Nanna

Mollie McKinley

Stina Puotinen

Alex Schmidt

Nanna is the Sumerian word for Moon God.

It’s also what many of us call our grandmothers.

“For some reason I’m always having a glass-blowing day on a full moon,” Mollie said over pancakes. She’d just gotten back from a residency where she met with a medium, and had convened and conversed with loved ones on the other side.

Mollie McKinley’s photographic cave sculptures glow with light from her camera’s flash, illuminating the cave walls, which read as shimmering galactic gems. Like a commune with the spirits, her work calls to mind not just the earth’s or the psyche’s interior – but outer space as well.

Alex Schmidt’s video shows two extremely occupied women who don’t need food – they just eat air and water, as they methodically run around a house claiming to bring good luck to daddy. These possessed, nymph-like beings write their dreams on a star calendar – “There are ten stars. There is only one diamond.”

Their paintings, which are installed with scores from the performances that inspired them, also depict the vastness of ritual space. In these works, people (sometimes Alex themself) perform various actions – and the viewers are suggestively invited to join.

Stina Poutinen’s images of zodiac beasts possess disarmingly human-like qualities. They stare like ancient animal gods – able to come to earth with fantastical rewards. Stina and I often talk about ‘Woman Island’ – a dream-like place not so much just for women, but an ageless and immortal paradise where we talk and laugh loudly, ideate, flail around, and dance together.

Through painting, video, textile, photography, and glass the artists in Nanna make works that manifest through their own sacred rites – and we are all now invited to drink and join the ceremony.

—Leah Dixon