Chilling Time Travel And Indigenous Futurism
History comes to life and even traverses through the future in Virgil Ortiz’s (he/him) exhibition at History Colorado. On view now, “Virgil Ortiz Revolt 1680/2180: Runners + Gliders” is an engaging exhibition that tells the story of the 1680 Pueblo Revolt, an uprising against colonialist power, through the transformed lens of Indigenous futurism. Artifacts, specifically pottery, including centuries-old Cochiti sculptures and Ancestral Puebloan pottery that dates back a millennium, are displayed alongside traditionally crafted ceramics that Ortiz made in 2023.
Virgil Ortiz is an innovative and traditionally trained potter hailing from Cochiti Pueblo. He expands beyond clay into fashion, photography, and cultural storytelling to create thought-provoking artwork and exhibitions. Ortiz’s artwork has been shown around the world including the Stedelijk Museum- Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands; Paris’s Foundation Cartier pour I’art Contemporain; the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of the American Indian; the Virginia Museum of Fine Art; and the Denver Art Museum and now at the History Colorado Center.
For his exhibition at History Colorado, Ortiz combines media including artifacts, ceramics he’s made, projection mapping, photographic prints, and augmented reality to convey a narrative of indigenous resilience. Nuanced and poignant, Ortiz’s ceramics are in conversation with his creative ancestors. Many juxtapositions between past, present, future–both real and unreal–are inherent in the world building throughout the exhibition and tell a story of possibility, strength, and resilience of indigenous peoples. Ortiz reminds us that “It’s important to recognize that Pueblo communities are very much alive and have a level of vitality that speaks to generations of strength, persistence, brilliance, and thriving energy.”
There are factual aspects of this exhibition that are informed by historical accounts and interlaced with elements of fantasy. One story told through the exhibition based on historical accounts is the story of Omtua and Catua. “Serving as messengers during the 1680 rebellion, Omtua and Catua delivered knotted cords made of deer hide which served as coded messages to the Pueblos of what is now New Mexico. The leaders of each Pueblo were instructed to untie one knot on the cord every morning, and when the final knot was undone, the Pueblos were to revolt simultaneously.”
Each portion of the exhibition is carefully considered to excite all of our senses while still leaving room for spacious contemplation. A combination of different mediums pull and push the audience’s sense of reality. Handmade items made of materials from the earth, like the clay of a coiled pot, ground viewers, while other elements are as vaguely tangible as the projected light that displays them. The combined result is something of a fantasy world told through the lens of magical realism.
These stories and fantasies have something very real to tell us, to remind us, something in our bones and our hearts, something ancestral and intergenerational. The stories in the exhibition may say similar things to me and you or we may have very different takeaways. Instead of conveying my heartfelt response to the exhibit, I instead invite you to go to History Colorado and enter into this fantasy world with curiosity and wonder asking, “What could this teach me about myself and about the world around me?” The answer may come as a feeling, words, or a loud roar. No matter the takeaway, I feel the experience of the audience is one that is pungent and enchanting like the deep, rich, blood reds that pierce surfaces of the exhibition space.
Finally, while this exhibition can be discussed in conversations and articles such as this, I invite you to keep in mind that words peril in comparison to somatic responses available to the viewer within the exhibition space. When you go, consider slowing down the speed of your steps as you listen to your heartbeat, and notice not only what you see, but what you can intuit, feel, hear, and how your body responds to the stories in the space. I would posit that the true work of this exhibition is to provide us with space to uproot what is and reimagine what could be.
Photos courtesy of the History Colorado
