Seneca artist Pete Jemison will be featured in the opening exhibition at Buffalo’s new commercial art gallery, K Art, owned by Seneca entrepreneur and art collector Dave Kimelberg
By L. David Wheeler (dwheeler@messengerpostmedia.com) | Canandaigua Daily Messenger | Reprinted from https://www.mpnnow.com | November 25, 2020
Photo above: G. Peter Jemison, who has some of his older pieces around him, said he has been making art for decades. Tina Macintyre-Yee/Rochester Democrat & Chronicle
The exhibit opens Dec. 11 at K Art in Buffalo, a new gallery devoted to contemporary Native American artwork.
VICTOR — In his work as historic site manager of Ganondagan State Historic Site — along with his writing, filmmaking and visual artwork — G. Peter Jemison presents Native culture as living, breathing and diverse, neither monolithic nor a thing of the past, preserved in amber.
Which is why it was exciting for Jemison to learn of a new, Native-run commercial gallery in Buffalo devoted to contemporary art by Native American creators — among the first if not the first in the eastern United States, he and organizers believe. And why he was particularly thrilled to be a part of K Art’s first exhibition, set to open Dec. 11 at 808 Main St. in Buffalo.
“I think it’s great because that really has not existed here in the east — this is something I’m more used to in places like Santa Fe, places like that,” said Jemison, of the Heron Clan, Seneca Nation of Indians. “It’s great to have a gallery that will have work that will be for sale, and the commitment they’re making to reach out.”
Indeed, Jemison was one of the first artists that owner Dave Kimelberg and art director Brooke Leboeuf reached out to, and proved a valuable resource in putting them in touch with other artists he has known in his decades of artistry and advocacy.
Crystalline is gouache on paper and made in 2008 by G. Peter Jemison, Heron Clan Seneca Nation of Indians. This will be one of his pieces included in a show that opens Dec. 11 at K Art Gallery in Buffalo. 
Sentinels (Large Yellow Version) is an acrylic and oil on canvas with collage created by G. Peter Jemison. This is another of his pieces that will be shown at the exhibit that opens Dec. 11th
Jemison will have a number of pieces in the inaugural exhibition, including “Crystalline,” a gouache on handmade paper depicting an early-winter view of a brook running through Ganondagan — “ice had frozen along the edge of the brook, and the water was still flowing freely in the brook” — and “Sentinels,” an acrylic and oil painting on canvas with collage depicting “three dried sunflower plants were left behind at the end of the season, a big stalk with a head at the top.”
Jemison is among 10 artists included in “More Than a Trace: Native American and First Nations Contemporary Art,” which will run from Dec. 11 through March 12. The 10 artists all are citizens of Native nations or tribes, were born to Native parents or identify as hybrid descendants. They represent a diverse group of peoples and geographical regions, as well as media, theme and subject matter.
Kimelberg has spoken about wanting to broaden people’s views of Native American artwork beyond traditional craftwork, Plains art and works speaking to the peoples’ past — whereas plenty of artists are engaging with the present and the future. That’s a goal that resonates with Jemison.
“It is important for people to realize that we are a culture that is still progressing and our art is still developing,” Jemison said. “They have to evolve, they have to be a part of the time period they are living in. … The cultures of the various nations are very much alive; it’s not static.” And while contemporary work may reference traditional tropes, it continues to reveal “something new,” Jemison said — “and that’s very important.”
Joining Jemison from the Six Nations of the Haudenosaunee are textile artist Marie Watt of the Senecas’ Turtle Clan and mixed-media artist Jay Carrier of the Onondaga/Tuscarora Wolf Clan. Also included are Duane Slick (Meskwaki/Ho-Chunk), Brad Kahlhamer, Luzene Hill (Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians), Gina Adams, Meryl McMaster (Canadian and Plains Cree), Jeffrey Gibson (Mississippi Choctaw/Cherokee) and Lewis deSoto (Cahuilla, in southern California).
“I wanted to really choose artists and find artists who were from a variety of geographical locations ” — from British Columbia to the Northeast, LeBoeuf said. “Really all facets of Native American heritage — I was also looking for a variety of artists representing different kinds of political thought.”
LeBoeuf — a graduate of Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva and the University of Buffalo, former project coordinator at Albright-Knox Gallery and former visual arts curator for Buffalo Arts Studio — was already familiar with Jemison, having written a paper on a work of his. She enjoyed having a reason to visit him at his Victor studio, as she and Kimelberg launched their research through word of mouth, internet and gallery contacts.
“It was kind of a full-circle moment in my career, getting to meet the artist who had been so inspirational to me in graduate school,” LeBoeuf said.
Kimelberg, a member of the Senecas’ Bear Clan, envisioned the gallery because he saw a lack of representation of that kind of growing, evolving Native artwork in gallery settings.
“I really saw a void. There wasn’t much representation of contemporary Native American art,” Kimelberg said, adding that such artwork “kind of exists on the periphery of some contemporary galleries.”
It was time for it to take center stage.
“There’s a lot of terrific Native contemporary art … and a lot of people aren’t aware of them,” Kimelberg said. “It’s my hope that this gallery will raise the profile of this type of art. … Our goal was to find really cutting-edge, acclaimed Native artists from all over the country and Canada so we could have representation of a bunch of perspectives.” There are more than 570 federally recognized Indian tribes and nations, he noted.
The former founding CEO of Seneca Holdings LLC, the economic development arm of the Seneca Nation of Indians, as well as former general counsel for SoftBank Capital and SoftBank Holdings, Kimelberg had been thinking about the gallery venture for a few years. He got the process underway around a year and a half ago, building the gallery within his K Haus development, a brownstone that houses design, art and tech start-ups in Buffalo’s Allentown district.
Which meant that the bulk of the preparations have been made against a coronavirus backdrop. The pandemic caused some work stoppages, Kimelberg allowed, but it remains on schedule for the December opening.
That opening won’t be the full, public event Kimelberg and partners would like, due to the need for social distancing and restricting gatherings. Erie County has been among the recent COVID-19 hot spots, with Gov. Andrew Cuomo suggesting parts of the county conceivably could move to the Red Zone designation — a more restrictive category than the Orange Zone designation Buffalo currently has — depending on the infection rate. In a Red Zone, gatherings are prohibited outright rather than restricted to 10 people as in an Orange Zone.
An online event is planned for Dec. 11, though, for the public to take part in the opening. The event, starting at 6:30 p.m., will include a virtual gallery tour, a viewing of the artwork on exhibit, and talks with the artists and gallery staff.
To attend the opening, go to www.thek.art/home and subscribe to the gallery newsletter, and K Art will send log-in details by Dec. 10. Afterward, the gallery will be open by appointment for in-person visits.
