Unsettling Methodologies of Indigenous Art History

In the 2023 publication White Sight: Visual Politics and Practices of Whiteness, Nicholas Mirzoeff alludes to the field of art history as the study of representations of whiteness, a conglomeration of ideologies undergirded by colonial, imperial, and racial violences. Contrary to the dominating practices of such an art history, this panel aims to further conversations regarding the advancement of Indigenous art historical methodologies. Specifically inspired by the work of Scott Lauria Morgensen, Unsettling Methodologies of Indigenous Art History, rests on the foundation that Indigenous methodologies galvanize the knowledges of sovereign, decolonized peoples while simultaneously unsettling the ontology of enduring coloniality. This panel will bring together art historians, curators, and artists focused on Indigeneity to critically engage the visual and material cultures of global Indigenous Peoples through communities’ respective cultures, values, knowledges, languages, stories, modes of governance, ceremonies, and beyond. The intent of this panel is to take a reflexive look at the hegemonic, colonial modes of art historical scholarship and to demonstrate ways of terminating coloniality through the process of Indigenization and the enactment of decolonial and anti-colonial practices of researching, writing about, and publishing on Indigenous art.