Fernandez Curates Smithson at SITE Santa Fe

Posted on October 29, 2024 by MsSusanB

It’s not often you get to see Robert Smithson’s large-scale works inside gallery walls. Strolling through SITE Santa Fe’s magnificent Teresita Fernández/Robert Smithson exhibition, through October 28, provides an opportunity to see how a contemporary Brooklyn-based Cuban-American artist – inspired by landscape and societal histories of the Caribbean – positions her own work “in conversation” with Smithson’s 1960s-1970s geologic works, drawings, and photo installations.

SITE invited art-world superstar Teresita Fernández to curate this show with the Santa Fe-based Holt/Smithson Foundation. Prior to her deep dive into Smithson’s career, her primary knowledge centered around his 1970 epic Spiral Jetty – 6,650 tons of rock and earth jutting out from the shore of Utah’s Great Salt Lake.

Smithson’s 1969-1970 *Mirrors and Shelly Sand* and two by Fernández: 2009 *Drawn Waters (Borrowdale)* and 2024 *Sfumato (Epic) 2.* Courtesy: Dallas Museum of Art; the artist and Lehmann Maupin.

Still from Robert Smithson’s 1970 film *Spiral Jetty, Great Salt Lake, Utah.* Courtesy: Holt/Smithson Foundation.

But Fernández found a lot more from Smithson’s too-short career that she could couple with her own work to create SITE’s spectacular installation. Both artists use landscapes, deep time, ancient history, and travel.

Smithson’s 1968 *installation A Nonsite (Franklin, New Jersey)* with 2020 *Archipelago* charcoal work by Teresita Fernández. Courtesy: Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; private collection

In the first gallery, Fernández selected a Smithson “nonsite” work – a minimalist series of boxes, each packed with rocks from the decidedly unromantic site of Franklin, New Jersey. Smithson’s “nonsite” includes a framed aerial photo that appears to document the site, but it’s a “readjusted” depiction of it. Not what it seems.

Next to the “nonsite,” Fernández hangs Archipelago, a charcoal wall sculpture., which appears to be a legit map, but it’s not. It’s an imagined map of separate Caribbean islands and continents linked together, making us reflect upon their shared socio-political colonial histories.

Viñales (Plateau) is a wall-sized “stacked landscape” depicting Cuba’s Viñales Valley, home of ancient karst caves once inhabited by Taino people and later where escaped plantation slaves sought refuge. At a distance, it evokes the valley’s ecological, social, and political legacies; up close, you see that the image is made up of thousands of tiny ceramic tiles. Something to get lost in.

2019 ceramic mosaic by Teresita Fernández *Viñales (Plateau*). Courtesy: the artist and Lehmann Maupin.

Both artists use reflection in their works. Manigual (Mirror) by Fernández– a tropical forest created from charcoal and sand – is affixed to a reflective surface, so you can “see yourself” in the charred thicket when you get right up to it. Smithson designed his earth-and-mirror Red Sandstone Corner Piece so that every gallery goer’s image is part of the visual experience – from close up, far back, and far away. You’re linked to the red sandstone.

Detail of 2023 *Manigual (Mirror)* by Teresita Fernández. Courtesy: Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.

On the other hand, Smithson famous photographic series, Yucatán Mirror Displacements, documents his meticulously arranged mirrors set into Mexico’s coastal landscapes. Just reflections of landscape and sky in all the settings he documented his set of mirrors; no people.

Detail of Smithson’s 1969 *Yucatán Mirror Displacements (1-9).* Courtesy: Guggenheim Museum.

Nature’s continual ebb and flow, the Earth’s surface, ecosystems, and the cosmos are all subjects explored by both artists.What’s beneath the Earth’s surface, forces of nature, and human impact on it all pop up covertly in every room. See more in our Flickr album.

Detail of 2017 charcoal work by Fernández *Charred Landscape (America)*. Courtesy: the artist, Lehmann Maupin.

Detail of Smithson’s 1971 ink drawing *A Profile of the Atlantic Bottom.* Courtesy: private collection.

And learn more about the “conversations” that works by these artists are having in the curator lectures in SITE Santa Fe’s videos with Fernández herself and her co-curator from the Holt/Smithson Foundation.

Detail of Robert Smithson’s 1961-1963 paint and photo collage *Algae, algae*. Courtesy: Holt/Smithson Foundation and Marian Goodman Gallery.

Detail of 2019 graphite-covered shell installation *Chorus* by Teresita Fernández. Courtesy: the artist and Lehmann Maupin.

National Gallery Celebrates 50 Contemporary Native Artists

Posted on September 10, 2024 by MsSusanB

If you want to take a trip across American land with 50 living Native artists, there’s still time to catch the ground-breaking exhibition, The Land Carries Our Ancestors: Contemporary Art by Native Americans, at Connecticut’s New Britain Museum of American Art through September 15, 2024.

