waterways
The Autry Museum of the American West
What is your relationship with water?
Nearly every major population center on the planet is situated along a major waterway. Water has the power to sustain the planet. It is essential for survival, and it is what connects us all. Water has provided for thousands of years and deserves our protection.
The special installation Waterways, part of the Human Nature exhibition at the Autry Museum of the American West, presents waterways and maritime cultures as central to local Native California communities: the Gabrielino-Tongva, Chumash, Tataviam, and Ajachamen peoples.
In 2022-23, artworxLA Teaching Artists worked alongside Autry staff to develop Level 1 workshop curricula that combined key learnings from Waterways with socio-emotional learning activities and multimedia arts projects. Students learned about local ecology and indigenous cultural practices, how water is featured in foundational stories, vessel-making and traditions of travel along water, and efforts to center traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and restore sacred connections to water.
Student artists from our Design and Media Arts Academy (DMAA) connected with Waterways thanks to artworxLA Teaching Artist Tasnim Boufelfel. Together, the students at DMAA embarked on a journey into the alchemy of film and its intersection with our deep connection to water's essence. Through intentional observation and imagination, the students explored their personal, communal, and ancestral connection to water and waterways. Students created abstract, non-linear short-film commentaries on water and its significance in their lives.
learn about ecology, indigenous cultural history, and museum exhibitions with a mini waterways quiz.
explore student artwork.
Jaimese, Central High School - 6th Ave
Selena and Jaimese, Central High School - 6th Ave
Annabelle, Stoney Point High School
Dymin, Central High School - 6th Ave
“It was good. It was my first time being here, so the experience was awesome. And I get to [see] … relations between my culture and another culture.”
- Azti, artworxLA student
