studio magazine fall/winter 2005-06

The Studio Museum in Harlem Magazine / Fall Winter 200506

/ Fall Winter 20

0506

COLLECTORSISSUE

The 2005-2006 Artists-in-Resi-dence have a lot to live up to, but Im sure that their work will exceed our greatest expectations. I am thrilled to introduce Rashawn Grifn, Clifford Owens and Karyn Olivier to our program and sup-porters. Please keep an eye out for these great talents around the museum.

And nally, I would like to take a moment to remember the won-derful legacy of Joyce Wein, a member of the Studio Museums Board of Trustees for the past 11 years. (See page 40 for a beautiful remembrance of a truly wonderful woman.) She will be sorely missed here at the Studio Museum.

See you around and denitely uptown ...

Hank Willis ThomasLiberation of T.O.: Aint no way Im gon in back tawork famassa in dat darn eld

2004Courtesy of the artist and Jack Shainman Gallery, New York, NY

I want to thank all of the support-ers of the Frequency exhibition for their unwavering support and their considerable generosity: The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, The Peter Norton Family Foundation, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation and David Teiger.

This has been a momentous year for our Artists-in-Resi-dence, both past and present. Kehinde Wiley (2001-2002) recently produced all of the artwork for the VH1 Hip-Hop Honors, a ceremony honoring the great talents of the hip-hop

SMH Board of Trustees

Raymond J. McGuire ChairmanCarol Sutton Lewis Vice-ChairReginald Van Lee Treasurer Gayle Perkins AtkinsKathryn C. ChenaultPaula R. CollinsGordon J. Davis Anne B. EhrenkranzSusan Fales-HillDr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr.Sandra GrymesJoyce Haupt Arthur J. Humphrey,Jr.George L. Knox Nancy L. LaneDr. Michael L. LomaxTracy MaitlandRodney M. MillerEileen Harris NortonCorine PetteyDavid A. RossCharles A. Shorter, Jr.Ann TenenbaumJohn T. ThompsonMichael WinstonKaren A. Phillips ex-ofcioHon. Kate D. Levin ex-ofcio

Studio Ali Evans Editor-in-chiefSamir S. Patel Copy editorRujeko HockleyJared RowellEditorial AssistantsOriginal Design Concept 2x4, New York Art Direction and DesignMap, New York

Printing Cosmos Communications, Inc.

Studio is published three times a year by The Studio Museum in Harlem, 144 West 125th St., New York, NY 10027. Copy-right 2005 Studio Magazine. All material is compiled from sources believed to be reliable, but published without respon-sibility for errors or omissions. Studio assumes no responsibil-ity for unsolicited manuscripts or photographs. All rights, includ-ing translation into other lan-guages, reserved by the pub-lisher. Nothing in this publication may be reproduced without the permission of the publisher. Please email comments to [email protected].

From the Director

Thelmas photo: Timothy Greeneld-Sanders

Julie Mehretu: Jerry L. Thompson

Kehinde Wiley: Biggie Smalls / 2005courtesy of Deitch Projects and Kehinde Wiley Studios

Cover image: Jeff Sonhouse / Inauguration of the Solicitor / 2005 / Collection of David Beitzel, New York

When it comes to art, never say never. After the tremendous success of Freestyle in 2001, I had both privately and publicly acknowledged that there might no longer be a need for me to organize group shows featuring the works of emerging black artists. At the time, I argued that what the Studio Museum needed most was original ideas that differ from everything we had done before. While I still feel the need to express our museums mission in as many innovative ways as possible, I continued to see so much incredible artwork that I couldnt resist the opportunity to present a group show that highlighted the best new artists I could nd. Along with Christine Y. Kim, the Studio Museums Associ-ate Curator, I am happy that I changed my mind as we present Frequency, a new show that continues the Studio Museums support of young talent.

Frequency should not be misconstrued as Freestyle II; it is not a reprise, nor is it a continuation of the themes that the Freestyle artists explored in 2001. These are different artists exploring a range of ideas in a

wide variety of media. However, I do believe that Frequency is a snapshot of the current moment we live in, and just as Freestyle ushered in a new generation of artists, I believe we are about to become acquainted with some of the most exciting new voices in contemporary art.

community, including LL Cool J, Salt-n-Pepa and Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. If you have seen reproductions of these paintings on billboards and in subway stations around New York City, you can attest to their breathtaking beauty and originality. Kehindes work is always thought-provoking and I truly look forward to what he comes up with next.

It is with great pride that I also congratulate artist Julie Mehretu on her being awarded a MacArthur genius grant this past September. Julie has a long, rich history with the Studio Museum as an Artist-in-Resi-dence (2000-2001) and as a part of 2001s Freestyle. I am thrilled that the MacArthur Foun-dation recognized the talents of an important artist such as Julie Mehretu.

Operation of the Studio Museum in Harlem is supported with public funds provided by The New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency. Major funding is also provided by The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation and The Carnegie Corporation of New York, with additional support from The New York Times Company Foundation, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation, JP Morgan Chase, LEF Foundation, The Scherman Foundation, Inc.,

gifts in memory of Joyce Wein, estate of Irene Wheeler; Goldman, Sachs & Co., American Express Company; Clifford L. Alexander, Altria Group Inc.,Bank of America, The Cowles Charitable Trust, Credit Suisse First Boston, New York Stock Exchange Foundation, Pzer, Inc., The Norman and Rosita Winston Founda-tion, Inc., Lord & Taylor, Pierre and Maria-Gaetana Matisse Foundation, The Moodys Foundation, Morgan Stanley Foundation and The Young & Rubicam Foundation.

The Studio Museum in Harlem is proud to be a cultural arts partner of WNYC, New York Public Radio.

02 / whats up Frequency / Harlem Postcards 14 / upcoming exhibitions Energy / Experimentation: Black Artists and Abstraction, 1964 1980 / Africa Comics 16 / artists-in-residence 19 / elsewhere Sam Gilliam / Yinka Shonibare / Snap Judgements / Edgar Arceneaux / Thornton Dial / Faith Ringgold / Slavery in NY / Malcom X / Margaret Garner 22 / feature A Portrait of the Artist 34 / The Frequency of Black Art Shows 36 / catalogue excerpt 37 / feature Joyce Wein 38 / artist commission Mark Bradford Willard Brown 40 / icon Gordon Parks 42 / feature wePod 47 / prole More in Store 48 / 3 questions Robin Rhode 49 / collection on loan 50 / prole Kadir Nelson 51 / coloring page 52 / education 53 / public programs 54 / artist abroad Camille Norment 55 / harlem where were at 60 / museum store 62 / ask a security ofcer

The Studio Museum in Harlem Magazine / Fall Winter 200506

Xiomara De Oliver Allegory of Some Bombshell Girls-only in amingo grass, (detail), 2005 courtesy of the artist and Angles Gallery, Santa Monica, CA

Studio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 20050603 / 02 / whats up

Frequency: November 9, 2005March12, 2006

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Frequency is a survey of new work by 35 emerging artists. Living and working in the United States and ranging in age from 25 to 46, these artists work in all media. Their inuences vary from folktales to hip-hop, from non-western aesthetics to abstract painting, and from tattoo design to album covers. With more than 85 works in painting, drawing, sculpture, photography, video, digital animation and mixed media, Frequency exemplies the non-thematic, non-linear climate of contemporary art today. The Studio Museums groundbreaking exhibition Freestyle (2001) identied a group of young artists who emerged as the next genera-tion of indicators and pacesetters. Freestyle had an immense impact on the understanding of contemporary black art and this Museums relationship to it. It brought into the public consciousness the concept of post-black, a term coined by Studio Museum Director and Chief Curator Thelma Golden. This curatorial concept identied a generation of black artists who felt free to abandon or confront the label of black artist, preferring to be understood as individuals with complex investigations of blackness in their work. Post-black art became a stance in the quest to dene ongoing changes in African-American art, and ultimately became part of the perpetual redeni-tion of blackness in contemporary culture. This widely debated idea took on a life of its own in the public realm, not only in art, but also in popular culture and cultural studies. Nearly ve years later, Frequency (commonly mistaken as Freestyle II) continues this tradition with a new group of artists. Co-curated by Thelma Golden and Christine Y. Kim, Associate Curator, there are no prevailing themes in this exhibition, except perhaps an overwhelming sense of individuality. As its title suggests, Frequency pinpoints and assimilates divergent sounds, situations and phenomena. The usesof imagery and materials in this exhibition are wide-ranging and experimental: rhinestones, sand, matches, cowrie shells, handmade set designs, appropriated sports footage, family snapshots, found objects from the 1950s, 60s and 70s, and black contemporary and historical icons such as Harriet Tubman, Paul Robeson, John Coltrane and Terrell Owens. In each work, aspects of American culture are re-imagined and rened for new purposes. Since opening in 1968, the Museum has played a catalytic role in its support and presentation of diverse works by established and emerging black artists. Frequency continues the Studio Museums role as a site for the dynamic exchange of ideas about art and society. Frequency is funded in part by The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, The Peter Norton Family Foundation, The Horace W. Goldsmith Foundation and David Teiger.

