A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue- Long Con Live with Sterlin Harjo and Cannupa Hanska Luger

This special program took place on November 2, 2024 and featured a screening of Sterlin Harjo's documentary Love & Fury, a film where Sterlin follows Native artists for a year as they navigated their careers in the US and abroad. Love & Fury explores the immense complexities each artist faces in regards to their own identity as Native artists, as well as pushing Native art further into a post-colonial world. 

Following the film screening, the program included a live Long Con series episode with Sterlin Harjo and artist Cannupa Hanska Luger. This is the first time Long Con was presented in front of a live audience, and the conversation was anchored in themes drawn from the film, Love & Fury, and in the spirit of Long Con, Sterlin and Cannupa also shared vulnerable and hilarious reflections of their life as two friends sharing what it feels like to be contemporary Native American artists actively participating in the record of the 21st century.

This episode continues our series of live recordings from the exhibition program which accompanied Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue at the Albuquerque Museum.

Sterlin Harjo is an award winning Seminole/Muscogee Creek filmmaker who has directed three feature films and a feature documentary all of which address the contemporary Native American lived experience. Harjo is a founding member of the five-member Native American comedy group, The 1491s. Sterlin’s latest project Reservation Dogs, is a television show created in collaboration with Taika Waititi, now available to watch on FX. 

Cannupa Hanska Luger is an award winning multidisciplinary artist who creates monumental and situational installations and durational performance and often initiates community participation and social collaboration. Raised on the Standing Rock Reservation in North Dakota, he is an enrolled member of the Three Affiliated Tribes of Fort Berthold and is Mandan, Hidatsa, Arikara and Lakota. 

Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue, curated by Ginger Dunnill and Josie Lopez, features large-scale installation, sculpture, video, and a robust programming line-up celebrating the work and ideas of 23 artists who have contributed to Dunnill's Broken Boxes podcast. The exhibition celebrates ten years of the podcast of the same name and amplifies the collective strength of contemporary artists.

https://www.cabq.gov/artsculture/albuquerque-museum/exhibitions-1/broken-boxes-a-decade-of-art-action-and-dialogue

Featured Song: Part-Time Indian by Mato Wayuhi

A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue- Planting Justice Live Panel Discussion

This episode features an inspiring panel conversation with members of the Planting Justice project and continues our series of live recordings from the exhibition program which accompanied Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue.

Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue co-curator Josie Lopez introduces this conversation with members from the Oakland, CA based project Planting Justice. This panel conversation took place live on October 17 2024 at the Albuquerque Museum. Broken Boxes founder and exhibition co-curator Ginger Dunnill joins Josie Lopez in conversation with artist Kate DeCiccio and Planting Justice members Covonne Page and Sol Mercado. 

This conversation touches on the important work taking place at Planting Justice with formerly incarcerated community members and expands on the act of gardening as a form of justice and healing. This conversation covers community advocacy, social justice, and long-term actionable care. 

Shout out to artist Chip Thomas and his work with the Painted Desert Project. Chip was slated to be a part of this panel conversation but was not able to make it in person. 

Episode Image: Planting Justice workshop. Photograph by Kate DeCiccio
Featured song: AMERIKKA by Xiuhtezcatl & Jaiia Cerff

More about Planting Justice:

“Our purpose is to empower people impacted by mass incarceration and social inequities with the skills and resources to cultivate food sovereignty, economic justice, and community healing. We are working toward economic and environmental justice by building a network of sustainable land–based social enterprises. We counter systemic oppression, violence, and inequity by creating good jobs with nature-based work, a healing environment with holistic community support, and real opportunities for personal growth.”

https://plantingjustice.org/

More about artist Kate DeCiccio:

"I’m an Oakland based artist, educator & creative strategist. My work centers portraiture for counter narrative, community storytelling & cultural strategy on behalf of abolition and collective liberation.  I’m from Central Massachusetts where I grew up on occupied Nipmuc territory on my family’s 4th generation farm. I’m the 3rd generation of my Polish and Italian ancestors and descends from 11 generations of English colonizers. Before working as an artist full time I was a mental health and substance abuse counselor and taught art at San Quentin Prison,  St Elizabeths Forensic Psychiatric hospital &  Leadership High School. The intersections of creativity, mental illness, addiction and ancestral investigation have been driving themes in my art practice since I was a teenager. I’m committed to repairing the harm of my inherited legacy and working to heal our collective imagination by learning how to stand squarely in truth, accountability, renewed resilience and unknown possibility."

https://www.katedeciccio.com/

More about the exhibition Broken Boxes: A decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue:

Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue, curated by Ginger Dunnill and Josie Lopez, features large-scale installation, sculpture, video, and a robust programming line-up celebrating the work and ideas of 23 artists who have contributed to Dunnill's Broken Boxes podcast. The exhibition celebrates ten years of the podcast of the same name and amplifies the collective strength of contemporary artists.

