george emilio sanchez

Writer, performance artist, and social justice advocate george emilio sanchez confronts the ways the courts have historically diminished the tribal sovereignty of Native nations, juxtaposing this against his experiences navigating generational trauma and Indigenous identity in an Ecuadorian immigrant household.

Part history, part autobiography, In the Court of the Conqueror is a multidisciplinary experience reexamining place and its relationship to the past and present historical conflicts of Indigenous lands. This is the second installment of sanchez’ series, Performing the Constitution, reflecting on the ways institutional racism and gender bias are embedded in this nation’s foundational document.

As part of sanchez’s artistic research for this performance work, he enrolled in a masters of legal studies program in Indigenous Peoples Law during the early months of the Covid-19 pandemic. He completed his degree in August 2021 and received his diploma in May 2022 from the University of Oklahoma, College of Law. 

In the Court of the Conqueror was created in collaboration with visual artist Patty Ortiz. As an integral part of the creative process of making this piece, the two artists traveled across seven states and the ancestral homelands of Native nations, where the Supreme Court cases cited in the work took place. 

About the Performance

george emilio sanchez was first introduced to me by an old mutual friend. sanchez' work over the last 40 years seeks to tell the stories created by the laws of this country. In the Court of the Conqueror melds stories from a dozen Tribes, in addition to his own. As we seek to understand one another, as institutions like Virginia Tech seek to come to terms with the wealth they received at the cost of the first nations of this land, context such as what is presented by sanchez' storytelling must be a part of our journey.

— Andre Bouchard, guest curator

george emilio sanchez

sanchez was born in Los Angeles; raised in Orange County, California; and became a New York transplant in 1978. He began making original pieces in 1992 and continues making performance work and social justice projects. 

He has been the performance director of EmergeNYC under the umbrella of the Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics since 2008. This three-month program works with cohorts of 16 to 20 national and international participants to explore the intersection of arts and activism. He also teaches performance and arts education at the College of Staten Island/City University of New York. 

sanchez’s work has been presented by theatres and museums in over 25 states and has received support from National Performance Network, the Fulbright Program (Peru), New York Foundation for the Arts, the Jerome Foundation, and the Rockefeller Foundation. sanchez has been an artist-in-residence at Brooklyn Arts Exchange, Abrons Arts Center, Dixon Place, Dance Theater Workshop, Pergones Theater, the MacDowell Colony, Tigertail Productions (Miami), Dance Umbrella (Austin), Centro Cultural de la Raza (San Diego), and Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center (San Antonio). 

This is george emilio sanchez's first performance at the Moss Arts Center.

Photos by Maria Baranova, courtesy of Abrons Arts Center, New York City, and the artist