Jeffrey Gibson: Because Once You Enter My House, It Becomes Our House

Production | Exhibition Grant

A monumental artwork, gathering space, and platform for performance, Jeffrey Gibson’s Because Once You Enter My House, It Becomes Our House serves as an homage to ingenuity of Indigenous North American peoples and cultures, to pre-Columbian Mississippian architecture, and to queer camp aesthetics. Gibson designed the multi-tiered structure to reference the earthen architecture of the ancient metropolis of Cahokia, the largest city of the North American Indigenous Mississippian people at its height in the thirteenth century.  In Gibson’s multi-tiered monument, the earth mound of the pre-Columbian ziggurat is represented by a plywood structure adorned with a vibrant surface of wheat-pasted posters integrating geometric designs inspired by the Serpent Mound located in Ohio, another monument of the Mississippi Valley, alongside texts that operate as activist slogans. Gibson has developed a series of academic and historical talks as well as Indigenous-led performances to activate the structure over the course of the installation. These collaborations with self-identifying Indigenous artists, LGBTQI, and people of color coincide with significant holidays such as the Summer Solstice, the Gueleguetza Festival, and Indigenous People’s Day.