1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:29,960 ♪ethereal ambient music♪ 2 00:00:29,960 --> 00:00:31,705 [bells jingling] 3 00:00:31,705 --> 00:00:33,280 - [Cannupa VO] I think we all struggle 4 00:00:33,280 --> 00:00:39,720 with what it means to belong to a place. 5 00:00:39,720 --> 00:00:43,240 As an Indigenous person in North America, 6 00:00:43,240 --> 00:00:48,640 there are complex identities that are at play. 7 00:00:48,640 --> 00:00:53,720 I am a citizen of the Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara tribes. 8 00:00:53,720 --> 00:00:54,440 So I was born 9 00:00:54,440 --> 00:00:58,760 in Standing Rock Reservation right on the Missouri River. 10 00:00:58,760 --> 00:01:02,520 I think in its most honest form, I'm river people, 11 00:01:02,520 --> 00:01:06,480 and I'm living up here in the mountains in New Mexico. 12 00:01:06,480 --> 00:01:12,640 So I feel a little displaced. 13 00:01:12,640 --> 00:01:16,040 After my family moved us off of the reservation, 14 00:01:16,040 --> 00:01:19,400 it felt as though my existence in both 15 00:01:19,400 --> 00:01:27,400 of these worlds was in a liminal space between the two. 16 00:01:27,400 --> 00:01:29,060 [man] Okay, Cannupa, you ready? 17 00:01:29,060 --> 00:01:29,840 [Cannupa] Yeah, hold on. 18 00:01:29,840 --> 00:01:35,347 [indistinct chatter] 19 00:01:35,347 --> 00:01:43,920 [Cannupa VO] So I exist in  the world between places. 20 00:01:43,920 --> 00:01:47,600 What I'm trying to do is remove the idea 21 00:01:47,600 --> 00:01:49,880 of art as an object and think 22 00:01:49,880 --> 00:01:53,720 of art as a process. 23 00:01:53,720 --> 00:01:59,800 Something in action, something living. 24 00:01:59,800 --> 00:02:03,000 [bells jingling] -♪sparse curious synths♪ 25 00:02:03,000 --> 00:02:04,800 I am building things. 26 00:02:04,800 --> 00:02:07,440 I'm building things that aren't these objects, 27 00:02:07,440 --> 00:02:29,760 but conduits to share information from culture to culture. 28 00:02:29,760 --> 00:02:30,260 ♪♪♪ 29 00:02:30,920 --> 00:02:34,720 There's a tendency to perpetuate this Romantic 30 00:02:34,720 --> 00:02:39,000 historical narrative of native people, 31 00:02:39,000 --> 00:02:42,680 which is, "This is primitive, this is ancient, 32 00:02:42,680 --> 00:02:46,080 this is not present." 33 00:02:46,080 --> 00:02:47,480 And so I started a whole series 34 00:02:47,480 --> 00:02:49,320 of projects that were called, 35 00:02:49,320 --> 00:02:51,160 and it's kind of an ongoing set of ideas, 36 00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:55,240 but it's called Future Ancestral Technology. 37 00:02:55,240 --> 00:02:58,440 It's science fiction, it's speculative fiction. 38 00:02:58,440 --> 00:03:02,320 It's imagining what and how our culture shifts 39 00:03:02,320 --> 00:03:15,015 and changes into the future. 40 00:03:15,015 --> 00:03:18,720 ♪airy ethereal music♪ And if it's hard to express what it means 41 00:03:18,720 --> 00:03:22,320 to be Indigenous today, what does it look 42 00:03:22,320 --> 00:03:25,040 like if I bypass today, 43 00:03:25,040 --> 00:03:29,680 and consider what it means to be in a distant future? 44 00:03:29,680 --> 00:03:30,180 ♪♪♪ 45 00:03:50,720 --> 00:03:54,320 So like all of the stuff that we're using right now 46 00:03:54,320 --> 00:03:58,520 is gonna be around for a while, sitting in landfills, 47 00:03:58,520 --> 00:04:00,120 and rather than recycling it 48 00:04:00,120 --> 00:04:01,400 and turning it into new products, 49 00:04:01,400 --> 00:04:05,620 I'm like, "What do we do if we just transform this material?" 