Carol Illanes (Santiago, 1987)Curadora e investigadora en arte chileno y latinoamericano contemporáneo. Magíster en Historia y crítica de arte de la Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro. Sus proyectos han abordado temas diversos entre ellos la relación entre arte y espacio público, el video experimental y la teoría de la historia en el arte latinoamericano. Entre sus curatorías están “Señales Aleatorias: retrospectiva de arte sonoro en Chile” (Parque Cultural, 2016), “Chulos chunchules chilenos: Piero Montebruno y Paz Errázuriz” (Galería D21, 2018) y “Agorafilia” (M100, 2020). Se ha desempeñado como co-editora de distintas revistas como Arte y Crítica que dirigió entre el 2014-2016. Se desempeñó como investigadora de la Colección del Museo de Artes Visuales, MAVI y actualmente lleva el cargo de productora del Centro de Extensión Palacio Pereira, un nuevo espacio programático abocado a la difusión del patrimonio cultural nacional.
Amalia Cross (Viña del Mar, 1989)es historiadora del arte y curadora. Licenciada en Arte por la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso (PUCV), magíster en Teoría e historia del arte por la Universidad de Chile y candidata a Doctora en Historia por la Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile (beca CONICYT). Entre 2013 y 2015 trabajó como investigadora para el Catálogo razonado del Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de la Universidad de Chile. Y entre 2016 y 2020 se desempeñó como profesora en el Instituto de Arte de la PUCV. Ha centrado su trabajo de investigación y escritura sobre museos, colecciones y archivos de arte latinoamericano. Ha sido co-curadora, junto a María Berríos, de la exposición “Alberto Cruz: El cuerpo del arquitecto no es el de un solo hombre” (MAVI-2017) y curadora de las exposiciones “El museo en tiempos de revolución” (MNBA – 2019) y “1872” (Palacio Pereira – 2021). Entre sus publicaciones recientes destacan: “¡Las musas se tomaron el museo!” (Seminario internacional de investigación, 12 Bienal del Mercosur, 2020), “El Happening de las gallinas de Carlos Leppe: documentación y peritaje” (D21 Editores, 2020), “Historias de boicot: sobre las causas y consecuencias de la participación de Chile en el boicot a la X Bienal de Sao Paulo, 1969” (Peter C. Marzio Award , ICAA – Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 2019) y el libro Álvaro Guevara La tela, el papel y el cuadrilátero (Mundana Ediciones, 2019). Es co-editora del sello independiente Ediciones JGV.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain #1 (an ongoing studio painting) 2021
By Lorien Suárez-Kanerva
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain #2 (an ongoing studio painting) 2021
New Artwork Series “Wooded Terrain”
Artist/Palm Desert, California
Over the last couple of months, I became creatively captivated by trees. I studied photographs, videos, and books, especially about trees’ anatomy and their fractal patterns. While doing this research, I created studies of a variety of trees.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study # 1, 2021
Suzanne Simard in her TED Talk “How Trees Talk to Each Other?” addressed something that I had somehow sensed about trees. I appreciate and respect trees with their extensive lifespans reaching well beyond ours. Discovering that forests and old trees have an extensive repository of Wisdom and a root network through which they share resources and information was awe-inspiring.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #4, 2021
In his work, “Earth and Reveries of Will,” Gaston Bachelard makes observations from a phenomenologist’s perspective that address trees’ significance at a symbolic level. “To understand its role adequately, one must, at least once in one’s life, have loved a majestic tree and been moved by its counsel of solidity.”
To expand on this symbolic meaning of trees, Bachelard reflects on Virginia Woolf’s description of an Oak tree in her writing, “Orland: A Biography.”
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #7, 2021
The dreamer moors his irresolute heart to the heart of the tree,…suddenly the dreamer who experiences the intimate hardness of the tree understands that the tree is not hard for nothing,…it gives to human beings a towering image of legitimate pride…and returns us to the peaceful condition of solidity. Gaston Bachelard, “Earth and Reveries of Will,” Chapter 3: Metaphors on Hardness and Solidity
Bachelard elaborates on the qualities that the tree represents.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #6, 2021
One who experiences images in all their original force knows well that no image appears by chance, that every image that has been restored to its psychic reality has deep roots. Ibid.
Alongside trees, landscapes don’t just exist to be contemplated; they have a dynamic character. “A landscape is a state of mind…gauging its forces and resistances.” Ibid. I use the term terrain to connect the title and this series with this expanded consideration of the terrain as a landscape with symbolic value.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #3, 2021
The dynamic character of landscapes rests with how these respond to forces and resistances. I find this reflection of interest to me as an artist since it connects with the beauty that I perceive from weathering. As landscapes and living forms adapt to the action of forces on them from their environment, the particular form of response they present creates a variation and transformation that’s unique to the circumstances of the specific hardship experienced.
Bachelard expands this analysis of the adaptation process by introducing the added matter of the will. The will becomes activated to meet the challenges presented by the environment.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #5, 2021
The resistant world lifts us out of our static reality, beyond ourselves, initiating us into the mysteries of energy. Henceforth we are awakened beings. Hammer or trowel in hand, we no longer stand alone – we have an adversary, something to accomplish. However insignificant it may be, we have, as a result of this, a cosmic destiny. Chapter 1: The Dialectics of Imaginary Energies
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain #3 (an ongoing studio painting) 2021
Here, I would venture to suggest that trees are, just as much as human beings, also exerting a will to adapt to adversity. In essence, trees are also “in handling diverse and quite distinctive types of matter, [developing their] own individual patterns of flexibility and resolution. Not only do [they] become adept at the crafting of forms, [trees] become materially skillful at balancing [their] strength against the resistance of matter…the [tree] at work elevates the subject to a higher plane, to an enhanced or dynamized level of existence.” Ibid.
