Adjusting, Color Bars, Snow, 2018

seal, thread, Gorilla glue, VELCRO, gutted Toshiba TV

Traditional Yup’ik culture features in-depth, high-definition stories and rituals about seals. This bond, which once permeated family and social life, was disrupted by Westernization. Now we struggle to control the narrative of who we are within a Western society that is bent on misrepresenting us and not allowing space for our voices. The glow in the center of many Yup’ik homes today comes from the TV, where it once came from the light of a seal oil lamp, but the seal’s sacredness remains.