"Definitions of the Exotic"
A solo exhibition by artist, Erica Lord

Art Talk: Friday, June 1, 12-1pm
National Museum of the American Indian, Smithsonian Institution

Reception:	Friday, June 1, 6-8pm
American Indian Community House Gallery

Gallery Talk: Saturday, June 2, 2-3pm
American Indian Community House Gallery

Definitions of the Exotic is a digital media exhibition of photography
and
video, by artist, Erica Lord (Athabaskan / Inupiaq).  In this
exhibition,
Lord reclaims stereotypes of gender and cultural identity.  She uses
herself
as the subject to be visually altered and changed.  The show will
include
images from the Tanning Series, in which she photographed parts of her
body
with text that was imprinted onto her skin by using a tanning bed.  The
letters that were placed on her skin to block the uv-rays in order to
leave
text, read, “I Tan To Look More Native,”  “Indian Looking,”
“Colonize Me,”
and “Half Breed.”

Media bombards the mainstream culture with misleading information that,
without critical thought, gives people false ideas about culture.
Exotic by
definition means, “belonging by nature or origin to another part of the
world; foreign; strangely different and fascinating.”  The definition
of
exotic has been implemented to the American Indian in media, such as
Hollywood film.  In, Definitions of the Exotic, Lord applies these
definitions to her body to take on the role of the exotic and re-define
herself.

- Sarah Sense (Chitimacha / Choctaw), Curator

www.aich.org