From Kongo to Othello to Tango to Museum Shows

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By Posted 10/25/12

Jacopo da Pontormo (Jacopo Carucci), Portrait of Maria Salviati de’ Medici and Giulia de’ Medici, ca. 1539, oil on panel. THE WALTERS ART MUSEUM, BALTIMORE, ACQUIRED BY HENRY WALTERS WITH THE MASSARENTI COLLECTION, 1902 (37.596).

In 1902 the Walters Art Museum acquired a Pontormo painting of an Italian noblewoman, Maria Salviati, dated ca. 1539. Back then it was considered a portrait of a woman whose hands were “in funny places,” as Gary Vikan, the museum’s director, puts it. Then in 1937, restorers removed some over-painting—and discovered a child was there. That child was assumed to be a portrait of Maria’s son, Cosimo de’ Medici.

And Then He Was a She

Now curators say the boy was a girl–Giulia de’ Medici. The daughter of Duke Alessandro de’ Medici, who was believed to be the son of a black female servant, Giulia is thought to have been the most prominent European woman of African descent at that time.

Darkness Visible

This discovery helped inspire “Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe,” an inventive show at the Walters that enlists familiar faces of art history to spotlight lesser-known ones in social history. Focusing on the period between 1480 to 1610, an era of increased contact as trade routes expanded, diplomats traveled more widely, and Africans were imported to Europe en masse to serve as slaves, the show includes works by Dürer, Rubens, Pontormo, and Veronese, among many others, depicting Africans living in or visiting Europe. The museum describes the show as an effort to restore an identity to individuals who have been invisible–in various senses of the word.

The show uses representations of slaves in Europe to find out who they were, how they lived, and what their depictions say about Renaissance society. A Caracci portrait of a slave woman is a fragment of a double portrait of her owner, of whom a bit of veil remains. She is holding a clock, meant to announce her mistress’s Christian concern for the quick passage of time.

Annibale Carracci, attrib., Portrait of an African Slave Woman, ca. 1580s, oil on canvas.

TOMASSO BROTHERS, LEEDS, ENGLAND.

Land of the Freed

A significant difference between African slaves in Renaissance Europe and pre- and post-revolutionary North America is that in Europe, slaves were more likely to be freed. According to wills, testimonies, and other documents from the 16th century, owners of black Africans in Western European countries not only liberated their slaves, but also often helped them establish livelihoods as lawyers, churchmen, schoolteachers, boatmen, authors, artists, and more. Renaissance Lisbon was home to the highest percentage of blacks in Europe at the time, ranging in status from slaves to knights.

This reality is reflected in an unusual painting made by an unknown artist, probably from the Netherlands, of the Lisbon waterfront in the late 16th century, where blacks and whites from a variety of social strata co-exist in a public square.

Netherlandish, Chafariz d’el Rey in the Alfama District (View of a Square with the Kings Fountain in Lisbon), ca. 1570-80, oil on panel.

THE BERARDO COLLECTION, LISBON.

The show also includes a sculpture of the first Christian saint of African origin to be canonized in modern times, Saint Benedict of Palermo (1524–89), who was born in Sicily (then part of Spain) to parents who were probably from Ethiopia and formerly enslaved.

José Montes de Oca, attrib., Saint Benedict of Palermo, ca. 1734, Polychrome and gilt wood with glass.

THE MINNEAPOLIS INSTITUTE OF ART, THE JOHN R. VAN DERLIP FUND (2010.27.2).

No Nudes Were Good Nudes

To Europeans, as curator Joaneath Spicer writes in the catalogue, Africa was “extraordinary in its excess,” representing savagery, sexuality, the unexplored, and the unknown. The black male nude does not often appear in European art of the time–unless it is depicted among the damned, as in the Last Judgment. It was considered too threatening.

From a more decorous remove, the black body fascinated artists. Some, like Dürer, explored its phrenological aspects, focusing on the shape of the skull. Others used it to demonstrate their flair for carving certain kinds of stone, like onyx, or their skill rendering dark skin tones alongside white fabrics. Diplomats from the Congo, Ethiopia, Tunisia, and Morocco, along with other prominent Africans, sometimes served as inspiration for European artists–although, as Kate Lowe notes in the catalogue, such portraits inevitably reveal more about European fantasies than they do about the subjects’ personalities.

Peter Paul Rubens, Head of an African Man Wearing a Turban, ca. 1609, oil on paper, laid down on panel.

PRIVATE COLLECTION/COURTESY JEAN-LUC BARONI LTD, LONDON.

New-World Style

The artist who painted the Three Mulattos of Esmeraldas, Andrés Sánchez Galque, was an indigenous Indian from present-day Ecuador who trained with Catholic missionaries. So why is he in a show about Renaissance Europe? Because his subjects, Don Francisco de Arobe and his two sons, had African as well as Indian ancestry. The men, who governed an independent Afro-Indian community, had traveled to Quito in 1599 to convert to Christianity and sign a treaty with colonial rulers. To commemorate the occasion a local judge commissioned this portrait for Spain’s King Philip III.

Sánchez Galque depicted the bi-racial men in multicultural get-ups that signal their peculiar status in Colonial Latin American society: Sporting elaborate golden earrings and nose rings, holding spears in the one hand and sombreros in the other, they wear Andean-style ponchos of fine Asian silk, adorned with European ruffs and capes.

