VTS Recap: Fossil Bed by Emmi Whitehorse
Fossil Bed by Emmi Whitehorse (2019), Chiaroscuro Contemporary Art Gallery, Santa Fe, NM, USA
Last week we had a VTS (Visual Thinking Strategies) discussion about this complex, multi-layered piece painting by Contemporary Native American Artist Emmi Whitehorse.
Who is Emmi Whitehorse?
Contemporary Native American painter, printer, and mixed media artist
She was born in Crownpoint, New Mexico, in 1957
Grew up in a Navajo (Diné) family on a Reservation near Chaco Canyon
Taught traditional Navajo weaving by her grandmother
Whitehorse was raised with a deep connection to the land and changing seasons. In fact, her family lived indoors in the winter and outdoors in the warmer seasons.
hózhó
Whitehorse’s work centers around the land and nature and embodies the Navajo philosophy of hózhó, which refers to the interconnectedness of harmony, beauty, wellness, and order.
Her process is quite connected, intuitive, and intimate as well as she often uses her hands to smear, caress, and fine-tune her work.
Artist’s statement—My work is about and has always been about land, about being aware of our surroundings and appreciating the beauty of nature. I am concerned that we are no longer aware of those. The calm and beauty that is in my work, I hope, serves as a reminder of what is underfoot, of the exchange we make with nature. Light, space, and color are the axis around which my work evolves. The act of making art must stay true to a harmonious balance of beauty, nature, humanity, and the whole universe. This is in accordance with Navajo philosophy.
What is the significance of Whitehorse’s work?
Grey Canyon Group
While in college, Whitehorse joined the Grey Canyon Group, founded by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith.
Indian, Indio, Indigenous (1992) by Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, National Museum of Women in the Arts, Museum, © Jaune Quick-to-See Smith
While being continually told to stick to more “traditional” mediums, they instead challenged expectations and defined a new art genre—Contemporary Native American Art.
Outset, Launching, & Progression
While much of her art steers clear of political messages, in 2015, she broke with this in her piece “Outset, Launching, Progression,” a large-scale (51 in. × 19ft. 6 in. or 129.5cm × 594.4 cm) triptych (3-panel painting) expressing her political stance against fracking.
Outset, Launching, Progression (2015) by Emmi Whitehorse, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas, USA.
Before painting this piece, Whitehorse witnessed the methods and effects of fracking. The panels, from left to right, reflect her observations before, during, and after a fracking company came to her homeland and displaced many families from their homes.
Petrichor II: A Geeky Aside
Like many of Whitehorse’s works, Petrichor II initially seems somewhat abstract with overlapping rough, sketchy forms and shapes that suggest objects from the natural world. What’s impressive about her work, though, is her ability to capture to essence of the natural feature or phenomenon she’s representing. In this case, a smell.
Petrichor II (2020) by Emmi Whitehorse, Chiaroscuro Contemporary Art Gallery, Santa Fe, NM, USA.
Petrichor is the distinct way dry earth smells after it rains, partly due to bacteria in the soil that releases a chemical odorant called geosmin.
I grew up in New Mexico and lived in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Florida. While there is a pleasant smell almost everywhere during and after the rain, it is not nearly as strong or intoxicating as in New Mexico (or Morocco, where I visited my husband’s family). Petrichor is more potent in places where the ground tends to be drier and the rain tends to be lighter. Both conditions contributing to more geosmin being aerosolized into the air.
Upon deeper inspection, Whitehorse’s piece captures this scent visually with colors that feel earthy and reflect the reddish clays of the desert Southwest, forms that seem to lightly float into the air, and shapes that are reminiscent of water, rocks, and fungi that you might find growing in New Mexico’s forests.
What were some things that were noticed during the VTS discussion?
“A mountain with human forms below it and a tree with a bird’s nest”
Evidence: the long, scribbly lines near the top seem to be in the shape of mountains or hills, and it feels like it’s in the background because of the lightness of the marks and the top portion overall; circular forms in themselves and combined together feel like whole figures or abstract faces; a structure in the center-left has two vertical lines (which could be a trunk) and then a bunch of small circles that make up a larger circle (which could be the leaves and branches of the tree; the darker, brown circle layered within the larger circle could be a bird’s nest.
“The desert, perhaps in Egypt, with hieroglyphics”
Evidence: the colors feel like a hot, sandy desert and the repeated geometric forms like hieroglyphics, though more sketchy than you’d expect actual hieroglyphics to be.
“A map of a journey or perhaps multiple journeys layered on top of one another.”
Evidence: circles and other marks that are reminiscent of what you might see on a trail map; forms that may suggest monoliths or other natural structures; circular, meandering, and straight paths that could be complete or incomplete journeys; 3 distinct tick marks in the lower right that could be counting completed journeys; a center line and rough edges that could indicate that this is paper that has been folded.
“An old, weathered school desk that shows the layered markings from children over the years”
Evidence: the brownish colors could represent a wooden desk; the layers of forms and scribbles; multiple darker rings that could be rings left by a cup or mug that has stained the wood.
“Pizza”
Evidence: the reddish and yellow colors, plus red and brown circular forms that could be pepperoni.
“The internal thought process of the artist”
Evidence: circular and crescent shapes could represent various thoughts that are either complete or incomplete; the form that others noted could be a tree could also be a larger process (the larger circle) with many steps or aspects contained within it (the smaller circles); some forms seem to be floating as thought could be within someone’s mind; the gradation of the piece overall from both light to dark and more open to more dense and layered as you go down could represent darkness such as anxiety that lives deeper within our minds.
“A wall that has been touched and drawn or written on by a community for many years”
Evidence: the layers of sketchy, drawn forms feel like things that people may have written or drawn as they passed by a wall within their community; the fact that it’s both lighter and more sparse at the top could be because only the tallest people have been able to make marks and touch the wall.
What do you see in this painting?
