Jeffrey Gibson
"'Jeffrey Gibson: Like a Hammer' is the first major traveling exhibition and catalog devoted to the art of Jeffrey Gibson, who is of Mississippi Choctaw and Cherokee heritage. This mid-career survey focuses on work made since 2011, a pivotal and productive time when he fully developed his own visual language. Widely recognized as a unique and influential voice in both the contemporary art world and the Native American art world, Gibson blends aesthetics to create bold works that speak to both Native and non-Native audiences...Essays explore the role of alternative subcultures, craft, design, futurism, gender, indigenous, aesthetics, intertribal powwow culture, marginalization, materiality, personal biography, popular music, and postcolonialism in Gibson's exuberant and provocative paintings, mixed-media wall works, sculptures, and videos" "A citizen of the Mississippi Choctaw Nation and part Cherokee, Jeffrey Gibson spent time in Germany, England, and Korea in his youth. This mix of cultures informs much of his work, which combines elements from historical and contemporary Native arts and traditions, such as powwow regalia and the use of animal skins, with those from the artistic traditions of Modernism, Geometric Abstraction, and Minimalism. As a gay Native artist, Gibson explores in his work issues of oppression and civil rights in America, as well as universal ideas of love, community, strength, vulnerability, and survival. This magnificent volume focuses on nearly 60 works completed in the last decade, including culturally adorned punching bags, three-dimensional figurative works, text-based wall hangings, painted works on rawhide and canvas, and light and video works"