abstracted landscape, viewed from above; purple, rose, and blue sky with rolling landscape with an orange river cutting diagonally across picture plane; numerous figures and animals in vignettes; campground with tents, teepees, and vehicles including a bus with a row of Porta-Potties and a line of figures on horseback in upper left; central section with farm equipment, Jeeps, police car, figures with flame throwers and figures wearing Ku Klux Klan outfits behind barbed wire, confronting people on opposite shore of river holding signs--one of whom has their pants dropped; foreground figures in LLQ include a man in a purple shirt printed "I'M TOAST" in a well, a Black man wearing a tie and holding a saxophone seated on a toilet, a man in a white shirt, a man wearing a feathered Native American headdress and a woman in a blue shirt and yellow vest with arms upraised; blindfolded woman with one bare breast, holding a blue bra and a scale balancing a dollar sign and a glass being grabbed from behind by a blonde man in a suit, with a row of men in suits behind them, smoking and drinking, with three hyenas; helicopters, plane, and a man holding two drones in the sky; received unframed

Standing Rock 2016, 2018

Jim Denomieexpand_more

Oil on canvasexpand_more

The Minnesota Artist Fund, the Michael Bennes Endowment for Art Acquisition, the Karl Thomas Opem Acquisition Fund, the Shared Fund, and the Driscoll Art Accessions Endowment Fundexpand_more  2022.17

Not on Viewexpand_more

Standing Rock 2016 comes from a series of works (2018-19) that respond to the North Dakota Access Pipeline protests at the Standing Rock Reservation (2016-2017). The painting also encapsulates the heightened anxiety, volatility, and absurdity of the American zeitgeist prior to the COVID pandemic.

Composed of small vignettes, the painting is not a document of historical events so much as it is a raw, cumulative response to what transpired at Standing Rock. Denomie pulls not punches. In the center of the canvas a group of Water Protectors hold signs as one moons law enforcement. In response, the officers open fire and spray a water canon. Two officers share a congratulatory high-five. The scene juxtaposes stark contrasts, laid bare for all to see.

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Details
Title
Standing Rock 2016
Artist Life
American (Ojibwe), 1955 - 2022
Role
artist
Accession Number
2022.17
Curator Approved

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abstracted landscape, viewed from above; purple, rose, and blue sky with rolling landscape with an orange river cutting diagonally across picture plane; numerous figures and animals in vignettes; campground with tents, teepees, and vehicles including a bus with a row of Porta-Potties and a line of figures on horseback in upper left; central section with farm equipment, Jeeps, police car, figures with flame throwers and figures wearing Ku Klux Klan outfits behind barbed wire, confronting people on opposite shore of river holding signs--one of whom has their pants dropped; foreground figures in LLQ include a man in a purple shirt printed "I'M TOAST" in a well, a Black man wearing a tie and holding a saxophone seated on a toilet, a man in a white shirt, a man wearing a feathered Native American headdress and a woman in a blue shirt and yellow vest with arms upraised; blindfolded woman with one bare breast, holding a blue bra and a scale balancing a dollar sign and a glass being grabbed from behind by a blonde man in a suit, with a row of men in suits behind them, smoking and drinking, with three hyenas; helicopters, plane, and a man holding two drones in the sky; received unframed
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