Twin Cities icon Scott Seekins created this body of work as an alternative to Minnesota’s tepid 2012 150-year remembrance of the Great Sioux Uprising of 1862. It is being exhibited in its entirety for the first time at Flanders & Associates.
 
In The New Eden, Scott Seekins investigates an infamous chapter of Minnesota history. His artworks delve into the Great Sioux Uprising of 1862, which began along the Minnesota River in southwest Minnesota, bringing about a mass execution of 38 Dakota men on December 26, 1862, in Mankato, Minnesota. Brutalities continued to be perpetrated by both sides until the Jeffersonian westward expansion was complete.
 
Interspersing images of settlers, Native Americans, religious missionaries and American soldiers as well as symbols from those cultures, Seekins acerbically shows how ideologies were twisted to justify neglect of treaty agreements, land grabs, armed conflict and genocide. Although these artworks are in part historical reflections, they also hold significant contemporary meaning.