anthony Ballas InVisible Culture

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Illustrations ix
Acknowledgments xiii
Introduction 1
1. The Word for World and the Word for History Are the Same: Jimmie Durham, the American Indian Movement, and Spatial Thinking 16
2. Now That We Are Christians We Dance for Ceremony: James Luna, Performing Props, and Sacred Space 61
3. They Sent Me Way Out in the Foreign Country and Told Me to Forget It: Fred Kabotie, Dance Memories, and the 1932 U.S. Pavilion of the Venice Biennale 94
4. Dance Is the One Activity That I Know Of When Virtual Strangers Can Embrace: Kay WalkingStick, Creative Kinship, and Art History's Tangled Legs 123
5. They Advanced to the Portraits of Their Friends and Offered Them Their Hands: Robert Houle, Ojibwa Tableaux Vivants, and Transcultural Materialism 152
Epilogue: Traveligng with Stones 184
Notes 197
Bibliography 249
Index 283

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