Sacred Datura

In his sculpture, JK Inson incorporates multiple dimensions, perspectives, and ages. With a Master of Arts in Anthropology, Inson is inspired and intrigued by history, culture, and the art that weaves our stories. His work considers the way other eyes see, the way others live, and another time in the present moment.

“I like art that represents something we see a lot, but that looks at it in a different way,” Inson says. In his stone sculptures of the southwestern plant the datura wrighti, or sacred datura, he considers its many uses; the Zuni, Chumash, Tongva, and other Native American tribes have used it for ceremonial and magical purposes – to hex and break hexes, for protection, divination, dreams. The perennial plant is sweetly fragrant but also poisonous; a hallucinogenic that transcends our particular sense of reality, and a striking flower that Inson morphs naturally into stone.

We encourage you to stop by the gallery to look at these sculptures, to see this embodiment of otherness, ancient and new, contemplative and vivid.