Currently, I have begun two new artworks in the series Wooded Terrain #2 focusing on Joshua Trees and Wooded Terrain #3 focused on the Tasmanian Snow Gum Tree. This is an ongoing project to share in the near future.
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #12, 2021
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #11, 2021
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #10, 2021
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #9, 2021
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #8, 2021
Lorien Suarez-Kanerva Wooded Terrain Study #2, 2021
Recently, Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic Jerry Saltz got himself in some trouble when he tweeted: “A good critic always puts more into writing about art work than the artist put into making it. The artist only creates. The critic must plumb that creation & also write creatively enough to deliver the full volume of the art while also creating a thing of beauty & clarity itself.”
The howls of those who make the art were loud and long, and to his credit, Saltz later apologized for the tweet, saying he intended merely to note that critics are creators in their own right, and that good criticism is art in and of itself.
Pulitzer Prize-winner Jerry Saltz stirred up a recent Twitter controversy with comments about the role of the critic. (Dia Dipasupil/Getty)
The tempest over Saltz’s tweet dovetailed with some thinking I’ve been doing about what I do in this space. It has been almost exactly nine years since I first published my very first Biblioracle column in the dearly departed Printers Row book section, and I still don’t have a concise description of my role here. When asked, I say that I write about books and stuff.
Yes, I am a recommender of books, an unparalleled expert on that front if I do say so myself after these nine years, but this is not my full purpose. What else am I?
I am confident that I’m not a critic of the kind Saltz is thinking of. For me, critics are a combination of judge, historian and teacher, and when done well it truly is an art form in and of itself. Good criticism can help contextualize a work as part of the broader culture. It can help us see things about a work of art that might otherwise be hidden. Art does not need critics to come into existence, but it is invariably better off for the work of critics. A good critic can even make you appreciate something that you didn’t know you were even interested in.
A good example close to home is the recently departed Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin, who won a Pulitzer Prize of his own in 1999. Writing about the architecture of the city, Kamin not only judged quality, but enhanced our understanding of the role architecture plays in the past, present and future of Chicago.
A good critic like that literally helps you see better, and when the critic sees problems, as Kamin did with his Pulitzer-winning series on the late-’90s development of the lakefront, the community is strengthened. I didn’t know I cared about architecture until I read Kamin.
Sometimes you will read my commentaries about a specific book and this will look like a review, but in my mind, they are almost always what I like to call an “enthusiasm.” I choose to write about a book, because it excites me and I’m eager to pass the word on to others. My goal is not to weigh the merits of the book as a reviewer, but to sing its praises.
Perhaps that’s what I am, an “enthusiast” for books and reading. An enthusiast need not be a Pollyanna — in fact, I’m more likely to be a worrywart than an optimist — but the enthusiast wants the object of their enthusiasm to thrive.
That’s me.
What a privilege to have had a role as a public enthusiast for nine years.
John Warner is the author of “Why They Can’t Write: Killing the Five-Paragraph Essay and Other Necessities.”
John Warner is the author of the novel “The Funny Man” and writes the Biblioracle column for Printers Row Journal. An editor at large for McSweeney’s Internet Tendency, he is a visiting professor at the College of Charleston in South Carolina.
María Elena Ortiz is Associate Curator at the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), where she curated At the Crossroads: Critical Film and Video from the Caribbean (2014) and the upcoming exhibition, Firelei Báez (2015). Previously, she worked as the Curator of Contemporary Arts at the Sala de Arte Público Siqueiros in Mexico City, where she organized several projects including Carlos Motta, The Shape of Freedom and Rita Ponce de León: David. Ortiz has also collaborated with institutions such as New Langton Arts, San Francisco; Teorética, San Jose, Costa Rica; the Museum of Craft and Folk Art, San Francisco; and Tate Modern, London. In 2012, she curated Wherever You Roam at the Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach. Ortiz has contributed to writing platforms such as Fluent Collaborative, Curating Now, and Dawire. She has a Masters in Curatorial Practice from the California College of the Arts (2010). In 2014, she was the recipient of the The Colección Patricia Phelps de Cisneros (CPPC) and Independent Curators International (ICI) Travel Award for Central America and the Caribbean. As part of this research, Ortiz will be presenting an upcoming screening program titled, Video Islands, at Anthology Film Archives in New York.
A SELECT GROUP OF BLACK CURATORS is making significant contributions to the museum field—collaborating with artists, organizing important exhibitions, shaping collections and programming, and taking advantage of opportunities to lend their expertise beyond their institutions.
Their representation is growing, slowly, but their presence and achievements remain rare. On the American museum front, among curators, conservators, educators and leaders, only 4 percent are African-American, according to a survey by the Mellon Foundation. A fraction of this group holds curatorial posts.
Since Mellon conducted its survey in 2015, there has been a concerted effort to address the lack of diversity in the museum field. The Studio Museum in Harlem and Museum of Modern Art have established a joint fellowship. Mellon and other foundations in collaboration with universities and museums are funding internships and fellowships to develop the next generation of curators of color and address access issues with paid training opportunities and mentorship programs to provide students with connections, guidance, and support.
