August 2023 – January 2024
Duhesa Gallery, Lory Student Center
Going through the motions is a phrase used to describe the simulation of an action. Motion is at the foundation of my work. I focus on Ho Chunk culture and history; dealing with issues of land and relocation along with the representation of our pervasive American identity. I create work that expresses the contemporary Ho Chunk experience and our relationship to place. This collection ranges from collage and mixed media on ledger paper to stretched GI wool over antique windows. These works share the history of places in our past and depict the pride and culture of the Ho Chunk people today. They contribute to one another through sharing of visual language to build the narrative of our survivance.
Throughout our history we have been reluctant to find ourselves removed from our homeland and relocated to another territory. Our historic relocation is intertwined with this country’s journey to find itself and the colonization of its Indigenous people is at the root of this struggle. As a result, the Ho Chunk people have had to make decisions based on the thought of their children and those decisions are what made us who we are today. The adaptation and transculturation of our ancestors will continue to keep inspiring and giving strength to future generations. I am thankful and proud to be able to capture the present while referencing the past to continue to make a voice for our future.
About Henry Payer:
Henry Payer is a Ho-Chunk artist who works primarily with collage and mixed media. Born in Sioux City, IA, in 1986, Payer received a BFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, NM, in 2008. He was invited to study at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and obtained an MFA in 2013. Henry has exhibited his work at locations such as the Great Plains Art Museum in Lincoln, NE; All My Relations Gallery in Minneapolis, MN; Sherry Leedy Contemporary Art in Kansas City, MO; and Overture Galleries located in Madison, WI. In Venice, Italy, Payer has also exhibited at the University of Venice Ca’ Voscari, Palazzo Cosulich. Payer has spent time as an instructor at the Oscar Howe Summer Art Institute located at the University of South Dakota in Vermillion. He currently lives in Sioux City, IA.
Payer’s narrative compositions are bold and contemporary. His works utilize Indigenous cartographic methods with traditional aspects of spatial representation and symbolism while appropriating European modernist models of cubism, spatial distortion, and collage. Each work offers a visual narrative of symbols and appropriated voices from American consumer society that reconfigures historical references to the altered landscape or the identity of a portrait. Payer questions our presumptions and challenges the dialogue of what is expected of Indigenous artists. Henry represents the work of artists seeking to expand the range and voice of their visual expression and cultural representation while attending to concepts and forms of tradition.
