Julianne Jennings: Muscogee artist shows 'Bloodlines' in China

Toni Scott is an American and a citizen of the Muscogee Creek Nation. She also descends from African and European ancestry. As a multimedia artist, she was recently selected for the 2015 Dame Jillian Sackler International Artists Exhibition Program at the Arthur M. Sackler Museum of Art and Archeology at Peking University, Beijing, China. The exhibit is called, DNA Bloodlines The Family of Mankind, and will open May, 2015. About winning the award Scott says, “I felt a unique validation. How often does an African Native American Woman receive an international exhibition?”

The cultural value of her work is what attracted The Sackler Foundation Artist Exhibition Program to Scott― to create open dialog between the work and the viewer, stimulate critical thinking, and bring cross-cultural understanding amongst people. “I was happy to find a home for my work and be given the freedom to express it fully,” she says.

In the United States, her Bloodlines exhibitions wove together the brutal history of slavery, including personal narratives and genealogical information, tracing her ancestry to the late 1600s. Bloodlines has traveled across the United States, notably a three- year solo exhibit (2009-2012) at the California African American Museum. She says, “We all have a history that includes a migration story, a journey, and global cultural influences that have shaped our individual world.”