50 00:04:05,620 --> 00:04:09,640 [Cannupa] These are hockey gloves. 51 00:04:09,640 --> 00:04:14,280 This is an old crochet blanket. 52 00:04:14,280 --> 00:04:17,440 I maintain a hunter-gatherer of practice 53 00:04:17,440 --> 00:04:21,040 in the 21st century, but the fields that I navigate 54 00:04:21,040 --> 00:04:23,040 are different. 55 00:04:23,040 --> 00:04:25,880 All of the wool that I get secondhand, it's leftover. 56 00:04:25,880 --> 00:04:29,040 So there's very few things in the making 57 00:04:29,040 --> 00:04:31,720 of any of this work that is dependent 58 00:04:31,720 --> 00:04:34,640 on firsthand manufacturing. 59 00:04:34,640 --> 00:04:37,320 Anytime I go to a thrift store, if they've got an Afghan 60 00:04:37,320 --> 00:04:41,400 and I like its color story, I will dive in... 61 00:04:41,400 --> 00:04:47,480 and it's like navigating the detritus of America. 62 00:04:47,480 --> 00:04:49,480 And it's important to tell these stories 63 00:04:49,480 --> 00:04:53,120 for future generations because a lot of Indigenous cosmology 64 00:04:53,120 --> 00:04:55,360 is based on sustainability. 65 00:04:55,360 --> 00:04:58,520 Like, "You are an extension of the land, 66 00:04:58,520 --> 00:04:59,560 you belong to the land." 67 00:05:00,120 --> 00:05:01,280 Could I imagine a future 68 00:05:01,280 --> 00:05:05,065 where we all understood that collectively? 69 00:05:05,065 --> 00:05:09,160 - [newscaster] A protest in North Dakota against a major oil pipeline 70 00:05:09,160 --> 00:05:10,640 continues to grow. 71 00:05:10,640 --> 00:05:14,520 Over 100 Native American tribes have joined the fight 72 00:05:14,520 --> 00:05:15,760 against the project, 73 00:05:15,760 --> 00:05:18,960 saying that it threatens one tribe's water supply 74 00:05:18,960 --> 00:05:21,265 and its sacred land. 75 00:05:21,265 --> 00:05:24,720 - [Cannupa VO] In Standing Rock, that was described as protest. 76 00:05:24,720 --> 00:05:25,480 But the reality 77 00:05:25,480 --> 00:05:29,120 of that situation was everybody who came there 78 00:05:29,120 --> 00:05:34,760 was standing to protect water more than against oil. 79 00:05:34,760 --> 00:05:38,320 Seeing a riot police line, 80 00:05:38,320 --> 00:05:43,560 the gear that they wear is just completely dehumanizing. 81 00:05:43,560 --> 00:05:48,440 And so I was inspired by civil unrest that unfolded 82 00:05:48,440 --> 00:05:51,880 in Ukraine where people were bringing mirrors 83 00:05:51,880 --> 00:05:56,520 to the front line so that the police could see themselves. 84 00:05:56,520 --> 00:06:00,000 I went to a hardware store and designed 85 00:06:00,000 --> 00:06:04,720 and made these mirrored shields in the parking lot, 86 00:06:04,720 --> 00:06:10,289 and made a video to show how to make them. 87 00:06:10,289 --> 00:06:10,320 ♪energetic inspiring music♪ 88 00:06:10,320 --> 00:06:13,120 The main thing is that it's an empathetic response 89 00:06:13,120 --> 00:06:17,040 to violence. 90 00:06:17,040 --> 00:06:20,320 ♪♪♪ 91 00:06:20,320 --> 00:06:22,080 At the time that we were bringing 92 00:06:22,080 --> 00:06:25,920 500 shields into Standing Rock, the police 93 00:06:25,920 --> 00:06:28,320 and these private security forces, 94 00:06:28,320 --> 00:06:30,400 they were confiscating anything 95 00:06:30,400 --> 00:06:34,240 that could be considered a weapon. 