Why ‘the world needs more Jeffrey Gibson,’ according to the curator of the Venice Biennale’s US Pavilion
The artist’s kaleidoscopic sculptures and paintings are embedded with powerful messages about Indigenous, American and queer histories

Exterior view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. Forecourt sculpture: the space in which to place me (2024). Photograph by Timothy Schenck
As Jeffrey Gibson becomes the first Indigenous artist to represent the United States in a solo exhibition at the Venice Biennale, 2024 has proven to be a watershed moment for Native American art. However, as the US Pavilion’s commissioner and curator Abigail Winograd notes, this particular milestone is long overdue. ‘It’s not necessarily something we should be patting ourselves on the back for in 2024,’ she says.
Although for Winograd, the ‘language of “firsts”’ is ‘problematic’ in itself, Gibson’s boundary-pushing work, which reflects his Choctaw-Cherokee heritage and experiences living across Europe, Asia and America, is certainly worthy of accolades. ‘My hope is that we move beyond a place where particular groups of people or particular kinds of art are fashionable, and we can instead have an art historical conversation that is totally inclusive,’ says Winograd.

Louis Grachos, Jeffrey Gibson, Kathleen Ash-Milby, and Abigail Winograd. Photo by Cara Romero
Given that this year’s Venice Biennale theme is Foreigners Everywhere, Gibson’s unique perspective feels especially apt for conveying the nuances of identity and belonging. ‘I always feel like the world needs more Jeffrey Gibson,’ says Winograd. ‘His practice is driven by empathy and love. His art is totally conversant in history and the traumas of the past, but he works from a place of conviction about our need to work collaboratively and to imagine a radically inclusive future.’
Jeffrey Gibson: the space in which to place me, the artist’s Venice Biennale exhibition, opened this April and will remain on view through 24 November. Winograd and Gibson also tapped Kathleen Ash-Milby, Curator of Native American Art at the Portland Art Museum and a member of the Navajo Nation, and Louis Grachos, Phillips Executive Director of SITE Santa Fe, for the project.

Installation view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. Centre: WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT (2024) Photograph by Timothy Schenck
Now an independent curator, Winograd met the artist while curating the 2021-22 Chicago exhibition, Toward Common Cause: Art, Social Change, and the MacArthur Fellows at 40. (In 2019, Gibson was awarded the prestigious MacArthur ‘genius’ grant, a five-year grant to ‘individuals with exceptional creativity’). The multi-venue show, organized by the University of Chicago’s Smart Museum of Art, paved the way for Winograd and Gibson’s coedited monograph, Jeffrey Gibson: Beyond the Horizon (2022).
While Gibson has steadily become one of America’s most exciting contemporary artists, the 60th Venice Biennale represents his first solo exhibition in continental Europe. ‘When the press got hold of this notion of the “first Indigenous artist to represent the United States in a solo exhibition at the Biennale”, that conjures, perhaps, a certain expectation of what the art will look like — we wanted to challenge those expectations,’ says Winograd, noting that Gibson’s work has always been about squashing persisting stereotypes. At the same time, Gibson strives to affirm that Native American artists are American artists, and in the contemporary art world, should not be seen as distinct from one another. ‘Jeffrey’s career and this exhibition have been about making space for anybody who has felt like they’re on the outside of a normative identity and showing that their work is valuable and important and should be seen.’

Installation view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. From left to right: IF NOT NOW THEN WHEN (2024); The Enforcer (2024); WE WANT TO BE FREE (2024) Mural: WE ARE MADE BY HISTORY (2024) Photograph by Timothy Schenck
Indeed, from the minute visitors step inside the exhibition, kaleidoscopic colourful murals and sculptures set the tone for celebrating the individual experience. ‘We wanted it to feel like you’re on a journey. You’re greeted by these figures who are going to be your guides through this space of reflection,’ says Winograd in reference to two towering sculptures, seven and nine feet tall respectively, composed of ceramic, glass and plastic beads, nylon fringe, tin jingles and more. According to the curator, the exhibition ‘pushed’ Gibson and his studio to think about scale while also providing an overview of his expansive practice.
Particularly thrilling for Winograd was seeing how Gibson created ‘total environments that mimic what’s happening in his paintings and sculptures.’ She notes, ‘From the perspective of fashion, Jeffrey is dressing bodies, ancestral spirit figures, and punching bags — but he’s also dressing the whole building.’ Painted with technicolour geometries and flanked by equally chromatic flags, the US Pavilion has never packed such a punch.

