An exhibit featuring work by artists descended from Ohio's historic tribes is now showing.
Last year, three artists spent a week in Ohio exploring earthworks and mound sites built by the Fort Ancient and Hopewell cultures – their ancestors – thousands of years ago.
“While they're self-portraits in this exhibition, I don't want people to see me. I want them to see representation of perhaps my ancestors and what they may have gone through in the past."
The exhibit showcases the work they created that was inspired by their experience. It’s available to view at the Bryn Du Mansion in Granville until November 26.
Artist residency brings renewed connection to Ohi:yo’
The works are the product of an artist residency called “Recovering Ohio’s Indigenous Voices,” hosted by the nonprofit Great Circle Alliance.
Great Circle Alliance, named after one of the UNESCO-designated earthworks sites in Ohio, organizes public programs, exhibitions and artist residencies with the aim of “bringing a more contemporary voice” to Ohio’s earthworks.
What: "Ohi:yo’: We’re Still Here" art exhibit
Where: Bryn Du Mansion, 537 Jones Road NE, Granville, OH 43023
When: Daily from 11 a.m. – 4 p.m., now until Nov. 26,
The exhibit is called "Ohi:yo’: We’re Still Here."
“It's in [reference] to our return to a space where we were removed from long ago. [Ohi:yo’] is a Seneca word, which means ‘the Great River.’ That's one of the tribes that were in this area,” explained artist Travis Mammedaty (Seneca-Cayuga Tribe), who was one of the three artists selected for the residency.
The U.S. and Ohio’s state government forcibly removed all American Indian tribes from the state by the early 19th century. Those tribes can be connected to 45 federally recognized tribal nations today.
Paintings, baskets and photographs
The artists visited sites like the Great Circle Earthworks, Octagon Earthworks, and Alligator Mound. They then had a year to complete their pieces.
After his trip, Mammedaty said he tossed around several ideas for what he wanted to paint.
“Do I want to do a mound type painting? Do I want to do something that's symmetrical?,” Mammedaty said.
He landed on three acrylic portraits that he titled “Ancestors of the Ancestors.”
“They created these [earthworks] and we don't know what they look like or anything like that. [But] these are how I interpreted them,” he said. “So I just gave a face to the people that created those mounds and structures.”
Dani Tippman (Miami Tribe of Oklahoma), another artist in the residency, uses elm bark to weave baskets. She said interest in the practice has been reinvigorated in her tribe.
“It is a tradition that's been handed down for generations. It fell asleep within our community and we had to regain it from help outside of our community,” Tippman said. “It carried food or utensils and now it carries hope for the future because it's something that connects us back to our ancient people.”
Looking at the earthworks, Tippman said they show the people that lived their day-to-day working or worshipping here, before being laid to rest here too.
“The baskets that I have here could very well have been made then too. So I think that that's a direct connection to the place and it's brought forward in time and culture,” she said.
Holli Margell (Eastern Shawnee Tribe of Oklahoma) uses photographs as her art medium. She described how the space resonated with her.
“When we visited the mounds, one of the things that I really felt – I felt a lot of big emotions that I had to take time to process. And I thought, well, ‘how do I share that story?’” Margell said.
Margell said she took self-portraits and incorporated themes of nature that were most powerfully tied to her ancestors.
To her, art feels like a powerful way to tell these stories.
“While they're self-portraits in this exhibition, I don't want people to see me. I want them to see representation of perhaps my ancestors and what they may have gone through in the past,” she said.
The free exhibit ‘Ohi:yo’: We’re Still Here’ is available to view at the Bryn Du Mansion in Granville until Nov. 26. The hope is that the exhibit can travel to other locations for viewing.