Following reports in 2016 and 2017, this year’s Culture Type list of art curators who have taken on new opportunities highlights the achievements of those who have been appointed to permanent institutional positions. Some of the emerging curators featured on this year’s list have already benefitted from the targeted investments made in training the next generation of curators.
The 2018 list also notes more seasoned curators who have accepted temporary posts working on special projects and programming with biennials and art fairs. On this front, there is plenty to look forward to in the coming year.
Nearly all the major U.S. art fairs and biennial-style exhibitions in 2019 will be influenced by black curators. From the Armory Show, and Frieze in New York and Los Angeles to Expo Chicago and the Whitney Biennial, they have been appointed artistic directors, tapped to select participating artists and galleries, and recruited to organize public programming.
Nearly all the major U.S. art fairs and biennial-style exhibitions in 2019 will be influenced by black curators. From the Armory Show, and Frieze in New York and Los Angeles to Expo Chicago and the Whitney Biennial, they have been appointed artistic directors, tapped to select participating artists and galleries, and recruited to organize public programming. African American curators are also co-curating forthcoming editions of Prospect New Orleans (2020) and the New Museum Triennial (2021). A selection of new 2018 appointments follows:
Allison Glenn recently guest curated the group exhibition “Out of Easy Reach,” which was presented in Chicago and Bloomington, Ind. | Photo by Mariana Sheppard, Courtesy Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art
Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Ark., named Allison Glenn associate curator contemporary art in January. She was previously manager of publications and curatorial associate at Prospect New Orleans. At Crystal Bridges, she joined a curatorial team that includes Lauren Haynes, curator of contemporary art. In October, Glenn conducted a conversation with artist Genevieve Gaignard at the museum.
Yolanda Wisher was 2016-17 poet laureate of Philadelphia. | Photo by Ryan Collerd. Courtesy of The Pew Center for Arts & Heritage
In February, Yolanda Wisher was named curator of spoken word at Philadelphia Contemporary. Founded in 2016, Philadelphia Contemporary is an independent, non-collecting, multidisciplinary, and exploratory institution devoted to visual and performing arts. Programming involves pop-up events, partnerships and collaborations while plans for a permanent space are underway. Nato Thompson, previously of Creative Time, is artistic director. Before coming on board, Wisher curated Philadelphia Contemporary’s Outbound Poetry Festival at 30th Street Station in April 2017.
Adrienne Edwards served as curator of “Assembly,” the new Live program at Frieze New York (May 3-6, 2018) featuring performances and installations. | Photo by Whitney Browne
The Whitney Museum of American Art appointed Adrienne Edwards performance curator in February. She had been serving as a curator at Performa in New York City since 2010 when the announcement was made. She officially started at the Whitney in May. Edwards organized the first solo museum show of multidisciplinary artist Jason Moran, which opened at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis in April. A pianist and composer, Moran’s exhibition is currently on view at the Institute of Contemporary Art Boston (through Jan 21, 2019) and will travel to the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio, before concluding at the Whitney in September 2019.
With a background in architectural design and curatorial studies, Yesomi Umolu (shown at the Chicago Cultural Center) concentrates on global contemporary art and spatial practices. | Photo by Andrew Bruah, Courtesy Chicago Architecture Biennial
In March, Yesomi Umolu was named artistic director of the 2019 edition of the Chicago Architecture Biennial. Her appointment was announced by the biennial and Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel. Umolu serves as exhibitions curator at the Logan Center for the Arts at the University of Chicago, where she recently organized “Kapwani Kiwanga: The sum and its parts,” the Canadian-born, Paris-based artist’s first solo exhibition in the United States. The biennial is Sept. 19, 2019-Jan. 5, 2020.
From left, Erin J. Gilbert is developing a strategy to bring new archives into the collection of the Archives of American Art, and Rayna Andrews is organizing and cataloging existing holdings and new acquisitions. | Courtesy Archives of American Art, via LinkedIn
In March, the Smithsonian’s Archives of American Art (AAA) announced the appointments of a curator and archivist to staff a three-year African American Collecting Initiative supported by a $575,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation. The grant also provides for one paid intern each summer. Erin J. Gilbert was named curator of African American manuscripts and Rayna Andrews is serving as an archivist. AAA has a substantial collection of archives and oral histories of important African American artists spanning generations. The goal of the initiative is to build upon the existing holdings.
Curator Brittan Webb previously served as a curatorial and research assistant at the African American Museum in Philadelphia, where one of John Rhoden’s best known works is installed out front. | Courtesy PAFA
Brittany Webb was named curator of the John Rhoden Collection at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) in April. PAFA accepted responsibility for more than 275 works by Rhoden (1918-2001), along with $5 million to support hiring a curator, organizing a traveling exhibition, producing a major publication, and arranging to place the African American sculptor’s work in museum collections. With Webb on board in the newly created position, she is charged with steering the projects and stewarding his legacy.
The British Pavilion at the 2019 Venice Biennale will be curated by Zoé Whitley. Glasgow-based artist Cathy Wilkes was selected to represent Great Britain at the international exhibition and Whitley, curator of international art at the Tate Modern in London, will organize the presentation. Whitley completed her Ph.D. this year under the supervision of artist, professor, and 2017 Turner Prize winner Lubaina Himid at the University of Central Lancashire. For the first time, the British Council invited UK-based mid-career curators to apply for the opportunity to curate the pavilion. Whitley was selected through the open-call process. The 58th Venice Biennale is May 11-Nov. 24, 2019.