Andrés Sánchez Galque, Los tres mulatos de Esmeraldas, (Portrait of Don Francisco de Arabe and Sons Pedro and Domingo), 1599, oil on canvas.

MUSEO NACIONAL DEL PRADO, MADRID (P04778), PHOTOGRAPHIC ARCHIVE, MUSEO NACIONAL DEL PRADO, MADRID.

Who Sells My Purse….

As part of the programming for the show, the Walters has invited artist Fred Wilson to lecture about “Speak of Me as I Am,” his project for the American Pavilion of the 2003 Venice Biennale, which was created around the same theme: the “hidden-in-plain-sight” history of Africans in Europe. In Wilson’s case, that focus continued up to the present, in the form of African immigrants he hired to sell knockoff accessories outside the pavilion. The show also included what has become a recurring motif in his work, chandeliers in black Murano glass that play with concepts of darkness and light.

Fred Wilson, Speak of Me as I Am: Chandelier Mori, 2003, murano glass with twenty light bulbs, edition of 3 + 1 AP. From “Speak of Me as I Am” at the American Pavilion in the Venice Biennale, 2003.

©FRED WILSON/COURTESY PACE GALLERY/PHOTO COURTESY PACE GALLERY.

Afro-Centric Art History

“Revealing the African Presence in Renaissance Europe” is the latest innovative effort to build on the work of a long-running research project with a trans-Atlantic, multi-millenarian purview: “The Image of the Black in Western Art,” launched by Dominique de Menil in the 1960s and currently managed by Harvard University Press and the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research. Edited by David Bindman and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the series, which began with the age of the pharaohs, published its most recent volume, which started with the American Revolution and ended with World War I, last May. Forthcoming in spring 2014 is Volume 5: Part 1, focusing on the era from the Artistic Discovery of Africa to the Jazz Age. Part 2, which covers the Harlem Renaissance to the Age of Obama, follows that fall.

Albert Eckhout. African American man, dated 1641, oil on canvas. From “The Image of the Black in Western Art.”

COPENHAGEN, NATIONALMUSEET, ETHNOGRAPHIC COLLECTION, EN.38A.7. HICKEY & ROBERTSON, HOUSTON/THE MENIL FOUNDATION.

Increasingly, scholars and curators have been exploring Africa’s role in the hybrid cultures that developed on both sides of the Atlantic. These initiatives range from “The African Presence in Mexico: From Yanga to the Present,” a long-travelling show organized by the National Museum of Mexican Art, to Robert Farris Thompson’s recent book “Aesthetic of the Cool: Afro-Atlantic Art and Music.” “Afro Modern: Journeys Through the Black Atlantic,” recently at Tate Liverpool, tracked the influence of Africa on modernism, beginning in the early 20th century with the Harlem Renaissance continuing through contemporary art.

Carrie Mae Weems, A Negroid Type / You Became a Scientific Profile / An Anthropological Debate / & A Photographic Subject, 1995-1996, color photograph in four parts. From “Afro Modern” at Tate Liverpool.

©CARRIE MAE WEEMS/©COURTESY THE ARTIST AND JACK SHAINMAN GALLERY, NEW YORK.

As Roger Atwood reported here, on November 27 the Metropolitan Museum of Art will open “African Art, New York, and the Avant-Garde,” which juxtaposes African and Western art to look at the impact of African art on Matisse, Picasso, Brancusi, among other Modernists, as well as members of the Harlem Renaissance like Malvin Gray Johnson and James L. Allen.

From Kongo to Tango

And next year comes “Kongo across the Waters,” a collaboration between the Samuel P. Harn Museum of Art at the University of Florida and the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, Belgium. The focus is the art, religion, and culture of the Kongo region of Central Africa–and how they were adapted and transformed when they arrived with the slave trade in the United States and Central America. Along with a multitude of objects from Africa, the show includes vodou vessels from Haiti, face vessels from South Carolina, coiled baskets by Gullah artists of the American South, and examples of the music and dance that developed as Kongo beats were transmitted through Congo Square in New Orleans, emerging in jazz, Stepping, the Charleston, and the Tango.

The final section considers the legacy of Kongo esthetics on contemporary art worldwide, by figures including Steve Bandoma and Paulo Kapela from Central Africa, Haiti’s Edouard Duval Carrié, José Bedia from Cuba, and Renée Stout and Radcliffe Bailey from the U.S.

Radcliffe Bailey, Returnal, 2008, mixed media. In “Kongo Across the Waters,” coming to the Harn.

COURTESY JACK SHAINMAN GALLERY, NY.

Be There or Be Square

Back in Maryland, school groups were invited to react to the exhibition at the Walters in artworks of their own. Inspired by that unknown artist’s view of multicultural Lisbon, children from Harlem Park Elementary/Middle School envisioned a Renaissance plaza–a little Lisbon, a little Baltimore, a little Rome. The picture is on view in a display of student work concurrent with “Revealing the African Presence.” It’s another place the African presence continues to manifest and reveal itself–if you know where to look.

Harlem Park Elementary/Middle School, Renaissance City, 2012, paint on board.

LENT BY HARLEM PARK ELEMENTARY/MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS (IL.2012.10.1).

Both shows will travel to the Princeton University Art Museum: “Revealing the “African Presence” will run from February, 16, 2013 through June 9, 2013; “Kongo Across the Waters” will open in November 2014.

