This is part two of a three part, multi-location symposium.
9:00 a.m. Welcome: Mary Kershaw, Director, New Mexico Museum of Art
9:05 – 10:20 a.m. Performing the Body: This panel seeks to unpack the influence, politics, and impact of using the physical body as a medium for actions, including the associations and perceptions that audiences may have of an artist’s body. How do perceptions placed upon the performer affect the understanding and perception of a performance or action? These perceptions might include an artist’s gender, race, whether someone is deemed exotic or not, scarred, old, young, disguised, threatening, vulnerable, or powerful, for example. How does or can a performers’ body inform, limit, and expand a performative action? How does the perception of the Indigenous artist’s body differ whether in the role of a performer or in the role of directing an action? How do these roles differ from the perspective of artists themselves? Moderator: Andrea R. Hanley, Public + Program Manager, IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts Panelists: Lori Blondeau, Artist; Muriel and Gloria Miguel, Artists and Co-founders of Spiderwoman Theater; and Adrian Stimson, Artist.
10:20 – 11:20 a.m. Performing the Body breakout session
12:30 – 1:45 p.m. Taking Place: Performance occupies time and space. This panel engages the idea of “taking place.” Taking place implies an action performed over a period of time, as well as the implications of occupying time, or occupying a physical location or site. Is the occupation of time and space by Indigenous artists an inherently political act? Why or why not? How are these actions understood within the context of past, present, and future and in relation to land, nation, and state? Moderator: Dr. Lara Evans, Chair, Museum Studies, Institute of American Indian Arts Panelists: Candice Hopkins, Chief Curator, IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts; Peter Morin, Artist and Assistant Professor, Brandon University; and Cheryl L’Hirondelle, Artist.
1:45 – 2:45 p.m. Taking Place breakout session
2:45 – 4:00 p.m. Summary and Observations: led by Merritt Johnson, Artist
About the Symposium
Acting O U T: A Symposium on Indigenous Performance Art, organized and hosted by the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts in partnership with the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture, the New Mexico Museum of Art and the Lensic Performing Arts Center take place on December 3 – 4th, 2015.Keynote Discussion and performances at the Lensic Performing Arts Center take place Friday, December 4, 2015, 6 – 8p.m..This symposium is made possible in part by a grant from the New Mexico Humanities Council.
Over the past 42 years, MoCNA has gained national and international acclaim for its innovative exhibitions, symposia, events, and programs of contemporary Native art. MoCNA will lead in the discourse and understanding of contemporary Native art with an interactive symposium in Santa Fe, New Mexico. This will be the first international symposium on Indigenous performance art to take place in New Mexico. Acting O U T recognizes the increasing importance and relevance of performance art—and its vanguard history—within Native and contemporary art. Symposium participants will include leading performance artists, scholars, curators, and writers working in the field today, in dialogue with the local, national, and international audiences. Participants include: Rebecca Belmore, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, James Luna, Lucy Lippard, Lori Blondeau, Adrian Stimson, and Spiderwoman Theater to name a few.
On December 3, symposium and workshops will be held at the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture. The first of three panel discussions, titled Performing for the Camera will be presented on that day as well as performance video screenings, the workshop/performance art intensives include: Words + Actions: led by Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Rebecca Belmore, and Sound + Performance: led by the Indigenous art collective Postcommodity. Speakers and panelists are invited to attend the workshops free of charge – 20 spaces will be available for community participants.
At 6p.m.on December 4, internationally acclaimed artists James Luna (with Sheila Tishla Skinner), Guillermo Gómez-Peña, and Rebecca Belmore will perform for one-night only in Santa Fe at the Lensic Performing Arts Center. For more than 30 years, James Luna has provocatively explored the Native American experience and has created some of the most iconic artworks of our time. McArthur Award recipient, Guillermo Gómez-Peña’s spoken word and actions engage notions of the “living archive” and radical citizenship. Rebecca Belmore’s performances activate the charged space between the personal and the political, memory and trauma. Following the performances is a keynote discussion between the artists led by writer, activist, and curator Lucy Lippard.
Tickets are available for purchase through ticketssantafe.org for the Acting O U T Symposium: Keynote Discussion and Performances taking place December 4th, from 6 – 8p.m..Tickets: $25/ $10 Students with ID.