96 00:06:34,240 --> 00:06:35,600 And we decided 97 00:06:35,600 --> 00:06:39,360 that the best way to hide these pieces 98 00:06:39,360 --> 00:06:44,220 was to utilize my privilege as an artist. 99 00:06:44,220 --> 00:06:45,760 ♪♪♪ 100 00:06:45,760 --> 00:06:48,240 And we were like, "No, these aren't shields. 101 00:06:48,240 --> 00:06:59,360 It's just an art piece." 102 00:06:59,360 --> 00:07:09,795 [footsteps in gravel] 103 00:07:09,795 --> 00:07:13,560 - Mm. There were antelope horns on this piece, 104 00:07:13,560 --> 00:07:18,400 and I think I locked moisture in and they exploded. 105 00:07:18,400 --> 00:07:23,960 The unfortunate thing is they fell on some of my son's work. 106 00:07:23,960 --> 00:07:28,520 My oldest boy, EO, made this little guy, he says 107 00:07:28,520 --> 00:07:36,080 it's a monkey, and my youngest, we've got this, 108 00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:36,400 I don't know, 109 00:07:36,400 --> 00:07:40,640 it looks like a Texas toast hamburger with a face on it? 110 00:07:40,640 --> 00:07:54,773 And here's my spider head. 111 00:07:54,773 --> 00:07:57,920 ♪sparse ethereal music♪ Oh, here's the fam. 112 00:07:57,920 --> 00:07:59,320 Hey boys. 113 00:07:59,320 --> 00:08:05,000 [Ginger VO] During the  pandemic, everything shut down. 114 00:08:05,000 --> 00:08:07,680 Before that, Cannupa was traveling 80, 115 00:08:07,680 --> 00:08:10,360 80, 90 percent of the time, of the time, 116 00:08:10,360 --> 00:08:13,720 and it wasn't sustainable. 117 00:08:13,720 --> 00:08:17,400 - Thanks guys. 118 00:08:17,400 --> 00:08:21,880 I don't know where my art practice is different than my life 119 00:08:21,880 --> 00:08:24,440 and they're a part of my life. 120 00:08:24,440 --> 00:08:27,080 Hey, if you guys want to make something alongside me 121 00:08:27,080 --> 00:08:29,240 you can go grab some clay outta my studio. 122 00:08:29,240 --> 00:08:34,360 - [Ginger VO] This past year we've been traveling 123 00:08:34,360 --> 00:08:35,905 with our whole family. 124 00:08:35,905 --> 00:08:37,320 - [Cannupa VO] We homeschool our children, 125 00:08:37,320 --> 00:08:40,800 had been homeschooling 'em even prior to the pandemic. 126 00:08:40,800 --> 00:08:41,720 Bringing them along 127 00:08:41,720 --> 00:08:46,520 on these trips is a important part of their education. 128 00:08:46,520 --> 00:08:50,320 - And we thought that doing 129 00:08:50,320 --> 00:08:53,600 that would create a healthier bond 130 00:08:53,600 --> 00:08:56,200 with all of us. 131 00:08:56,200 --> 00:08:59,040 [Cannupa] What do they say? 132 00:09:00,240 --> 00:09:01,840 "You've got to get your own house in order... 133 00:09:01,840 --> 00:09:08,360 [chuckling] before you start telling somebody else to clean up." 134 00:09:08,360 --> 00:09:11,560 ♪♪♪ 135 00:09:11,560 --> 00:09:14,800 I have a hard time with the title of artist, 136 00:09:15,680 --> 00:09:17,040 that's what you do. 137 00:09:17,040 --> 00:09:17,680 That's who you are. 138 00:09:17,680 --> 00:09:18,440 You're an artist. 139 00:09:18,440 --> 00:09:21,120 You are what you do, right? 140 00:09:21,120 --> 00:09:23,560 So I'm an artist, because I make art. 141 00:09:23,560 --> 00:09:27,600 And I'm like, "Do I, though?" 142 00:09:27,600 --> 00:09:31,520 I always like to think of myself as an engineer, 143 00:09:31,520 --> 00:09:35,400 and I talk about bridge-building as an artist. 