Tracking Time
Tracking Time: Chelsea Kaiah and Noelle Phares
Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art
1750 13th Street, Boulder, CO 80302
Located on Cheyenne, Arapahoe, and Ute lands
May 23 – September 2, 2024
Admission: Pay What You Can
Review by MG Bernard
The Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA) is currently hosting the exhibition Tracking Time, which will be on view until September 2, 2024. This show presents the works of two artists—Chelsea Kaiah and Noelle Phares—who address the pressing ecological issues surrounding the Colorado River. [1]
An installation view of Chelsea Kaiah’s Artist Inspirations, 2024 (various personal items and research materials from artist Chelsea Kaiah’s workspace) with Noelle Phares’ seven site sketches in the background. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art (BMoCA).
By juxtaposing their works, Tracking Time not only underscores the urgent environmental issues surrounding the river, but also gives viewers two perspectives regarding the contemporary impacts of the Anthropocene. [2] BMoCA describes the exhibition as “a map to help navigate the current conversation around our ecological crisis and as a reflection of our interrelated past, present, and future.” [3]
Noelle Phares, Site 1 - Green River, WY, 2024, oil and acrylic on panel. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
Noelle Phares, a Denver-based painter with a background in environmental science, focuses on the transformation of landscapes altered by human development. Her paintings are informed by her scientific understanding of the environment and highlight both the “fragile beauty of nature” and the potential for harmonious coexistence between built and natural environments. [4]
Chelsea Kaiah, Land Back, 2023, deer hide, wood frame, red felt, rope. Image by DARIA.
In contrast, Cheslea Kaiah, a multidisciplinary artist born on the Northern Ute reservation, uses traditional indigenous materials and symbolism to engage with contemporary environmental issues. Her work serves as a reminder of the deep, culturally rooted relationship between indigenous practices and ecological stewardship.
A detail view of a panel from Noelle Phares’ 2024 triptych work Site 7 - Lake Mead / Hoover Dam. Image by DARIA.
The significance of Tracking Time lies not only in its exploration of ecological themes, but also in its commentary on the often-overlooked contributions of indigenous perspectives in environmental discussions. The exhibition illuminates the historical and ongoing exclusion of indigenous voices from mainstream environmental discourse—a trend that has profound implications for how ecological crises are understood and addressed. It is an example of how including indigenous artists in the American ecological conversation is often an afterthought even though “indigenous communities are on the frontlines of America’s climate-related dangers.” [5]
An installation view of Noelle Phares’ 2024 triptych works Site 1 - Green River, WY and Site 2 - Colorado Headwaters in BMoCA’s front gallery space. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
The presentation of the artworks within the exhibition space creates a thematic contrast between how the two artists approach raising awareness around our current ecological crisis. Phares’ paintings, displayed in a more traditional gallery setting (e.g., a white cube, equal spacing between works, and paintings hung at 60 inches center), provide an orderly and structured view of her interpretations of environmental change. Anchored by seven historically relevant sites along the Colorado River, Phares intentionally creates a linear timeline and framework to track her trips amongst the historically changed and contemporary changing landscapes. [6]
An installation view of Chelsea Kaiah’s 2023 and 2024 works Land Back, Tarp Paintings, and Apache Stars in BMoCA’s back gallery space. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
Kaiah’s work, on the other hand, occupies a less conventional space with a more chaotic and fragmented presentation (e.g., black walls, mixed-media materials, and artworks hung at various heights). Her use of materials associated with her indigenous hunting practice, including animal hides and blue plastic tarps, challenges viewers to reconsider their perceptions of indigenous art and life within the broader ecological narrative.
An installation view of one of Chelsea Kaiah’s Tarp Paintings and Apache Stars in BMoCA’s back gallery space. Image courtesy of Wes Magyar and BMoCA.
The spatial arrangement of Kaiah’s artworks serves many purposes. First, they visually create a nonlinear framework that considers time and space as fluid—rather than structured—engagements of existence. This is a crucial separation from the dominant colonial viewpoint of time moving from point A to point B. Second, they critique capitalism’s hierarchal view of materials. Kaiah purposefully hangs her Tarp Paintings (2024) from the ceiling to visually and symbolically raise the importance of a mass-produced, disposal material to the level of her “one-of-a-kind” deer hide works Apache Stars (2024) and Land Back (2023). This physical placement asks viewers to reconsider all materials as sacred and indispensable.
An installation view of Noelle Phares’ sketches from her seven trips along the Colorado River. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
Another thematic contrast between these two bodies of work is seen in the upstairs gallery, which focuses on the two artists’ creative processes. Phares presents her pen and watercolor sketches of the landscapes she visited on her seven trips along the Colorado River. Like her paintings in the downstairs gallery, Phares’ sketches are hung systematically and uniformly. They give viewers some of the details included in the larger paintings (a purple sky, a fish, bushes, a pond) and are illustrations that suggest a European ethnographer studying “newly discovered” plants, animals, and landscapes.
An installation view of Chelsea Kaiah’s process works. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
A detail view of Chelsea Kaiah’s process works. Image by Wes Magyar, courtesy of BMoCA.
Kaiah, on the other hand, chooses various artifacts and images to convey the importance of her embodied relationship to the Green River (a tributary of the Colorado River) and the connection of her familial history to the time, space, and land in which she presents herself. In addition to two maps illustrated by her father, Kaiah’s process photographs show the artist and her family on a hunting trip along the section of the Green River that runs through a Native reservation—land that is largely unmapped by colonizers. In this way, Kaiah physically embodies herself as the subject of her artwork, revealing to viewers how she, her father, her nieces, and her sisters are the embodiments of the impacts of historical and contemporary resource exploitation.
An installation view of the exhibition Tracking Time at BMoCA. Image by DARIA.
Tracking Time is a significant exhibition that not only explores the environmental challenges facing the Colorado River but also addresses the broader issue of indigenous exclusion from ecological discourse. By juxtaposing the works of Chelsea Kaiah and Noelle Phares, the exhibition highlights the need for a more inclusive approach to understanding and addressing ecological crises. The exhibition serves as a powerful reminder of the value of indigenous perspectives and the importance of creating space for diverse voices in discussions about our relationship with the natural world.
Mary Grace Bernard (MG, she/her) is a transmedia and performance artist, educator, advocate, and crip witch. Her practice finds itself at the intersection of performance art, transmedia installation art, art scholarship, art writing, curation, and activism.
[1] For information regarding the ecological crisis surrounding the Colorado River, visit https://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/2023/02/28/colorado-river/.
[2] According to the Natural History Museum in London, the “Anthropocene” is the name for a proposed geological epoch, dating from the commencement of significant human impact on Earth up to the present day. This impact affects Earth's geology, landscape, limnology, ecosystems and climate. Oftentimes, the term “Capitalocene” is substituted to “place due blame on a global minority of government and corporate leaders.” For more information, see https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/anthropocene.html and Jessica L. Horton (2017), “Indigenous Artists Against the Anthropocene,” Art Journal, 76:2, pages 48-69.
[3] Jane Burke, “Curatorial Statement,” Tracking Time, May 23–September 2, 2024, Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Jessica L. Horton (2017), “Indigenous Artists Against the Anthropocene,” Art Journal, 76:2, pages 48-69.
[6] It is historically relevant in terms of colonial settlers’ interactions with and discoveries of the Colorado River. For example, Phares chose to paint her first site at the Flaming Gorge Reservoir as part of the Green River in Wyoming because it is where John Wesley Powell started his major expedition of the Colorado River in 1869. For more information, see Phares’ artist talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=olb2cHq1M1k.
