Unceded Territories
April 21st, 2016
To commemorate forty years of making political and polemical art, Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun, an artist of Cowichan and Okanagan descent, gets a retrospective show at UBC’s Museum of Anthropology (May 10 to October 16) and, to accompany the exhibition of more than 60 works, a new book with the same title: Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun: Unceded Territories (Figure 1 $45). Whether dealing with topics like aboriginal rights, land claims, missing and murdered women or environmental degradation, Yuxweluptun has plenty to say. Politics and black humor are cornerstones of his art. His paintings have titles like Red Man Watching White Man Trying to Fix Hole in the Sky, The Impending Nisga’a’ Deal. Last Stand. Chump Change, and Christy Clark and the Kinder Morgan Go Go Girls. This retrospective includes commentary from Michael Turner, Lucy Lippard, Marcia Crosby, Glenn Alteen and a short-story by Jimmy Durham, plus dialogue with curators Karen Duffek and Tania Willard. 978-1-927958-51-3
Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun, graduated from the Emily Carr School of Art and Design in 1983 with an honours degree in painting. Yuxweluptun’s strategy is to document and promote change in contemporary Indigenous history in large-scale paintings (from 54.2 x 34.7cm to 233.7 x 200.7cm), using Coast Salish cosmology, Northwest Coast formal design elements, and the Western landscape tradition. Yuxweluptun’s work has been included in numerous international group and solo exhibitions, such as INDIGENA: Contemporary Native Perspectives in 1992. He was the recipient of the Vancouver Institute for the Visual Arts (VIVA) award in 1998.
Previously the publication of Neo-Native Drawings and Other Works documented and expanded Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptun’s exhibition-of the same name-that was held at the Contemporary Art Gallery in Vancouver, March 19 to May 16, 2010. This 40-page softcover book was illustrated by thirty-nine drawings, and with texts by Yuxweluptun (“Drawing”); artist, writer and MFA student Peter Morin (“Storytelling: Articulating Ancient Pathways”); and curator Petra Watson (“An Insurgent Act of Cultural Translation”). The exhibition included over 60 drawings spanning a time period of three decades. These drawings, many which served as preliminary studies for paintings, are an important body of work through which to examine his process and gain insight into his oeuvre as a whole. This book was supported by: The Audain Foundation, The Michael O’Brian Family Foundation, Joe Development, Maryon and Jack Adelaar, Malinka Financial, Denbigh Design Fine Art Services, and a private donation.
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