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01 / Demetrius Oliver TillCourtesy of Inman Gallery, Houston, TX2003/2005

02 / Rodney McMillian chair Collection of Gaby and Wilhelm Schuermann, Aachen, Germany2003

03 / Zo Charlton Blow (Undercover Series)2005

04 / Wardell Milan Burning Giraffe: Love pt. 4Courtesy of the artist and Taxter & Spengemann, New York, NY2005

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01 / Xiomara de Oliver Love Nuggets Courtesy of the artist and Angles Gallery, Santa Monica, CA2004

02 / Robert A. Pruitt CEO Portrait (Talented 10th Series) Collection of David Alan Grier, Los Angeles, CA2004

03 / Leslie Hewitt riffs on real time (2 of 10) 2002-05

04 / Wayne Hodge Doppelganger (video still)2004

05 / Roberto Visani Corner Cutters 2005

06 / Hank Willis Thomas Branded Head Collection of The Studio Museum in Harlem. Museum purchase made possible by a Gift from Anne Ehrenkranz, New York.2003-05

07 / Jeff Sonhouse Inauguration of the Solicitor Collection of David Beitzel, New York2005

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01 / Kwabena Slaughter Span2004

02 / Sedrick E. Huckaby A Love Supreme 2003

03 / Rashawn Grifn Untitled (portrait) 2002-03

04 / Nick Cave Sound Suit Courtesy of Jack Shainman Gallery, New York, NY2004

05 / Jonathan Calm Scratching Chance (video still) Courtesy of Caren Golden Fine Art, New York, NY2005

06 / Xaviera Simmons High Seasoned Brown 2004

07 / Jefferson Pinder Invisible Man (video still) 2005

08 / Kalup Linzy Conversations wit de Churen III: da Young and da Mess (video still) 2005

09 / Shinique Amie Smith Bale Variant No. 0006 2005

10 / Lester Julian Merriweather Meredith 2005

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01 / William Vil-lalongo The Centaurs Kiss2005

02 / Mickalene Thomas Instant Gratication (Brawling Spitre Series) 2005

03 / Jina Valentine Appetite for Destruction: Top 40 Best Selling Albums Ever 2005

04 / Marc Andr Robinson Untitled (Crusade Fragments) (1 of 9) 2005

05 / Michael Paul Britto Dirrrty Harriet Tubman (video still) 2005

06 / Isaac Diggs Bling #2 2002

07 / Nyame O. Brown Battle for the break of dawn...it goes on, an on, an on, an on... 2005

08 / Karyn Olivier DoublesCourtesy of the artist and Dunn & Brown Contem-porary Dallas, TX 2005

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01 / Nzuji de Magalhes Eta: A Proverb by my Mother (detail) 2005

02 / Paula Wilson Turf (detail) 2005

03 / Mike Cloud Untitled 2 (African Ceremonies: Volume I and II) Courtesy of the artist and Max Protetch Gallery, New York, NY2005

04 / Kianga Ford Urban Revival 2005

05 / Michael Queenland Flight of Shelves 2005

06 / Adam Pendleton History 2005 Courtesy of the artist and Yvon Lambert, New York and Paris

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Harlem Postcards13 / whats up

02 / Rashid Johnson the coolest nigga you never did see 2005

12 / whats up

Rashid JohnsonBorn 1977, Chicago, I.L. Lives and works in New York, N.Y.

As a young artist, I was rst introduced to the streets of Harlem through the lens of the photographer Roy DeCar-ava. His inuence, without question, helped mold the con-ceptual strategy that I employ today. When I made this image, I felt it was a chance to document my rst Harlem image-making experience. There is nothing more genuine than proving that you are actually in a space. I think of this photograph as an homage, a chance to visit the home of one of my heroes.

Adia MillettBorn 1975, Los Angeles, C.A. Lives and works in New York, N.Y.

As artists we often have a tendency to allow every moment, sound, image and even taste to become metaphors for the experiences and people in our lives. This familiar scene of a pigeon eating fried chicken on 132nd Street, in its absurdly simple way, captured more than words can say.

You used to be my lover.

The eastern American coastal pigeon will never hesitate to get up in your face; will eat out of the palm of your hand, but only for a little while; and will devour his distant cousin ... if deep fried.

Nadine RobinsonBorn 1968, London, EnglandLives and works in Bronx, N.Y.

National Geographic magazine, a prominent journal of photographic essays, has done many projects document-ing the cultural and physical changes in Harlem from its Renaissance to its recent neo-renaissance, and for the last couple of years theres been interest in its cache as a land and property. I hope they havent forgotten about its people.

Before I met Barry on the corner of 126th Street and Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard, I had been placing my large fake gold nuggets all over Harlem for a few days. My goal was to go shingthe nuggets would func-tion as shiny bait for people to interact with and touch, and as luck would have it, Barry was the only one who actually picked them up and offered his person for my photographic project. He was interested in the idea of oversized gold nuggets and delighted when I said that gold prospecting and mining still go on in parts of Alaska, Australia and even North Carolina. Barry wanted to buy more gold jewelry and thought of all the new pieces he could add to his meager collection of a gold cross, ring and chapereta watch ... all obviously fake ...

Barry held on to his new collection of gold and I gave my nd of large nuggets to him for sharing his time and body with me ...

Barry, the human gold detector ...

Louis CameronBorn 1973, Columbus, O.H. Lives and works in Brooklyn, N.Y.

One of the qualities of photography I like most is its ability to depict a specic moment in time, frozen, available for future generations to witness and explore. This is a qual-ity that I cherish in the photographs of James VanDerZee. His pictures of Harlem give us a window into the past and let us see the people and places that have shaped what Harlem is today. As a result, my Harlem Postcard project is a response to the photographs of VanDerZee. I have set out to rephotograph places in Harlem that VanDerZee had photographed in the past. Many of the places do not exist anymore. However, there are a few that do and have not changed much, such as The Abyssinian Baptist Church and VanDerZees old studio on Lenox Avenue, around the corner from The Studio Museum in Harlem. Yet the photograph that I chose for the postcard is a restaging of VanDerZees The Hotel Theresa, 1933.

I am primarily interested in the hotel as a link between the past and present. I am also interested in the difference in the structure between the two periods. In the original photograph the focus is Theresa Bar & Grill and Theresa Tap Room on the ground oor of the hotel, an elegant-looking establishment that appears to have catered to the guest. In the same spot today, there are Churchs Chicken and White Castle, fast food restaurants that cater to the thriving pedestrian trafc of 125th Street. The difference in these photographs illustrates the shift in business inter-est in the Harlem community. In the end, my photograph becomes yet another moment in the history of this build-ing and the Harlem community.

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01 / Louis Cameron The Hotel Theresa (after James VanDerZee)2005

03 / Adia Millett You used to be my lover 2005

04 / Nadine RobinsonGold Crush (Barry in West Harlem) 2005

FallWinter 200506


Energy / Experimentation: Black Artists and Abstraction, 1964-1980 April 5July 2, 2006

Africa Comics November 8, 2006 March 18, 2007

14 / upcoming exhibitions 15 /

In the Spring of 2006, The Studio Museum in Harlem will present Energy/Experimentation: Black Artists and Abstraction, 1964-1980, a group exhibition guest-curated by Dr. Kellie Jones.

Energy/Experimentation explores the strong voice of abstract art-making that developed during the second half of the 20th century. Working in both painting and sculpture, this group of artists committed themselves to innovation in structure and materials. While the guration of the 1960s and 1970s is well known through the works of Romare Bearden, Betye Saar or artists connected with the Black Arts Movement (the focus of the groundbreaking SMH show Tradition and Conict in 1985), less explored abstractionists, such as Sam Gilliam, William T. Williams, Al Loving, Joe Overstreet and Howardena Pindell, were steadfast in their use of non-objective visual language. Energy/Experi-mentation will present the painting and sculpture of 15 artists whose work challenged artistic, technical and social boundaries and assumptions during this period.

The Studio Museum in Harlem, in conjunction with Africa e Mediterraneo (Bologna, Italy), will present the rst exhibition of African comic art in the United States.

Africa e Mediterraneo, a non-prot cooperative, was created in 1997 to foster intercultural education between Italy and Africa, and developed the rst serious contemporary investigation of comic art in Africa today. With narrative, engaging humor, social awareness, history and myth, African comic art has achieved a wide range of recognition as both an art form and a valuable medium for cross-cultural communication. The Studio Museum in Harlem will present a selection of recent work in support of this vital art form, which is omnipresent on the African continent.

01 / William T. WilliamsTrane 1969Collection of The Studio Museum in HarlemGift of Charles Cowles

02 / Melvin EdwardsCotton Hangup 1966Collection of The Studio Museum in HarlemGift of Mr. and Mrs. Hans Burkhardt

Asimba Bathy (Democratic Republic of the Congo) Kinshasa non completa

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Meet the Studio MuseumArtists-in-Residence20052006

Rashawn GrifnBorn1980, Los Angeles, C.A.

Education2002, BFA, Painting, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, M.D. 2005, MFA, Yale University, New Haven, C.T.

In certain ways, my artistic practice is somehow comp- arable to nding ways to stake a claim in territories that are not necessarily my own. With this in mind, my mate-rials become things at hand, if not referencing my own actions. The food I eat, clothes I wear, stuff I have, these elements becoming grounding for re-interpretation of the world around.

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Karyn OlivierBorn1968, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago

Education1989, BA, Psychology, Dartmouth College, Hanover, N.H.2001, MFA, Cranbrook Academy of Art, Bloomeld Hills, M.I.

