Bozeman Show Reframes Edmonia Lewis Through Contemporary Art
Tinworks Art in Bozeman is presenting Chisel & Razor: The Artistic Legacies of Edmonia and Samuel Lewis through April 2027, a two-part project focused on Edmonia Lewis and her brother Samuel. The second chapter opens on October 11 and is part of a citywide tribute to the Black and Indigenous sculptor.
Rather than display Lewis’s original works at Tinworks Art, the exhibition brings together contemporary artists to trace what her life and practice still set in motion. The result is less a retrospective than a conversation across time, built through materials, references, and artistic method.
The first installment centered on Samuel Lewis, a Bozeman businessman and performer; the second turns to Edmonia. It includes Sanford Biggers, Andrea Carlson, Kelly Church, Athena LaTocha, and a new commission by Auriea Harvey, alongside artists featured in Act I such as Edgar Arcenaux, Terry Adkins, Sonya Clark, Maud Sulter, Gisela Torres, and Nate Young.
Harvey’s Edmonia Triumphalis imagines a speculative visit in which Edmonia travels to Bozeman to see Samuel. She combines sculptural and research-based approaches in an arch made from local earth and a fountain shaped by classical flourishes associated with Lewis, linking Rome and Montana while pointing to the enduring relevance of her work.
For artists and viewers interested in drawing, sculpture, and visual research, the show is compelling because it asks how an absent body can still structure an exhibition. It also highlights how contemporary artists can use form, surface, and place to recover a legacy without flattening its complexity.
Source : Hyperallergic