Naima J. Keith is taking on curator roles at Expo Chicago in 2019 and Prospect New Orleans in 2020. She received the David C. Driskell Prize in 2017. | Photo by Cristina Gandolfo, Expo Chicago
For the first time, Prospect New Orleans named two curators to envision the next installment of the citywide exhibition. Naima J. Keith, deputy director and chief curator of the California African American Museum (CAAM), and independent curator Diana Nawi were appointed co-curators in May. Both are based in Los Angeles and have previously collaborated. Prospect.5 opens in fall 2020. In the meantime, Keith is taking on another role. In November, Expo Chicago announced she is curating the Exposure section of the art fair. The section spotlights emerging galleries (in business eight years or less) with one- and two-artist presentations. Expo Chicago is Sept. 19-22, 2019.
Elvira Dyangani Ose is a member of the Thought Council at the Prada Foundation where she curated exhibitions with Betye Saar and Theaster Gates. | Photo by Hendrik Zeitler
The Showroom in London named Elvira Dyangani Ose director in June. Challenging “what art can be and do for a wide range of audiences,” The Showroom commissions art, programming and publications and provides a platform for artists to mount their first solo exhibitions in London. Dyangani Ose previously served as senior curator at Creative Time in New York City and is a lecturer in visual cultures at Goldsmiths, University of London.
Juana Williams earned a master’s degree in art history from Wayne State University in Detroit, where a major part of her thesis explored the contributions of black women artists during the Civil Rights Movement. | Photo by Jeff Cancelosi
In June, the Urban Institute for Contemporary Art (UICA) at Kendall College of Art and Design at Ferris State University hired Juana Williams as exhibitions curator. An independent curator, she most recently served as assistant to the chair of the department of art and art history at Wayne State University in Detroit.
Curator Vera Grant held posts at Stanford University and Harvard University before joining the University of Michigan earlier this year. | Courtesy UMMA
In July, Vera Grant was appointed deputy director of curatorial affairs and curator of modern and contemporary art at the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA) in Ann Arbor. Previously, Grant was director of the Ethelbert Cooper Gallery of African & African American Art at Harvard University’s Hutchins Center. She has also served as executive director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at Harvard and associate director of the African and African American Studies Program at Stanford University (2001-2007). She started at UMMA in September.
An artist, curator, and arts administrator, Kristina Newman-Scott hails from Kingston, Jamaica. | Photo by Chion Wolf
In July, BRIC announced Kristina Newman-Scott had been tapped as its new president. She previously served as director of culture for the state of Connecticut. An art and media organization, BRIC describes itself as “the leading presenter of free cultural programming in Brooklyn.” Newman-Scott will oversee a multitude of programming, including exhibitions, performances, film and television projects, a summer-long festival and a fall jazz festival, and school-based initiatives. BRIC marked its 40th anniversary in September.
A curator and critical race historian, Kelli Morgan has been awarded fellowships by the Ford Foundation (2014), Birmingham Museum of Art (2014-15), and Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (2016). | Courtesy IMA
The Indianapolis Museum of Art (IMA) at Newfields announced the appointment of Kelli Morgan as associate curator of American art in July. She has held curatorial and scholarly positions at a variety of institutions. A Detroit native, Morgan earned a Ph.D. in Afro-American Studies and a graduate certificate in Public History – Museum Studies from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst in 2017. Next March, she is co-curating the exhibition “Samuel Levi Jones: Left of Center” at IMA.
Curator Ndubuisi C. Ezeluomba earned a Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Florida, Gainesville, specializing in historic African shrines. | Courtesy NOMA
The New Orleans Museum of Art (NOMA) named Ndubuisi C. Ezeluomba the Françoise Billion Richardson Curator of African Art. Originally from Benin City, Nigeria, Ezeluomba joins NOMA after serving as the Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial Research Specialist in African Art at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. In prior roles, he worked on two major exhibitions at the Harn Museum of Art at the University of Floria—“Elusive Spirits: African Masquerades” and “Kongo Across the Waters.”
The next New Museum Triennial will be co-curated by Margot Norton, curator at the New Museum, and Jamillah James, curator at the Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles. James was previously assistant curator at the Hammer Museum in Los Angeles where she collaborated on exhibitions and public programming with Art + Practice. Scheduled to open in 2021, the New Museum’s international exhibition is dedicated to presenting the work of emerging artists from around the world.
Curator V. Mitch McEwen is also a professor of architecture at Princeton University. | Courtesy A(n)other Lab, Princeton SOA
The New Museum in New York named V. Mitch McEwen curator of IdeasCity, an annual initiative that “explores the future of cities with culture as a driving force” through enterprising gatherings, projects, and exhibitions. McEwen is principal and cofounder of A(n) Office, a collaborative of design studios based in Detroit and New York. She is responsible for the 2018-19 cycle of IdeasCity. On Sept. 15, IdeasCity took place in Toronto and a spring 2019 event is planned in New Orleans.
