Audio Stop 731

MARIE WATT: 

I’m interested in that space, between earth and sky, that humans seek to occupy.

NARRATOR: 

Artist Marie Watt...

MW: 

And it’s a vulnerable space, and it’s a spiritual space, and it’s a space that we’re custodians of, and that we have responsibility to steward.  When I think of the land carrying our ancestors, I do think of the sky space.  I think of clouds.  I think of the air that we’re breathing. 

NARRATOR: 

In her work Antipodes, Watt evokes this in-between sky space through the diagonal chasm separating the words “skyscraper” and “skywalker.”  But the words themselves also carry meaning.

MW: 

The word “skywalker” talks to me on a bunch of different levels.  On one hand, I’m reminded of being a kid in the 1970s and going and watching Star Wars and the thing that I was drawn to in that word “skywalker” was not just that it related to this character Luke, but also that in our tribe, we have skywalkers, and our skywalkers are our ironworkers. 

NARRATOR: 

Watt is a member of the Seneca Nation.  In the early- and mid-20th century, Seneca, Mohawk, and other Haudenosaunee Native Americans helped build New York City’s towering skyline.  They risked their lives working atop the massive iron skeletons of the city’s skyscrapers.

MW: 

Then in 2009, my family and I moved to Brooklyn, New York, and we lived near Boerum Hill, that area was this area that was often referred to as Little Akwesasne, which is where many Haudenosaunee but also specifically Mohawk ironworkers lived while working on Manhattan’s skyscrapers.

NARRATOR: 

In the 1950s, the community included about 800 Mohawk families.

MW:

And there were so many people in that area that there was even a church that did Mass in the Mohawk language.  I felt like I had landed in a community where I was meant to be. My ancestors had kind of maybe paved the way for me to be there too and share that space.

NARRATOR: 

Through her work, Watt honors these skywalkers and the foundation they laid.