Frieze Los Angeles 2023

Donald Ellis Gallery is pleased to present Fast Ponies: Past and Present at Frieze Los Angeles 2023, held at Santa Monica Airport between February 18-19, with invitation-only previews on February 16 and 17, 2023. 

The exhibition is the second iteration of Fast Ponies: Past and Present, showcasing a new body of work by critically acclaimed Lakota artist and filmmaker Dana Claxton in dialogue with early 20th century Plains pictographic drawings. The presentation continues Ms. Claxton's engagement with historical Ledger Art introduced with the online exhibition Fast Ponies and War Bonnets: A Lakota Look at Ledger Art.

By staging the human figure in an open space evocative of the vastness of the Great Plains, both historical Plains drawings and Claxton’s photographs foreground the dress and personal belongings of their respective protagonists. Both visualise predominantly male cultures, bringing together references to Plains warrior societies, applied cultural and spiritual aesthetics and in Claxton’s case hip hop, lowriding and cowboy culture. Yet unlike Ledger Art, which was predominantly created by male warrior artists in response to events deemed important by the community, Claxton composes her images with a heightened sense of formality. Past, present and future fold into one another, speaking of the encounters, exchanges and violent conflicts that continue to shape North American Indigenous experiences to the present day.