Shaper of God
American Artist
Shaper of God is an exhibition by American Artist (they/them) that culminates a multi-year and multidisciplinary project inspired by the life and work of science fiction writer Octavia E. Butler (b. 1947, Pasadena, CA). Building upon previous exhibitions of this project at REDCAT, Kadist and LACMA, this presentation will be the most comprehensive to date, and be accompanied by a monograph published by Pioneer Works Press, providing a new vantage point into an expansive project rooted equally in biography and fiction.
Shaper of God derives its title from an epitaph found in a religious text written by Lauren Oya Olamina, the protagonist of Butler’s Parable of the Sower (1993)—a novel set in a post-apocalyptic America. Threatened by dire instability caused by climate change, corporate greed and wealth inequality, Olamina and her community flee their breached city of Robledo and trek across a dystopian California, eventually starting a new religion that calls on its followers to depart Earth in the pursuit of a new beginning. As Artist notes in their monograph, “[Butler] continues to influence artists—especially Black, feminist, queer, and politically engaged speculative artists—who are drawn to her empathetic yet stark narratives about humanity’s perilous patterns and blindspots… The Parable series, set in Los Angeles in 2024, suggests that building community is [our] best chance for survival. It warns that when demagogues and oligarchs hold power and oppose everything you value, you’d better have an escape plan.”
A key emphasis in Shaper of God is the resonance between the speculative worlds of Butler’s fiction and the intimate details of her personal life. Artist examines biographical details from Butler’s lived experiences to understand how the radical political possibilities in her fiction were made possible, for example, by the support provided by her mother and grandmother. In Estella Butler's Apple Valley Autonomy (2024)—exhibited at Pioneer Works for the first time—Artist used AI tools to generate an image of Butler’s grandmother’s chicken coop, which then became a visual reference for the sculptural installation they created. The work also nods towards the extensive research that Artist conducted at the Octavia E. Butler Collection at the Huntington Library by situating rows of archive file folders within its interior.
Rather than treat the Butler Collection solely as a reference, Artist incorporates archival materials into the exhibition by recreating them in their own hand. Using stationary from the Huntington Library, they meticulously hand-traced over documents and ephemera found in the archive. Presented in vitrines that recall the library’s decor, these drawings reanimate details and objects from Butler’s life by bringing them into dialogue with the artworks in the exhibition.
Notably, Artist shares biographical kinship with Butler in that both grew up in Pasadena, California, attended the same high school there and are descendants of Black Southern families who migrated westward to California. This shared connection manifests in a pair of sculptures within the exhibition, in which regional species of agave plants appear as bases of Los Angeles municipal bus stop signage that Butler once waited next to on her way to John Muir High School, Pasadena City College and the Los Angeles Public Library. Shaper of God was born out of Artist’s interest in understanding how the specificities of their birthplace, from the roads to the institutions, fauna and political climate, impacted Butler as an adolescent who aspired to be a full-fledged writer.
Similarly, the four videos on view mine the history of Pasadena—the site of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab—and its influence on Butler’s writings about space exploration in her novels. Pasadena’s history as a hot-bed of the rocket science industry is inflected with references to the attempts by present-day billionaires to remake space exploration in their own image. In The Monophobic Response (2024), Artist combines a two-channel video, birthed from a performance commissioned by LACMA’s Art + Tech Lab, with a sculptural installation to consider the spiritual, political and material necessity of leaving Earth—not in search of a new colonial frontier, but as a response to the planet’s destruction.
The multidisciplinary scope of Shaper of God extends through Artist’s first monograph, which expresses their process of engaging with Butler’s life and creative output. Edited and designed by Zainab Aliyu and featuring original essays and reprinted writings by Taylor Renee Aldridge, Lou Cornum, Tananarive Due, Alexis Pauline Gumbs, Ayana Jamieson and Fred Moten, the publication combines scholarly insights with images culled from Artist’s own archive of artworks, text message exchanges, desktop screenshots, sketches and research materials. The book will be a hallmark of a reading room environment set within the exhibition, where audience members can further engage with volumes about Butler and other related topics.
Like the reading room and the monograph, the exhibition’s related programming series will offer visitors a variety of ways to engage with the material and conceptual landscapes of Shaper of God. This includes an installment of Warpmode, inspired by the titular, conceptual card game created by Black Beyond; co-presented by ONX and Pioneer Works, the program will pitch Artist and Jazsalyn in a dialogue about Afropocalypse. Contemporary science fiction author N.K. Jemison will also engage with Janna Levin, Director of Sciences at Pioneer Works, in a new iteration of the ongoing series Science vs. Fiction.
About the Artist
American Artist makes thought experiments that mine the history of technology, race and knowledge production, beginning with their legal name change in 2013. Their artwork primarily takes the form of sculpture, software and video.
Artist is a recipient of the 2024 Trellis Art Fund and the New York City Artadia Award. They are a grantee of Creative Capital and the Herb Alpert Award in Visual Art. They are a former resident of Smack Mellon, Red Bull Arts Detroit, Abrons Art Center, Recess, EYEBEAM, Pioneer Works and the Whitney Museum Independent Study Program. They have exhibited at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Studio Museum in Harlem, Kunsthalle Basel, Switzerland and the Nam June Paik Art Center, Seoul. Their work has been featured in The New York Times, Cultured, Artforum and Art in America. Artist is on the board of the School for Poetic Computation and is a faculty at the Yale School of Art.
American Artist: Shaper of God is curated by Vivian Chui and is made possible with support from Creative Capital Foundation and the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Foundation. It is also made possible with, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in Partnership with the City Council, as well as the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.