The MIT List Visual Arts Center presents “List Projects 31: Kite,” a solo exhibition that promises to redefine the boundaries of new media art. This showcase of Oglála Lakȟóta artist Kite’s work invites viewers into a mesmerizing world where machine learning, artificial intelligence, and dream interpretation converge to express Indigenous ontology and epistemology.
For over a decade, Kite has been at the forefront of digital interface exploration in music and live performance. Her innovative approach, which she terms “Indigenous protocols for AI,” has resulted in a body of work that is as intellectually stimulating as it is visually captivating. The exhibition, curated by Selby Nimrod and Zach Ngin, celebrates Kite’s remarkable ability to transcend artistic, musical, and academic disciplines through her embrace of elasticity and invention.
At the heart of Kite’s recent work is a fascinating exploration of dreams as both an ancestral technology and a material for artmaking. Visitors to the exhibition will encounter a variety of media, from stone sculptures and embroidered deer hides to performances and interactive web projects. In each piece, Kite translates dreams into a Lakȟóta visual language, creating a semiotic vocabulary that serves as the foundation for abstract musical scores. This unique approach brings together the realms of the spiritual and the technological, offering a fresh perspective on how we can interpret and interact with the world around us.
The centerpiece of the exhibition is “Wičháȟpi Wóihaŋbleya (Dreamlike Star),” an immersive installation that transforms the Bakalar Gallery into a hallucinatory environment of doubles and reflections. This multifaceted work features a constellation of stones on a reflective floor, representing a score composed from Lakȟóta visual language translations of the artist’s dreams. Behind this, a large-scale projection displays a vast network of stars scattered across a purple night sky. The recurrence of imagery and objects in the projected video, its reflection in the mirrored floor, and the sculpture itself evokes a vast and interconnected universe where earth and sky are entangled in what Kite describes as an “ancient and future dance.”
Kite’s work stands out for its unique approach to advanced technology. Rather than using it as a tool for critique, she challenges creative and scientific fields to engineer machines that reinforce a respectful exchange between humans and the earth. This perspective is deeply rooted in the Lakȟóta philosophy of the Good Way, which emphasizes decision-making processes that consider the impact on seven generations ahead. By infusing technological, spiritual, and ecological vocabularies, Kite encourages us to imagine dreams as a viable research-creation methodology, suggesting the possibility of building systems that are sensitive and responsive to future generations.
The exhibition showcases the breadth of Kite’s performance and composition practice through four videos documenting both individual and collaborative performances, three instructional and illustrated scores reproduced as wall works, and audio of a musical composition performed by the Silkroad Ensemble. On April 17, 2025, visitors will have the unique opportunity to witness Kite activate the exhibition’s central work through a live solo performance in the gallery space, bringing together wearable technology and choreography by Muscogee artist Olivia Camfield.
“List Projects 31: Kite” runs from January 30 to May 18, 2025, at the MIT List Visual Arts Center. This exhibition is not just a display of art; it’s an invitation to reimagine our relationship with technology, dreams, and the natural world through the lens of Lakȟóta ontology. It offers a hopeful vision for the intersection of art, technology, and Indigenous wisdom, challenging us to consider how we can build a future that is both innovative and deeply respectful of ancestral knowledge. As visitors navigate through Kite’s dreamlike creations, they are encouraged to reflect on the potential of dreams as a powerful tool for understanding and shaping our world, bridging the gap between the ancient and the futuristic, the spiritual and the technological. This exhibition stands as a testament to the power of art to inspire, challenge, and transform our perception of reality, inviting us all to dream of a more interconnected and harmonious future.
Exhibition dates: January 30-May 18, 2025