Copyright 2012, ARTnews LLC, 48 West 38th St 9th FL NY NY 10018. All rights reserved.

Art News – Magazine

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Hank Willis Thomas Stages a Photo Shoot
Text by Rachel Wolff

 How Sanford Biggers came to strike a pose as a two-faced dandy

Excerpt:

“It’s a little bit about blackface and minstrel-sy,” Thomas says. “I couldn’t figure out what the context was, except for Mary Poppins, which was out around the same time. But still, there’s this thing about white men with black covering them. It’s tens of years away from the minstrel era, and it’s only slightly different. Race has always been somewhat about class.”
Thomas wants to build his own take on the subject by combining the two images, riffing on this idea of racial, cultural, and socioeconomic hybridity, and fleshing out the deceptively complex characters embedded in each. He has enlisted fellow artist Sanford Biggers to collaborate and pose.
“I think Sanford’s work has been very much about cultural hybridity,” Thomas says. “He has done stuff with B-boys and hip-hop and Buddhism. He’s frequently engaged with that, and I thought he could be a kind of lens to talk about these issues.”
Biggers quickly got on board. “I think it’s an American knee-jerk response to equate black and white with literally blacks and whites. I want to find a way for it to be more nuanced,” he says. “And, in fact, I think it did that because this photograph and the character in it become more about duality and a more multifaceted being. It’s about the yin and yang, and pathology and moralism, and life and death. And superego. Those types of things. Which are things I’ve really been exploring in my recent work as well.”

 

Pick up a copy of the November 2012 issue of ARTnews on newsstands now or  read complete story and see more photos here.

The Gordon Parks Foundation

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The Gordon Parks Foundation permanently preserves the work of Gordon Parks, makes it available to the public through exhibitions, books, and electronic media and supports artistic and educational activities that advance what Gordon described as “the common search for a better life and a better world.” The Foundation is a division of the Meserve-Kunhardt Foundation.

About Gordon Parks

Gordon Parks was one of the seminal figures of twentieth century photography. A humanitarian with a deep commitment to social justice, he left behind a body of work that documents many of the most important aspects of American culture from the early 1940s up until his death in 2006, with a focus on race relations, poverty, Civil Rights, and urban life. In addition, Parks was also a celebrated composer, author, and filmmaker who interacted with many of the most prominent people of his era—from politicians and artists to celebrities and athletes.

Born into poverty and segregation in Kansas in 1912, Parks was drawn to photography as a young man when he saw images of migrant workers published in a magazine. After buying a camera at a pawnshop, he taught himself how to use it and despite his lack of professional training, he found employment with the Farm Security Administration (F.S.A.), which was then chronicling the nation’s social conditions. Parks quickly developed a style that would make him one of the most celebrated photographers of his age, allowing him to break the color line in professional photography while creating remarkably expressive images that consistently explored the social and economic impact of racism.

When the F.S.A. closed in 1943, Parks became a freelance photographer, balancing work for fashion magazines with his passion for documenting humanitarian issues. His 1948 photo essay on the life of a Harlem gang leader won him widespread acclaim and a position as the first African American staff photographer and writer for Life Magazine, then by far the most prominent photojournalist publication in the world. Parks would remain at Life Magazine for two decades, chronicling subjects related to racism and poverty, as well as taking memorable pictures of celebrities and politicians (including Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., and Stokely Carmichael). His most famous images, such as Emerging Man, 1952, and American Gothic, 1942, capture the essence of activism and humanitarianism in mid-twentieth century America and have become iconic images, defining their era for later generations. They also rallied support for the burgeoning Civil Rights Movement, for which Parks himself was a tireless advocate as well as a documentarian.

Parks spent much of the last three decades of his life expanding his style, conducting experiments with color photography. He continued working up until his death in 2006, winning numerous awards, including the National Medal of Arts in 1988, and over fifty honorary doctorates. He was also a noted composer and author, and in 1969, became the first African American to write and direct a Hollywood feature film based on his bestselling novel The Learning Tree. This was followed in 1971 by the hugely successful motion picture Shaft. The core of his accomplishment, however, remains his photography the scope, quality, and enduring national significance of which is reflected throughout the Collection. According to Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Research Center at Harvard University, “Gordon Parks is the most important black photographer in the history of photojournalism. Long after the events that he photographed have been forgotten, his images will remain with us, testaments to the genius of his art, transcending time, place and subject matter.”

Films

  • Flavio, 1964. Director and screenplay
  • Diary of a Harlem Family , 1968.. Narrator, still photography.
  • The World of Piri Thomas, 1968. 16mm. Director
  • The Learning Tree, 1969. 35mm. Director, producer, screenplay, music.
  • Shaft , 1971. 35mm. Director
  • Shaft’s Big Score! 1972. 35mm. Director
  • The Super Cops , 1974. 35mm. Director
  • Leadbelly , 1976 35mm. Director
  • Solomon Northrup’s Odyssey , 1984. 16mm, made for TV. Director, screenplay.
  • Moments Without Proper Names, 1987. 16mm. Director, screenplay, music.