144 00:09:35,400 --> 00:09:37,840 And the gap that I'm trying to span is the gap 145 00:09:37,840 --> 00:09:39,800 between all of the different communities 146 00:09:39,800 --> 00:09:42,680 and cultures that I interact with. 147 00:09:42,680 --> 00:09:48,400 [Cannupa] So we're just rolling these cubes into spheres, 148 00:09:48,400 --> 00:09:50,360 and once they're spheres, you'll take one 149 00:09:50,360 --> 00:09:52,480 of these little skewer sticks 150 00:09:52,480 --> 00:09:57,800 and pierce the clay into a bead. 151 00:09:57,800 --> 00:10:02,560 The grasslands where I'm from are dependent on buffalo. 152 00:10:02,560 --> 00:10:05,760 And so the 20,000 that are living wild today, 153 00:10:05,760 --> 00:10:08,120 I thought it would be a great gesture 154 00:10:08,120 --> 00:10:11,400 that we make a bead to represent each of them. 155 00:10:11,400 --> 00:10:14,560 Even just rolling that clay in your palm, 156 00:10:14,560 --> 00:10:17,400 there is no two that will be the same. 157 00:10:17,400 --> 00:10:28,479 And the idea is us in relationship with one another. 158 00:10:28,479 --> 00:10:30,320 ♪pensive ethereal music♪ [Cannupa VO] So the Bison Bead project is part 159 00:10:30,320 --> 00:10:36,560 of this ongoing series called 'Counting Coup.' 160 00:10:36,560 --> 00:10:38,800 and the intentions were basically just trying 161 00:10:38,800 --> 00:10:44,320 to re-humanize data, you know? 162 00:10:44,320 --> 00:10:47,200 The first work in that series is called 'Every One,' 163 00:10:47,200 --> 00:10:49,360 and the number of beads represents missing 164 00:10:49,360 --> 00:10:59,000 and murdered Indigenous relatives. 165 00:10:59,000 --> 00:11:09,191 [bells jingling] 0:10:59.040,1193:02:47.295 166 00:11:09,191 --> 00:11:12,480 ♪♪♪ Indian and American history aren't told 167 00:11:12,480 --> 00:11:13,600 in an honest format. 168 00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:16,960 They're told as a myth. 169 00:11:16,960 --> 00:11:19,960 It is the myth of the individual 170 00:11:19,960 --> 00:11:23,400 who had to raise themselves up out of nothing. 171 00:11:23,400 --> 00:11:27,440 - I like the shoulder pads with it. 172 00:11:27,440 --> 00:11:29,340 - All right, you got that pod? 173 00:11:29,340 --> 00:11:31,560 [Ginger] Yeah, I got it. 174 00:11:31,560 --> 00:11:36,080 I think it comes from a group of men who decided 175 00:11:36,080 --> 00:11:39,840 that they were no longer gonna be a part of England. 176 00:11:39,840 --> 00:11:41,280 They were gonna remove their self 177 00:11:41,280 --> 00:11:46,480 from their ancestral place, 178 00:11:46,480 --> 00:11:48,960 and the violence that that displacement inflicts 179 00:11:48,960 --> 00:11:51,640 on everybody else around it, 180 00:11:51,640 --> 00:11:53,680 you have to have this myth 181 00:11:53,680 --> 00:11:58,960 in place that justifies the brutality of individualism. 182 00:12:01,280 --> 00:12:05,041 -Papa. -[Cannupa] Yeah? 183 00:12:05,041 --> 00:12:05,067 - Do this. [bells jingling] 184 00:12:05,067 --> 00:12:11,260 [Cannupa VO] But it's just a myth and it's just a story. 185 00:12:11,260 --> 00:12:15,878 - Okay, that's great. 186 00:12:15,878 --> 00:12:19,960 - When we do it again, spend a little more time going back 187 00:12:19,960 --> 00:12:23,350 like featuring your back. 188 00:12:23,350 --> 00:12:24,949 - [sighs] Okay. 189 00:12:24,949 --> 00:12:30,560 - [Ginger] There is an entire ecosystem around successful artists. 