I engage objects and spaces by means of architectural alterations and interventions. The spectator is asked to cross the threshold between the exterior and interior of the installation, foregrounding a physical and psychologi-cal response to the space. My interest is in collapsing the distinctions between architecture and sculptural objects, emphasizing instead their interdependence and coalescence. This exploration into domestic spaces con-verges with my interest in nostalgia. Nostalgia functions in my work through cultural references (memory-based and imagined) and through art historical references, notably minimalism.

01 / Rashawn Grifn Fig Land 2005

02 / Rashawn Grifn Self Portrait 2005

03 / Karyn Oliver Ridgewood Line (BQT Ghost No. 6064)2004

Clifford OwensBorn1971, Baltimore, M.D.

Education19911992, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, M.D.1998, BFA, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, I.L. 2002, MFA, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, N.J.2000 2001, Whitney Museum Independent Study Program, N.Y.

If my statement read: Everything I have to say about my work can be read in the work itself, would that be an adequate artist statement? If my statement read: Every-thing I have to say about my work can be read in the work itself, and if the meaning of the work is still unclear, please refer to the work of another artist any artist, from anonymous cave painters to William Cordova and Karyn Olivier, would that be acceptable? After all, artist state-ments are less about art and more about art history, and art history is not about art, its about art history.

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04 / Karyn Oliver Untitled 2000/2005

05 / Clifford Owens Skowhegan: Studio Visit with Alix Pearlstein2004

06 / Clifford Owens Tell Me What To Do With Myself2005

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Sam Gilliam: A Retrospective @ Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. / October 15, 2005-January 22, 2006 / www.corcoran.org

This exhibition is the rst full-career retrospective of painter Sam Gilliam and is the most extensive presentation of his work to date, offering an opportunity to reassess his inno-vative ideas. Gilliam rst achieved widespread acclaim in the late 1960s with his groundbreaking draped paint-ings, which blur distinctions between painting, sculpture and architecture. In the past, critics have tended either to explain Gilliams achievements as the work of a Washing-ton Color School artist or situate his work within the con-nes of an African-American art tradition. To concentrate too much on either account is to miss the brilliance and scope of his remarkable career and his signicant contri-butions to abstraction. Gilliam will also be featured this spring in the Studio Museums Energy/Experimentation: Black Artists and Abstraction, 1964 1980.

19 / elsewhere: art beyond SMH 20 / elsewhere: art beyond SMH

Completely Biased, Entirely Opinionated Hot Picks By Thelma Golden

Heres some must-see exhibitions that Im not going to miss!

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Snap Judgments: New Positions in Contemporary African Photography and African American Vernacular Photography: Selections from the Daniel Cowin Collection @ The Inter- national Center of Photography, New York / December 9, 2005-February 26, 2006 / www.icp.org

Few curators or scholars have done more to enlarge our sense of art from the African continent than my friend Okwui Enwezor. Each of his exhibitions have expanded my view and my sense of the world immeasurably. Snap Judg-ments: New Positions in Contemporary African Photog-raphy will be the rst major U.S. presentation to focus on photo-based artwork from the African continent since 1996. Over 200 works by 35 artists from across the Afri-can continent, the majority of whom will be exhibiting in the United States for the rst time, will be presented. The exhibition will seek to dene the nature of contemporary African art, which has emerged against a background of historical change. The four sections comprising Snap Judgmentslandscape, urban formations, the body and identity, and history and representationreect important themes being addressed by African artists today.

Also on view is a presentation on vernacular photography from the ICP collection. Little is known about the private lives of African Americans in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Their social transactions took place, for the most part, outside of public view and often away from the cameras lens. This exhibition offers a glimpse into the rarely seen everyday lives of African Americans through a variety of photographic genres and poses: formal studio portraits, casual snapshots, images of children, images of uniformed soldiers, wedding portraits and South-ern-views made for tourist consumption. While some of the sitters were celebrities of their days, the majority are unnamed Americans posing for portraits. The images attest to photographys ability both to record personal his-tory for private uses and to be seen as a document of social history. This exhibition and its catalogue explore the ICPs Daniel Cowin Collection of African American History, a trove of over 2,000 postcards, stereographs, cartes-de-viste, tintypes, albumen prints and gelatin silver prints. Taken together, these ephemeral images provide an impor-tant window into African-American cultural life from 1860 to about 1930.

Studio / Fall Winter 200506

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Yinka Shonibare Selects Works from the Permanent Collection @ The Nancy and Edwin Marks Gallery, Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, New York / October 7, 2005-May 7, 2006 /www.ndm.si.edu

When artists are asked to take on museum collections, the results are often provocative and unexpected. This installation by Nigerian artist Yinka Shonibare is no exception and provides an interesting window on the collection of the Coop- er-Hewitt. Shonibare is the third guest curator in a series in the Nancy and Edwin Marks Gallery in which outside artists, writers and critics are invited to draw from Cooper-Hewitts permanent collection to create themed exhibi-tions. Shonibare has focused on modes of transportation, as exemplied by objects he has chosen relating to motion and travel and acquired by the museums founders, the Hewitt sisters. 02 / Yinka

ShonibareFigure of Eleanor Hewitt 2005

01 / Carol Harrison Sam Gilliam in his studio, photo C 2005

03 / Cindy and Nkuli Lolo Veleko 2003Courtesy Goodman Gallery,Johannesburg. Copyright Lolo Veleko

05 / Unidentied Man on a Motor-cycle Unidentied Photographer ca.1936

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Margaret Garner @ The Opera Company of Philadelphia / February 10-26, 2006 / www.operaphilly.com As a writer, Toni Morrisons words have illuminated aspects of my life and had a profound affect on me. Margaret Garner is a theatrical adaptation of her semi-nal novel, Beloved. Beyond the historical signicance and issues of law, Margaret Garner, as conceived by Richard Danielpour and Toni Morrison, will speak to audiences on a purely human level. It is an opera that confronts the remembered horrors of enslavement and Civil War-era America, while also conveying the enduring resonance and irrepressible power of the human spirit. Also, I am curious and intrigued by another musical adaptation now on BroadwayThe Color Purple. I am truly looking forward to seeing how such deeply moving words on paper can be trans-lated to the musical stage.

Faith Ringgold: Mama can sing, Papa can blow @ The Art Gallery at the Univer-sity of Maryland, College Park / October 5, 2005-December 10, 2005 / www.avtgallery.umd.edu

The exhibition highlights the renowned artists newest story quilts, paintings, drawings and prints depicting jazz music-ians and singers. The exhibition is organized in conjunction with ACA Galleries, New York.

20 / elsewhere: art beyond SMH

Thornton Dial in the 21st Century @ Museum of Fine Arts, Houston / Through January 8, 2006 / www.mfah.org

In a work by Thornton Dial, one witnesses the intense strug-gle of the artist to master the demanding materials he has deliberately acquired to make art. It is the visible tension that characterizes Dials three-dimensional works. Equally adept in the media of painting, assemblage, sculpture and works on paper, Dial creates art that is arresting for its power and insight, and for its visual ights of free-dom. Dials work can be, by turns, humorous, reective and challenging.

Slavery in New York @ The New-York Historical Society, New York / October 7, 2005-March 5, 2006 / www.nyhistory.org

The New-York Historical Society presents the story of slav-ery in this great city, a story that reveals the rich cultural

01 / Edgar Arceneaux: The Alchemy of Comedy, Stupid photographed byGrant Therkildsen 2005

02 / Ground Zero: Nighttime All Over the World Thornton Dial Sr. 2002

03 / Mama Can SingFaith Ringgold 2004

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Check ItOut !

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Malcom X: A Search for Truth @ The Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, New York / May 19, 2005-December 31, 2005 / www.nypl.org/research/sc/

I hope you all have seen the amazing exhibition on view at the Schomburg, Malcom X: A Search for Truth. If you havent, it continues to be on view until December 31, 2005. The exhibition is based in part on the collection of per-sonal and professional papers and memorabilia of Mal-colm X that was rescued from auction in 2002 and placed on deposit at the Schomburg Center by the Shabazz fam-ily. Malcolm X: A Search for Truth uses the materials from this extraordinary collection and other collections from the center. These never-before-exhibited materials pres-ent a provocative and informative perspective on the life of

Edgar Arceneaux: The Alchemy of Comedy, Stupid @ Gallery 400, Univer-sity of Illinois, Chicago / March-May 2006 / www.ulc.edu

The Alchemy of Comedy, Stupid breaks down comedy rout-ines into non-sequential segments in order to examine how a joke is structured, how a distinct mental process underlies what we routinely experience as an involuntary response. Arceneauxs video, which stars actor / comedian David Alan Grier, who worked with his own material in front of a live audience, will be presented in a gallery space trans-formed with echoes of the video shoot sites, as well as related works in sculpture and drawing.

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legacy produced by enslaved people and honors New York-ersblack and whitewho fought to erase the peculiar institution from the city and state. Material from the Soci-etys collectionledger books of slaving voyages, ads for runaway slaves, manuscript records of New Yorks rst abolition society, the rst paintings of black New Yorkers is supplemented by treasures from the British Library, the New York State Archives, Colonial Williams-burg and other great repositories.

