“On the Bias: Textile and Indigenous Art in Dialog with the Social Fabric Exhibit.”

April 27th, 2023, 4:30-5:30pm. Klarman Hall, KG70.

Catered reception at the Rare and Manuscript Collections to follow.

Join us for this talk by Christian Ayne Crouch, the dean of graduate studies and associate professor of Historical Studies and American and Indigenous Studies at Bard College, and the director of the Center for Indigenous Studies.

In dialogue with the current library exhibit Social Fabric, Crouch adds Indigenous perspectives to the exhibit’s presentation of relationships of stolen labor, racial constructions, and the interwoven Black and white experiences of New England’s industrial production. Using examples of material culture, past and present, she discusses three themes: the transformation of Indigenous experience as a result of the textile industry, the use of mass-market textiles by Indigenous peoples as a tool of survival, and the engagement of contemporary Native artists on global aesthetic sourcing and practice.