GISELA MCDANIEL

Gisela McDaniel (b. Bellevue, NE 1995) is a diasporic, indigenous Chamorro artist. Her work is reflecting the journey of womxn and non-binary people who have survived sexual trauma. By interweaving assemblages of oil painting, immersive audio sequences and objects connected to her subjects, she intentionally incorporates survivor’s voices in order to subvert traditional power relations and to enable both individual and collective healing. She aims to give a voice, safe space, as well as a confidential vehicle for survivors to not only share their experiences, but to also explore how those experiences have affected them long-term.

Working primarily with womxn who identify as Black Indigenous Women of Colour (BIWOC), her work deliberately disrupts and responds to historical and contemporary patterns of female silence. There is no denying the ways in which global histories of enslavement, militarisation, colonisation, and patriarchal violence continue to inform the manner in which her subjects reflect on their personal stories of ‘waymaking’. Their calls to reclaim their bodies and identities illuminate active resistance to these same systems.

Paul Gaugin is a primary but not exclusive figure whose work McDaniel engages and converses in regard to his artistic and colonial legacy in the Pacific. As a Pacific Island artist, McDaniel denounces Gaugin’s sexual and racial fantasy forged from a position of patriarchal, colonialist power and regains the Pacific territory and visual framework Gaugin had occupied for himself.

In this new body of work, McDaniel has been engaging with the practice of voyages in between islands, which, for her, are metaphoric for the way the subjects of her paintings evolve and become resilient after suffering from sexualised violence. The body of work presented here maps a range of intimate journeys undertaken by womxn who made their way to places of healing.

Based in Detroit, she received her BFA from the University of Michigan in 2019. Recent solo and group shows include: Dhaka Art Summit, Dhaka, Bangladesh (2020); On the Road II, Oolite Arts, Miami (2019); Save Art Space, Playground Detroit, Detroit (2019); Lush P®ose, Playground Detroit, Detroit (2019); Virago, Detroit Art Babes Collective, Detroit (2019) and Theotokos: New Visions of the Mother God, The Schvitz, Detroit (2018).