Wednesday, June 19, 2019

Wednesday, June 19, 2019

This is a black arts and culture site. We will be exploring the African Diaspora via the writing, performance, both musical and theatrical (film and stage), as well as the visual arts of Africans in the Diaspora and those influenced by these aesthetic forms of expression. I am interested in the political and social ramifications of art on society, specifically movements supported by these artists and their forebearers. It is my claim that the artists are the true revolutionaries, their work honest and filled with raw unedited passion. They are our true heroes. Ashay!

400 Year Commission
1. Michael Khubaka Harris is Regional Director, National Juneteenth Observance Foundation (www.njof.org)

Read about the 400 Year Commission: https://www.nps.gov/orgs/1892/africanamericanhistorycommission.htm

John Templeton, historian, Sacramento Observer, http://sacobserver.com/2019/06/juneteenth-the-victory-of-black-courage-and-patriotism/

2. Ebony Iman Dallas, featured artist at Joyce Gordon Gallery, "Through Abayah's Eyes"
https://www.ebonyimandallas.com/about 

Ebony Iman Dallas is an award-winning artist, writer and founder of Afrikanation Artists Organization.  Through art, she combines rich and fiery hues with whimsical forms to bring the spirit and energy of her subjects to life. Her artwork primarily addresses social, political and cultural issues. With a focus on authenticity and progress, her artwork takes form organically where each line determines the shape and direction of the next.

Ebony received her BA Advertising and Art degree from the University of Central Oklahoma, then went on to work at Carol H. Williams Advertising in Oakland, California as an art director.

She earned her MFA Design degree from California College of the Arts (2009) in San Francisco, CA. Her thesis titled "Painted Bridges," explored ways to unify diverse populations within the African diaspora through art and design. This was an effort to promote collaboration and solution-finding to joint challenges amongst them. As a result, Afrikanation Artists Organization was founded as a non-profit, NGO based Hargeisa, Somaliland/Somalia and a 501(c)3 in the United States.


3. Rebroadcast interview with Oyafunmike Ogunlano (Mona) in Sankofa (1993), dir. Haile Gerima

Announcement

About Things Loved: Blackness and BelongingCal Conversations

May 17–July 21, 2019
“Can blackness be loved?”

—Fred Moten

Black culture and museum institutions have often had a negative relationship. Historically, this has included the theft of cultural objects, the appropriation of styles, and the devaluation of skilled practices, as well as the marginalization and exclusion of Black artists from exhibitions and collections. Museums have been implicated in antiblack practices that present racial difference as biological fact rather than social construction, and exclude, marginalize, and devalue Black art, Black artists, and Black life. Recognizing this, About Things Loved: Blackness and Belonging centers a diverse array of Black art in the hope of addressing these questions: To whom does blackness belong? Where does blackness belong? How can blackness belong within the museum?

This exhibition highlights the artworks and intergenerational relationships of Romare Bearden, Girma Berta, Chakaia Booker, Peter Bradley, Erica Deeman, Charles Gaines, Dan Halter, Lyle Ashton Harris, Mildred Howard, Margo Humphrey, Julie Mehretu, Kamau Amu Patton, Faith Ringgold, William Rogers, Betye Saar, Raymond Saunders, Lorna Simpson, Hervé Télémaque, Kara Walker, Carrie Mae Weems, Charles White, and Fred Wilson. Most of the artwork was produced by Black artists from Africa and its diasporas, drawn from the permanent collections and archives of BAMPFA and the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology. However, crucially, this exhibition does not intend to define Black art or to limit Black artists to a single aesthetic. Rather, the exhibition foregrounds the richness and diversity that becomes visible when blackness is taken as the norm rather than the exception, proposing the museum as a space of care for relationships of justice, equity, and inclusion.

This is the third in a series of annual exhibitions, Cal Conversations, developed in collaboration with UC Berkeley classes.

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