Look and Listen

Over the course of the next 11 days, New York City will undergo a change of scenery, as Climate Week NYC (September 22-29) and the Creative Time Summit 2024 (September 20-22) unfold throughout town. Even now, passersby walking underneath the High Line on 506 West 27th Street will notice a massive billboard patterned in a shimmering gradient of blue and purple. Two phrases in white font adorn the image; one situated at the top reads “the sky,” while another, in the center: “cry with me.”

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This is the first in a series of public installations by Jeffrey Gibson, occurring from September 16 to 29. During this period, the multidisciplinary artist will trigger a sequence of moving and still-image digital artworks taken from his animated video The Spirits Are Laughing, 2024. The works are straightforward: multicolored images with geometric patterns are paired with short, poetic phrases that express the indigenous philosophy of a spiritualized and anthropomorphic land. 

Scenes from Gibson’s The Spirits Are Laughing, 2024 will be scattered across public spaces in New York City, landing in Columbus Circle, the Brooklyn Bridge, and the Grand Army Plaza, with activation sites changing by the day. At the annual Creative Time Summit, portions of the 11-minute long animation will be projected upon the facade of the Brooklyn Academy of Music, as activists, leaders, and creators gather from across the world to collaborate in response to the summit’s 2024 theme: States of Emergence: Land After Property and Catastrophe. Other installations in the series will emerge this weekend and throughout the coming week: at a climate justice panel with Pioneer Works, on a billboard outside Citi Field in Queens, and at different locations in Dumbo at dusk. 

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This is not the first time the artist has lent his voice to urgent conversations around environmental and social justice that center Native American tradition and its connection to the land. This year, Gibson became the first Indigenous artist to represent the U.S. with a solo exhibition at the 60th Venice Biennale. In “Jeffrey Gibson: the space in which to place me,”––on view until November 24, 2024––the United States Pavilion is painted red and adorned with multi-colored murals and flags, while a red geometric structure destabilizes the historic building’s exterior. Inside sculptures of animals made from traditional beadwork, bags, and tapestries sit alongside murals that display texts of U.S. legislation and government speeches. 

This month, Gibson’s installations direct his momentous articulation of Indigenous knowledge toward the topic of climate––not just in New York City, but across the country. The activations will extend beyond Climate Week’s epicenter, to digital kiosks in Houston, Detroit, Columbus, Cleveland, Miami, and other cities across the U.S. As Climate Week draws eyes home and abroad to the environmental issues that affect the global community, Gibson reminds us of the importance of communing with the natural world. Displayed upon the utilitarian surfaces of metropolitan life, it is his hope that city goers will pause, and listen to the land’s many voices. 

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Installations from The Spirits Are Laughing, 2024, are on view now at 506 West 27th Street in New York City, and will continue to occur at various locations in New York City boroughs and in select cities across the U.S. until September 29.