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04 / Mrs. Pierre Toussant Anthony Meucci1920

05 / Malcolm X On University Tour Photography by Robert L. Haggins,Malcolm X Collection, Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Researchin Black Culture, The New York Public Library

the person known variously as Malcolm Little, Detroit Red, Malcolm X and El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. More signic-antly, the exhibition poses questions about the nature of the developmental journey that Malcolm Little pursued to become El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz. The subtitle, A Search for Truth, focuses the interpretive dimensions of the exhi-bition on the process and products of his driving intellec-tual quest for truth about himself, his family, his people, his country and his world.

vA PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST Its easy to become overwhelmed when faced with an en-

tity as vast as Frequency, an exhibition containing more

than 70 works of art by 35 different artists. Though unit-

ed by the fact that these 35 emerging black artists are

each creating some of the most exciting and compelling

work of 2005, there is little else to unify them. Beyond

the wide range of media represented and the diversity

of age and geography, there is an even vaster range of

inspirations and ideologies informing their practices and

production. Each artists work stems from a different

source; each is moved to create by a different impulse.

To showcase this diversity of thought and practice, we

asked each artist one question: What word or sentence

best describes your work or art practice? Their consid-

ered individual responses and self-selected visuals fol-

low below. Enjoy this window into the mind of the artist.

Rujeko Hockley, Curatorial Assistant

22 / feature 23 / Studio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 200506

Demetrius Oliver Stacked, 2004, Courtesy of Inman Gallery, Houston, TX

NICK CAVE

Shamanism.

24 / feature 25 / featureStudio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 200506

NYAME BROWN

ZO CHARLTON

Drawing is my primary studio activity. The drawings have a sketched quality that signies a subconscious process of thinking ... I am intrigued by racist and sexist jokes because, like racist imagery, they pinpoint stereotypes that affect the perceived identities of individuals ... I am dealing with visual prejudices and the relationships that we have with each other.

I make art the way I do because of the relationship I want to have with my audience.

MIKE CLOUD

Synecdoche.

ISAAC DIGGS

KIANGA FORD

Today I think the work is about feeling. Its true that its after Saids Other and after Fanons arrested gaze and after Butlers uid performativity that I set these little stages/stage these little sets; but, as a viewer, youre not supposed to be researching, or realizing, or coming to some great understanding, youre just supposed to be feeling the space and feeling yourself and feeling other people and feeling other people feeling you and maybe, only maybe, wondering what that is all about.

MICHAEL BRITTO

I like to think of my work as familiar and new.

I am trying to make African-American Allegorical Paintings, making connections to the African Diaspora to create new ways of seeing the African than through historys two dimensional stereotypes.

JONATHAN CALM

My work combines and loops images that reect and explore the layered memories of my many neighborhoods and the multiple meanings they accumulate through time.

26 / feature Studio / Fall Winter 200506 27 / feature Studio / Fall Winter 200506

Salty.

RASHAWN GRIFFIN

LESLIE HEWITT

Grounded in everyday situations.

WAYNE HODGE

A fragmented history that sits upon the throne of desire.

SEDRICK HUCKABY

Intuition / IntellectualImprovisation / ControlSpontaneity / Order.

KALUP LINZY

Organized chaos.

NZUJI DE MAGALHES

My work is a mingled documentary, a strong storyteller, and a vision- ary that shows what could only be seen in thought.

RODNEY McMILLIAN

I guess Im interested in the spaces around the corner which are some-times right in front.


LESTER MERRIWEATHER

Grind.

WARDELL MILAN

28 / feature 29 / feature

Phantasmagoric.

DEMETRIUS OLIVER

The most valuable thing is intuition. Albert Einstein

XIOMARA DE OLIVER

A queer relationship between perception & actuality.

KARYN OLIVIER

Holding pattern.

ADAM PENDLETON

LAB.

JEFFERSON PINDER

Stark.

ROBERT PRUITT

Proving that we use to exist.


MICHAEL QUEENLAND

Last night I went to a Sonic Youth concert, and there in the front row was Stanley Kubrick! With a digital camera held high over his head, making high quality boot-leg videos ... I was really shocked, but immediately wanted to see what he had done with the footage ... Somehow I knew they would be hard to nd and expensive, even for a bootlegs. The Marvin Gaye bootleg Live at The Kennedy Center 73 was at least a couple of hundred dollars on the streets.

MARC ANDR ROBINSON

Rad.

XAVIERA SIMMONS

A soul deep feeling for the black vernacular in the landscape.

KWABENA SLAUGHTER

What could a mime create if they ever stopped making that damn box.

SHINIQUE SMITH

Ecstatic.

JEFF SONHOUSE

Tenebric.

MICKALENE THOMASA representation of the beauty that is BLACK WOMAN ... she works hard for the money!



JINA VALENTINE

I excise the most idiosyncratic bits from my modern language & remix all the exquisite minutiae that is the glue between us.

WILLIAM VILLALONGO

Re-vision.

ROBERTO VISANI

Mulatto in the middle.

PAULA WILSON

Representation, ***lost love, opposition, and ownership disputes (why not repara-tions!?!).

HANK WILLIS THOMAS

Songha: The conundrum of eclectic blackness.



Its fall and its 2005. Four years after Freestyle, its survey of the new generation of emerging black artists, The Studio Museum in Harlem is presenting Frequency, the follow-up to that ground-breaking exhibition, curated by Director and Chief Curator Thelma Golden and Associate Curator Christine Y. Kim. Four years later, we once again raise the issue of the viabilitynay, the validityof all-black exhibi-tions. That premise is questioned as those of us who are

senior members of the black art community remember a time when group exhibitions of black artists were anathema and curators who dared such ventures were roundly accused of essentializing the work of black artists. So why are we doing this all over again?

There are, of course, nuances to the current situation that distinguish it from the past. Back in the 1970s, as main-stream institutions yielded to the demands of black artists for inclusiveness and diversity, black shows tended to be hodgepodges of styles and political inclinations. Figurative and abstract artists were included in the same projects, and the roster of participants was often predicated as much on

The Frequencyof Black Art Shows: Ruminations on a PhenomenonBy Lowery Stokes Sims, President, The Studio Museum in Harlem

34 / feature: from the president 35 /

an individuals willingness to be part of any given project as by any curatorial at. There could be a myriad of reasons why an individual artist would participate one time and not another. As Sam Gilliam once noted, he and Mel Edwards would consider the quality of the exhibition, the quality of the catalogue and various things like that.[1] Other art-ists worried about being ghettoized as black artists and not seen in the context of their white contemporaries who were of similar stylistic or philosophical leanings. This situation remained largely unchanged during the ensuing decades.

There were, however, glimmers of a new approach to this issue. In line with its core mission to promote black artists globally, The Studio Museum in Harlem organized all-black shows, but its directors and curators resisted the hodgepodge approach with such projects as Tradi-tion and Conict: Images of a Turbulent Decade: 1963-1973 (1985), Harlem Renaissance: Art of Black America (1988), and Explorations in the City of Light: African American Artists in Paris, 1845-1965 (1996). That same year, 1996, The Studio Museum in Harlem was also the rst venue for

01 / Lowery Stokes at the Met-ropolitan Museum of ArtPhoto: Photograph studies, The Metropolitan Museum of Art1972

03

0203 / Freestyle installation views April 28 June 24, Photo: Adam Reich2001

Freestyle Artists:

Top row: Mark S. Bradford, Susan Smith-Pinelo, Julie Mehretu, Rico Gatson, Clifford Owens, Eric Wesley, Tana Hargest, Rashid Johnson, Jennie C. Jones, Laylah Ali, Kori Newkirk, Trenton Doyle Hancock, Camille Norment, Kira Lynn Harris, Arnold J. Kemp, Sanford Biggers, Senam Okudzoto, Kojo Grifn, Jennifer Zackman, Vincent Johnson. Bottom row: John Bankston, Deborah Grant, Adia Millett, Nadine Robinson, Jerald Ieans, Louis Cameron, Dave McKenzie, Adler Guerrier. Not pictured: David Huffman.

01

In the Spirit of Resistance: African-American Modernist and the Mexican Muralist School, organized by the Ameri-can Federation of Arts, which examined long-standing re-lationships and common themes among Mexican and black American artists in the 1930s, 40s and 50s. We can also look at Afro-American Abstraction, organized at P. S. 1 in 1981 by April Kingsley, which examined abstract tendencies in the work of black artists through the lens of African art and culture. This past year, Valerie Cassels Double Con-sciousness: Black Conceptual Art since 1970 at the Contem-porary Art Museum in Houston examined this overlooked phenomenon among black artists, and The Studio Museum in Harlem takes up the cause of abstraction again in spring 2006 in Energy/Experimentation: African American Artists and Abstraction, 1964-1980, curated by Kellie Jones. This exhibi-tion can be seen as the companion to Black Romantic, which Thelma Golden organized at The Studio Museum in Harlem in 2002 to examine elements of desire and romance around black images that are particular to guration and the black experience.

All of these projects demonstrate how cogent concepts can legitimize all-black exhibitions. The viability of Frequency may then be determined in this context. If Freestyle is any indication, its reception will not be predicated on the fact of it being an all-black exhibition, but the fact that an institu-tion committed to the work of black artists is presenting some of the most dynamic new art being created today.

