Grantee: Da-ka-xeen Mehner
Native Citizenship: Tlingit/N’ishga
Location: Fairbanks, Alaska
Award: 2014 NACF Artist Fellowship
Discipline: Visual Arts
Web Site: http://da-ka-xeen.com/
Embedded in photography and self-portraiture, the work of multimedia Installation Artist Da-ka-xeen Mehner includes sculptural elements, sound and video projections.
Often including himself as a subject in the works, Mehner invites the viewer to join him in reinterpreting definitions of identity and ethnicity placed upon Native people. Upon witnessing how his young son instinctively took to the drum at Tlingit celebrations, he is currently working on a body of work related to language, song and how culture passes non-verbally from one generation to the next.
The University of Alaska, Fairbanks, Professor is the recipient of a Rasmuson Artist Fellowship and a number of regional awards. With the support of a 2014 NACF Artist Fellowship, this promising Alaska Native artist will be able to bring his work to national arenas, including preparing for a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Native Arts in Santa Fe.