The National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. asked Jaune Quick-to-See Smith (Citizen of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Nation) to survey the United States and create an exhibition reflecting the diversity of the living Native American artists.

2014 wool weaving *World Traveler* by Melissa Cody (Navajo). Courtesy: Stark Museum of Art.

Smith, whose own artistic achievement was honored most recently in a three-museum retrospective in 2023-2024, became the first artist invited to curate a show at the National Gallery.

Entrance banner features *Orchestrating a Blooming Desert* by Steven Yazzie (Diné/Laguna Pueblo).

Smith has always done whatever possible to increase the visibilty of Native artists in the contemporary art world. For this exhibition, she chose 50 intergenerational artists from diverse regions, cultures, and artistic practices. Look at our Flickr album of the National Gallery installation to see some of our favorites.

All of the works reflect the artists’ deep connection to the land, especially Orchestrating a Blooming Desert by Steven Yazzie (Diné/Laguna Pueblo), a painting that reflects one man’s joyful encounter with a lush landscape.

Some works depict a tribe’s link to the natural world through origin stories. Visitors are mesmerized by Preston Singletary’s exquisite sculpture of Tlingit creation-myth legend, Raven stealing the Sun. It’s glorious to admire this dramatic icon fully realized in a distinctly nontraditional medium – blown and sand-carved glass.

Experiencing the large, spiritual earth-colored ceramic figure by Rose B. Simpson (Santa Clara Pueblo) harkens back to eras when people had a more integral connection to the earth. Simpson calls her figure Tonantzin, an Aztec name for earth mothers, corn mothers, and even the Virgin of Guadalupe.

2017 blown and sand-carved glass *Raven Steals the Sun* by Preston Singletary (Tlingit). Courtesy: private collector.

2021 ceramic, steel, leather, and brass *Tonantzin* by Rose B. Simpson (Santa Clara Pueblo). Courtesy: Tia Collection.

Smith has chosen to hang many smaller two-dimensional works across a long wall in a checkerboard to suggest that visitors reflect on the impact of 1887 Dawes Act upon Native lands – a law that cut Native territory into “checkerboard” lots to facilitate private ownership.

At the National Gallery, Jeffrey Gibson’s punching bag (all made of found materials) was hung nearby, reminding us of the delicate balance that has to be struck by simultaneously caring for and taking gifts from the earth.

Next to checkerboard wall, the 2020 beaded punching bag *To Feel Myself Loved On the Earth* by Jeffrey Gibson (Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians/Cherokee Nation). Courtesy: Hirschhorn Museum.

Some artists mix impressions of modern life with tribal lands, such as satiric works by Diego Romero (Cochiti Pueblo) and stylized symbols in a monoprint by Joe Fedderson (Colville Confederated Tribes).

2017 lithograph Girl in the Anthropocene by Diego Romero (Cochiti Pueblo). Private collection

In addition to sculptures, paintings, and photos, Smith has also included pieces made for fashion runways, live performances, and social protests.

Fashion designer Jamie Okuma (La Jolla Band of Luiseno Indians) beaded her fringed fashion boots with a portrait of her family’s pet scrub jay.

Ten foot-long fiber seashell earrings designed for an interactive video and gallery performance by fiber and performance artist Eric-Paul Riege (Diné) are a reminder of the ancient trade networks that brought trade items from the ocean to the interior deserts.

2021 beaded and fringed Casedei boots by Jaime Okuma (La Jolla Band of Luiseno Indians). Courtesy: Dartmouth College’s Hood Museum

2020 mixed-fiber installation jaatloh4Ye’iitosoh [3-4] by Eric-Paul Riege (Diné). Courtesy: Tia Collection.

A wall of “mirror shields” were mounted by artist-activist Cannupa Hanska Luger (Mandan/Hidatsa/Arikara/Lakota), showing just a small sample of the 1,000 protective and reflective shields made by people to help water protectors during thre 2016 pipeline intervention at Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Reservation, Luger’s childhood home. Take a look at Luger’s instruction video here.

The shields served to protect the peaceful protesters from rubber bullets and water cannons, and reflected images of the security forces back to them. The crowd-sourced shields were also used in a social-action performance piece at Standing Rock.

2016 mirror shields and video for *Mirror Shield Project – River (The Water Spirit)* by Cannupa Hanska Luger (Mandan/Hidatsa/Arikara/Lakota). Courtesy: the artist, Garth Greenan Gallery.

Textiles and vinyl drawings also pack a punch in this show. Take a look at the dazzler woven by Melissa Cody (Diné), who draws inspiration from video gaming and the matriarchs of Navajo Nation. Watch her interview from her recent exhibition at MoMA PS1.

Here, John Hitchcock explains how his room-sized drawing, Impact vs. Influence, incorporates his influences – nature, family, Native beadwork, and the next-door military base: