Raven Chacon: Conductus

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“I was trained with Western notation, and I was told that you’re supposed to understand that language in order to make music. And of course, that’s not true. Most musicians in the world do not read Western music notation.” —Raven Chacon

Conductus, the project for Kunstverein Hannover by Raven Chacon, the first Native American artist to receive the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 2022, brings together an array of his most significant sculptural works, films, and installations, alongside two new live performances developed specifically for the Kunstverein.

The practice of Raven Chacon (b. 1977, Fort Defiance, Arizona, Navajo Nation) unfolds between sound, video, performance, sculpture, and notation. It is informed—among other influences—by the values and musical traditions of Chacon’s Diné (Navajo) roots, through which he approaches the sonic practices of the West. His multifaceted work addresses environmental issues as well as Indigenous identity, sovereignty, and historical narratives, through often minimal means. In Chacon’s words, “Every time I see humility within artwork, it gives me broader hope for humanity as well.”

The exhibition features, among other works, scores from the For Zitkála-Šá series (2017–2020), written for twelve Indigenous performing artists as an homage to the Yankton Dakota activist and author Zitkala-Ša (1876–1938), who explored in her books the rift between the Indigenous and majority culture. Conductus also includes …the sky ladder (2024), an installation and sculptural score created during Chacon’s residency at Lásságammi, the home of Finnish-born Sámi artist Nils Aslak Valkepäa-Áillohaš (1943–2001), and was developed in a multigenerational dialogue with the Sámi people. The sound work Aviary (2024), which recently premiered at the American Academy of Arts and Letters in New York, transforms another room of the Kunstverein into a soundscape of field recordings and replicated calls of extinct and endangered bird species. Chacon’s Report (2001/2015), is a radical and experimental composition for various firearms.

Raven Chacon is a composer as well as a performance and installation artist. From 2009 to 2018, he was a member of the artist collective Postcommodity, with whom he realized, among other projects, Repellent Fence (2015), a temporary monument consisting of 26 tethered balloons spanning the U.S.–Mexico border near Agua Prieta (Sonora) and Douglas (Arizona). Chacon has released over eighty compositions on various international labels. In 2022, he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music for his work Voiceless Mass. His opera Sweet Land (2020), co-composed with Du Yun, was named Opera of the Year 2021 by the Music Critics Association of North America.

With Conductus, Kunstverein Hannover presents Raven Chacon’s first solo exhibition in German-speaking countries, curated by Kunstverein Hannover’s director Christoph Platz-Gallus with support by Carlota Gómez, curator Kunstverein Hannover.

Performance: August 2, 7pm, Künstlerhaus
Raven Chacon in collaboration with the Ukrainian choir Kalyna, Heimatmelodie, and jazz choir After Six, coordinated by composer Anja Ritterbusch

Solo performance: August 8, 7pm, Künstlerhaus
Raven Chacon

The project is made possible through the support of the Ministry of Science and Culture of Lower Saxony, VGH Stiftung, and UNESCO City of Music Hannover.

Press contact: Nane Anna Bohn, presse@kunstverein-hannover.de

Design: Grupa Ee, 2025