>^^iiwii^^<
Cannupa Hanska Luger, 2020
Installation, ceramic, paper, steel, fiber
5' H x 8 W' x 4' D, varies
Coyote, a trickster, dreams of a way to capitalize on a population void of meaning and connection by gathering the stereotypes of spiritual ecstasy and builds a stoic white paper medicine man levitating above a selection of objects which symbolize systematic, colonial and patriarchal violence in the form of bullets, gas pumps, spiritual items and phallus shaped effigies. This is a moment of transaction, becoming an opportunity to purchase settler innocence, commandeer resources, commodify erasure or co-opt culture and spirituality without any accountability to Indigenous communities. Upon closer determination, it is noted that the objects no longer carry the function they were intended for. The artist has diminished their use, creating them from clay, their power is just an illusion. Coyote sits just outside of the market installation and in anticipation looks towards the nearest exit, reliably ready to escape to the next lesson.
Cannupa Hanska Luger’s ceramic and mixed media installation >^^iiwii^^< vends trauma back to the oppressor. Our current society of settler colonial culture celebrates ownership and toxic masculinity over matriarchal and land based practices of Indigenous culture. Addressing the casualties of this trauma, the artist questions whether his participation in any level of exchange within a settler colonial society as an Indigenous person and artist is perpetuating further harm. In considering art as action and in acknowledging and maintaining that we all must be accountable for how we engage in this exchange, this installation gives us pause, and asks us to consider our ability to deconstruct the narratives we have been sold.
>^^iiwii^^< acknowledges the absurdity and continued harm that is perpetuated in commodifying Indigenous lifeways, including culture, spirituality, the human body, resource, land and water. Our current social system is capitalizing off of Native American-ism in order to perpetuate a myth of settler innocence. Now see this for what it is and IT IS WHAT IT IS.