When did you first encounter the image of James Earle Fraser's End of the Trail? Has your understanding or perception of it changed over time?

I don’t recall a first encounter with the image of James Earle Fraser’s End of the Trail, and I don’t think that I’ve ever changed my perception of it. I have always understood it to have nothing to do with myself or Indigenous people. I’ve always understood it in terms of a white male fantasy that has nothing to do with Indigenous people.

As an artist, you often work with the figural. What compositional impression does End of the Trail make on you?

If I squint my eyes I can look at the piece abstractly and then I can get over what it’s intended meaning is. And as an abstract image that plays with positive and negative space, maybe I can look at the piece with some redeeming factors of how it’s compositionally put together. But the overall image, the meaning behind the image is so loud and deafening that it’s hard to see End of the Trail in terms other than what it means. So that’s in general, I have a really hard time getting past the screen of meaning to look at it in terms of formal qualities.

What are your thoughts about the impact of this image today?

I wrote a poem about the sculpture: