Jennifer Loureide Biddle

Biddle begins with anecdotes about her time with Central Australia's Indigenous women. As many before her, working with indigenous populations throughout the globe, she experiences frustration while trying to educate these artists about the value of their work and how to sell it to maximum advantage. And as many before her, she slowly learns that the ways of the culture in which she immerses herself prohibits elements of what she attempts to teach as good business practice. The women use this kartiya [white woman] in their midst as a tool that allows them to honor their culture while conducting business with the Whitefellas. It reminds me of a friend who lives near a Conservative Jewish synagogue. On certain holy days, when Jews are not allowed to touch light switches and certain other modern paraphernalia, the congregation recruits him to turn on exterior lighting and other routine tasks that the modern world demands in defiance of their centuries-old practice. Biddle learned, she writes, "that the amount of money received, the price paid, is not so much the issue. Selling is." Anthropologist Biddle's text is academic, bridging two disciplines: art and anthropology. Her interest, she says, is in affect: what the art does, not what it means. Having myself spent a short time among a small group of Indigenous women in a remote settlement, Biddle's book has a special personal meaning to me. Beyond that, I believe art historians, anthropologists, and feminists throughout the globe will find her work intensely interesting. As well, this book is a visual feast of black-and-white photographs and color plates.… (mer)