Books

  • Flash Photography, NY: Grosset and Dunlap. 1947
  • Camera Portraits: Techniques and Principles of Documentary Portraiture, NY: F. Watts. 1948
  • The Learning Tree, NY: Harper and Row. 1963
  • A Choice of Weapons, NY: Harper and Row. 1966
  • Gordon Parks: A Poet and His Camera, NY: Viking Press. 1968
  • Born Black, Philadelphia: Lippincott. 1971
  • Gordon Parks: In Love, Philadelphia: Lippincott. 1971
  • Gordon Parks: Whispers of Intimate Things, NY: Viking Press. 1971
  • Moments Without Proper Names, NY: Viking Press. 1975
  • Flavio, NY: W.W. Norton. 1978
  • To Smile in Autumn, NY: W.W. Norton. 1979
  • Shannon, Boston: Little, Brown. 1981
  • Voices in the Mirror: An Autobiography, NY: Doubleday. 1990
  • Arias of Silence, Boston: Bulfinch Press. 1994
  • Glimpses Toward Infinity, Boston: Little, Brown. 1996
  • Half Past Autumn: A Retrospective, Boston: Bulfinch Press. 1997
  • A Star for Noon: An Homage to Women in Images, Poetry, and Music, Bulfinch. 2000
  • The Sun Stalker, Ruder-Finn Press. 2003
  • Eyes With Winged Thoughts, Atria. 2005
  • A Hungry Heart, Washington Square Press. 2005

Read more….

Mendocino County Youth Project Mendocino Family & Youth Services

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A Call to Local Artists for Submissions

We are soliciting donations of artwork from Mendocino County artists, young and old, to benefit the Youth Project’s Transitional Living Program. The artwork donated will be part of our annual fundraising art aution. We would appreciate the honor of including your most precious gift: your personal expression through art.

The event will feature artwork by students and other local artists from all reaches of Mendocino County.

100% of the proceeds from adult art will go to the Transitional Living Program.
50% of the proceeds from youth art will go to the program and 50% will go to the young artist.

Deadline for submissions: Friday, November 9, 2012

If you are 10-24 years old and wish to submit art for the Celebration of Young Artists, please read and fill out the application form (Word) or PDF-version

If you are an adult wanting to donate your work, please read and fill out the application form (Word) or PDF-version

Halle Berry’s Sheer Leather Dress Is Jaw-Dropping (PHOTOS)

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The Huffington Post  |
By Posted: 11/02/2012 9:56 am EDT Updated: 11/02/2012 10:03 am EDT

As far as sheer dresses go, Halle Berry has serious cred. After all, she made Oscars history in one of the most memorable sheer dresses of all time, her Elie Saab sheer-topped gown.

But we’re impressed nonetheless with her most recent frock, a leather-and-sheer contraption that managed to conceal in all the right places at Thursday night’s “Cloud Atlas” premiere in Moscow. Even when she bent over to sign autographs, the Catherine Malandrino frock stayed in place (although it was so tight we’re surprised she could bend over at all).

“Cloud Atlas,” Halle’s new movie with Tom Hanks, has put the star back into the spotlight recently. We haven’t seen the movie, but we are happy to be seeing so much of Halle again — fingers crossed that the flick is good enough to land Halle on the Golden Globes and Oscars red carpets. Sheer dresses ahoy!

But seriously, check out Berry’s latest outfit and let us remind you that this woman is 46 years old. Yup, our jaws dropped too.

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Al Johnson Visual Artist

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Al Johnson, illustrator, fine artist, educator and mentor has developed an inclusive vision that captures the Classical, weaves it with the contemporary and refracts it through the prism of his remarkable individuality. While formally trained in the techniques of the Great Masters, Al Johnson’s art, in fact, goes to the essence of jazz in that it brings together many influences while celebrating individuality . Mr. Johnson honed these skills, while attending famed institutions such as Pratt Institute, the Albert Pale School of Commercial Arts and the Arts Student League.

Called “the artist” since his youth, Mr. Johnson has exhibited in many corners of the world including the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum in Japan and the Guangzhou International Art Fair in China. His abilities as a draftsman has allowed him the opportunity to develop the original renderings of the Georgia Aquarium, the largest aquarium in the world. Chosen out of a nationwide search, Mr. Johnson created the commissioned portrait of Congresswoman Shirley Chisholm, permanently installed in Brooklyn Borough Hall, in New York City.

As a storyboard artist in the commercial and feature film industry, his signature style is sought after. The over 700 illustrations created for the feature film “After.Life” brought darkness to light from frame to frame. Mr. Johnson has developed storyboards for the Academy Award Winning Film “The Hours”, the feature film “The Fountain”, HBO’s Soprano’s, Six Feet Under and Sex and The City, the 2010 and 2011 Izod Indy 500 commercial, to name a few.

His passion is to inspire. Mr. Johnson gives back to future artists by providing his unique teaching style designed by Al Johnson Art Studios. The lists of his accomplishments are many as he motivates those to come.

Specialties

Fine Art, Permanent Installations, Storyboards for Commercials and Films, Art Mentoring, Curatorial Team for Group Exhibitions

President Halts Campaign Trail Appearances To Handle Hurricane Sandy

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The Huffington Post  |
By Posted: 10/30/2012 11:41 am EDT Updated: 10/30/2012 3:05 pm EDT

WASHINGTON — The politics of Hurricane Sandy are obviously difficult to game out. But the White House has clearly decided that it would look uncomfortably partisan for the president to be on the stump while the federal government was managing a massive natural disaster. And so, on Tuesday morning, the administration announced that President Barack Obama would be off the trail on Wednesday, canceling a swing through the critical state of Ohio.

