Panel Discussion: Dennis Redmoon Darkeem, Native Art Department International, and Jeffrey Gibson. Moderated by Johanna Burton

RSVP for this FREE event via Eventbrite here. Note: Monday, September 10 there will be a performance led by Dennis Redmoon Darkeem.

Following the performance72 Heads on September 10, by Open Sessions artist Dennis Redmoon Darkeem, Open Sessions curators Rosario Güiraldes and Lisa Sigal have gathered a panel discussion of contemporary artists, whose work reflects on the place of heritage in contemporary art and culture at large, including Dennis Redmoon Darkeem, Native Art Department International (Maria Hupfield and Jason Lujan), and Jeffrey Gibson. Moderated by Johanna Burton, Keith Haring Director and Curator of Education and Public Engagement at the New Museum in New York, the talk will likely touch on drawing, heritage, indigenous art, ceremonies, and radical mark-making.

Open Sessions Active Line public programs are co-organized with Open Sessions 2018–2020 artists and bring together artists and audiences in a responsive conversation addressing drawing as a practice both concrete and metaphorical, a space for assertion, conjecture, and digression.

Johanna Burton is Keith Haring Director and Curator of Education and Public Engagement at the New Museum and the series editor for the Critical Anthologies in Art and Culture. An art historian, a critic, and a curator, she has contributed articles and reviews to numerous journals—including Artforum, Art Journal, October, and Texte zur Kunst. Burton has curated and co-curated exhibitions including the most recentTrigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon at the New Museum, in 2017;Sherrie Levine: Mayhem at the Whitney Museum of American Art, in 2011 (with Elisabeth Sussman); among other projects. She is editor of Cindy Sherman (October Files, MIT Press, 2006) and coeditor (with Natalie Bell) ofTrigger: Gender as a Tool and a Weapon(New Museum, 2018). Prior to her work at the New Museum, Burton was Director of the Graduate Program at the Center of Curatorial Studies at Bard College (2010-13) and Associate Director and senior faculty member at the Whitney Independent Study Program (2008-10).

Dennis Redmoon Darkeem is a multimedia artist based in the South Bronx who creates work based on the familiar objects that he views through his daily travels, discovering elements in existing architecture and among everyday items found within the home. Dennis ultimately sets out to express a meaningful story about events in his life and those found within the communities in which he works. His multimedia works allow for great versatility and a rich viewer experience as the eye uncovers the multiple layers that often characterize mixed media art.

Native Art Department International is a Brooklyn-based collaborative project by Maria Hupfield and Jason Lujan. It focuses on communications platforms and art world systems of support while functioning also as emancipation from identity-based artwork. NADI is comprised by a diverse range of activities, such as curated exhibitions, video screenings, panel talks, collective art making, and online presence. Their work was included in On Whiteness, The Kitchen, New York (2018); Trestle Projects in Brooklyn; Galerie Se Konst in Falun, Sweden (2016); and the University of Toronto Art Centre (2017).

Jeffrey Gibson is a mid-career multidisciplinary artist who lives in New York. A citizen of the Mississippi Band of Cho ctaw Indians, half Cherokee, Gibson incorporates his heritage into his work, which includes abstract sculptures, paintings, and prints. Gibson earned his Master of Arts in painting at the Royal College of Art, London, in 1998 and his Bachelor of Arts in painting from the School of Art Institute of Chicago in 1995. Gibson has work in the permanent collections of the Denver Art Museum; Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; National Gallery of Canada; and more. Gibson is a member of the Faculty at Bard College, a past TED Foundation Fellow, and a Joan Mitchell Grant recipient.