Larry Ossei-Mensah co-curated “Allison Janae Hamilton: Pitch,” the artist’s first solo museum exhibition, which is on view at Mass MOCA through February 2019. | Photo by Andrew Boyle
The Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD) appointed Larry Ossei-Mensah senior curator in August. MOCAD brought Ossei-Mensah on board to help institute a more expansive approach to the museum’s exhibitions and public programming. Over the past decade, he has been an independent curator, organizing exhibitions, producing live events, and contributing to publications. In New York City, he has curated shows with galleries such as Elizabeth Dee, Jenkins Johnson, and Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art. In Rome, Ossei-Mensah recently co-curated “Postcard from New York—Part II” at Anna Marra Contemporanea. He is also a co-founder of Artnoir, a collective of writers, artists, and curators that designs and produces experiences for a diverse community of new generation creatives. He officially joined MOCAD in September.
Curator Legacy Russell previously held posts at the Artsy, the Brooklyn Museum, The Bruce High Quality Foundation, Creative Time, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Whitney Museum of American Art. | Courtesy Studio Museum in Harlem
In August, the Studio Museum in Harlem named Legacy Russell associate curator, exhibitions. The museum is in the midst of its 50th anniversary year and is currently producing programs and collaborative projects off-site while its new building is constructed at its 125th Street location. A writer and curator whose work focuses on gender, performance, and new media, Russell most recently served as European gallery relations lead at Artsy. In 2017, she collaborated on a series of multimedia events focused on digital feminism at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London.
Akili Tommasino’s new appointment at MFA Boston marks a return to the museum where he interned in the Art of Europe department a decade ago. | Franz Lino, Courtesy MFA Boston
Akili Tommasino was named associate curator for modern and contemporary art at the Museum of Fine Arts (MFA) Boston in August. He officially joined the museum in the newly created role in October. Tommasino has been a curatorial assistant at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) since 2014. There, he founded Prep for Prep/Sotheby’s Summer Art Academy, a program designed to expose New York City high school students of color to museums and the larger world of art and promote diversity in the field.
Naomi Beckwith organized “Prisoner of Love” which opens Jan. 26 at MCA Chicago. Centered around Arthur Jafa’s video montage “Love is the Message, The Message is Death,” the forthcoming exhibition features a rotating selection of works from the museum’s collection that respond to the same powerful themes about the black experience and life in America Jafa explores in his work. | Photo by Maria Ponce, Courtesy MCA Chicago
In August, Naomi Beckwith was promoted to senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. Since 2011, she has been curator at the museum. Beckwith co-curated the first-ever survey of multidisciplinary artist Howardena Pindell with Valerie Cassel Oliver of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts (VMFA). A comprehensive exploration of her five-decade practice, “Howardena Pindell: What Remains to be Seen” opened at MCA Chicago in February, traveled to VMFA, and is headed to the Rose Art Museum at Brandeis University, where it will be on view beginning Feb. 1. Beckwith chaired the Armory Show’s curatorial summit earlier this year and also served as curatorial adviser for SITElines 2018, the biennial in Santa Fe, N.M. (Aug. 3, 2018-Jan. 6, 2019).
N’Goné Fall said Season Africa 2020 will expose France to Africa’s emerging leaders under the age of 30—the artists and creative thinkers of tomorrow—and how their vision of the world is shaping the continent of Africa. | F.diouf Photography, Courtesy Institut français
N’Goné Fall was named general commissioner of the Season Africa 2020 at the end of August. A grand undertaking initiated by French President Emmanuel Macron, Season Africa 2020 is “an invitation to look, learn and understand the world from an African perspective” and will occur over six months beginning June 2020 in metropolitan France and its territories. The ambitious program spans the creative disciplines—from visual arts, film, fashion, performing arts, architecture, design, and literature to science, technology, and sports—and will feature exhibitions, public conversations, and large outdoor events. Senegalese-born Fall is a scholar, art magazine editor, and cultural policy consultant, who has curated exhibitions in Africa, Europe, and the United States.
Jade Powers curated two exhibition currently on view at the Kemper Museum of Art: “Abstracted Wonders: The Power of Lines” and “Deconstructing Marcus Jansen.” Shown, Powers with detail of Nari Ward’s “Breathing Panel: Oriented Right” (2015). | Photo by Kenny Johnson, Courtesy Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art
In August, the Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art in Kansas City , Mo., announced the expansion of its curatorial team with the appointment of Jade Powers as assistant curator. Powers previously served as 2017–2018 Romare Bearden Graduate Museum Fellow at the Saint Louis Art Museum. During her Bearden fellowship, she created an interpretive guide to works by African American artists in the collection of the Saint Louis Museum of Art, and also helped document a gift of 81 abstract works by African American artists. Powers also held a prior post at the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis.
Curator Lauren Haynes’s role at Crystal Bridges Museum is expanding to include curator of visual art at The Momentary, a forthcoming satellite venue the museum is developing. | Photo by Beth Hall, Courtesy Armory Show
In September, the Armory Show announced the curatorial team for the 2019, including Lauren Haynes who will organize the Focus section of the art fair. Focus is “devoted to solo- and dual-artist presentations by relevant and compelling artists.” Haynes is the contemporary art curator at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Ark., where she curated the first U.S. presentation of the touring exhibition “Soul of a Nation: Art in the Age of Black Power.” Haynes previously spent a decade at the Studio Museum in Harlem. The 2019 Armory Show is open to the public March 7-10.
Over the years, Hamza Walker has engaged in public conversations with some of the most interesting figures in contemporary art—most recently, artists Theaster Gates, Walead Beshty, Todd Gray, Matthew Day Jackson, Shinique Smith, Paul Sepuya, and curator Naomi Beckwith.