From the White House Press Office:

The President will remain in Washington, DC on Wednesday to monitor the response to Hurricane Sandy and ensure that all available federal resources continue to be provided to support ongoing state and local recovery efforts. As a result, the President will not participate in the campaign events that had been scheduled in Ohio tomorrow.

Instead, he will head to New Jersey. The press office released a statement Tuesday afternoon announcing that Obama will survey the hurricane damage along with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie:

Tomorrow afternoon, the President will travel to New Jersey where he will join Governor Christie in viewing the storm damage, talking with citizens who are recovering from the storm and thanking first responders who put their lives at risk to protect their communities. Additional scheduling details will be released when they are available.

Mitt Romney is holding “relief events” on Tuesday, though those seem to be toned down campaign stops that are also helping raise money for victims of Sandy. He is also scheduled to make campaign stops in Virginia on Wednesday, though it remains to be seen how hard he campaigns against the president during the week ahead.

This article has been updated with information about the president’s trip to New Jersey.

28th Annual October Gallery Art Expo; Then & Now

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The Tradin’ Times: One Man’s Trash is This Woman’s Treasure

This years October gallery art expo was missed by many who long for the return of the times when thousand of attendees and an unlimited amount of artists would flood this city with guests for the annual art fest. 2012 is 28 years since the early 90’s beginning of the art expo’s start. The annual event began at the Philadelphia convention center and then evolved to the Liacouras center when it enjoyed it’s largest and longest venue placement.

I was a student of Moore College of Art & Design then when I had the pleasure of displaying my photography at the expo and reading poetry during their weekly panoramic poetry readings; featuring the likes of Trapeta Mason, Rich Medina, Jill Scott and Poetica to name a few.
I was Introduced to the poetry scene via the panoramic poetry venue developed by the October Gallery inheritance, Lamar Redcross, son of October Gallery founder, Mercer Redcross.

My invitation appeared after a performance with Timi Dread and the Dub Warriors, a local dub roots, reggae band (Timi currently performs with a collective entitled “Urban Shamen” ) with whom I would sing and perform poetry, I returned to the table from the stage, were my guests and I were seated, to a napkin left by Lamar who had written, “You should come by and perform at Panoramic Poetry, I really enjoyed your performance” I took his advice and then began my history with the October Gallery and spoken word.

The October Art Gallery was then located on Church st and 2nd in Olde City Philadelphia. Years away from it’s current location at 7165 Germantown ave formerly North by Northwest, live music venue which featured the likes of John Stephens prior to his legendary classification. The gallery featured an array of distinguished art from black painters, photographers, illustrators; established and familiar to the public through then popular culture references like “The Cosby Show” highlighting Haitian painter Ellis Wilson’s “the Funeral Procession” causing Vanessa’s fight for her “rich” family name since Claire paid 11,500 for the painting in the episode. ( Wilson in real life never earning more than 300 dollars for the painting and passed in 1977)

The expo is were I met some of the most inspiring poets and visual artists. There is were I met traveling wordsmiths who made their living selling their words pressed between pages of offset printed glossy covers. I’ve written for “The Paint” the galleries corresponding paper prior to them going to cyberspace. In the early 90’s The young Redcross was gathering writer’s to publish his own collection of poetry and photography. I found out once I was asked to contribute to the Panoramic Poetry Anthology of Words, given the title of “Rhythmic” I contributed my words without question to how & why they would be used and surprisingly months later a glossy cover to a collection of words was born and I was among the October Gallery Panoramic Poets whose words wet the pages on the Pisces press release compiled by Lamar Recross published among then poet and now DJ, Rich Medina, and then poet turned vocalist, Jill Scott to name two of the contributing authors to appear with then poet now journalist, poetica.

In the 90’s our backdrop was a art gallery space with hard wood floors that gave in with a old house sound when pressure applied and echoed footsteps against the brick adorned with a mural of jazz artists and in pauses pages were heard turning and coughs were amplified and so was agreeable testimony like oohs and ahhs from the audience or truth revealed ah ha’s that translates into “you go girl” or the popular phrase ” teach” yelled from peers who could relate. It was our church on Church street to visit the word weekly on a Friday evening. There was no open mics then (no weekly, monthly events just one time events feat a poet), just a handful of folks who regularly shared there words from memory or a black and white composition book and the folks who enjoyed them.

The panoramic poetry format was a dozen artists, give or take, set to read 1 or 2 poems and a featured writer/poet sharing poetry, stories, motivation and occasional musical accompaniment; saxophone, vocal, upright bass, violin, and djembe drums and no open mic. Readings were word of mouth, prior to internet marketing and there was always a refreshment table with juice, fruit, chips and cheese and the mandatory socializing afterwards that usually lead to the next venue, dinner invites to share poetry and break bread or invites to volunteer or participate in the Annual October Gallery Art Expo, for some years I participated as a exhibitor, using the expo audience to try out a series of products and performance styles.

The expo is were I met Kwame Alexander publisher of the then popular poetry anthology 360 degrees of Black Poets. The often 3 day event made room for building alliances with other artists and authors and for some years admission to the expo remained Free and you received a original gallery print upon arrival, there were holistic health pavilions, Capoeira, Brazilian martial arts, celebrity arts auctions ( you could spot a Jordan or a Cosby purchasing the rare, striking African american art) and featured vocalists and band appearances. Normally occurring in November it was a major tourist attraction responsible for a large part then of the cities revenue. It was anticipated annually.

