Marie Watt’s solo exhibition, Storywork: The Prints of Marie Watt, From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation, opens at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Portland State University on August 26 - December 6, 2025.
“Multimedia artist Marie Watt is a storyteller. As a member of the Seneca Nation (one of six Indigenous nations that form the Haudenosaunee Confederacy) with German-Scots ancestry, she tells stories that draw from both Native and non-Native traditions: Greco-Roman myth, pop music and Pop art, Indigenous oral narratives, Star Wars and Star Trek.
Watt reminds us of the stories told by her Seneca ancestors: how the world came to be; what we have to learn from animals; our ethical obligations to the planet, as well as to past and future generations. She tells stories about humble, everyday materials and objects—blankets, quilts, corn husks, letters, ladders, dream catchers—that carry intimate meanings and memories.
Over the course of her career, Watt has told these stories through prints. The collaborative printmaking process is consistent with Watt’s desire to build communities through art and storytelling. The stories the prints tell are personal, cultural, and universal, dealing with elemental themes including shelter, dreams, the earth and sky, the cosmos.
As a Klamath elder once told her: “My story changes when I know your story.”
Since this exhibition debuted in 2022, Marie Watt’s repertoire of stories has continued to expand and grow. In our presentation of the exhibition at the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Portland State University, we have the privilege of including new work Watt has created over the past three years, including Forest Shifts Light (Sequoia, Crest, Canopy) 2025, a jingle cloud commissioned for this presentation. We are further honored to present this exhibition in Watt’s hometown—she was born in the Pacific Northwest and has called Portland home for almost thirty years.”
For more information: https://sites.google.com/pdx.edu/jsma-at-psu/storywork-the-prints-of-marie-watt?authuser=0
Storywork: The Prints of Marie Watt, From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation
August 26 - December 6, 2025
Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art at Portland State University
1855 SW Broadway
Portland, OR 97201