Kahlhamer from p 23 floor, so you go out and there’s your friends, and you’re all showing at galleries and comparing notes and supporting each other’s lifestyle. We lived that life, that studio life.” He lived in New York for decades (and is still represented by Garth Greenan Gallery there), but Kahlhamer never forgot his desert roots. After 9/11, he came back to southern Arizona to stay for a bit in what he calls a “productive and successful ... self-realized residency.” Then, in 2018, he moved back, this time to Mesa. “It’s a mystical land,” Kahlhamer says of Arizona. “There’s a very active Native culture, a very vibrant culture. You don’t have that on the East Coast.” Some of the works in “Swap Meet” are a representation of his current existence. The “zombie botanicals,” as he calls them, are grotesque figures crafted from bits of dead desert flora Kahlhamer collects during his hikes. He imagines them as guardians that protect him and his home from harm. Other elements of “Swap Meet” have more of a New York influence. The Bowery Nation is a series of kachina dolls that are painted not in a traditional Indigenous palette, but instead in the bold, expression- istic style of the late 20th century New York underground art scene. Indeed, “Swap Meet” has a little of everything: Kahlhamer’s sketchbooks inspired by his travels; painted rocks that are reminiscent of petroglyph art; a giant wire dreamcatcher crafted from smaller dreamcatchers; and more. For Kahlhamer, who doesn’t know his tribal affiliation and considers himself “tribally ambiguous,” using Indigenous art forms is a way to connect to his Native Artwork from “Swap Meet.” heritage, McCabe says. “He’s talked about this idea of being ‘other.’ He’s said, ‘I just wake up and I’m an artist and I do my thing, but people look at me and they say I look Native, you’re Native.’ So I think it’s him trying to connect to something that’s impossible to connect to. So he does it through these ubiquitous Native things like the dreamcatcher [and the [kachina] dolls,” she says. “Swap Meet,” which continues at SMoCA through October 9, will undoubt- edly be seen by thousands of museum visi- tors. But Kahlhamer says that he doesn’t want viewers to necessarily experience the show a certain way. “I’ve done over 30 solo shows, and over that considerable stretch, everybody is bringing their own sensibilities and their own memory train to these shows, so you can only think about a takeaway,” he says. “When people come in, I want them to Jennifer Goldberg exit thinking that there’s a particular discordant hum, this idea of a swap meet — there’s this incredible anticipation, you see the cars in the parking lot and all the people, and then halfway through, you’re like, ‘This is junk.’ The despair and hope of a Mesa swap meet. To me, that’s real life. It’s a real transaction along with an emotional transaction — the interchange- ability, the randomness of our exchanges and our encounters, and that’s this idea of ‘Swap Meet,’ the slipstream of both objects and persons.” “Swap Meet” continues at Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art, 7380 East Second Street, Scottsdale, through October 9. At 7 p.m. on Friday, April 1, Kahlhamer will perform music as part of an evening of “swap meet-style performances.” Cost is pay-what-you-wish. To RSVP, visit smoca.org/event/live-swap-meet. 25 phoenixnewtimes.com | CONTENTS | FEEDBACK | OPINION | NEWS | FEATURE | NIGHT+DAY | CULTURE | FILM | CAFE | MUSIC | PHOENIX NEW TIMES MARCH 31ST– APRIL 6TH, 2022
