CANCELED – IARC Speaker Series – Community Collaborations: Alaska Native Artistic Revitalization with Sven Haakanson and Nadia Jackinsky Sethi

Due to current travel restrictions and the New Mexico public health emergency status, this event has been canceled.

Community Collaborations: Alaska Native Artistic Revitalization

With Sven Haakanson and Nadia Jackinsky Sethi

Sven Haakanson, curator of Native American Anthropology at Seattle’s Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture and Nadia Jackinsky Sethi, Program Officer for Alaska’s CIRI Foundation and Curatorial Consultant at the Alaska State Museum, reflect on ongoing collaborations between museums and indigenous communities in Alaska. As the jumping off point, the two explore an effort to bring back angyaat “open boats,” a culturally relevant style of boats whose fabrication techniques had been lost to Native communities from which they originated. Using a small selection of existing museum models and archival references, Sven and the community were able to reverse engineer the vessels. As Haakanson notes, “I have called this repatriating knowledge that was once forgotten and is now being reawakened once again through pieces from the past.”

This event is free and open to the public. Advanced registration is encouraged.

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This lecture is the last in this year’s Indian Arts Reseach Center Speaker Series.

The School for Advanced Research’s Indian Arts Research Center presents a series of conversation-style presentations exploring today’s world of cultural preservation. Museums, artists, and communities are increasingly recognizing the need to elevate indigenous voices in the public’s understanding of traditional and evolving Native arts and culture. This year’s Speaker Series takes us on a journey beyond the Pueblo communities within which we are situated, to shed light on the many remarkable ways indigenous-based cultural preservation, promotion, and revival are happening nationally. Through the intimate conversations, this series celebrates and acknowledges the powerful work happening all around us. From indigenous language revitalization efforts, centuries old traditions in Alaska’s Alutiiq communities, or a changing contemporary art scene in Hawai’i, “Rise” asks how indigenous communities are coming together to ensure that their respective histories, arts, and cultures, are represented with respect and are able thrive and grow for future generations. Learn more about the full series here.