[1] Sam Gilliam, interview with Joseph Jacobs, Since the Harlem Renaissance: 50 years of Afro-American Art, exhib. cat. (Lewisburg, PA: The Center Gallery of Bucknell University, 1984)

02

Studio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 20050636 / catalgoue excerpt

I. A Frequency

In his 1925 manifesto, Negro Youth Speaks,1 the modernist critic Alain Locke said, The Younger Generation comes, bringing its gifts. Here we have Negro youth, with arresting visions and vibrant prophecies; forecasting in the mirror of art what we must see and recog-nize in the streets of reality tomorrow, foretelling in new notes and accents the maturing speech of full racial utterance. He continues his address to the visual arts with a thesis of deant optimism (this being 1925 in America and Locke being a black man). So, in a day when art has run to classes, cliques and coteries, and life lacks more and more a vital common background, the Negro artist, out of the depths of his group and personal experience, has to his hand almost the conditions of a classical art.

That we may nd sustenance in Lockes words 80 years later is remarkable and a testament to his prose. Picture a time when America knew little about modernism and played second ddle to Paris, even though Duchamp and his readymadeseveryday objects desig-nated as art and placed in the appropriate contextlived in New York by 1915. And the Mexican muralists went full scale in the United States by 1925. But Clement Greenberg, Americas modernist art critic of record, missed Duchamp in his little circle of taste and art for arts sake, and I forgive him for the short shrift he gave the Mexicans, whose highly political murals inuenced countless others with their own racial utterances. The space where Duchamps art of concepts and ideas intertwines with Mexican political murals nds resonance to varying degrees in all American art since World War II. And, as Leo Steinberg wrote in 1968, American art after this period

is unthinkable without this liberating impulse towards something other than art.2

Lockes words might have been taken as highly original then, but are even more prescient in the context of today. Substitute the word classical for the more theoretical present-ness of, say, paradigm-shifting and delete Negro, and the sentence could be an adequate rallying cry for the artists in this exhibition. Speaking of todays contemporary art and the occasion of this exhibition, Lockes thesis-concluding sentencewritten after the rst World War and before the Great Depressionbears strongly on the world of art and culture today. While the 2001 annihilation of the World Trade Center is the rst bookend to this essay, the other might be the credible threat of terror since thentipped off to our rich friends and museum directors (please hit me that e-mail next time) who know whats going down next week or next month on the terror front. (This excerpt is from the Frequency exhibition catalogue)

[1] Alain Locke, The Negro Youth Speaks, The Black Aesthetic, ed. Addison Gayle, Jr. (New York: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1971) 16. (Originally published in 1925 in his anthology The New Negro.)[2] Leo Steinberg, Other Criteria, Other Criteria: Confrontations with 20th Century Art (New York: Oxford University Press, 1972) 62.

An Excerpt From: A Frequency? Other Criteria, Or, Something in the Way By Franklin Sirmans

Jefferson Pinder and Jeff Stein, Carwash Meditations (video still), 2005

37 / prole

In Remembrance of Joyce Wein

The Studio Museum Harlem trustee Joyce Wein passed away in August 2005. She served on the board since 1994. ... Together with her husband George Wein, she was a tireless supporter of the museum and an important collector of modern and contem-porary art with an exemplary representation of the work of African-American artists. The Weins also helped to support the museums long-standing program Vital Expressions in American Art, by des-ignating the museum as one of the city-wide sites for the annual JVC Jazz Festival. The following reminiscence was provided by long-time friends and associates Hugh and Jewel Fierce. Mr. Fierce is the CEO of Jazz at Lincoln Center.

Joyce Wein possessed a set of values to which she quietly but tena-ciously adhered and which unerringly guided and dened who she was: truth, knowledge, honesty, hard work, giving spirit, kindness and compassion. Out of this deep well sprang a subtle but demons-trative generosity for those she loved, especially George, as well as those who needed her. She had no need of great recognition for her acts. She gave because she cared. This was the best portion of this good womans life. But, without doubt, Joyce had little toler-ance for nonsense. She had only to reach out and grab your arm tightly, hold up her hand or simply give that wide-eyed look for the recipient to know that it was time to keep quiet and listen. She was the teacher and her wisdom demanded respect.

Our friendship was not immediate, for Joyce was thoughtful, cau-tious, watchful. It evolved over the years, through many conversa-tions, some late at night over our favorite cocktail in the quiet of her lovely home in France. The better I came to know the inner re of this woman, the more I loved her, her spirit, her gusty laugh, the more I understood her concerns and joys. Preparing meals under her direct, and not-to-be-messed-with, supervision was a treat. Every-one knew how much she loved tennis, but I wonder how many knew that she was the best Scrabble player or that she enjoyed puzzles with a kazillion pieces. All fond memories.

I was with my friend the morning she received the news about her health. She took it with dignity and strength and somehow man-aged over the next years to renew her courage to face life bravely. We continued to have our talks, share laughter and have hope, but eventually it was tinged with sadness because we both understood. She is gone but we still smile at each other daily, for her picture graces the counter where I have breakfast and serves as a reminder of how precious she was and will always be. Many people will walk in and out of our lives, but only true friends leave footprints in your heart.

The better I came to know the inner re of this woman, the more I loved her, her spirit, her gusty laugh, the more I understood her concerns and joys.

Photo by Ray Llanos

Commissioned / Mark Bradford in collaboration with Willard Brown

Studio / Fall Winter 20050640 / icon Studio / Fall Winter 200506

Icon

Being a native New Yorker, I pride myself on not being shaken at the sight of a famous person on the street. We are surrounded by so many great minds, amazing actors and inspired musicians that encountering celebrity can become a regular experience. But I confess that if I ever met Gordon Parks anywhere, ever, you would think that Michael Jackson (of 1983) had just asked me to replace Ola Ray as his girlfriend in the Thriller video.

The true denition of Renaissance Man, Gordon Parks is an icon. He is a world-renowned photographer, writer, composer, director and lmmaker who, at the age of 93, continues to be a creative force. Born in Fort Scott, Kan., in 1912, Parks was one of 15 children. Taught to value honesty, education and hard work, he was shaken by the death of this mother in 1927. Sent to live with his sister in St. Paul, Minn., so he could nish high school, he found himself homeless following a dispute with his brother-in-law.

As a result, his amazing artistic career began in his teens in the most honest and utilitarian of wayshe began playing the piano and singing his own songs to make a living. I barely survived playing the piano in a brothel and washing dishes at a dingy restaurant. But an urge to create had taken hold, though the little art I had been exposed to was that found in the funny papers. The clos-est thing to classical music Id heard was the humming of june bugs in Poppas corneld.[1] Invited to join a band that later fell apart, Parks found himself stuck in Harlem.

It was there that he met his rst wife in 1933. A year later he returned to St. Paul and worked as a dining car waiter and porter on the North Coast Limited.

While working for the railroad, Parks discovered that his love for creating led him to photography. He came across a magazine that included images taken by Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans and Ben Shahn for the Farms Security Administration (FSA), an agency set up by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt as part of the Works Progress Administration. Inspired by their work, he took his rst pictures in Seattle, Wash., during a train run from St. Paul. He was given his rst show by Eastman Kodak shortly thereafter. Determined to make a career in photography, Parks was awarded a fellow-ship in 1941 to work with photographer Roy Stryker at the FSA in Washington, D.C. It was there that Parks met Ella Watson and created an image that speaks about the black experience in this countryAmerican Gothic (1942).

Parks work at FSA laid a foundation for his future. He became a photographer for the Ofce of War Informa-tion and photographed World War II black ghter pilots. His eye later landed him a job as the rst black fashion photographer for Vogue. The idea of documentary photography, however, the driving force behind his love of photography, still was important to Parks. So, in 1948 he approached Life magazine to ask for a job. Impressed by his work, they hired him the same day. His assign-

Gordon Parks

mentsdocumenting the gang crime scene in Harlem and covering upcoming Parisian fashions exhibited a duality which has spanned his entire career.

My rst intimate experience with his photographs was during the 1998 New York installation of his retrospec-tive exhibition, Half Past Autumn (1997), curated by the Corcoran Gallery, Washington, D.C. I will never forget being drawn into the splendor, motion and emotion of his images. I spent hours poring over his work, amazed at his ability to give the poorest of the poor the same sense of worth and beauty as the women in his fashion photographs. I stood for hours, developing my own relationship with Flavio da Silva and his family, and found elements of my own life in images of Harlem, Fort Scott and Paris.

But most of all, I was and am still amazed by the degree of access that this one man has. He has photographed royalty, celebrities and common folkcapturing moments that I never knew existed or would be afraid to witness.

Parks was a trailblazer not only for black artist, but for American photography as well. He was awarded the National Medal of Arts in 1988 and has received over 50 honorary doctorate degrees. In 2002, at the active age of 90, he was inducted into the International Photo-graphy Hall of Fame and Museum and received the Jackie Robinson Foundation Lifetime Achieve- ment Award.

The long list of kudos and awards do not honor his photography career alone. Parks touched our hearts and minds in The Learning Tree (1969), a lm adaptation of his autobiographical novel of the same title. Capturing his life in Fort Scott, this amazing movie, which Parks directed himself, was placed on the National Film Regis-try of the Library of Congress in 1989. And he will forever be honored in the hallowed halls of black popular culture as the director of the original Shaft (1971). This mark of distinction was recognized by director John Singleton, who included Parks in a cameo in the 2000 re-invention of the lm (remember the scene at the Lenox Lounge?).

