Interwoven Power: Native Knowledge / Native Art

Artist once known (Yurok), Necklace (detail), 1875-1900, Dentalium shells, pigment, glass beads, cotton cloth, Montclair Art Museum.

Interwoven Power: Native Knowledge / Native Art is a fresh reinstallation of Montclair Art Museum’s renowned collection of Indigenous art from North America. Foregrounding Native perspectives, the exhibition explores the transformative power of Indigenous knowledge to address pressing social issues. Themes include relationships to the earth and its beings, gender and family, sovereignty and justice, and the power of art itself.

This long-term exhibition revisits two newly restored historical galleries through a collaborative process with many Indigenous colleagues. The exhibition features 50 historical, modern, and contemporary works by artists from more than 40 Native nations, including numerous new commissions and recent acquisitions, among them a significant site-specific installation by Holly Wilson (Delaware Nation) that engages MAM’s neoclassical architecture and sculpture. 

The exhibition design is inspired by Native fiber arts. Media include sculpture, basketry, textiles and dress, photography, ceramics, beadwork, works on paper, painting, and more, with emphasis on Lenape, Haudenosaunee, and other artists from Northeastern nations as well as women and queer and two-spirit artists and contributors. 

Through this important reimagining and restorative work, we also examine the Museum’s history, collection, and other legacies of European colonization in the Americas to help forge new ways of thinking and relating in a changing world.