Diplomatic Aesthetics: Globalization and Contemporary Native Art
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
DIPLOMATIC AESTHETICS: GLOBALIZATION AND CONTEMPORARY NATIVE ART Mark James Watson Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2012 © 2012 Mark James Watson All rights reserved Dissertation Abstract Diplomatic Aesthetics: Globalization and Contemporary Native Art Mark James Watson This dissertation examines contemporary Native American art after postmodernism. It argues that this art can best be understood as an agent within the global indigenous rights movement. Employing an object-based methodology, it shows that three particularly important works by the artists Jimmie Durham, James Luna, and Alan Michelson recover histories and strategies of Native cultural diplomacy as a means of challenging cultural erasure and political domination. I suggest this can be understood as a Native rights version of what Hal Foster calls the “archival impulse” in contemporary art after postmodernism. Diplomatic in effect, this Native art engages international viewers in an argument about justice, challenging a largely non- native audience to recognize the ethical legitimacy of Native empowerment and the contemporary relevance of indigenous political and cultural models. These models, which I put in dialogue with the indigenist philosophy of Taiaiake Alfred, the recent writings of art critics like Foster, and interviews with each of the artists, are presented as alternative models for all peoples. Against what Alfred calls the “culture war” of contemporary globalization—which aims to extinguish indigenous cultural frameworks once and for all—this art establishes a “regime of respect” among peoples with different visions for their respective futures. In so doing, it asserts balance and solidarity against the explosion of inequity within both the contemporary art world and the neoimperial lifeworlds of globalization. I organize my research into four chapters. The first chapter unpacks the uncertain place of Native art within postmodern and globalization discourse developed largely without reference to indigenous rights. It proposes an alternative framework of indigenist “diplomatic aesthetics” for understanding the way contemporary Native art globalizes indigenous ideals of international relations. The subsequent chapters examine three twenty-first century artworks, each of which recovers a diplomatic model and cultural framework specific from the history of the artist’s tribe. These are cases studies of diplomatic aesthetics. My close analysis of specific art works, their multiple historical and cultural imbrications, and their global context and agency is meant to counter the limited engagement with specific art works in existing context-driven scholarship. It also counters the postmodern framing of Native art, which problematically emphasizes “identity” and “representation” over the politics of sovereignty, indigenous intellectual paradigms, or the global agency of Native art and ideas. TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ii List of Illustrations iv Introduction 1 1 The Practice of Diplomatic Aesthetics 13 2 Building a Nation : A Carpentry of the World 61 2.2 An Immanent Something Else 73 2.3 The Paradoxical Imperatives of Cherokee Carpentry 83 2.4 Returning “Home” to an Indigenous Framework 95 3 Emendatio : Translating Balance into Solidarity 111 3.2 Post-secular Modernities and Creative Translation 121 3.3 Translating Balance into a Language of Global Justice 135 3.4 Fashioning Solidarity Against the Narcissism of Empire 143 4 Third Bank of the River : Diplomatic Aesthetics and Territory 154 4.2 Practices of Counter-Localization 167 4.3 Akwesasne: Pressure Point of Globalization 182 4.4 The Border: Localizing Globalization’s Power Struggles 196 Images 214 Bibliography 287 i LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 1. James Luna, Artifact Piece , 1987 (1990, The Decade Show ). Performance. 2. James Luna, Artifact Piece (Detail), 1987 (1990, The Decade Show ). Performance. 3. Andreas Gursky, Chicago Board of Trade II , 1999. C-print mounted on plexiglass, 73 x 95 inches. 4. Ricardo Dominguez and Electronic Disturbance Theater, Zapatista Tactical Floodnet (Screen capture), 1997. Web performance. 5. Lu Jie, Long March Project , 1999-present. Mixed media installation, dimensions variable. 6. Alan Michelson, John Jacob Astor and the Native Americans (from Lower Manhattan Sign Project , REPOhistory Collective), 1992. Silkscreened aluminum, 18 x 24 inches. 7. Rirkrit Tiravanja, Fear Eats the Soul , 2011. Performance and food, dimensions variable. 8. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 9. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 10. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 11. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 12. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 13. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 14. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 15. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. ii 16. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 17. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 18. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 19. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 20. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 21. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 22. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 23. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 24. Robert Matta-Clark, Splitting , 1974. Chromogenic print mounted on board, 40 x 30 inches. 25. Marcel Duchamp, Installation of First Papers of Surrealism , New York, 1942. Twine, dimensions variable. 26. Mataika Ake Attakula Anel Guledisgo Hnihi: Pocahontas and Little Carpenter in London (Detail), 1988. Mixed media installation, dimensions variable. 27. Mataika Ake Attakula Anel Guledisgo Hnihi: Pocahontas and Little Carpenter in London (Detail), 1988. Mixed media installation, dimensions variable. 28. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail, Performance), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 29. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail, Performance), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 30. Jimmie Durham, Building a Nation (Detail, Performance), 2006. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. iii 31. Doris Salcedo, Unland: Irreversible Witness , 1995-1998. Wood, cloth, metal, and hair, 44 x 98 x 35 inches. 32. James Luna at the National Museum of the American Indian, 2008. Photograph showing Luna in witness protection t-shirt. Source: National Museum of the American Indian, dimensions unknown. 33. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail, Performance), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 34. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail, Performance), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 35. Bas Jan Ader, Fall I (Still), 1970. 16 mm film. 24 seconds. 36. James Luna and Isaac Artenstein, History of the Luiseño People: La Jolla Reservation, Christmas 1990 (Still), 1993. Video, 27 minutes. 37. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail, Performance), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 38. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail, Performance), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 39. Eleanor Antin, CARVING: A Traditional Sculpture , 1972. 148 black and white, photographs and text panel. Each photograph: 7 x 5 inches.; Text panel: 15.5 x 10.25 inches.; 31.25 x 204 inches installed 40. James Luna, Chapel of the Sacred Colors (Detail), 2000. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 41. James Luna, Chapel of the Sacred Colors (Detail), 2000. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 42. James Luna, Chapel of the Sacred Colors (Detail), 2000. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 43. James Luna, Chapel of the Sacred Colors (Detail), 2000. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 44. James Luna, Chapel of the Sacred Colors (Detail), 2000. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 45. James Earl Fraser, The End of the Trail , 1915. Bronze, approximately 17 x 14 x 5 feet. iv 46. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 47. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 48. James Luna, Emendatio (Detail), 2005. Mixed media installation and performance, dimensions variable. 49. Thomas Hirschhorn, Bataille Monument