MacArthur Foundation Nwi Yathmomen Indigenous Exhibit Design

The City of Chicago is situated within the homelands of the Potawatomi Nation. The pre-contact inhabitants referred to this place as Zhegagoynak, a crossroads of intertribal trade and gathering.

The MacArthur Foundation, headquartered in the historic Marquette Building, features Tiffany glass murals and bronze reliefs depicting early exchanges between Native inhabitants and European colonizers. Collectively, the lobby artworks capture the era from a Euro-American perspective, showing a romanticized version of these interactions riddled with historical and cultural inaccuracies. Reliefs above each elevator portray faces of people who did not exist, apparently conjured from the popular imagination of what an Indian looked like. During this time, this included cultural motifs, architecture, and other details associated with the Plains tribes. Regalia, long-feathered headdresses, and tipis appear in multiple frames, none of which would have been present in the Great Lakes region.

The MacArthur Foundation wished to provide a more accurate depiction of the Indigenous people and felt it was important to celebrate, respect, and humanize Indigenous leaders.

Bodwé Professional Services Group assisted the MacArthur Foundation and co-curators (visual artist Andrea Carlson [Ojibwe] and historian John Low, PhD [Potawatomi]) with an interpretive intervention titled “Nwi Yathmomen" which translates to “We Will Tell Our Story.”

The intervention addresses the representation of Native people and their continued presence in the area. The space features art by Native artists and highlights Native stories, language, and design. Vitrines are adaptable and support the display of multi-media art.

The Bodwé design-build team provided the following scope of services:

• project planning, space utilization diagram, and cost estimate for the new exhibit design
• conducted site visits from project initiation through construction; performed laser scans of existing space to create a 3-D virtual model
• reviewed and produced a spatialized version of the curator-provided exhibition content
• prepared a preliminary story, sequence, and visitor flow diagrams
• designed a coherent and consistent exhibition “language” consisting of typography, colors, and other graphic treatments
• developed design concepts for each panel and label rail
• interpretive panel and label graphic design services
• facilitated the production, fabrication, and installation of custom woodwork and 2-D exhibition content
• developed shop drawings for custom vitrines and exhibition panels

The intervention will serve to correct misconceptions of the European colonizer as a “civilizing” force that the building’s architecture has helped to propagate for over 125 years.