We Each Hold Stories
November 7 – May 2
This exhibition is a broad survey of the work being created by established and emerging Indigenous American artists today. The exhibit explores themes of personal experience, family, history, community, and contemporary issues. The exhibiting artists approach these topics with directness and humor with many using traditional elements and techniques. Observing changes in society and political views, the one constant is that the artists represented in the exhibition hold firmly to their individual cultures.
“From Indigenous communities across the United States, these artists define a new line in the historical continuum of Native identity, offering reinterpreted concepts and forms rooted in a storytelling tradition. Their work addresses land, identity, and visual culture, embodying vibrant contemporary practices that weave together personal and collective histories.
Through repurposed materials and reimagined symbols, they explore interpretations of human behavior—how we treat one another, how we interact with the land. Their sensibilities carry the potential for healing, bridging past and present, and offering new ways of seeing, understanding, and remembering.”
~ Tom Jones
Co-curated by Tom Jones of the Ho-Chunk Nation and Paula Lincoln, Gallery Director for The Sheldon.
November 8 at 1PM
Join curators Tom Jones (Ho-Chunk) and Paula Lincoln, The Sheldon Gallery Director for a discussion on the exhibition We Each Hold Stories. This event is free and open to the public.
Tom Jones (Professor of Photography, University of Wisconsin-Madison) is an artist, curator and educator. He graduated with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, a Master of Fine Arts in Photography and a Master of Arts in Museum Studies from Columbia College in Chicago, Illinois. Jones’ artwork is a commentary on identity, culture appropriation, experience and perception of Native America. He is raising questions about these depictions of identity by non-natives and Natives alike. He continues to work on an ongoing photographic essay on the contemporary life of his tribe, the Ho-Chunk Nation of Wisconsin. Jones co-authored the book People of the Big Voice, Photographs of Ho-Chunk Families by Charles Van Schaick, 1879-1943. He is the co-curator for the exhibition and contributing author to the book, For a Love of His People: The Photography of Horace Poolaw for the National Museum of the American Indian. He is currently curating a show and book about Ho-Chunk baskets for the Museum of Wisconsin Art. His artwork is in numerous private and public collections, most notably: The Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian, Sprint Corporation, The Minneapolis Institute of Art, The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Museum of Contemporary of Native Arts, The Museum of Contemporary Photography, Polaroid Corporation, and Microsoft.
