iGalerie RudolfinumStaré Město
First major European joint show by these First Nations artists, with sculpture, installation and painting on Indigenous land, trade and erased histories, woven with Czech glass beads.
You start in a room the gallery calls Masaryk's office, where Duane Linklater's kîya plays his music from speakers set among blankets and luggage. Next door stands rarebird, a monumental crane built from steel, soil, clay and grass, its legs sunk into its pedestal so it can't fly.
This is the couple's first major joint show in Europe: Tanya Lukin Linklater is Alutiiq, from Kodiak Island, and Duane is Moose Cree. Across eight rooms and the Loggia they look at what was taken from their peoples: land, language, belongings now in museum stores. Their new joint piece, Slip lusters, recurs in nearly every room: deep red glass rods from the Czech firm Preciosa Ornela, halted before being cut into beads like those once traded from Bohemia to First Nations.
Several titles stay in Cree, so download the curators' 23-page guide first. Entry is pay what you wish from 200 CZK (120 CZK concessions, under-15s free), free on the first Sunday of the month, and open until 20:00 on Thursdays.
The First Nations artists' first major joint show in Europe: sculpture, installation and painting on Indigenous land, trade and erased histories, worked with Czech glass beads.
rarebird
In Room 2, a monumental crane with an oversized beak weighing down its body, made from local clay, hay and grass on steel, its long legs trapped inside the pedestal.
Fin
In Room 3, twenty-one panels of waxed yellow canvas hang from the ceiling in a line that follows the Vltava outside, patterned on a rare Sugpiaq waterproof gut parka.
Slip lusters
Look for bundles of deep red glass rods, the stage before Czech glass becomes beads, placed through the rooms; red is a ceremonial colour for both artists' peoples.
The caches in Room 5
Steel scaffolds hold fur coats, a Prada suit screen-printed with a red lightning bolt after William Blake, a 3D-printed hockey helmet and a Brazil football shirt, with their entrances blocked.
Quiver
In Room 7, young researchers in rubber gloves handle Indigenous belongings in a museum store, then the film cuts to the Pacific coast, where they stand humming in a circle.
Under-15s go free. Ateliérovky art workshops for ages 5 to 14 run on selected Sundays at 2pm during the show (130 CZK per child), and parents can see the exhibition meanwhile.