Jordan Poorman Cocker
IN 2023, Jordan Poorman Cocker (Kiowa Tribe and Kingdom of Tonga) was appointed the first full-time curator of Indigenous Art at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas. Her exhibition “American Sunrise: Indigenous Art at Crystal Bridges,” a survey of over thirty artists spanning 150 years, is on view through March 23. While many art museums inscribe Indigenous nations within colonial frameworks (with their histories beginning and ending with colonization), Poorman Cocker’s curatorial work emphasizes their contemporaneity and continuity. She is also a traditional Kiowa beadwork and textile artist, operating her own atelier, MÀYÍ, since 2018.
HOW WOULD YOU DEFINE CURATING?
Curating is a means of facilitating a meaningful dialogue between art and the world. As an Indigenous person, I often begin the process of curation with a place-based lens: What do “we” know about the site of the exhibition? On whose ancestral and treaty territories is the gallery founded? What relationships has the institution or organization cultivated in recognition? How can an exhibition strengthen not only the broader public’s understanding of Indigenous art and artists but its own understanding of a place? Which Indigenous artists, scholars, cultural knowledge keepers, and curators should lead these discussions? Curating for me is a well-cultivated practice of locating truth via Indigenous ways of knowing and doing.
WHAT WAS THE LAST SHOW YOU TRAVELED TO SEE?
This past summer, my husband, Christopher Côté, and I flew to Venice, where I saw Jeffrey Gibson’s “the space in which to place me,” the site-responsive exhibition curated by Kathleen Ash-Milby and Abigail Winograd at the Venice Biennale’s US pavilion. I found the presentation profoundly impactful and refreshingly hope-ful, especially its educational aspects. Color-saturated murals covered the walls; joyful, monumental artworks filled the pavilion’s corners. The experience transported viewers across time, reteaching American histories and reminding us of our place and perhaps our responsibilities in the present.
WHAT UPCOMING EXHIBITION (BESIDES YOURS) ARE YOU MOST EXCITED ABOUT?
I’ve been watching Kent Monkman’s boldly unapologetic interventions into Western art history and American art for many years. I am looking forward to seeing his forthcoming “History Is Painted by the Victors” at the Denver Art Museum, curated by Léuli Eshrāghi (Seumanutafa and Tautua Sāmoan) and John P. Lukavic.
WHAT IS ONE SHOW THAT HAD A BIG INFLUENCE ON YOU?
For “Hearts of Our People: Native Women Artists” at the Minneapolis Institute of Art in 2019, curators Jill Ahlberg Yohe and Teri Greeves intentionally departed from a typically Western curatorial approach that centers on a single narrative with an institutional or expert tone and adopted the progressive, de-hierarchical curatorial models successfully undertaken in countries such as Canada, Aotearoa New Zealand, and Australia. In preparing the show, Greeves and Yohe developed a collaborative process, forming an advisory board consisting of a team of twenty-one primarily Indigenous art historians, curators, and artists to provide multiple perspectives on every stage of the show’s development. Beautiful to see in person, “Hearts of Our People”changed the field for the better.
WHAT IS THE BEST PIECE OF CRITICISM YOU’VE READ RECENTLY?
Aruna D’Souza’s review of Archie Moore’s kith and kin, 2024, in the Australian pavilion at the last Venice Biennale, has stuck with me. D’Souza is a brilliant critic; her review deftly illuminates the broader historical context of colonialism that made Moore’s presentation—an unveiling of genocidal systems of suppressing Indigenous knowledge—so powerful.
IS THERE A PARTICULAR IDEA THAT IS INSPIRING YOUR WORK NOW?
As a beadwork artist, I am focused on the intergenerational transmission of artistic knowledge. I am especially drawn to craft-based art forms that are passed down matrilineally. My own lived experience and artistic practice—not to mention my memories of making with family members—remains an evergreen source of inspiration. Events around the world, including war, lead me to ask: Who is carrying the textiles, and the knowledge of how to make them? My family survived “the end,” an apocalypse in the form of American settler colonialism. My great-great-grandmother Atah held on to Kiowa beadwork during the reservation period. Generations later, I still treasure the art form.
WHAT DO YOU THINK IS THE MOST IMPORTANT CONVERSATION HAPPENING NOW WITHIN THE CURATORIAL FIELD OR IN THE ARTS MORE BROADLY?
Institutions must continue to meaningfully invest in and promote the work of Indigenous artists and art workers, allowing us to tell our own stories in our own words. This past January, I opened an exhibition (organized with Janet Dees and Kathleen Berzock) at the Block Museum of Art that centers the perspectives of four artists with connections to Zhegagoynak, or Chicagoland, tracing a confluence of forces that shape Indigenous creative practices in the region and beyond. It’s exciting to see Indigenous-led exhibitions and projects receive support from folks who understand the critical importance of doing this work—and who allow us to lead.
WHAT DO YOU WISH PEOPLE BETTER UNDERSTOOD ABOUT CURATING?
It takes a great deal of time, resources, and teamwork to realize an exhibition. Curating is a truly collaborative journey, involving the support, expertise, and time of others.
WHAT PIECE OF ADVICE WOULD YOU GIVE TO AN ASPIRING CURATOR?
Much of what we know and do, and how we do it, depends on our training and education. Choose your mentors and projects with discernment, and bring fellow artists and community members forward with you. At some point, please also take an art class from an artist directly: This sensory way of learning will transform the way you appreciate and understand art.
WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING A CURATOR CAN DO FOR AN ARTIST?
Listening is a dying art: Moments for real exchange feel fewer and farther between. When working with an artist, I try to hold space for deep listening and connection. I don’t always succeed—but I try. Relationality is important in all spheres, including the curatorial.