October gallery also put out plenty previously for its annual advertising budget, featured ads in essence magazine and highlights in ebony, all knew of its time of year being near by readership via the paint and assisting publications. Fast forwarding to the present, its rumored alliances made in Brasil by the Redcrosses has attention split, some say it became an overwhelming endeavor. What ever it was, change became inevitable for the expo and its handlers, admission rose up to ten dollars at one point, venues changed and the exhibition price had become too high for some long standing vendors.

Bobbi Kristina Inheritance Settled: Star Comes To Agreement With Cissy Houston

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Earlier this month, it was reported thatWhitney Houston’s family filed a petition, as executors of the Pop star’s estate, against Bobbi Kristina Brown in an attempt to revise the 19-year-old’s inheritance payments.

Now, just weeks later, it appears that the case has apparently been settled.

Sources tell TMZ, that Kristina and her grandmother, Cissy Houston, have reached an agreement to leave the teenager’s $20 million payment plans unadjusted. As the agreement currently stands, Brown will receive 10% when she turns 21, 20% at age 25, and the remaining amount when she turns 30.

The singer’s mother, Cissy Houston and sister-in-law/business manager, Pat Houston originally sought out to revise Brown’s inheritance payments citing that she “is a highly visible target for those who would exert undue influence over her inheritance and/or seek to benefit from respondent’s resources and celebrity.”

Last week while promoting their new Lifetime reality show, “The Houstons: On Our Own,” Cissy and Pat Houston appeared on “The View” to discuss their new series, which included a scene of Bobbi Kristina drinking a mimosa. As Pat Houston explained to show hosts, Barbara Walters and Sheri Shepherd, guiding Brown into the right direction is a work in progress.

“She’s not in trouble as it relates to drinking,” she admitted. “I had concern sitting there watching her. I don’t like it at all. But this was her reality, even before her mother passed. I don’t like it, but we’re working on it. She’s growing…we’re seeing her more; we’re dealing with life management skills as it relates to Bobbi Kristina.”

Whitney Houston’s mother added to Pat’s comments; “When you got a teenager who’s 19-year’s old, who loses her mother and really don’t feel like she really has to listen, do you know how that is,” she said.

Deborah Kass On Appropriation, Barbra Streisand, And The Dissolving Middle Class (PHOTOS, INTERVIEW)

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Deborah Kass is not soft spoken. Nor is her art work, which appropriates pop culture icons and artists she admires, while redefining New York School abstract painting through the lens of feminism. Today, Kass’ first retrospective, “Before and Happily Ever After,” opens at the Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. The exhibition features approximately 75 of Kass’ works spanning the past three-decades of her career.

After her move to New York City in the 1970s, then 20-year-old Kass entered the art world with her more traditional landscapes and abstract paintings. In the ’80s however, the tide changed with the emergence of neoexpressionism, which was “completely and utterly male,” as Kass put it in a phone interview with The Huffington Post. “The definite prevailing sense with their success and with their attitude, was that this was the natural order of things. And no one seemed concerned or the least interested at all that there were literally no women involved.”

Kass channeled her frustration in a way that shook the art world. She appropriated Andy Warhol’s work, and turned her lady heroes into her subjects, painting the likenesses of Gertrude Stein, Sandy Koufax, and Barbra Streisand.

We spoke to Kass on the phone about her upcoming exhibit at The Warhol Museum. Read on for Kass’ charged, poetic descriptions of her work, how we define ourselves through culture, and why we need female artists. Scroll down for photos.

2012-10-26-again
Before and Happily Ever After, 1991.

The Huffington Post: From where did your use of appropriation in your work emerge?

Deborah Kass: Appropriation was the language of my generation in many ways. It came out of Duchamp, Warhol, Johns, Lichtenstein. My work since the late ’80s specifically questioned what was presented as the “natural” order of things in the history of post war NY painting. In effect I was questioning power and artistic genius and I was asking was this not just part of that same value/valuing system called white patriarchy? And can there even be anything new about an art that re-inscribes those values? By questioning that, I put in jeopardy the assumed power and value of my male colleagues. That could not stand and I have had the career that was the result of that: undervalued and under represented, like every other woman who dared to paint of my generation.

So it’s strange to be getting attention now after all these years. But times have changed, meaning the context has changed. People like me in other disciplines were pioneers of women’s studies, queer studies, black studies in the ’80s. Your generation was educated by those radical thinkers who changed the way we conceive of the history of culture in literature, the law, the media and in every way. The academy embraced and supported them. I mean they were a bunch of serious bookish literature professors!

HP: Can you talk about your famous Barbra Streisand re-appropriation specifically?

DK: Barbra was someone who insisted on patrolling her own representation in Hollywood and it drove Hollywood crazy. Of course she was wildly successful because of that. But there was so much resistance to her despite the bigger embrace of her culturally. Because she went against the norm in Hollywood…like I was sort of obsessed with her resistance because I identified with it so closely…I have this whole idea now — well its been developing now for thirty years — that you find yourself in culture as a child and that’s how one defines oneself. One says, “Oh, I really like that song”…“I like that character”…”I like that book,” and that’s how. It’s something that’s resonating within you. It’s a way that you define yourself through the culture.

