China Basin District

Inscriptions

Signed and inscribed, on reverse, bottom edge, in ink: "Entering Zigs Indian Reservation" China Basin Toxic Dump Zig Jackson Mandan Hidatsu Arikara

Label

With his signs, Native artist Zig Jackson brings the reservation to San Francisco’s China Basin, home to many houseless people who were driven out to make way for the construction of a ballpark. Eliminating the urban and rural divide that separates city dwellers from Indigenous communities, Jackson satirizes both stereotypes of Native people and the transformation of stolen Indigenous land into “private property.” By occupying space in one of the wealthiest cities in the world, Jackson highlights the continuities between colonial land dispossession and the capitalist housing crisis.

From the 2025 exhibition Visual Kinship, curated by Alisa Swindell, Associate Curator of Photography, Dr. Kimberly Juanita Brown, Dr. Thy Phu and Dr. Iyko Day

Course History

NAS 30.1, ARTH 17, Modern Native American Art History, Joyce Szabo, Summer 2013

ANTH 3, Introduction to Cultural Anthropology, Sienna Craig, Summer 2013

SART 17.9, The Photographer as Activist: Making Art Inspired by the Hood Museum's Collection, Virginia Beahan, Winter 2015

HUM 1, Dialogues with the Classics, Paul Carranza, Caroline Dever, Andrea Tarnowski, Timothy Pulju, Fall 2015

SART 30, SART 75, Photography II and III, Virginia Beahan, Spring 2019

NAS 30.21, Native American Art and Material, Jami Powell, Spring 2020

NAS 30.21, Native American Art and Material, Jami Powell, Spring 2020

NAS 30.21, Native American Art and Material, Jami Powell, Spring 2021

GEOG 25, Social Justice and the City, Erin Collins, Fall 2021

Geography 29.01, Global Cities, Erin Collins, Spring 2023

Studio Art 77.01, Senior Seminar II, Karol Kawiaka, Spring 2023

Studio Art 77.02, Senior Seminar II, Jen Caine, Spring 2023

English 62.05, Horrors of Survival: Modern American Literature, Jamie Godley, Summer 2023

Geography 25.01, Sociology 49.22, Women’s Gender, and Sexuality Studies 37.03, Social Justice and the City, Erin Collins, Fall 2023

Anthropology 73.01, Main Currents in Anthropology, Sienna Craig, Spring 2024

Art History 40.02, The American Century, Mary Coffey, Spring 2025

Art History 40.02, The American Century, Mary Coffey, Spring 2025

College Course 26.01, What’s in Your Toolbox?, Casey Aldrich and Mokhtar Bouba, Fall 2025

Women’s, Gender, Sexuality Studies 65.07, Queer Popular Culture, Eng-Beng Lim, Fall 2025

Exhibition History

Making Connections at the Hood Museum of Art, Harrington Gallery Teaching Exhibition, Art History 2, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, January 20-April 14, 2009.

Native American Art at Dartmouth: Highlights from the Hood Museum of Art, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, October 8, 2011-March 12, 2012.

No Laughing Matter: Visual Humor in Ideas of Race, Nationality, and Ethnicity, Harrington Gallery Teaching Exhibition, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, in conjunction with the Humanities Institute, Leslie Center for the Humanities, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, October 6-December 9, 2007.

Portrait of the Artist as an Indian / Portrait of the Indian as an Artist, Harteveldt Family Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, January 26-April 21, 2019.

Visual Kinship, Lathrop, Jaffe and Hall Galleries, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, August 30 - November 29, 2025.

Publication History

George P. Horse Capture, Sr., Joe D. Horse Capture, Joseph M. Sanchez, et al., Native American Art at Dartmouth: Hightlights from the Hood Museum of Art, Hanover: Trustees of Dartmouth College, 2011, ill. on p. 57 and p. 161, no. 96.

John R. Stomberg, The Hood Now: Art and Inquiry at Dartmouth, Hanover, New Hampshire: Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, 2019, p. 54, ill. fig. 8.9.

Provenance

Andrew Smith Gallery, Inc., Santa Fe, New Mexico; sold to present collection, 2007.

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Subjects