INVITATION TO BEING A FUTURE BEING

Emily Johnson / Catalyst, Raven Chacon, Drew Michael, Holly Mititquq Nordlum

September 17 through October 3, 2021

Portland Institute for Contemporary Art
Lands of the Multnomah, Oregon City Tumwater, Watlala, Wasco, Kathlamet, Cowlitz, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin Kalapuya, Molalla

Celebrated for a distinguished body of dance works, Emily Johnson unites audiences in a shared experience of movement, place, history, collective action, and the continuance of Indigenous cultural practices and perspectives. As part of a creative residency at PICA, Johnson gathers an extraordinary group of collaborating artists to create an in-process activation and installation as part of her newest work in development, Being Future Being.

Johnson, along with composer Raven Chacon, visual and tattoo artist Holly Mititquq Nordlum, and artist and mask maker Drew Michael, delves into the power of creation to build a visual, aural, and ancestral landscape of Indigenous power. By (re)building new visions of the forces that brought this world into being, Being Future Being brings forth new futures with the potential to reshape the way we relate to ourselves, and to the human and more-than-human cohabitants of our world.

Performance

Exhibition

All photos by Tojo Andrianarivo, courtesy of Portland Institute for Contemporary Art

Office, Minneapolis, MN, US612.597.7400emily@catalystdance.com

Emily Johnson / Catalyst is based on Mannahatta in Lenapehoking. We work to pay respect to Lenape homeland, people and ancestors past, present, and future by organizing with communities from the Lenape diaspora to build pathways for Lenapeyok return. We have been taught to name Lenape Nations and say cama’i to our relatives from Delaware Tribe of Indians in Bartlesville, OK; Delaware Nation of Oklahoma in Anadarko, OK; Stockbridge-Munsee and Mohican Community in Wisconsin; Moravian Delaware of the Thames in Ontario, Canada; Munsee-Delaware Nation at Munceytown in Ontario, Canada; Delaware of Six Nations in Ontario, Canada. 

We strive to be in good relations with our kin—human and more than human—and in effort to support growing kinstillatory relations and sovereign, liberated futures we are anti-colonial and abolitionist in all capacities. We are committed to on-the-ground water and land protection, consistent decolonization work, and Land Back. 

Quyanaqvaa-lli elpeni to all Sovereign Nations, Indigenous and First Nations people who live in relation to and from Lenapehoking and upon whose lands we work and tour.

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