Part of my project has been talking about not finding my reflection. And what that felt like and what that means and how to find it anyway or redefine…my favorite history to make it look like me.

HP: Do you consider yourself a political artist?

DK: Yes.

HP: In the “Brooklyn Rail,” you say: “There are more important issues than someone thinking they are right about a historic moment, even if the moment is now. We need all the option on the table to survive right now.”

Where did you get this sense of immediacy? Have you always had it, or has there been a time when it’s more pressing?

DK: I am not alone in thinking that we are at a tipping point ecologically and morally and politically. Democracy cannot survive without a vibrant middle class, yet the policies of one of the parties has been committed to wiping it out for 30 years. Social issues have been used to distract Americans from their own self interests since Nixon’s southern strategy and now people are paying the price. It’s as if someone was yelling “abortion! religion! gay! black! women! poor people!” to your face, just so they could pick your pocket from behind and it worked.

All the other immediacies of my adult life have been building up to this. I never understood how people couldn’t see it coming for the last three decades, it was so clear. The other recessions didn’t carry with them the massive unemployment, the income inequality and the death of the middle class like this one, and the sheer unadulterated greed. Nor the rejection of science and the reality of global warming. The end times. Citizens take democracy for granted, but that is a huge mistake. We took the middle class for granted and now look.

HP: In “Art in America” you talk about your work as referring to “the construction of the self.” And in an interview with BOMB magazine you talk about W.E.B. Du Bois’s “double consciousness of the oppressed.” Can you talk about the intersection of the two in your work?

DK: [Take as an example] John Berger’s “Ways of Seeing,” there’s no woman in the world or black person in America who doesn’t know what that means. The people in power are the people who define everybody else. That’s the nature of power. And survival depends on understanding.

“Deborah Kass: Before and Happily Ever After” runs through October 27 through January 6, 2013 at The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Natina Reed Dead: ‘Bring It On’ Star Killed In Car Accident At Age 32

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Natina Reed of the late 1990s girl band Blaque has passed away, multiple publications are reporting.

The “Bring It On” star, 32, died on Friday, Oct. 26 after she was struck by a car while crossing the street in Georgia. According to the Gwinnett Police Department, the driver of the vehicle was “was determined to be not at fault and there are no charges pending.” The driver also phoned 911 after the accident, at 10:30 P.M. Reed was pronounced dead at 10:59 P.M. at Gwinnett Medical Center. She would have been 33 Sunday.

Reed was known as one-third of the Atlanta-based group Blaque, who had hits like “808,” “Can’t Get It Back” and “Bring It All To Me,” which featured ‘N Sync’s J.C. Chasez. She starred in 2000’s “Bring It On” with band mates Brandi Williams and Shamari Fears-DeVoe. The rapper was a protégé of the late Lisa “Left Eye” Lopes, who was a member of TLC until 2002.

Fellow Blaque members Williams and Fears-DeVoe issued a joint statment today:

We are devastated by the loss of our group member, sister and friend Natina Reed. Because of the enormous support of Blaque fans and our love for each another, Blaque officially reunited this fall and we were in the process of working on a new album and a reality show. Natina continuously embodied the pioneering spirit of Blaque and her undeniable creativity touched the hearts of fans everywhere. Natina was a mother, sister, accomplished songwriter, artist and friend. We ask for your prayers at this time for Natina’s family. She will forever be missed and her global influence eternally felt. We thank God for the experiences we shared.

Williams took to Twitter to share her grief about Reed’s death, writing, “Last night the world was changed forever, life will never be the same….she was my sister.”

And Gabrielle Union, who also starred in “Bring It On,” simply tweeted, “#RIP #SAD #BringItOn.”

Reed was reportedly working on a solo rap album, as well as a new movie and reunion with Blaque.

She is survived by her 10-year-old son, Tren Brown, with rapper Kurupt.

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Gabrielle Monique Union was born in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1972, the middle child in a family of three daughters. She is the daughter of Theresa (née Glass), a former dancer, social worker, and phone company manager, and Sylvester C. Union, an AT&T manager and military sergeant. Union’s early childhood years were spent as part of a rich black community and as part of a large family that had been in the Omaha area for many generations. [1][2][3] She was raised Catholic.[4] At the age of eight, her family moved to Pleasanton, California, where she grew up and attended Foothill High School. In high school, Union was an all-star point guard in basketball and a year-round athlete, also playing in soccer and ran track.

Union attended the University of Nebraska before moving on to Cuesta College. She eventually transferred to UCLA and earned a degree in sociology. While studying there, she interned at the Judith Fontaine Modeling & Talent Agency to earn extra academic credits. Invited by the agency’s owner, Judith Fontaine, Union started working as a model to pay off college loans.[5]

Union started her acting career in minor roles. Most were in teen movies such as 10 Things I Hate About You and Love and Basketball. In 1997, Union appeared in the sixth-season episode of “Star Trek: Deep Space Nine – Sons and Daughters” as the Klingon N’Garen.[6] She also appeared in Sister, Sister as Vanessa, in Smart Guy as Denise, and in five episodes of 7th Heaven as Keesha Hamilton.

In 2000, Union landed the role of Isis in the cheerleading movie Bring it On opposite Kirsten Dunst. Bring It On helped push Union into the mainstream and she began gaining more exposure. This led to Union being cast in the CBS television drama City of Angels as Dr. Courtney Ellis.

