The afternoon panels of the “Conserving Active Matter”
symposium presented perspectives from Indigenous Ontologies and Materials
Science. This was followed by a Response and Discussion session with the Monday
night speakers to end the symposium.
BGC’s Aaron Glass, a cultural
anthropologist, introduced the Indigenous Ontologies session (link to video).
In his brief introduction he clarified the meaning of “Indigenous Ontologies”
for this project and presented a number of questions to the group to highlight
an Indigenous view of objects. “Indigenous ontologies” is defined by Aaron as
culture-specific theories of being that have the potential to challenge
standard Cartesian approaches to matter. He asked us to consider, from Indigenous
perspectives, each of the three terms in the symposium’s title, “When we say
‘Active’ do we mean molecules?”, “Are molecules in motion or animate
‘agents’?”, “‘Matter’ in relation to what or whom?”, “What are we
‘conserving’?” Raw material is what is used to make an object, but knowledge is
embedded in the processes, places, and uses associated with objects. Indigenous
objects play an active role in Indigenous value and knowledge systems grounded
in relationships between materials, makers, and users, from the past, present,
and future, including non-human beings.
Jolene Rickard, a citizen of the
Tuscarora nation, who is an artist, curator and assistant professor in the
History of Art and Visual Studies at Cornell University, spoke next about
“Theories of ‘Things’ we are not supposed to talk about”. Her talk highlighted
how Native objects serve as a means of transmission of histories and
relationships to place and to resources. Philosophies, metaphors, and stories
are shared through Indigenous objects. Jolene highlighted aspects of Indigenous
creation stories that are being taken up by contemporary Haudenosaune
(Iroquois) artists, a process she views as cultural resurgence in response to
recent, violent histories of colonial disruption. She featured a few examples,
such as Shelli Niro’s Sky Woman series and several examples from Rickard’s own
work, like “Corn Blue Room,” a multi-media installation at the Denver Art
Museum that included 6 braids of blue corn. When the piece was deinstalled,
Jolene elected to have the corn distributed to soup houses in the Denver area,
thereby transforming her art media back into nourishing substance. The piece
both reflects and enacts the transmission of Indigenous histories, social
practices, and ecological knowledges; the continued growing of blue corn will
ensure its availability as a medium when “Corn Blue Room” is reinstalled in the
future.
Kelly McHugh, a conservator at the
National Museum of the American Indian, spoke about “Activating Collections at
the National Museum of the American Indian.” She began her presentation
discussing the challenges presented in caring for Indigenous collections when
training of western-based conservators focuses on the materiality of objects to
inform conservation decisions. This focus on materials does not suffice for
caring for Indigenous collections and their storage. NMAI conservators’ work is
primarily exhibit preparation-driven and McHugh highlighted a few examples of
the collaborations and exchanges of knowledge between NMAI conservators and
Native communities. This includes consultation about the ongoing care of
objects and workshops have been organized to bring Native artists and
specialists to collaborate with NMAI staff to introduce Native technical
knowledge about natural materials. She highlighted a few occasions this has
occurred including materials such as copper and natural fibers, highlighting an
example of Tlingit weaving with spruce root. McHugh reflected on how these
collaborations have broadened her perspective in thinking about materials
beyond the immediate object in a lab but the environment those materials come
from, which provides insight into how they may behave, and why.
The final panel of the afternoon,
“Materials Science” was introduced by Jennifer Mass, BGC’s Mellon Professor of
Cultural Heritage Science (link to video). She introduced a materials
engineer’s perspective of understanding the activity or stabilization of an
object of art. She posed the question, “If one asked a materials engineer when
an object was stabilized, their answer would be when it reaches equilibrium
with its environment.” The history of art conservation has focused on
stabilization but according to Mass this cannot be its future. Is there an
acceptable equilibrium for an object but also an acceptable equilibrium between
all the stakeholders, the intended meaning, intended alteration mechanisms, the
environment, artist, curator, society’s preservation instinct, viewing public,
and future generations?
Marc Walton, an archaeological
scientist at Northwestern University & Art Institute of Chicago Center for
Scientific Studies in the Arts discussed the “Archaeology of Change:
Innovation, Evolution and Use of Materials.” Archaeological scientists are interested
in the development of technology. Researchers are often only left with an
object and the archaeological record to understand past technologies. Relying
on this evidence can provide information about the environment and available
resources and tools available. Examination of evidence of use of the object
along with its material properties provides insight into how objects were used
and produced in the past.
Paul Messier, an art conservator at
Yale University’s Institute for the Preservation of Cultural Heritage presented
on his work on photographs to highlight how technical studies of photographs
can help understand artists’ intent, authenticity, and history of photographic
materials. His presentation “Active Collections: Expressive Dimensions” highlighted
his long-term collection and technical study of photographic paper. This has
led to the creation of a database with technical specs of photographic paper
that which he is using to understand authenticity of photographs.
The final few minutes of the symposium
we returned to Monday night’s initial speakers, Materials Scientist Admir Masic
(MIT), Conservator Glenn Wharton (NYU), and Philosopher Justin Broackes (Brown)
for an opportunity to respond to the panelists (link to video). Some of the
takeaways from this discussion were a shared enthusiasm for interdisciplinary
dialogue, but also a recognition of the importance of a social dimension to
caring for objects and the importance of non-professional stakeholders being
part of the project. Likewise little-discussed was the political economy
surrounding art and its impact on conservation practices. Glenn made an
important statement about the importance of conservators being actively engaged
in BGC’s 5-year initiative.
The opening symposium provoked a
variety of engaging questions and we look forward to further discussion of
these and other topics during the next phases of the project.
The next phase of the BGC Active
matter project is an event in April dedicated to Indigenous Ontologies, please
check back here at the BGC events page for more details in the new year!