In September, Hamza Walker was named inaugural curator of Frieze Los Angeles Talks and Music. The programming will center around conversations and music and “highlight Los Angeles as a place of interdisciplinary experimentation that extends into the mediums of sound, poetry and performance.” Walker is executive Director of LAXART, a nonprofit art space in Los Angeles. In 2016, he was co-curator of “Made in L.A.” at the Hammer Museum. Previously, he served as director of education and associate curator at the Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago. Frieze is presenting its first fair in Los Angeles Feb. 14-17, 2019, at Paramount Pictures Studios in Hollywood.
Under Linda Harrison’s leadership, the Museum of the African Diaspora in San Francisco (MoAD) was re-designed doubling its gallery space. The exhibition program was transformed and she also introduced poet- and chef-in-residence initiatives. | Photo by Adrian Octavius Walker, Courtesy Newark Museum
The Newark Museum named Linda Harrison director and CEO in October. She joined New Jersey’s largest museum after serving as director and chief executive of the Museum of the African Diaspora in San Francisco since 2013. In 2017, the Newark Museum was one of 20 U.S. museums selected by the Ford Foundation and the Walton Family Foundation to participate in an initiative aimed at diversifying curatorial staffing and management at art museums. In 2019, the Newark Museum is celebrating its 110th year.
Pérez Art Museum Miami Director Franklin Sirman (with Arturo Herrera, “When Alone Again III,” 2001), hosted a series of museum events earlier this month during Miami Art Week, parties, dinners, and talks centered around exhibitions and installations by Ebony G. Patterson and Christo, among others. | Photo by Angel Valentin, Courtesy PAMM
Frieze has announced collaborations with museum leaders for its 2019 New York edition, including Franklin Sirmans, director of the Pérez Art Museum Miami. At Frieze, Sirmans is planning a themed section paying tribute to Just Above Midtown (JAM), the legendary art gallery founded by Linda Goode Bryant in New York City. From 1974-1986, JAM provided a platform and gathering space for artists of color who were generally ignored by galleries and museums. Alonzo Davis, David Hammons, Norman Lewis, Senga Nengudi, Lorraine O’Grady, Lorna Simpson, and Fred Wilson are among the artists who showed their work at the black-owned gallery. Working with Bryant, Sirmans will “reimagine” JAM, inviting galleries to mount solo artist presentations. Prior to his appointment at PAMM, he served as department head and curator of contemporary art at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Frieze New York is May 2-5, 2019 at Randall’s Island Park.
Courtney J. Martin stands before a Robert Ryman painting at Dia:Chelsea. | Courtesy Dia Art Foundation
Courtney J. Martin is curating the second installment of the Frieze Artist Award at Frieze New York. The art fair made the announcement earlier this month. Martin is deputy director and chief curator of the Dia Art Foundation. She previously served as an assistant professor of art history and architecture at Brown University, where she is currently on leave. The Frieze Award provides an opportunity for an emerging artist to create a site-specific installation for the 2019 art fair (May 2-5). Artist Kapwani Kiwanga was selected for the inaugural New York award and commission, which was curated by Adrienne Edwards. For 2019, the deadline for submissions is Jan. 11.
Toña Vegas – Energy Matters Triptic- 2018- 63″ x 26″- Watercolor, ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @pedrowazzan
The long night. The sound of the water says what I think.
Gochiku
The recent work of Toña Vegas gathered in “Energy Matters” seems to be guided by and to propitiate an ineffable knowledge. The patient and methodical contemplation of nature that the artist has carried out as part of her existential experience has led her to understand the hidden essence shared by everything—the breath of cosmic life that is energy. In the pieces displayed, she transfers that energy by registering their tracings or by picturing their waves and effluvia.
Toña Vegas – Shizen series- 2018- 15″ x 12″- Perforated Shizen paper & black gesso- Photo @pedrowazzan
In the contemporary critical perspective, rooted in the western philosophical tradition, the fact that art produces a diverse mode of knowledge—in which forms and images involving both the spectator and the artist access a subtle understanding of reality and a special awareness of the world—is often left aside.
Toña Vegas- Energy matters. Homage to Oscar Perez- 2018- 101″ X 80″- Ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @tonyavegasofficial
Following this idea, “Energy Matters” is presented as a sensitive lesson that suggests the great mystery of who and what we are—part of a nature that contains us, part of a cosmos that inhabits us, and part of an energy that transforms and continues towards infinity temporal space.
Toña Vegas – Energy Matters Triptic II – 2018- -12″x29″- Watercolor, ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @pedrowazzan
In the works of the Shizen and Scripture series, the “silent writings” of the sea, the surfaces of rocks, the bark and leaves of trees, or the shapes of clouds—“unveiled” by subjecting photographs of these elements to a high contrasting technique—have been transcribed into perforations on black-painted paper or, as in Traces, into the “positive” silhouettes of its contours. The Energy Matters series comprises paintings executed by Vegas using her fingers; this allows her to materialize her own energy pictorially. In the process, guided by her senses and intuition, energy appears simultaneously as structure and vibration in layers that overlap and interweave, creating a complex and deep space. These pieces are also traces, vestiges of an energy that is transformed into lines and stains, of a continuous flow suggesting skins of animals, leaves fluttering in a breeze, the wall of an old cave, or a burning emotion.
