Strange Fruit: Split Seed series
"Strange Fruit, Split Seed: August 3, 1920" (detail), graphite on paper, 72 x 42 inches, 2007
What shocked me most when I first saw the pages of the book of lynching postcards entitled Without Sanctuary; Photographs and Postcards of Lynching in America were the confident looks on the faces of the lynch mob staring back at me from the; the threat seemed implicit.
But what disturbed me even further was the sense that I also became a witness. In the act of just looking, I, like the other participants in the inhuman act that had occurred, also became accomplice to the crime.
"Strange Fruit, Split Seed: Lige Daniels" (detail), graphite on paper 72 x 42 inches, 2007
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"Strange Fruit, Split Seed: August 3, 1920", graphite on paper, 72 x 42 inches, 2007
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Re-editing the photographs, separating the lynched from the lynch mob, is my act of transforming them, to make them neither objects of celebration nor condemnation, to make the viewer neither victim nor participant. Manually reproducing these photographs has been my way of taking possession of these anonymous objects of terror, defusing the potential threat, and dismantling the mechanism of terror.
Strange Fruit; Split Seed @ ArtBridge NYC |
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Up now on 23rd Street between 9th and 10th avenues in Chelsea, NYC.
ArtBridge empowers emerging artists to transform urban spaces. ArtBridge transforms 192 miles of street-level construction scaffolding into a canvas for local, emerging artists. These exhibitions result in incredible exposure for artists, while artfully reinvigorating our urban landscape.
ArtBridge empowers emerging artists to transform urban spaces. ArtBridge transforms 192 miles of street-level construction scaffolding into a canvas for local, emerging artists. These exhibitions result in incredible exposure for artists, while artfully reinvigorating our urban landscape.
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I Draw & You Talk project
For one month, I offered free portraits at Matteawan Gallery in Beacon, New York. Visitors were invited to sit, enjoy a cup of soup and record a conversation about the topic of the day. 109 portraits of Beacon residents (including Beacon’s own Mayor!) hung in the gallery until the end of the month when participants could pick them up. The drawings and several audio recordings were compiled on this blog.
"I Draw & You Talk" project in progress at Matteawan Gallery, Beacon, NY, 2016
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N*gatives series
N*gatives aims to create type of alternative film history which narrows down films (American and international) in which race plays an outsized role. The series of drawings are based on the moment in which the actor utters the n-word at a crucial moment in the plot.
