For more than a decade, Indiana-born Samuel Levi Jones has created abstract assemblages with found printed and bound matter, deconstructing encyclopedias, law books, medical texts, and other didactic materials. Jones removes their fabric covers and pulps their pages, sewing these swatches together and applying paper pulp to create texturally rich, collaged works with raw edges, loose threads, and worn surfaces. His process of physically destroying archival materials and reconstructing them into artworks constitutes a materially engaged critique of institutional authority, reflecting on systems of knowledge that uphold power and privilege in the United States. For his exhibition at the Eskenazi Museum, Jones mined the museum’s collection for works that resonate with the themes he interrogates, including nationalism and patriotism, censorship, and the representation marginalized identities in historical narratives. Borrowing its title from the ideas of the influential French philosopher Michel Foucault, Samuel Levi Jones: An Archaeology of Knowledge comprises ten years of Jones’ investigations into the underlying structures that shape how we see, speak, and think about culture, politics, and power.
