For 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 MoreHoused at the Tyler School of Art, reForm tells the story of Fairhill Elementary’s untimely closure and of the students evicted. Fairhill was but one of two dozen schools shut down by the city of Philadelphia due to budgetary concerns in 2013. The school remains closed to this day. Osorio collaborated with teachers, students, parents, and neighbors to retrieve abandoned items from the school and create a work of installation art that would decry the injustice Osorio saw in the closing of Fairhill.
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 MoreThough varied in media, all the works selected are figurative and highly literal, and contextualize black identity and female identity through the lens of burden, even as a burden unto itself, a trope that can be both stereotypical and empowering.
Read MoreThe paintings share a single attribute, which animates and adds coherence to the collection: they are bold. Even when they are humble or uncertain, they bespeak grandeur.
Read More“I didn’t see my life going anywhere,” said Lugo, who grew up in a series of burned out and damaged homes that his father—a Pentecostal preacher, factory worker, and occasional vendor—was repairing.
Read MoreBoth Báez and García are currently based in New York City, and their reflections on the island of their birth are shaped by that geographic distance. Water features prominently in their work, the ocean that surrounds their island but also which separates them from it.
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