Exterior view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. Forecourt sculpture: the space in which to place me (2024). Photograph by Timothy Schenck
‘I love how the flags designate the pavilion as this empathetic, cathartic space that Jeffrey is trying to create,’ says Winograd. The flags feature uplifting texts, such as ‘PRAY REJOICE DANCE SING’ and ‘POWERFUL BECAUSE WE’RE DIFFERENT’. ‘For years I’ve been so excited thinking about how people will react when they turn that corner [in the Giardini] and see the building. It did not disappoint.’
I love when people are inspired to have a dance party in the building.Abigail Winograd
Gibson’s maximalist transformation of the columned building was better than anything Winograd could imagine. ‘It all feels really classical to me in a way I hadn’t expected’, says the curator, noting Gibson’s distinctive take on classical busts. which trade marble for luscious locks of multicoloured beads and ribbons. ‘Jeffrey is riffing on the visual language of classicism because we’re in Venice, and we’re thinking about the history of the Biennale, his relationship to the place, and what it means to be an artist in a global art historical context.’

Installation view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. THE GREAT SPIRIT IS IN ALL THINGS (2024); ACTION NOW ACTION IS ELOQUENCE (2024); THE OBLIGATION OF HONOR OF A POWERFUL NATION (2024); WE WILL BE KNOWN FOREVER BY THE TRACKS WE LEAVE (2024). Busts from left to right: Be Some Body (2024); I’M A NATURAL MAN (2024). Photograph by Timothy Schenck
Throughout the interior are paintings and works on paper framed by brilliant beaded borders and emblazoned with poignant messages, such as ‘THE RETURNED MALE STUDENT FAR TOO FREQUENTLY GOES BACK TO THE RESERVATION AND FALLS INTO THE OLD CUSTOM OF LETTING HIS HAIR GROW LONG.’ The text comments on the centuries of forced acculturation Native people have had to endure. Other texts in the exhibition link America’s past — ‘WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT’ — to the universal present — ‘ACTION NOW ACTION IS ELOQUENCE’ — stressing the urgency to unite today’s conflict-ridden world.

Installation view of the space in which to place me (Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition for the United States Pavilion, 60th International Art Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia), 20 April – 24 November 2024. From left to right: She Never Dances Alone (2020); WHEREAS IT IS ESSENTIAL TO JUST GOVERNMENT WE RECOGNIZE THE EQUALITY OF ALL PEOPLE BEFORE THE LAW (2024). Photograph by Timothy Schenck
The exhibition reaches a crescendo in the final gallery with a nine-channel video installation depicting Sarah Ortegon, an acclaimed jingle-dress dancer and member of the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho tribes.
On 18 April at the US Pavilion’s inauguration, Ortegon led a live performance of more than 22 jingle dress, fancy dress, and traditional dancers, and three singers and hand drummers. Originating with the Ojibwe tribe, the jingle dance is traditionally performed at powwows by women to bring healing and protection to their community.

Members of the Oklahoma Fancy Dancers and Colorado Inter-Tribal Dancers activating the forecourt of the US Pavilion for Jeffrey Gibson’s exhibition the space in which to place me. Biennale Art 2024. Photograph by Federica Carlet
Made in 2020, the exhibition video plays with abstraction as Ortegon’s image multiplies, and the details of her handmade dresses create mesmerising optical effects. The soundtrack ‘Sisters’ (2013) by The Halluci Nation featuring Northern Voice, blasts through the gallery. ‘I love when people are inspired to have a dance party in the building’, says Winograd, hoping visitors to the US Pavilion leave with a ‘sense of joy and possibility.’ She continues, ‘The title of the film is She Never Dances Alone, and we want people to feel they’re also not alone. You don’t always get that experience in a contemporary art exhibition, but we desperately need a sense of commonality right now, a sense that we can all be part of a more hopeful future.’
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