{"id":1326,"date":"2009-11-30T15:32:30","date_gmt":"2009-11-30T23:32:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp\/2009\/11\/at_the_henry_gallery_-_gifts_i\/"},"modified":"2009-11-30T15:32:30","modified_gmt":"2009-11-30T23:32:30","slug":"at_the_henry_gallery_-_gifts_i","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/2009\/11\/at_the_henry_gallery_-_gifts_i.html","title":{"rendered":"At the Henry Gallery – gifts in motion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lewis Hyde opened The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property<\/i><\/a> by describing a rift in understanding between Pilgrims and
\nIndians. Because the latter expected that gifts would
\nstay in motion, the English called them “Indian givers,” meaning, those
\nwho take gifts back. <\/p>\n

\"giftshop.jpg\"From
\nthe Indian point of view, wrote Hyde, the Pilgrims might have been
\ncalled “white man keepers (or maybe capitalists, that is, people
\nwhose instinct is to remove property from circulation, to put it in a
\nwarehouse or museum or, more to the point for capitalism, to lay it
\naside to be used for production).”<\/p>\n

Northwest Coast Indians turned
\nthis principle of gifts in motion into a banking system, known as the
\npotlatch. What was given away bestowed prestige and power, not what was hoarded. <\/p>\n

Hyde:<\/p>\n

The
\nIndian giver…understood a cardinal property of the gift: whatever we
\nhave been given is supposed to be given away again, not kept. Or, if it
\nis kept, something of similar value would move on in its stead, the way
\na billiard ball may stop when it sends another scurrying across the
\nfelt, its momentum transferred. You may keep your Christmas present,
\nbut it ceases to be a gift in the true sense unless you have given
\nsomething else away. As it is passed along, the gift may be given back
\nto the original donor, but this is not essential. In fact, it is better
\nif the gift is not returned but is given instead to some new, third
\nparty. The only essential is this: the gift must always move. There are
\nother forms of property that stand still, that mark a boundary or
\nresist momentum, but the gift keeps going.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

After the gift shop at the Henry Gallery<\/a> failed and the space went dark, Seattle painter Matthew Offenbacher<\/a> proposed turning it into an artist space. (Story here<\/a>.) Different teams of artists run it on themes of their devising. Through Dec. 13 is The Gift Exchange<\/i> by Claire Cowie<\/a>, Sol Hashemi and Jason Hirata<\/a>,
\nbased on a come-one, come-all version of a  potlach. Anyone can bring a
\ngift and take one, or bring several and take several. Cowie, Hashemi
\nand Hirata set a high standard for the exchange by seeding the original
\nstock with their work. <\/p>\n

Since it opened Nov. 14, the audience
\nhas risen to the occasion. Although some people tear open corners of
\nwrapped gifts and keep going until they find treasure, many, many
\nothers bring treasures and take what they’re given in a blind exchange.
\nNot all gifts are blind. Some lack wrapping, in the interests of making
\nsure a gift goes to someone who will value it. <\/p>\n

As a profile of the community, The Gift Exchange<\/i>
\nproves that people raised in an individualistic, me-first, capitalistic
\nsystem can transcend their training and rise to higher ground. Since
\nthe 1980s and accelerating ever since is the assumption that art equals
\nmoney, that its value can be translated into cash on the secondary
\nmarket. The Gift Exchange<\/i> argues for an older, truer version of art, that it is in essence a form of grace. To all concerned, well done.<\/p>\n

Note:<\/b> Remember the hours. Thanks to budget cutbacks, the Henry is open only Thursdays to Sundays. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Lewis Hyde opened The Gift: Imagination and the Erotic Life of Property by describing a rift in understanding between Pilgrims and Indians. Because the latter expected that gifts would stay in motion, the English called them “Indian givers,” meaning, those who take gifts back. From the Indian point of view, wrote Hyde, the Pilgrims might […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1326","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1326","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1326"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1326\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1326"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1326"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/anotherbb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1326"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}