The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art WSU is excited to share the exhibition “What Was Always Yours and Never Lost” with visitors from May 16 through June 30. As always, the museum continues to be free for the public to enjoy. Beginning May 9 and continuing through June 30, the galleries will be open Tuesday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The museum will be closed this summer for a refresh and the installation of new exhibitions from July 1 to August 21, reopening for fall semester beginning Tuesday, August 22.
“What Was Always Yours and Never Lost” provides an essential introduction to recent works of video art and experimental documentary by Indigenous film and video makers from throughout North America. The nine included films traverse a wide range of topics and formal strategies while touching on indigeneity — assertions of identity and presence in the face of colonial history. They make space for poetry, for beauty, and speak to the joys of preserving the past, establishing community, and seeing the future differently.
Notably, this program was curated by MacArthur Fellow Sky Hopinka, who writes: “It’s a lonely thought that outside of the safe harbors of reservations, reserves, towns, circles of friends, and remembrances of what was and what could be, are whole other worlds that are familiar, yet at the same time still foreign. The moniker of the Indigenous is vast and is often centered on those of us affected by Western colonialism. It was difficult to choose which works by each of these artists to include here, but the films here are both ones that I’ve been watching for years, and that are brand new to me. They’ll teach you things that you didn’t know you needed to learn; they claim what was always theirs and celebrate what was never lost.”
“What Was Always Yours and Never Lost” presents an intergenerational selection of films by the following artists and collectives: TJ Cuthand, Colectivo Los Ingrávidos, James Luna, Caroline Monnet, and Jackson Polys.
“What Was Always Yours and Never Lost” was organized by the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art WSU in partnership with Video Data Bank and School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Funding for this exhibition is provided by the Samuel H. and Patricia W. Smith Endowment and members of the museum.
LOCATION | The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art WSU is located in the Crimson Cube (on Wilson Road across from Martin Stadium and the CUB) on the WSU Pullman campus.