In addition to The Learning Tree (1963), Parks has written several books including: A Choice of Weapons (1966), To Smile in Autumn (1979), Voices in the Mir-ror (1990), Arias of Silence (1994) and the catalogue accompanying his retrospective exhibition, Half Past Autumn, in 1997. And on the eve of his newest autobiog-raphy, A Hungry Heart, A Memoir, and book of poetry and images, Eyes with Winged Thoughts, The Studio Museum and his self-proclaimed greatest fan pause to recognize the amazing work, life and creative spirit of Mr. Gordon Parks. [1] Gordon Parks, Half Past Autumn (Boston: Bulnch Press, 1998).

Jonell Jaime Manager of School , Family and Youth Programs

Photo by Johanna Fiore

MENU/PLAY >I put my iPod on a timeout. Every time I took it out for a walk it was too demanding, refusing to share my ears. I was missing something, needed more. But how can we resist the sexiness of orchestrating the soundtracks for our own movies, our names forever above the titles. Forget the extras. A cat on its eighth life has no time for curiosity. Hip Hop. Blues. Rap. Rock. Jazz. Folk. They are all around me, providing lifes playlist, forever on shufe. But try as I may, I cant truly hear them with plugged ears.


wePod. Harlem. Shufe.

Were pleased to introduce this new feature, which pairs contemporary visual artists with writers. For this debut edition, contemporary photographer Kira Lynn Harris provided 10 of her images of Harlem to novelist Brian Keith Jackson, who responded with his words.

Heres what they both had to say.

FORWARD >Outside my window, ve oors down yet rising to greet me, a horn blows. Its not Ellington and Coltrane. Rather, Dizzy. Cheeks and all. This is how I choose to interpret the sound, how I salve annoyance. I neednt get up from my desk to inquire why this horn is blowing. I know the story well. Alternate Side Parking. Some-one has double-parked on the dirty side of the street, leaving another motionless. There is a time to be silent, but for the player of the horn, this is not it. We are not always the only obstacles in our way. Eventually some-one comes. Riffs are exchanged. The blowing stops. The spit is disposed. Freedom.

SHUFFLE >Come back to the Lord. Get your latest gospel CDs, says the curbside prophet in front of the historic Hotel Theresa. His suitcase is loaded with music keen to spread the Word. When the word on the street is still C-R-E-A-M. Cash rules everything around me. Gospel CDs. Three for ve. Get em while theyre hot. Sudd-enly the prophet zips up his suitcase. It is not the spirit that moves him. Its the approaching policeman.

SHUFFLE >The African women measuring heads along 125th Street no longer call out to me. My hair is too short even for their expert ngers. No tweets or cahnrows will they sing. My hair, at this length, provides no cowrie shells. They will give me time, hoping I will nd my way back. Perhaps I will. Im an inch away. Cornrows. Ill tell her, Not too tight. She will say, Okay. I will still feel the pull. Even the ghetto facelift needs healing time. I will know the instant my head is worthy again. In harmony, a mass choir of women will appear as I make my way around the neighborhood. They wont miss a beat. An old song new. Tweets. Cahnrows. Harlem has a history of measuring heads. While a student at Barnard, Zora Neale Hurston was sent to measure them on this very street. One of her professors believed Negroes were less intelligent due to head size. Absurd, yes, but she measured with aplomb. She had tuition to pay. Zora, like the African women, paid attention, never wasting an opportunity to move ahead.


By Kira Lynn Harris and Brian Keith Jackson >

SHUFFLE> We now have almost as many drugstores in the neigh-borhood as churches. A young woman, in the latest designer attire, has been detained for allegedly shop-lifting in Duane Reade. Allegedly, is a musical word; it skips off the tongue. Its denition: we have permission to embarrass and fuck you up, without liability. Okay, those arent the exact words that Mr. Webster used, but some Liberties must be taken. Security stands with the woman. She is not having it. She calls someone on her cell phone, telling them to come. I envision a huge SUV rolling up on the sidewalk, rims spinning, speak-ers pumping Kanye Wests Gold Digger. Its about to be on. Up in heah, up in heah. She closes her phone. I wait in line as I watch. I hate scenes like this. I have been falsely accused before. According to statistics, many just like me have been detained. I give her the benet of the doubt. They want to look in her bag. She refuses. Credit or Debit? asks the cashier ringing me up. Debit, I say. Im buying oss. On closer inspec-tion lets go to the video they nd no stolen goods. She is let go. We walk out at the same time. Are you okay? I ask. Oh, Im ne. But they bout to catcha case. My ears are now tuned enough to know that she does not mean the bird u.

SHUFFLE >I go into a local caf. Classical music plays. A fugue. Two women are sitting a table away, Citarella bags at their feet. While some people in the neighborhood pass the day on a park bench, swapping tales and gossip, these ladies do so over lunch. Like the women before her and the women before her, shes a white wine drunk. But since she only drinks white wine she doesnt con-sider herself a drunk. It is true. She can hold her wine. But just like the women before her, its her pills that fuck her up. Oh Lawd, your blues aint like mine?

SHUFFLE >I walk through Mount Morris, Marcus Garvey, Mount Morris Park. This parks name has been changed so much it would make P. Diddy, Puff Daddy, Sean Combs, envious. Change does happen. Ive always been fond of this park. Ive watched it turn from dirt to grass. Its a windy fall day and the leaves sing and dance. Wind chimes. There is a rhythm in the drift of a falling leaf. While growing up in Louisiana Id heard that if you catch a falling leaf, its good luck. I also learned that luck stems from perseverance. Your number will hit. A woman and man are walking toward me. I cant tell how old they are. Time has not been their keeper. Thats Rock & Roll, Baby. Why you always talkin down to me, like I dont know shit, says the man to the woman. Just cuz you get upn look in tha toilet, dat dont make you no expert on shit, says the woman to the man. They scurry past me, scanning the ground like squirrels seeking their harvest. I crack a smile, pleased I was there to catch their repartee. I will steal, er, appropriate, er, sample, their words, and use them at some point. In Harlem, everything seems up for grabs.

SHUFFLE >The sun is setting. Night, soon come. The clouds and the color of the sky merge. Its a picture God created and pollution intensied. Children are playing on the street, cherishing the last days of warmth. Soon it will be too cold to just chill. From a window, one of the children has been called home. It seems kids are older now. They move as they please. So the child tarries, not heeding his mothers summons. It is not long before she appears, but not at the window this time. Hes not as grown as hed like it believed. I watch the scene. I listen. The mother and son make their way into their building. Ah, man, says one of the boys cronies.

Aint nothin worsen havin yo mama beat yo assn tha streetn front of everbody. Another rings in as their jeers rise, Wit rollasn huh hair. They all laugh, as kids should, when given the opportunity to be kids. I laugh too.

45 / feature44 / feature Studio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 200506

SHUFFLE >I sit back at my desk. The sun has set. I still hear sounds. Cars, with no sense of urgency, continue to move below. This time it is more Ellington and Coltrane than Gillespie. I am in a sentimental mood. I dont always want to hear or listen. Often it is easierto block everything out. If music is truly the universal language, closing our ears to the sounds weaken the exchange, the quest for understanding. Im glad I put my iPod on a timeout. I will take it out again, but I needed to be reminded that my playlist isnt the only one worth hearing. Talk.

PAUSE/HOLD/CHARGING.

46 / feature Studio / Fall Winter 200506

True beauty is in the details. Although there exist several variations of this common phrase, one recent experience I had with it was reading the September 2005 issue of Essence magazine in which one of Cheryl Rileys one of a kind furnishings was featured. Numerous renderings of this piece have been fashioned, and many more will be fabri-cated, but this particular design breathed new life into the piece we know as the functional coffee table.

Committed to creating work that not only meets the needs of the buyer but also speaks to her artistic objectives, Cheryl Riley is an artist who goes the distance. Implementing her unparalleled attention to detail, Riley is interested in the

things people dont see, which is articulated in how she n-ishes the bottoms of her furniture designs.

This 22nd-century renaissance woman, who effortlessly shifts between artist, designer, academic, consultant and back to artist, credits her mother with encouraging artistic exploration by allowing her to draw on a wall in their Hous-ton, Texas home. As a result of this encouragement, Riley has exhibited her work in over 25 museums and 50 galler-ies around the world, including the Smithsonians Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, where Coin Encrusted Tudor Tables III (Elizabeth I) and IV (Henry VIII) (1982) were not only museum purchases, but the sole furniture pieces included in the Smithsonians traveling show. In addition to making functional sculptures, Riley continues to push the envelope of her artistic practice by creating wooden brace-lets based on patterns from her furniture designs.

The products of this manipulated ow of deliberate spont-aneity will be on view in the Museum Store for its third installment of More-In-Store. There, Cheryl Rileys Appropri-ation Bags, Because Youre Worth It mirrors, Baldwin Totems, Hot Flash fans and unique wallpapers will be for sale.

These heirlooms-in-the-making range in subject matter from the various readings and constructions of ones self worth to an homage celebrating the life and work of one of the worlds greatest thinkers and controversial writers. Rileys musings can be found in many realmsart history, literature and popular culture, to name a fewbut one thing is clear: you will de nitely want one of her creations in your home.

