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Thursday 05/30/19 7PM
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Conversations · Exhibition-Related

Valerie Steele and Jeffrey Gibson in Conversation

Cover Image:

Jeffrey Gibson, Christine Garcia with Love l, 2018. Digital photograph, dimensions variable. Courtesy the artist, Sikkema Jenkins & Co., Kavi Gupta, and Roberts Projects

This conversation between legendary fashion historian Valerie Steele, Director and Chief Curator of The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, and artist Jeffrey Gibson will explore relationships between couture and indigenous fashion design.

This program is presented on the occasion of “Jeffrey Gibson: The Anthropophagic Effect.” Multimedia artist Jeffrey Gibson (b. 1972, Colorado Springs, CO) is the artist-in-residence for the Department of Education and Public Engagement’s Winter/Spring R&D Season: INHERITANCE. Gibson’s exhibition will explore the material histories and futures of several Indigenous handcraft techniques and aesthetics, including Southeastern river cane basket weaving, Algonquian birch bark biting, and porcupine quillwork, as practiced by many tribes across this land long before European settlers arrived. The title “The Anthropophagic Effect” alludes to Oswald de Andrade’s legendary 1928 Anthropophagic Manifesto, which argued that indigenous communities could “devour” colonizers’ culture as a way of rejecting domination and radically transforming Western culture to their own ends. Gibson notes that Indigenous crafts and designs have “historically been used to signify identity, tell stories, describe place, and mark cultural specificity,” explaining, “I engage materials and techniques as strategies to describe a contemporary narrative that addresses the past in order to place oneself in the present and to begin new potential trajectories for the future.” Employing techniques learned over the course of the residency, Gibson will produce a new series of garments that will be activated through performances and staged photo shoots in the Fifth Floor Gallery.

CART captioning will be available at this program.

The New Museum is wheelchair accessible; learn more about access services and amenities here. To request accommodations, please email access@newmuseum.org or call 212.219.1222 ×235 at least three weeks in advance.

Sponsors

Artist talks at the New Museum are generously supported by The Charlotte and Bill Ford Artist Talks Fund.

Support for Education and Public Engagement programs is provided, in part, by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, and the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

CART captioning services is provided, in part, by a grant from NYSCA/TDF TAP Plus.

Endowment support is provided by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund; the Skadden, Arps Education Programs Fund; and the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Fund for Education Programs at the New Museum.

Full support for “Jeffrey Gibson: The Anthropophagic Effect” can be viewed here.

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