Harvey Herman (Očhéthi Šakówiŋ, 1952 – ), Geometric #4 (triptych) (detail), circa 1971, oil on canvas, 33 3/4 x 98 1/4 x 1 1/2 in., On loan from the IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts Collection: Honors Collection, S-78, S-79, S-80.
Action/Abstraction Redefined is the first major traveling exhibition to highlight modern Native American art through the lens of 20th-century Abstract Expressionism, Color Field, and Hard-Edge Painting. Comprising 52 works by 36 artists—including George Morrison, Fritz Scholder, and T.C. Cannon—the exhibition showcases work by artists who redefined the concept of abstraction at midcentury and pushed the boundaries of Native art.
Drawn from the collection of the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA) in Santa Fe, a school where revolutionary approaches encouraged experimentation and risk-taking, Action/Abstraction Redefined explores how artists combined New York School art influences with Native art traditions and challenged stereotypical expectations of American Indian art.
After several decades of the U.S. government’s forced assimilationist policies, IAIA was created, instead, to foster radical teaching and bold, student-centered learning for Native students who came from as far away as Alaska and Florida. Experimentation was encouraged alongside traditional Native arts, and the two uniquely merged in the works on view.
With Action/Abstraction Redefined, AMFA presents a broader, more inclusive conversation about American art from the 1940s-1970s. The work of artists such as Jackson Pollock, Mark Rothko, and other soon-to-be Abstract Expressionists in the mid-1940s has dominated American art history. This exhibition flips that script and expands the conversation to showcase Indigenous artists authentically bringing their own visual culture and innovation to Abstract Expressionism, Color Field, and Hard-Edge Painting.
While artists such as George Morrison and Fritz Scholder have often been the subject of solo museum exhibitions, Action/Abstraction Redefined offers the chance to view these and dozens of other artists in conversation with each other. The lasting impact of these early works continues to reverberate today in the Contemporary Native Art movement and can be seen in AMFA’s own collection with works by such artists as Raven Halfmoon (Caddo), Dawn Walden (Ojibwe), and Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee), all on view in AMFA’s Harriet and Warren Stephens Galleries.
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Action/Abstraction Redefined is organized by IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, Santa Fe, NM. Support for this exhibition is provided by Art Bridges.
Action/Abstraction Redefined: Modern Native Art, 1940s to 1970s is organized by Dr. Manuela Well-Off-Man, chief curator, IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, Tatiana Lomahaftewa-Singer, curator of collections, IAIA Museum of Contemporary Native Arts, and Dr. Lara Evans, IAIA Associate Professor of Native Art History.