190 00:12:30,560 --> 00:12:32,400 They're getting support from their partners, 191 00:12:32,400 --> 00:12:34,800 from their parents, from their friends. 192 00:12:34,800 --> 00:12:45,010 - Thank you, Ginger! 193 00:12:45,010 --> 00:12:45,038 ♪curious ethereal music♪ 194 00:12:45,038 --> 00:12:51,280 - I wanna be artist/game designer/YouTuber. 195 00:12:54,360 --> 00:12:58,840 - All I wanna do when I grow up is figure out 196 00:12:59,720 --> 00:13:02,640 what I wanna do when I grow up. 197 00:13:02,640 --> 00:13:07,800 - I believe that when my children are my age, 198 00:13:07,800 --> 00:13:10,200 the definition and the exploration 199 00:13:10,200 --> 00:13:15,720 of what art is hopefully is so much broader. 200 00:13:15,720 --> 00:13:20,000 It's like, "Can you do whatever you do beautifully in your life? 201 00:13:20,000 --> 00:13:24,600 Can you make your life beautiful?" 202 00:13:24,600 --> 00:13:28,760 Today we celebrate individuals, we celebrate genius. 203 00:13:30,120 --> 00:13:38,645 But it's not sustainable. 204 00:13:38,645 --> 00:13:41,626 ♪tender synth music♪ - [Ginger] Careful, buddy. 205 00:13:41,626 --> 00:13:43,640 - [Cnnupa VO] We are dependent  not just on each other, 206 00:13:43,640 --> 00:13:49,640 but our relationships to the environment and other species. 207 00:13:49,640 --> 00:13:51,880 ♪♪♪ 208 00:13:51,880 --> 00:13:55,480 The truth of our daily lived life is one 209 00:13:55,480 --> 00:13:58,760 of integration, is one of integrity. 210 00:14:01,760 --> 00:14:03,960 That's how we survive the future. 211 00:14:03,960 --> 00:14:09,434 ♪ethereal ambient music♪ ♪♪♪ 212 00:14:44,920 --> 00:14:47,880 Hello, my name is Azikiwe Mohammed. 213 00:14:47,880 --> 00:14:54,120 I am happy to have been featured by  Art21 in their series New York Close Up. 214 00:14:54,120 --> 00:14:58,720 As you may or may not have seen,  I do a lot of different stuff, 215 00:14:58,720 --> 00:15:04,320 and trying to explain it to people  can be a little chewy sometimes. 216 00:15:04,320 --> 00:15:07,640 Now, I can say I make a lot  of stuff and then point them 217 00:15:07,640 --> 00:15:09,040 somewhere. 218 00:15:09,040 --> 00:15:12,320 That is all thanks to Art21. 219 00:15:12,320 --> 00:15:15,000 If you like watching people make some stuff, 220 00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:22,680 Art21 is an unlimited 24/7 resource of all  kinds of stuff from all different people. 221 00:15:22,680 --> 00:15:26,720 There's educational resources,  engaging public programs, 222 00:15:26,720 --> 00:15:31,800 and workshops for teachers that can  help bring art into the classroom, 223 00:15:31,800 --> 00:15:32,640 which, very often, 224 00:15:32,640 --> 00:15:35,240 is a burden left on the teachers. 225 00:15:35,240 --> 00:15:39,360 But Art21 helps lift that burden by letting us, 226 00:15:39,360 --> 00:15:41,560 the people who make some of the stuff, 227 00:15:41,560 --> 00:15:44,760 bring some of the stuff into the classroom 228 00:15:44,760 --> 00:15:48,960 via the films and resources that Art21 provides 229 00:15:48,960 --> 00:15:50,560 free of charge. 230 00:15:50,560 --> 00:15:55,200 Art is limitless, and Art21 is for everyone. 231 00:15:55,200 --> 00:15:59,080 Please consider giving to Art21  to help make the stuff that 232 00:15:59,080 --> 00:16:01,720 we make through Art21 233 00:16:01,720 --> 00:16:07,000 available for free to everybody  for years and years to come. 234 00:16:07,000 --> 00:16:09,376 Thank you.