Toña Vegas – Scriptures. Leaves & Bark – 2018- 34″ x 24″ – Perforated Hahnemulhe paper & black gesso -Traces. Bark- Hahnemulhe paper & black gesso- Photo @pedrowazzan
The nature of some works of art could be related to Eastern philosophical practices which incorporate subjectivity and non-explicit notions as parts of the knowledge process. As in Taoism—where the teacher does not teach what he knows as something that he possesses and transmits rationally and objectively—the work of Toña Vegas communicates knowledge in a poetic way, through “brushstrokes of meaning” that trigger understanding. This process assumes the relativity of the cognitive experience and, subsequently, the immeasurability of any notion of reality.
Holland Cotter reports in the New York Times that Ellsworth Kelly has passed away. Recognized for his elegant and vibrant works that blend hardedge abstraction with Minimalism, Kelly lived in Spencertown, New York. His death was announced today by Matthew Marks of Matthew Marks Gallery.
Kelly was born on May 31, 1923 in Newburgh, New York. After his discharge from the Army in 1945, he studied painting at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston from 1946 to 1947. In 1948, he moved to Paris and encountered numerous European artists, including Brancusi, Picabia, and Giacometti, among others. Here, he began to craft an aesthetic that incorporated strategies of chance with a tracing of motifs found in life. Returning to New York in 1954, Kelly further harnessed his output and distanced himself from Action Painting, instead focusing on a single shape or working with shaped canvases. These spare yet significant methods of working were examined and refined in much of his subsequent signature work. In his recent paintings, Kelly distilled his palette, often to white or black, and introduced new forms.
Of Kelly’s 1996 retrospective at the Guggenheim Museum in New York, James Meyer wrote for Artforum: “What can we learn from a retrospective of Kelly’s work? The rewards of sticking to one’s guns.”
FRAGMENTOS E IDENTIDAD. COLLAGES DE RICARDO CARBONELL
Ricardo Carbonell Rupture #3
Converso en esta oportunidad con el artista del collage Ricardo Carbonell, quien, desde Caracas, Venezuela, me comenta sobre su obra y sus inicios en este transitar del arte. Carbonell (Caracas, 1952) abogado de profesión, se desenvuelve conjuntamente desde hace más de dos décadas, en el difícil —a veces ingrato— quehacer del artista. La consolidación de su vida profesional como abogado, no fue nunca obstáculo para desarrollar en paralelo una expresión plástica que desde niño ya se manifestaba a través del dibujo y la pintura. Pero es el collage, esa expresión artística intimista y en su caso, de cortes y pegados precisos, lo que ha sido su línea de investigación por tantos años, convirtiéndose en el eje fundamental de su trabajo.
Sus herramientas, mayoritariamente objetos del cotidiano, papeles de distinto gramaje, tirros coloridos, exacto y tijeras, dan forma a maravillosos collages cargados de dinamismo compositivo dispuestos sobre el soporte, en tela o papel. Y es que esta técnica que ya tiene en su haber un recorrido de varias centurias, irrumpió con fuerza en las vanguardias de la primera mitad del siglo XX y se mantiene en el discurso plástico de los artistas contemporáneos.
Ricardo Carbonell Road Series #11 2019 collage on canvas 40×40 inches
Carbonell imprime un sello personal a su obra, —un género que abarca estilos, técnicas, materiales y soportes variados— con el uso de cintas plásticas para electricidad en cortes y composiciones diversas. Es un artista metódico, organizado y en algunas de sus series —si no todas—, la nomenclatura numérica se convierte en parte del registro de la pieza, seguido de una palabra que denomina un color. Algo así, como si de un código se tratase. La serie Columnas, desarrollada en años recientes, es un ejemplo de ello. El artista dispone en vertical, bloques de cintas adhesivas en tonalidades diversas a modo de columnas, asignando un número a cada color, con lo que cada pieza se denomina según los colores utilizados en su elaboración. El artista comenta: “…dado que la paleta de los tapes o cintas adhesivas es escasa, le asignamos a cada color un número…”. Me explica que dispone de una gama de apenas 9 colores y en ocasiones, el fondo blanco del soporte se convierte en columnas inadvertidas que dan peso visual a la composición.
Ricardo Carbonell SErie aL-15-8
La serie Collages, ha sido producida entre 2013-2019 y en palabras del artista, refiere a “…un sueño y su realización, que culminó con la ejecución de 138 obras…”. Elementos coleccionados por años, dan vida a este cuerpo de trabajo con el que el artista motiva al espectador a crear sus propias historias; objetos reconocidos por el colectivo y que podrían “hablarle” de una cotidianidad a otra. Es así como el cambio de uso de los objetos, les imprime otro carácter y es desde esa otra dimensión —la artística— en la que se han insertado, desde la cual tendrán una nueva identidad.
Tickets de transporte público, envoltorios de golosinas, pegatinas de tiendas por departamento, llaves, paletas de helado, restos de algún hilo colorido, entradas a eventos, trozos de alambre, cápsulas de precinto de botellas de vino, todo suma en polícroma composición sobre el soporte. Una mirada intimista, muy cercana al recuerdo cotidiano.
En noviembre de 2015, un trágico hecho conmovió a la Ciudad Luz. París, la cuna del glamour, la gastronomía y la moda, se vio sacudida por múltiples explosiones que dejaron un saldo trágico de muerte y destrucción, entre ellos el ataque al Teatro Bataclan. La serie París Bataclán, nace de esa situación infortunada. Así lo relata el artista: “Ante esa negativa realidad ejecutamos a las horas de los acontecimientos,…una serie de seis (6) obras…”. De nuevo el carácter intimista de una técnica desarrollada en el silencio de un estudio de muy poco espacio, da pie para el desarrollo de un cuerpo de trabajo basado en los colores de la bandera francesa —azul, rojo y blanco—. El artista articula franjas verticales atravesadas por líneas laberínticas dispuestas sobre el plano. Las franjas, —columnas fracturadas y en ocasiones, interrumpidas por el color negro—, expresan la consternación de la tragedia. París, la ciudad idílica, ha quedado indefectiblemente impactada.
