scene of the day

Atlanta-based contemporary artist Fahamou Pecou and his outlandish promotional video.

"street" chic

In the January 24th edition of the New York Times, critic Randy Kennedy profiles artist Shepard Fairey and the National Portrait Gallery's acquisition of his iconographic portrait of President Barack Obama. Kennedy dares to suggest that this move symbolizes the blurring of the lines between fine art and what he labels "street art":

So it has been hailed by street-art fans as a significant moment, the fine-art world beginning to find a way to recognize a movement that has been growing apace for more than a decade, propelled by a generation of artists who grew up with graffiti and now make work on the streets with materials as varied (and sometimes as ephemeral) as paper, plastic, tape, snow, rubber bands and knitted wool.

Since when did the tradition of screen print posters become canonized into the ambiguous category of "street art"? Should artists like Shinique Smith and Jean-Michel Basquiat, who were heavily influenced by the tradition of graffiti, but whose works are most often exhibited inside gallery spaces and museums, be considered "street" artists as well? How about artists like David Hammons and William Pope L., who often utilize "found" public materials within their installations...are they "street" artists as well?

In short, site-specificity, or the spaces in which art is presented and displayed, public or private, plays a large role into how society consumes it. Distinctions like "fine/high" and "low/street" art are constantly being contested in artistic practices today with a merging of formal and technical artistic traditions within particular expressions that extend from specific subcultures and anti-establishment practices. Perhaps it is necessary to re-examine the roles that museum institutions play in presenting so-called "street" art and facilitate public interpretations of the work itself.

Top: Jean-Michel Basquiat, Untitled, 1984, Acrylic and mixed media on canvas, 86 x 68 in. (218.4 x 172.7 cm)
Bottom: Shinique Smith, Voodoo Children, 2005. Fabric, clothing, accessories and ink. Dimensions variable

scene of the day

An intimate portrayal of the collaborative work of America's most celebrated artists, the late Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol.

scene of the day

Check out the student-produced short film on textile artist and sculptor Yinka Shonibare: Questioning Authenticity in African Art: Yinka Shonibare

the dream: revisited

American photographer Gordon Parks (1912-2006) framed some of the most prolific moments in our country's history. Today's post is a tribute to him, as he is one of many Americans who could not witness yesterday's momentous occasion. Parks' powerful rendition of American Gothic (Ella Watson, 1942) is a befitting photograph because it serves as necessary reminder to keep the past within the present. Parks' work keeps alive the legacy of hundreds of thousands of African-Americans who struggled in hopes that one day we could be one nation, under God, indivisible...with liberty and justice for all. Though we are not there yet, the legacies of our forebearers encourage and motivate us to progress forward, one step at a time. You can check out more of Parks' works in Bare Witness: Photographs by Gordon Parks at the Mary and Leigh Block Museum of Art in Evanston, Il in April 2009.

Image: Gordon Parks, American Gothic, photograph, 1942.

scene of the day

President Barack Obama's "Yes We Can" speech

hope

Happy Martin Luther King Jr Day! Inauguration is literally hours away...take a moment to observe the monumentality of this historic occasion. Just BE.


Image: Shepard Fairey, Hope, screenprint

why we don't live in a post-racial society

Because even images as provocative as Dsquared's new ad campaign featuring Naomi Campbell and Linda Evangelista, conceptually, are racializing. In a clever Nickolas Muray meets Robert Mapplethorpe kind of way, bodies in these photographs become markers of beauty and race, while contention between the two colored/marked bodies creates visual interest but demarcates difference. Dsquared ads are normally shot in black and white photography... perhaps the creative directors decided to take "black" and "white" to another level. You can check out the ad campaign at www.dsquared2.com.

rhapsody in hue

So I've been dying to write about the breathtaking work of abstract painter Ed Clark. And now that I finally have the platform, I'm at a loss for words. His paintings are wall-sized fields of color, often inspired by sunsets in Mexico, Egyptian deserts, Moroccan architecture, and Parisian hill-top skylines. Clark is most popularly known for breaking into the art world by breaking out of the traditional four-sided canvas. His work can be found in major collections across the country, but is also conveniently available to locals at the Art Institute of Chicago and G.R. N'Namdi Gallery. According to one of my favourite scholars of all time, Robin D.G. Kelley, a little known fact about Clark is that he and other black artists were invited to- and subsequently visited Cuba in 1959 vis-à-vis Fidel Castro. Quite the visual revolutionary.

Left: Ed Clark, Untitled, 1957.

scene of the day

Thelonious Monk. Blue Monk.