Clearly Indigenous Audio Exhibition
Chaco Sunrise
Chaco Sunrise, 2017, Adrian Wall (American, Jemez Pueblo, b. 1970), 64 x 25 x 18 in. (162.6 x 63.5 x 45.7 cm), glass and stone, Collection of Roberta C. Robinson, L10.2023:69
Verbal Description
Hello, I’m Eric Hughett, the museum’s curatorial assistant for East Asian art. I will be sharing a description of Chaco Sunrise by Adrian Wall in Clearly Indigenous: Native Visions Reimagined in Glass.
Adrian Wall, born in 1970, is part of the Jemez Pueblo. He created Chaco Sunrise in 2017 in glass and stone. It is in the collection of Roberta C. Robinson.
Chaco Sunrise is a large three-dimensional sculpture crafted from glass and stone. It is on view in a case positioned to the left of the gallery exit. The work measures 64 inches tall, 25 inches wide, and 18 inches deep, or 162.6 centimeters tall, 63.5 centimeters wide, and 45.7 centimeters deep. A round glass disk, representing the sun, grows out of a gray, wave-shaped stone. Where the cast glass disk connects to the stone base, the disk is a deep red; as we move up the piece, the color shifts from orange to yellow at the top. The disk’s surface is defined with a swirling, white spiral that starts in the upper left of the disk and unfurls to the disk’s rim. A carved spiral also decorates the stone base starting just to the right of the point where the base meets the glass disk. This spiral comprises much of the right side of the base. It takes on the form of a curling tail.
Label Audio
Hello, I’m XXXXX, the museum’s XXXXXX. I will be sharing the label for Chaco Sunrise by Adrian Wall in Clearly Indigenous: Native Visions Reimagined in Glass.
Adrian Wall, born in 1970, is part of the Jemez Pueblo. He created Chaco Sunrise in 2017 in glass and stone. It is in the collection of Roberta C. Robinson.
Ancestral Puebloan Peoples had extensive knowledge of seasonal and astronomical cycles. They incorporated this information about the sun and moon and the alignment of sunrises and sunsets during solstices and equinoxes into their architecture, as found at ruins from a thousand years ago at Chaco Canyon, New Mexico. The colorful orb of this garden sculpture represents in glass the historical importance of this knowledge.