SKY HOPINKA on What We Pass On /364

Scene from Sky Hopinka’s short film, Sunflower Siege Engine (2022).

This week, Ayana is joined by Sky Hopinka in a conversation that dives deep into the meaning of art and film and the stories and emotions we share between generations. Sky grounds the conversation in his incredible expertise and thoughtful approach to media. Touching on the very questions of who we are and how we make meaning, the questions in this conversation cut to the core of what it means to be human.  

The conversation is a beautiful exploration of art, Indigeneity, intergenerational pain, and the way we make meaning in times like these. Weaving together the ephemeral worlds of emotion and identity with the grounding power of shared values and reciprocity, Sky reminds us that art is meant to provoke, inspire, and make the space needed for feeling to emerge.

“How can I focus on my own unique experience and speak from my own sort of movement through these different landscapes of colonial history and reckoning and the presence without necessarily trying to speak for everyone?”

— Sky Hopinka / Episode 364

Photo of Sky Hopinka

Sky Hopinka was born and raised in Northern Washington State and Southern California. He's a member of the Ho-Chunk Nation and descendent of the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians. His video, photo, and text work centers around personal positions of Indigenous homeland and landscape, designs of language as containers of culture expressed through personal, documentary, and non fiction forms of media. His work has played at various festivals including Sundance, Toronto International Film Festival, and the New York Film Festival. His work was a part of the 2017 Whitney Biennial, the 2018 FRONT Triennial and Prospect.5 in 2021. He was a guest curator at the 2019 Whitney Biennial. He has had solo exhibitions at the Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, in 2020 and in 2022 at LUMA in Arles, France. He was a fellow at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study at Harvard University in 2018- 2019, a Sundance Art of Nonfiction Fellow for 2019, an Art Matters Fellow in 2019, a recipient of a 2020 Alpert Award for Film/Video, a 2020 Guggenheim Fellow, and was a 2021 Forge Project Fellow. He received the 2022 Infinity Award in Art from the International Center of Photography, and is a 2022 MacArther Fellow.

♫ The music in this episode is “The Sun Swirls Within You” and “My People Have Deep Roots” by Arushi Jain courtesy of Leaving Records.

Episode References

Emerson's Letter to President Van Buren: Full Text & Context

“Send in the Clouds: James Benning's ‘FAROCKI’” | MUBI 

“Sky Hopinka: Film Is the Body” | MOMA MAgazine

“Sky Hopinka Introduces His Film ‘Dislocation Blues’” | MUBI 

“Sky Hopinka on Uncertainty, Authority, and Indigenous Representation” | Walker Museum

Perfidia by Sky Hopinka

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