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Janet Goldner engages in long-term collaborations, particularly with Malian artists. They are all, at the same time, researcher and object of research producing dialogue and concrete works of art. Working transculturally unites people from different cultures, education, histories. The exchange of perspectives and contexts can highlight global similarities and specific cultural differences as contributors think together, contributing beliefs and strategies from their individual experiences.  As the work continues over a long period of time, the result can be an identity that is not exclusively linked to a geographic location or ethnicity but to new cultural and conceptual realms.

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Since her 1995 Fulbright Senior Research Fellowship, Janet has spent several months in Mali every year working on a variety of projects across sectors. An active participant in both American and Malian culture over the last twenty years, Janet’s world view is simultaneously American and Malian. Her collaboration with Malian artists has been the key to her experience and understanding of wider Malian culture.

Janet says. “We have let each other into our lives and our artistic process so all are simultaneously researcher and subject. Our common purpose has to do with cultural preservation. This work involves research into the past and bringing our findings into the present and the future as saved artifacts and concepts, ways of thinking and being and as contemporary works of art.“