For more information:[email protected]

Makeba Dixon-HillEducation and Public Programs Coordinator

Cheryl RileyArtist

47 / pro le Studio / Fall Winter 200506

Studio / Fall Winter 20050648 / 3Qs Studio / Fall Winter 200506

Q: In the 51st Venice Biennale catalogue, Thomas Botoux writes Rhodes modus operandi is to depart from performances that he stages either in the public space or within the perimeter of museums and galleries, in front of an audience, or in private. Using chalk or charcoal, Rhode executes elementary drawings of every-

day life objects directly on the surface of streets, oors and walls, and then by in-teracting with them like a mime, wiping and redrawing. In your live performanc-es, stop-action animations, videos and photographs, your body is rarely pres-ent. Why is this? Albeit from the back and somewhat disguised, is this you in Stacked Drawing? What is the relation-ship between your body or presence and the work?

A: I have taken on a disguise in my work in order to create an entity anonymous to my practice. The disguise is a simple ges-ture of wearing hats and common clothing items, which has somehow allowed me to develop into another character, an alter ego. I also wish to shift away from hier-ar-chical structures where the artist is sole controller over the nature and process of the work into a more relational and open process. The artist body could therefore identify itself with existing social bodies and clandestine forms.

Q: You and Jun Yang (China/Austria) are the youngest artists included in the Bi-ennale. How old are you and how does it feel to be exhibited alongside Francis Bacon, Philip Guston and artists who are two or more generations before you?

Robin Rhode

A: I turned 29 years old this year. It was a revelation to exhibit alongside past mas-ters and to focus around the importance of a co-existence between art and a dia-logue between generations, since we are not only making art but constructing a new history that should be engaging for future generations.

Q: Critics have said that you refuse to conform to the standards that have emerged in South African art. What does that mean to you? A: This point extends beyond the geo-graphy of South Africa and could relate to many other contexts. In certain instances, many artists have chosen to use political themes as a syntax for the realization of art. I do not reject this notion of making political art, but I have instead embarked on a practice where forms could become engaging to an extent that allows art to become political.

Interview byChristine Y. Kim, Associate Curator

01 / Robin RhodeStacked Drawing(Detail)2004Collection of The Studio Museum in Harlem

New Acquisi

tion / Robin R

hode

01

02

The Studio Museum in Harlem has over 1,600 pieces in the permanent collection. Some of these works are on view in venues around the world. Here are some works to look out for:

The Corcoran Gallery of Art has organized a multiple-venue tour, Sam Gilliam: A Retrospective, which will in-clude a prominent piece from our collection, Lions Rock Arc (1981), a Gift of Dr. Morton J. Roberts, Washington, D.C. The tour originates at The Corcoran in Washington, D.C., and proceeds to the Speed Art Museum, Louisville, Ky.; the Telfair Museum of Art, Savannah, Ga.; and the Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, Texas, where the exhibition will close in May 2007.

Indigo Mercy (1975) by Betye Saar, a Gift of the Nzingha Society, Inc., will be on loan to the Musee National dArt Moderne at the Centre Pompidou for the exhibition Los AngelesParis, on view from March 8, 2006, to June 26, 2006. This exhibition is devoted to art of Los Angeles from 1955 to 1985, and will include a number of sig-nicant and historical works by Betye Saar among many others.

Shari ZollaRegistrar and Collections Manager

Collection: On Loan

01 / Sam GilliamLions Rock Arc(Detail)1981

02 / Betye Saar Indigo Mercy1975

FPO

49 / collection

01

FPO

02

050 / whats up Studio / Fall Winter 200506 Studio / Fall Winter 20050651 / coloring page

Kadir NelsonIllustrator

You never need to see a childrens book illustrated by San Diego-born Kadir Nelson to be familiar with his work. Many of us have seen his dynamic images of basketball players, Negro League baseball gures and scenes that celebrate African-American history and culture in paintings and posters for sale all around the country. But what you may not know is that he was the conceptual artist behind the Oscar-nominated ani-mated lm Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron and the man whose vision of the Middle Passage brought Amistad to life for director Steven Spielberg.

His large-scale oil paint-ings have been commis-sioned by Sports Illustrated, Coca-Cola, Dreamyard

and Major League Base-ball. And for Playstation 2 fans, the amazing cover for NFL Street II, featuring the New York Giants Jeremy Shockey, is his artwork as well. Not into video games or sports? No problem. Movie goers and television enthusiasts may recognize Nelsons unique paintings from the sets of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, The Jamie Foxx Show, Ice Cubes movie Friday and Beauty Shop, starring Queen Latifah.

His success as an artist is no surprise. Citing his artistic ability at the age of three, Nelson acknowledges, I have always been an artist

... Its a part of my DNA. Supported by his family, he was apprenticed at 11 to his uncle, artist and arts instructor Michael Morris. It was then that he developed his foundation in art, a base that won him an architecture scholarship to the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn. Some people said that I should

become an architect, he said. Use my drawing abil-ity for that. But his heart wasnt in it. After changing his major to illustration, he never looked back.

Nelson is dedicated to creating artwork that, gives people a sense of hope and nobility ... I want to show the strength and integrity of the human being and the human spirit. In line with that mis-sion, illustrating positive, inspiring childrens books is an important part of his artistic career. Believing that childrens books are a young persons introduction to the arts, Kadir has collaborated with notable authors and entertainers to bring incred-ible stories to life. He won the 2005 Coretta Scott King Award for his work in Jerdine Nolens Thunder Rose, a wonderful story about a young black cowgirl. He has worked with Debbie Allen on Dancing in the Wings, and he illustrated the bestseller Please, Baby, Please, writ-ten by Spike and Tonya Lee. Nelson was also awarded an NAACP Image Award for his images in Just the Two of Us,written by Will Smith.

In addition to his commer-cial success, Nelson has also exhibited internation-ally at many museums and galleries. His work has been shown at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles, The Studio Museum in Harlem, the Bristol Museum in England and The Citizens Gallery of Yokohama, Japan, among other venues. His work is in the private collec-tions of Denzel Washington, Debbie Allen, and Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith.

Jonell JaimeManager of School ,Family and Youth Programs

50 / pro le Studio / Fall Winter 200506

2005 Kadir NelsonCookieman created exclusively for The Studio Museum in Harlem


EMERGEncy: Replenishing the Field

Vital Expressions in American Art: Performance at SMHCraig Harris and friends performing Souls within the Veil, June 10, 2005

52 / education and public programs 53 /

Public Programs

The Studio Museum in Harlem has a long tradition of presenting programs that address prevalent issues in contemporary art by artists of African descent. Through the Department of Education and Public Programs, we offer a range of activities and programs that engage a diverse cross-section of artists of various disciplines, writers, scholars and critics who share diverse perspectives with our audiences.

Pre-registration is required. Call 212 864-

4500 x264 with questions or to register

for any of the following programs.

Artists-In-Residence Open Studio Sunday, November 13, 26pm

Books + Authors: Evenings with Writers and OthersFriday, November 18, 7pmFeaturing Gordon ParksTitles: Eyes With Winged Thoughts: Poetry & Images and A Hungry Heart: A Memoir both by Gordon Parks.

World Aids DayThursday, December 1, time to be determined

Activating Archives The Archives of American Art as a resource for research on African-American artWedneday, November 16, 7pm

Sunday SalonSunday, December 4, 35pm Tours for Seniors!Saturday, December 3, 2pmSaturday, January 7, 2pmSaturday, February 4, 2pmSaturday, March 4, 2pm

Hoofers HouseFriday, December 16, 7pmFriday, January 20, 7pm Friday, February 17, 7pmFriday, March 10, 7pm

Family Programs The Studio Museum in Harlem acknowledges the need for families to spend time together. Nurturing bonds between parents and their children through art, the museum offers programs and activities that allow families to share in the creative process. Bring the family and explore our exciting exhibition. Become an artist in a hands-on workshop and create works of art with your kids!

Family programs are designed for families

with children 4-10 years old. These

programs are free. Pre-registration is

required. Call 212.864.4500 X264 to

register.

Family fun @ the Studio! Cool quilting for kids! Saturday, December 310am12noon

Kuumba = Creativity! Kwanzaa celebration at the Studio Museum Saturday, December 1711am2pm Make Your Mark! Saturday, January 710am12noon

Dress Up, Dress Down!Saturday, February 410am12noon

Books + Authors Kids!Saturday, March 410am12noon

Youth Programs The Studio Museum in Harlem is dedicated to creating a safe environment for youth to express themselves creatively. The museum hosts free programs for high school students outside of the school environment. These programs offer students the opportunity to meet and converse with prominent visual artists, express their ideas through discussion, facilitate tours and hands-on workshops and develop important communication and critical thinking skills. Pre-registration is required. Call 212 864-

4500 x264 with questions or to register

for any of the following programs.

Artlooks: A Day in the Life of an Artist The 2004-2006 Jacob and Gwendolyn Lawrence Gift Portfolio Review Day for High School Students! Saturday, January 21, 11am1pm

Hands-on: Video Two-Weekend Intensive Workshops for HS Students Saturday, January 21, 24pmSunday, January 22, 10am3pmSaturday + Sunday January 28 + 29, 10am3pm Words-In-Motion: One-Day CipherSaturday, March 11, 10am3pm

Public Programs

The new millennium has given birth to an unprecedented number of reality television shows, ranging from The Sur-real Life and Americas Next Top Model to Starting Over and Big Brother. And lets not forget the ever-present yet reinvented and pioneering Real World. While some of these voyeuristi-cally entertaining swatches of personal pitfalls and triumphs have enjoyed greater success than others, I think there is some value that can be gleaned from most of these explorations, whether it be the identication of bad television or the basic understanding that on a public and private level people are in search of ll in the blank or are trying to escape ll in the blank. Whatever lls in the blank,

there is a void in almost every professional arena and the art world is no exception.

