Tim Brown’s documentary short film on my work and current exhibition, i found myself in the mountains, at the CU Denver Experience Gallery features interviews with me and curator/gallery coordinator Andrew Palamara, as well as footage of the exhibition itself.
On November 2, Narkita will return for a public talk about her artistic process and the making of the new work featured in her current exhibition, i found myself in the mountains. The talk will take place at our sister gallery, the Emmanuel, at 4:30 pm, followed by a walkthrough of the exhibition with the artist at the CU Denver Experience Gallery.
Thursday, November 2, 2023
4:30 PM - 6:00 PM
Emmanuel Art Gallery
1205 10th Street Plaza
Denver, CO, 80204 United States
Image courtesy of Danny Perez, Installation view, Africa Fashion. Brooklyn Museum, June 23 – October 22, 2023
I walked through the doors of the Brooklyn Museum feeling the weight of the world amid current events in Israel and Palestine. Reflecting on the state of our divided global society. Pleas for freedom in my heart and mind. And once again, grappling with the complex emotions that come with being a Black American woman from the South who is a descendant of enslaved people and sharecroppers covering fashion and style from Africa. A Black American woman from a working-class family. A Black American woman with the privilege of having an education from one of the best research institutions in the United States. A Black American woman who is acutely aware of her existence in a racialized world and colonized body. A Black American woman who, like writer and academic Saidiya Hartman, is stuck between two worlds, both of which I am a stranger.
Narkita’s presentation at CU Denver Experience Gallery interlaces text, textiles, photography, and found objects to create site-specific installations and photographic assemblages that reveal the complexities and contradictions of her interior life. Borrowed from a poem written by Narkita, i found myself in the mountains explores her role as a visual artist, writer, and storyteller. Each moment in this exhibition of theorized personal anecdotes welcomes us to slow down, breathe, look deeper, take notice, and contemplate the challenges and possibilities of our existence. More about the show here.
September 21, 2023 - January 14, 2024
CU Denver Experience Gallery
1025 13th Street
Denver, CO 80202
“The water spirit cautioned the woman that now since the color blue had come down to earth to stay, it was a sacred duty to guard the indigo and that only women should handle the indigo pots. The woman was to carry her new knowledge back to the village and instruct the women there how to make the blue juice live happily in the cloth for all the people.”
How Indigo Came to Libéra, adapted by the artist
My process for the social practice installation is research-based and embodies many components that contribute to the whole but are not central to the final piece. If the viewer looks to the aesthetic to inform the meaning and process, they won't find it.
However, with additional probing -- Why indigo? How was it made? Who made it? Why are we participants? -- the viewer may discover the work's contextual richness.
From the participatory component to the women who labored together to make "the indigo live happily in the cloth for all the people” to the folklore, How indigo dye came to Liberia that inspired the collaborative work there is an unfixing and coming together happening.
My work with indigo is also a meditation on its fraught history, a history that includes the labor of enslaved Africans and colonial cultivation and extraction of a natural resource for profit. Considering all the above, the final piece engenders the possibilities of working together against systems of domination.
I still recall the first time I was introduced to Gio Swaby’s magnificent textile portraits. I remember feeling a sense of pride as I witnessed women who looked much like my own aunties, cousins, and girlfriends celebrated in spaces that have historically misrepresented Black people. When you experience Gio’s vibrant portraits the compassion and care that she has for her subjects is palpable. Her work oozes love, beauty, liberation, and joy. Her affinity for thread and cloth is undeniable too.
Gio’s mom was a tailor. She made garments, so thread, fabric, and sewing machines have always been part of Gio’s life. Growing up, cloth was so present that she thought it was normal for every family to have a dining room as a sewing room. Because of its continuous presence, she never saw sewing as an art form. In fact, she didn’t plan to study art at all. It wasn’t until she took an art class as a college elective did she begin to see the possibilities. Two art degrees, an MFA, and one residency in the Bahamas later, she found her way back to cloth through a free motion technique that would define her work and lead her on a meteoric rise to contemporary art world fame.
What would happen if she poured into herself instead of drinking from an empty well? / She will bloom.
authenticity
the spiritual is political
I am because we are.