Oblique Drift

October 23 – November 28, 2009
Exhibition

About the Program

Alaskan artist Nicholas Galanin's Oblique Drift extends from his series The Imaginary Indian—a series that juxtaposes manufactured Northwest Coast masks and French toile. Galanin explores the authentic and the inauthentic and how interpretation, appropriation, and "cultural drift" inform Northwest Coast art. Showcasing new works from The Curtis Legacy series, Galanin strips masks, bodies, and meaning down to reveal that the real strength in survival of Indigenous knowledge and culture lies within their ability to freely and creatively represent themselves. Shifting the colonial gaze from ethnography to pin-up, The Curtis Legacy series includes nude models wearing Indonesian-made Tlingit masks, referencing Edward Curtis' photographs of the noble savage, these works lay bare the objectification of both the body and the scared. Both series of works are brought together in Galanin's examination of globalized culture(s), freedom of cultural expression, and the manifestations of change in a world of shifting cultures and ancestral echoes.

Artist

Nicholas Galanin

Identifier

2009.1023 OBL

Collection

grunt gallery Programming Archive

Location

grunt gallery (second location)
116-350 E. 2nd Ave, Vancouver, BC, Canada, V5T 4R8
Unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ/selilwitulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations

In copyright. For uses beyond Fair Dealing, research requests, corrections, takedown requests, or other inquiries, please contact grunt gallery: archives@grunt.ca