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Wu Hung’s Contemporary Chinese Art will be required reading for anyone wanting an introduction to the subject, and will also be useful to readers who want to understand the history of international art of the period, since Wu presents Western movements with as much clarity as he charts the uses Chinese artists made of them. It is a more nuanced and complete picture of a recent art culture than any other I know. The essays in The Dynamic Library present a variety of historical and theoretical approaches in clear language that are likely to interest scholars in the humanities, artists interested in classification, and anyone who owns enough books to be concerned with how to sort them.
Read MoreMike Durkin and the performers of The Renegade Company offered an amusing and thought-provoking interpretation of Bosch’s medieval masterpiece. The deliberately loose and open structure of the performances allowed us as audience members to pick and choose our sins, and gave us space to reflect on their meaning.
Read MoreLike Romare Bearden’s collages, Musson brings together a spirit of formal experimentation with a deep-rooted cultural awareness. The title of his canvas Knowledge God may refer to the 1995 song of the same name by Raekwon, of the Wu Tang Clan. The repeated patterns of the Coogi fragments echo like musical phrases across the canvas, creating a sort of sweater sound collage. Just as Bearden’s collages often evoke sense of communal ritual (as in his series, The Prevalence of Ritual), Musson draws on shared reference points that span high-brow to low-brow to create visually arresting and thought-provoking work.
Read MoreFor over forty years, Quentin Morris has explored the possibilities of blackness. Larry Becker and Heidi Nivling have selected twelve of Morris’ works, dating as far back as 1980 and as recently as March, 2016, in the current exhibition, “Quentin Morris, Untitled.” I found this thoughtfully organized show moving and meditative. While all the pieces belong to the same dark universe, each one draws the viewer in with its subtle variations of shape, texture, and tone.
Read MoreAnd perhaps this last is one of the most significant points the exhibition makes: despite an international interest in the commercial vernacular and the visual impact of the media, the works in the exhibition can only be truly understood within the cultures that produced them. This leaves serious viewers with the realization that the information in many of the introductory labels is insufficient background for a real understanding of the art and how it functioned in its native territory.
Read MoreThe film has been widely described as a Nigerien remake of Prince’s iconic 1984 film, “Purple Rain,” shot in Tuareg and French with English subtitles. The music is intoxicatingly groovy. The visuals are dreamy and striking. And my feelings after seeing the film are absolutely electric–like the guitars.
Read MoreBetween and among the bodies, repeated patterns emerge and tensions twist. Each human interaction—which depends on the particular people attending—can be analyzed in terms of the submission and dominance of the players.
Read MoreLocated in a charming 2-story carriage house behind the Keefe’s house on a quiet residential street, the space was light-filled and welcoming on a recent Sunday afternoon when I visited to see the two person exhibit of works by Anne Canfield and Gary Petersen.
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