Ricardo Carbonell Road Serie 8 2019 collage on canvas 40×40 inches
Otra de sus series, Rupture, es una obra de carácter político con un componente de silente repudio a lo que acontece en su país natal, Venezuela. Un cuerpo de trabajo de 14 piezas elaboradas en tapes de colores amarillo, azul y rojo —los del tricolor nacional— dispuestos de manera horizontal sobre el lienzo como soporte. Las 7 estrellas blancas originalmente ubicadas en la franja central azul del estandarte nacional, dan paso a elementos triangulares en color negro, colocados en un ordenamiento específico a lo largo de toda la obra, y que expresan el oscurantismo por el que atraviesa la sociedad venezolana. Es la ruptura de la constitucionalidad, de una democracia venida a menos y de un sistema comunista impuesto por el régimen gobernante.
Ricardo Carbonell Paris Bataclan Series V
La obra de Ricardo Carbonell se nutre del cotidiano, de sus vivencias y de la observación consciente de hechos y realidades que lo marcan no solo en lo personal, pero además tienen repercusión en lo colectivo. Como espectador, no me distrae el colorido y la composición estéticamente agradable de sus piezas. En ocasiones me cuestionan en dialogo amable. Y cuando el arte es cuestionador, puedo llegar a ser empático con el artista, desde la conexión emocional con la obra a través de percepciones y sentimientos personales. Intentar interpretar qué ha sucedido entre el objeto en desuso y su escogencia por parte del artista —para infundirle nueva vida— es algo que queda en la mente del espectador. Enero 11, 2021
NOTA: Imágenes cortesía del artista y de MIA Curatorial Projects.
Toña Vegas – Energy Matters Triptic- 2018- 63″ x 26″ Watercolor, ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @pedrowazzan
La larga noche; el sonido del agua dice lo que pienso.
Gochiku
El trabajo reciente de Toña Vegas reunido en «Energy Matters» parece guiado por y para propiciar un conocimiento que es inefable. La contemplación paciente y metódica de la naturaleza que la artista ha realizado como parte de su experiencia existencial, la ha llevado a comprender la esencia recóndita que comparte todo lo que contiene ese soplo de vida cósmica que es la energía, y que ella transvasa, en las piezas que hoy vemos, a través del registro de sus huellas gráficas o de la «pictorialización» de sus ondas y efluvios.
Toña Vegas Shizen series 2018- 15″ x 12″ Perforated Shizen paper & black gesso Photo @pedrowazzan
Para la perspectiva crítica contemporánea, arraigada en los constructos derivados de la tradición filosófica occidental, queda de lado frecuentemente el hecho de que el arte comporta un modo diverso de conocimiento, en el que, a través de formas e imágenes, tanto el espectador como el artista acceden a una comprensión sutil de la realidad y a una especial conciencia del mundo.
Siguiendo esto, «Energy Matters» se presenta como una lección sensible que nos asoma al gran misterio de lo que somos: partes de una naturaleza que nos contiene, de un cosmos que nos habita y de una energía que se transforma y continúa hacia la infinitud espacio-temporal.
Toña Vegas- Energy matters. Homage to Oscar Perez- 2018 – 101″ X 80″ Ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @tonyavegasofficial
En las obras de las series Shizen y Scripture las «escrituras calladas» del mar, las superficies rocosas, las cortezas vegetales, los follajes o las nubes —«develadas» al someter a alto contraste fotografías de estos elementos— han sido transcritas en surcos perforados en papel pintado de negro o, como en Traces, en las siluetas «en positivo» de sus contornos. La serie Energy Matters comprende pinturas ejecutadas usando los dedos como medios que permiten a la artista materializar pictóricamente su propia energía. En el proceso, guiado por la sensorialidad y la intuición, esta aparece simultáneamente como estructura y vibración, en capas que se superponen y entretejen, creando un espacio complejo y profundo. Estas piezas constituyen también huellas, vestigios de una energía que se transforma en trazos y manchas, en un caudal continuamente sugerente en el que aparecen, a un tiempo, la piel de un animal, hojas movidas por la brisa, la pared de una antigua gruta, o una emoción que abrasa.
Toña Vegas – Energy Matters Triptic II – 2018 – 12″ x29″ Watercolor, ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @pedrowazzan
La naturaleza de la obra de arte –o quizás de algunas muy especiales, como las aquí exhibidas– se emparenta con las prácticas filosóficas orientales, que incorporan la subjetividad y las nociones no explícitas como partes del proceso de conocimiento. Como en el taoísmo, donde el maestro no enseña lo que sabe como algo que posee y que trasmite racional y objetivamente, la obra de Toña Vegas comunica un saber de modo poético, a través de «pinceladas de sentido» que desencadenan el entendimiento, pero asumiendo dentro de sí la relatividad de la experiencia cognitiva y, más allá, lo inabarcable de toda noción de realidad.
Toña Vegas – Energy Matters Triptic II – 2018 12″ x29″ Watercolor, ink & oil on yupo paper- Photo @pedrowazzan