Union was cast in her first leading role in the 2003 film Deliver Us from Eva with rapper L.L. Cool J. This was her second time working with the rapper since making a cameo in his video “Paradise” in 2002. The film received fair reviews from critics and it showed that Union was a leading lady. Union landed the role of Will Smith‘s girlfriend Syd in the film Bad Boys II, a box office success grossing over $273 million worldwide. Union starred with Academy Award winner Jamie Foxx in the film Breakin’ All the Rules in 2004.

Union starred in the short-lived 2005 ABC series Night Stalker. She has also starred in the independent drama films Neo Ned and Constellation, the latter of which was released to theaters. She won an award for Best Actress in Neo Ned at the Palm Beach International Film Festival, and the film received awards at several festivals.

She starred in the 2005 remake of The Honeymooners with comedian Cedric The Entertainer. In 2006, she starred as Busta Rhymes‘ love interest in the music video for Rhymes’ “I Love My Chick“. Union starred in the 2007 films Daddy’s Little Girls by Tyler Perry (released on Valentine’s Day) and the Christmas film The Perfect Holiday which opened on December 12.

In an interview with Art Nouveau Magazine, Union complained about the lack of roles for black actresses and actors in Hollywood: “There used to be [roles] specifically written black, if you knew Denzel was doing a movie you knew his wife, girl or love interest was going to be black [but] that’s not necessarily the case anymore. You’re in that room with every amazingly talented actress of every hue, and it’s a dogfight, it’s hard”.[7]

In 2008, Union appeared on Ugly Betty for 3 episodes (36–38) as Renee, Wilhelmina Slater‘s (Vanessa L. Williams) sister and Daniel Meade‘s (Eric Mabius) love interest. She also made a cameo appearance in the music video for Ne-Yo‘s “Miss Independent“.

She joined the cast of the U.S. television series Life on NBC and appeared in four episodes prior to the cancellation of series in May 2009.[8] She appeared in the ABC series FlashForward alongside John Cho and Joseph Fiennes as Zoey Andata, a role for which she got nominated for an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series.

Abstract Fine Art Gallery – Corey Barksdale – Atlanta Georgia Artist (SlideShow)

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Fine Art Gallery, Black Artists, Black Visual Artist, Atlanta Artist Corey Barksdale, Atlanta fine Art Fine, Art Atlanta Art Paintings, Art Atlanta Drawings, Georgia Atlanta Painter Atlanta, Kentucky Paducah Art Gallery, Artist Kentucky Art Atlanta Fine Art, Cincinnati Fine Art Gallery, Ohio Art Gallery Arts, Arkansas Fine Artist, Little Rock Arkansas Fine Artist, Missouri Fine Arts Gallery

 

 

 

 

 

COREY BARKSDALE
September 27, 2011 — If you live in Atlanta, you might have already come across Corey Barksdale’s paintings in art festivals, galleries, or on his website. This bright African American artist brings life to his designs with great textured colorful elements and creativity. His works reflects his many sources of inspiration, with a focus on music and dance – Jazz music in particular -, urban city life and the love and strength present within the African-American community.

Corey has carried out numerous projects for businesses and individuals throughout Atlanta, and he has participated in art shows throughout the United States.

Over the last few years Corey has also developed his skills as a mural artist and one of the major projects he recently completed was a 30 feet mural painting for the Beltline, Atlanta’s ambitious urban redevelopment project. Rob Brawner, the Atlanta Beltline program director was thrilled with the result, stating that: “Corey was able to bring the Atlanta BeltLine alive through his colorful interpretation of the project.” Another much acclaimed mural project he recently completed was a vast wall painting for the Ben Hill Recreation Center as part of the Paint Big project, an initiative by Wonderroot, Living Walls, Dorian McDuffie and the City of Atlanta Office of Recreation.

Corey is also an artist who cares and who often donates his time and artistic energy to various charity projects. He recently participated in a house remodeling for the ABC show Extreme Makeover Home Edition, contributing a mural painting for one of the family’s bedrooms. One of the charities dear to his heart, the Furniture Bank of Metro Atlanta, has “been honored to receive donated art work from Corey Barksdale for its annual fundraiser. Every year we are amazed by his talent and generosity!” says Megan Anderson from the Furniture Bank.

Corey’s creations can be used as quality interior design decorations by advertising firms, bars, restaurants and other retail businesses.

His fine art paintings offer a modern/contemporary style, on canvas or Masonite and will create a memory you can treasure for years to come.

His mural paintings will make your location stand out, contributing to your visual identity and allowing you to express and communicate your mission and vision in a creative and esthetic way.

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Thurayyah Mitchell – Jumpoff Sues Stephon Marbury For Missing Payments on Hush Money & Wins

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by Robert Littal | Posted on Saturday, October 20th, 2012

Stephon Marbury has been married for a decade and his wife will be on Basketball Wives this season, but as we know that doesn’t mean anything in regard to cheating.

Marbury was having an affair with his personal chef Thurayyah Mitchell, but when he fired and kicked her to curb she claimed Marbury was sexually harassing her.

Marbury wanting the problem to go away promised his jumpoff $900k.

I repeat Marbury promised a woman he slept with 5 times almost a million dollars just to be quiet.  According to TMZ, Marbury paid the woman $600k and then the payments stop.

The women went to court and WON the case to get the rest of her hush money.

Only in America.