A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue - Raven Chacon & Laura Ortman Live Performance

Broken Boxes is pleased to present the audio from a very special site specific experimental music performance by award-winning artists and longtime collaborators Raven Chacon and Laura Ortman. 

This episode continues our series of live recordings from the exhibition program which accompanied Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue.

The performance was held on the occasion of the exhibition Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue at the Albuquerque Museum. Curated by Ginger Dunnill and Josie Lopez, the exhibition featured large-scale installation, sculpture, video, and a robust program celebrating the work and ideas of 23 artists who have contributed to the Broken Boxes podcast over the past 4 years.

Raven Chacon and Laura Ortman performed live September 19th 2024 at the Albuquerque Museum.

RAVEN CHACON, a Pulitzer Prize-winning composer from Fort Defiance, Navajo Nation, is known for his solo and collaborative works in contemporary art and music. His compositions range from highly experimental sound art to chamber music. His works have been featured at major museums and venues including the Whitney Biennial and documenta 14. Chacon has mentored over 300 Native American high school composers since 2004.

LAURA ORTMAN, a member of the White Mountain Apache tribe, is a musician and composer whose work spans albums, performances, and multimedia. As a soloist, Ortman performs on amplified violin, vocals, piano, electric guitar, and keyboard. She has performed at prominent venues like MoMA and the Whitney Museum and received the United States Artists Fellowship in 2022.

A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue - Artist Roundtable with Tanya Aguiñiga, Jeremy Dennis, Amaryllis R. Flowers and Guadalupe Maravilla

This episode kicks off a mini-series celebrating our six months of live programming which accompanied the 10 year anniversary exhibition, BROKEN BOXES: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue. 

On September 7, 2024 the opening program of the exhibition at the Albuquerque Museum included an artist roundtable featuring exhibiting artists Tanya Aguiñiga, Jeremy Dennis, Amaryllis R. Flowers and Guadalupe Maravilla in conversation with Broken Boxes hosts Ginger Dunnill and Cannupa Hanska Luger. 

The artists reflect on their respective practices as contemporary artists working to shift paradigms within the larger art world while upholding localized efforts of care. We hear about the work they each do and their values around community building, solidarity and the tools they use to enact survival as artists. Co-curator Josie Lopez opens the conversation with remarks and introductions. 

More about the artists featured in this conversation:

TANYA AGUIÑIGA, raised in Tijuana, creates work reflecting her binational identity using traditional and innovative materials. Focused directly on the US-Mexico border, she has activated spaces to confront contemporary issues of immigration. Founder of AMBOS, she collaborates on community-based projects and has received numerous awards. Her work is in major museum collections including LACMA and the Smithsonian Museum of American Art. 

JEREMY DENNIS, a Shinnecock Indian Nation photographer, explores Indigenous identity and cultural assimilation. His work examines the unique experience of living on a sovereign Native American reservation and addresses contemporary Indigenous issues. He holds an MFA from Pennsylvania State University. 

AMARYLLIS R. FLOWERS, a queer, Puerto Rican-American artist based in upstate New York, examines hybridity, mythology, and sexuality through her vibrant, non-linear visual narratives. Her visual language uses symbol sets as a form of mapping to challenge colonial notions of how to navigate and describe our world. Her work has been showcased in significant national and international venues. She earned an MFA from Yale University and has received numerous prestigious awards.

GUADALUPE MARAVILLA, a Salvadoran artist, creates works that address migration and healing. His art serves as an impetus for healing through sound and is included in the collections of major institutions including MoMA and the Guggenheim. Maravilla has received

numerous fellowships and his work has been featured in significant international biennials.

More about the exhibition:

BROKEN BOXES: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue, curated by Ginger Dunnill and Josie Lopez, features large-scale installation, sculpture, video, and a robust programming line-up celebrating the work and ideas of 23 artists who have contributed to Dunnill's Broken Boxes podcast. The exhibition celebrates ten years of the podcast of the same name and amplifies the collective strength of contemporary artists. Focusing on interviews over the past four years, each of the featured artists engages their own cultural experience and elevates activism within diverse communities. 

Music featured by India Sky

Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue (Exhibition Sound Installation)

Over the next several months Broken Boxes will be releasing recordings from live programming which took place at the Albuquerque Museum in relation to the 10 year celebration exhibition, Broken Boxes: A Decade of Art, Action, and Dialogue, curated by Ginger Dunnill and Josie Lopez. The exhibition is currently on view until March 7 2025 and features the work of 23 artists who have been featured on the podcast over the past 4 years. The exhibition included a robust monthly program which featured artist talks, performance and film screenings. 

To start off this live series, Broken Boxes is sharing the sound installation compiled from interviews over the past 4 years with the featured artists. This audio plays throughout the exhibition on hyper-directional speakers and is also currently broadcasting from participating artist Autumn Chacon's illegal broadcast frequency from the museum out into the city of Albuquerque. 

Following this episode Broken Boxes will release the recordings from each live program that coincided with the exhibition. There is just a couple months left to see this special exhibition, so go catch it if you can!