“Community and Continuity: Native American Art of New York,” an exhibition at The Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz, featuring selections from the New York State Museum’s collections of contemporary Native American Art and archeological artifacts, has been critically reviewed in a recent issue of Hyperallergic.com.
"What unites this patchwork exhibition is land. The artists are all Native Americans whose ancestry is tied to the place now known as New York State...it goes without saying that Indigenous artists are underrepresented in most mainstream art museum collections...it is refreshing – and exceptional – that 'Community and Continuity' has 32 artists on view...the show does what an art museum should: it provides a place for a variety of voices to be heard."
--Nikki Lohr, in Hyperallergic October 22, 2018 (click hyperlink for complete review)
“Community and Continuity” is the product of a partnership between the Dorsky Museum and the New York State Museum (NYSM) consisting of approximately 50 pieces of contemporary art, curated to showcase the diversity of Native American creative output and exemplify the state’s thriving, vibrant and continuous Indigenous presence. Many of these works have been collected as part of a NYSM initiative, launched in 1996, to collect art that reflects the rich traditions of creating that have been central to Native American communities in New York State for generations. Complementing the contemporary artworks is a selection of archaeological artifacts of fired clay, bone, and shell from the NYSM collection and from Historic Huguenot Street. These pieces are included to provide a glimpse into the prolific artistic traditions of Indigenous peoples from the 15th – 17th centuries, and deepen the exhibition’s exploration of the theme of continuity.
The exhibition, curated by Gwendolyn Saul, curator of ethnography at the New York State Museum, and John P. Hart, director of the NYSM’s Research and Collections Division, is on view at the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz, 1 Hawk Drive, New Paltz, NY through December 9, 2018.
For further information, please contact Dr. Gwendolyn Saul, gwendolyn.saul@nysed.gov.