Behind the scenes at many arts organizations across the country, there are circular conversations that take place in meeting rooms year after year. The discussion is usually about replenishing the eld or preempting a looming void from landing in your area. These discussions force the uncom-fortable conversation about electing who will be next in line to take up the torch or break new ground. In speaking with colleagues, this subject seems to be as ripe as ever. It actually seems as urgent as an emer-gencyan emergency to sup-port the emerging. While the

American public is humiliating the candidates for its next idol, the art and culture elds might want to take note of that shows fallout and consider nurturing the potential of its next genera-tion. Considering replenishing the eld.

Yes, I too indulge in the guilty pleasure of watching some of these popular reality shows and often think that there is something amiss when popular culture needs to create the illusion of building the next generation of icons before our eyes. Questions such as,

how authentic is the talent? and, why have these particular people been selected? come rushing forward.

In some cases, for the art world, answers to these questions and the issue of vacancy are manifested in institutional programming, making museums and cultural spaces sites for professional development.

The subject of replenishing the eld is obviously a hot topic at The Studio Museum in Harlem, as we are continuously engaging emerging artists and arts professionals. The Studio Museums youth programs, ARTlooks: A Day in the Life of an Artist and Expanding the Walls: Making Connections Between Photography, History and Community, along with the adult program The Artists Voice are designed to challenge artists to think about their work in the context of art history and the world, in an effort to foster new thinking.

While these standout programs illustrate my point, I must admit that when I think about the Studio Museums most recent efforts to restock, President Lowery Stokes Sims and Direc-tor and Chief Curator Thelma Golden instantly come to mind. In an era in which little atten-

tion is given to understanding legacies or nurturing critical thinking professionals, I think the transition made by these two women speaks volumes about the manner in which the Studio Museum fosters the emergence of leaders in the eld. Do their landmark deci-sions exclude us from worrying about who or what is next on the horizon? Absolutely not! At the end of the day, replenishing the eld means fostering emerg-ing thought and practice and diversifying the eld in order to avoid cultural bankruptcy or, for lack of a better word, an

emergency.

Photo by Robert Hale

Sandra D. Jackson-DumontDirector of Education and Public Programs

FPOPULL FROM LAST ISSUE

Wayne Hodge, Doppelganger II (Body and Soul) (video still), 2005

Education and Public Programs are funded in part, by: The New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency, Nimoy Foundation, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, Wachovia Foundation, Gwendolyn Knight Lawrence, Elaine Dannheisser Foundation, MetLife Foundation, Time Warner Inc., Citigroup Foundation, The Greenwall Foundation, The Center for Arts Education, Barker Welfare Foundation, Helena Rubinstein Foundation, Jerome Foundation, ARTS Intern, Dedalus Foundation, The Renate, Hans & Maria Hofmann Trust, May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation, Rush Philanthropic Arts Foundation, public funds from the New York State Ofce of Parks, Recreation & Historic Preservation made available by the ofce of Assemblyman Keith L. Wright and Corcoran Group Real Estate.


Artist Glenn Ligon recently went to visit artist Camille Nor-ment who was featured in our 2001 exhibition Freestyle in Oslo, Norway. We asked him to let us know what shes up to.

Camille Norment is an artist whose practice embraces visual and sonic complexity. In her work, images slide in and out of focus, sound permeates the body on a subaural level and vibrations and tones subtly alter the space around the viewer. To experience her work is to be more aware of ones body in relation to the microcosm of the exhibition space as well as the larger world outside.

I visited Camille this summer at a fantastic loft space in Oslo that she shares with her partner, the artist Knut Asdam, and their young daughter Ravn. Among the many things she was working on was a new body of photographs focused on issues of photography and perception. A series of beautiful photographic portraits use a type of glass that renders the images illegible from certain angles, thereby focusing our attention on seeing as an act of framing. She is also developing a number of large-scale installation pieces.

The Oslo art scene is quite international, with contemporary and alternative spaces that show work from all over the world. What struck me about Oslo was that the artists I met there were intensely focused on politics: questions of social justice, nationalism, the global economy, etc. They saw themselves not as Scandinavian art-ists, but as artists who were in dialogues across genres, borders and histories. In that context, Camilles conceptually based work,

with its emphasis on the politics of perception, is in a fruitful dia-logue with the local scene.

Besides hanging out with Camille and the other artists I met, the other thing I liked about Oslo is that they like to par-tay, as I discov-ered when I went to bed at ve oclock in the morning for the third night in a row after hanging out in a punk bar and a hip-hop club. Love me some Oslo!

Artists Abroad:Camille Norment & Glenn Ligon in Olso, Norway

54 / artists abroad 55 / harlem: where were at

Photos by Glenn Ligon


StudioSound: Freeness, Presented by Chris Olis Icebox Organization, CDR and Blacktronica

Creativity often lives and dies without ever having an audience. The Freeness initiative, organized by artist Chris Olis Icebox organization in collaboration with CDRs Gavin Alexander and Tony Mwarchukwu and Blacktronica, put out a call for new music by artists of African, Asian, Carribean and Chinese descent. To do this, CDR organized a three-month tour across the United Kingdom, and invited producers and musical innovators to bring their ideas, tracks, remixes and edits on CD and be aired in an intimate space among peers and likeminded individuals. Sessions were held in 10 cities throughout the United Kingdom including London, Manchester, Bristol, Newcastle and Leeds from January to March 2005.

For too long, the musical traditions of jazz, blues and reggae have been relegated to the sidelines of the current musical zeitgeist. Musicians who choose to forego the traditional routes of soul-crushing record contracts, long-winded studio sessions and international headlining tours are often marginalized as well. In an attempt to rectify the sad state of todays music industry, the Freeness organizers have compiled a dazzling collection of songs that reect the cur-rent inuences of the United Kingdoms diverse population. This compilation, Freeness Volume I, seeks to explore alter-native musical sounds outside of the connes of mainstream popular music.

The CDs 29 tracks are lled with a variety of musical inuences, including R&B, hip hop, Zimbabwean folk, Ugan-dan soul, Cuban percussion, African gospel and Indian clas-sical mixed with indigenous sounds native to Brazil, Nigeria, Asia and the Middle East. During the tour, an astonishing 2000 tracks were submitted by local artists, reecting the incredible musical talent currently residing in the United Kingdom. This prolic outpouring inspired CDR to partner with Icebox and Blacktronica to compile a sampling of songs in a two-disc album. This compilation is a snapshot of the current musical tastes and moods of a young, culturally-diverse British generation.

Freeness Volume I is a ercely diverse and sprawling albumthe common link between artists is their indepen-dent spirits. Many of these musicians are unsigned artists who proudly produce and distribute their own tracks, shoot their own videos and use homemade promotional tools to sell their albums. For example, the Leeds-based nu-soul band Bootis, whose music is infused with elements of funk, soul and jazz, has no member above the age of 26. Then there are the songs of Josephine Oniyama, whose musical inuences range from Bob Dylan to Ella Fitzgerald and even Oasis. For these artists, music is not just a pastime or a means to a lucrative career but is their way of life and the platform to deliver their deepest thoughts and emo-

56 / harlem: where were at 57 /

When public art is men-tioned, monuments of heroes or minimalist sculptures come to mind. Often they seem out of place or out of date. But around Harlem, public art is more engaging in both shape and content. So if youre tired of white walls, check out the city streets.

Today grafti is idealized in magazines, on t-shirts and occasionally in galleries.

But theres a place to see the best in its appropriate environment. We all know 106 and Park as a television show, but few know its the location of the Grafti Wall of Fame. Artists from all over the country update this evolving monument ann- ually. The rest of the year, its a city playground.

To the east, at 104th Street and Lexington Avenue stands The Spirit of East

Harlem. This mural, which takes up a buildings entire faade, is a landmark of El Barrio. From giant-size domino players to residents climbing a build-ing, this mural is a portrait

of the vibrancy of Spanish Harlem.

Across the street is a more recent addition to El Barrios public gallery. The Helio-Chronometer, com-pleted by my friend Marina Gutierrez and Oscar Cornejo in 2004, resides in the yard of P.S. 72. This piece is intended to interact with the movement of the sun to cre-ate the visual record of time on a building. Using symbols

from grafti, Puerto Rican folklore and pre-Columbian iconography, the Inti-Hua-tana, its Andean Qechua name, serves as a marker of time through cultural development.

Up on 136th Street are hid-den treasures. While work-ing on a collaboration with Harlem Hospital, I came across some WPA murals in the Old Nurses Resident Building. Of all the paint-ings, I was most intrigued by the one that tells of the role of nurses in medicineit was reminiscent of Mexican murals by offering a story of important social progress through stunning visuals.

Staff Picks


tions. These ideas can best be expressed by a Freeness artist, Hondo Netsayi, a former refugee of the Zimbabwean war of liberation, who declares with utter honesty, Most of us are brought up on lies ... I like to get to the root of things and I will write about anything as long as theres a question to be answered.

Above all, Freeness is not just an album, but a not-for-prot music initiative that aims to celebrate new young artists. The wide-ranging ethnic inuences that the Freeness art-ists contribute to the album are a celebration of a vibrant community taking root in the United Kingdom. According to art

studio magazine fall/winter 2005-06

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