culturalboundaries

As reported in Vogue Magazine

“I’ve always done too much,” Sarah Lewis says in a tone that falls somewhere between self-mockery and pride. Thirty years old and whiplash fit, with honors degrees from Harvard and Oxford under her belt and on the verge of a Ph.D. from Yale, she has two books nearing completion, and is co-curating the SITE Santa Fe biennial, the closely watched art show, which opens next month. Rocco Landesman, the chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts, wants to create a special initiative for her at the NEA in Washington, D.C. She has become a young woman to watch. As her friend Agnes Gund, MoMA’s president emerita, said the other day, “You don’t know what she’ll end up doing—there are so many possibilities.”

Read the rest of the article about Lewis in the May 2010 issue of Vogue at the link above.
Read more about the Biennial here.

The GAP tees are now in stores. After a few delivery issues snafus from their factory, they finally arrived.  I want to thank all of you for your patience and support.
Gap (RED) is featuring a few artworks by Len Davis for their Limited Artist Edition Spring/Summer line. One of the three t-shirt designs are in Gap stores today.  The other two designs will be in stores on May 10th.
Look for the in-store signage for Gap (RED) Limited Artist Edition tees.
All proceeds go to The Global Fund to Fight AIDS in Africa. http://www.joinred.com/Learn/HowRedWorks.aspx

As reported by The National Design Museum

“Ted Muehling Selects” is the 10th in a series of small one-gallery exhibitions in the Nancy and Edwin Marks Gallery. The museum invites guest curators from all around the world to create exhibitions and installations interpreted in their own voice from works in the museum’s permanent collection.

Check out Ted Muehling’s splendid retail shop located in Soho.

If you ever thought paper dolls were just for little girls, think again! Instead of Ilisha Helfman recycling the pile of Sunday Times Magazines that litter her house, this Graphic Designer and toy maker has created an exuberantly colorful line of paper dolls that function like puppets with moving parts. These dolls are made from the award-winning NY TIMES covers designed by Design Director Arem Duplessis. I’m sure Arem would be pleased to know his cover designs have found another use. Crafitinista Ilisah Helfman’s paper doll kits are sold at Leafpdx, a store she owns with her husband, Joe Freedman. Check out these wonderfully crafted interactive paper dolls. Before you throw out your Sunday Times, maybe you too will find another use for it besides fodder for the landfills.

Apparently French Vogue has  featured Dutch supermodel Lara Stone in Blackface in the fashion spreads . While Marc Jacob’s Spring collection for Louis Vuitton has shown his models sporting huge Afros styled wigs like political activist Angela Davis, and blaxploitation film actor Pam Grier on this springs Paris Fashion runways. What’s up with all this appropriation of black culture? And blackface haven’t we passed this or does the presence of white models in blackface makeup underscore the lack of black models on the runway? Or is this some fantasy being played out by fashions designers just to call attention to this seasons fashions.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/zandile-blay/black-face-in-italian-vog_b_320328.html

AGO 2010 Exhibit Wangechi Mutu

Wangechi Mutu at work in her Brooklyn Studio in conversation with art curator David Moos from AGO Gallery in Ontario, Canada.

Mutu’s work tackles hard topic of  hyper-sexualized Black females in her work, and at the same time she challenges the viewer to rethink their concept of the black female body.  She composes  intricate collages assembled from scraps of visual images from fashion magazines or medical journal then she overlays broad strokes of watercolor to give a sensibility of transparency ambiance. At times the viewer might find her work disturbing because of the vial content the position of the female bodies or the politics of violence.  She also shows her women as empowered figures.

Wangechi Mutu’s work boldly explores the contradictions of female and cultural identity, drawing the viewer into conversations about beauty, consumerism, colonialism, race, and gender. Her representation of the human forms are disturbing and transfixing, at once utterly complex and strikingly direct.

This is one of those all day Saturday events at the Japan Society that you should not pass up. Feast on everything the Japan Society has to offer at j-CATION: Taste Japan, a day-long event. Explore all the flavorful taste of Japan from, sweet, savory to spicy delights with the first-ever j-Cation, which promises to take you on trip to Japan without getting on an airplane.
Make sure to hang around until the evening to listen to the explosives sounds from DJ. AKI’s rocking beats, and some unusual drinks and morsel bites to satisfy your taste buds.

Beats by DJ. AKI:

Spring is in the air  along with a slew of international film festivals. Check out EL-Play about an Afro-Colombian female soccer player film showing at El Museo del Barrio is part of the Havana Film Festival New York. TEZA, by filmmaker Haile Gerima is showing at Lincoln Center and Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute. TEZA is set in Germany and Ethiopia, and examines the displacement of African Intellectuals, both at home and abroad.

If you truly want to know more about the practice make sure to view, “The Buddha, A film by David Grubin which airs on PBS and is narrated by Richard Gere who tells the story of the complex and beautiful life of Prince Siddhartha of India, what we today call the Buddha.

Asia Society features a China Past, Present, Future on Film. This collection of films provides a glimpse into reemergence of work by independent filmmakers in China.
Gai Shanxi and Her Sisters a documentary by Ban Zhongyi, in Mandarin with english subtitles. Watch excerpts online.

Urban Africa/David Adjaye:

International Ghanaian architect, David Adjaye’s exhibit at the Design Museum in London offers a glimpse into urbanism in Africa. David was born in Tanzania and raised in London. His architectural firm Adjaye Associates, has offices in London and New York City. Adjaye has photographed and documented major key cities in Africa. In order to shed light on an area of African urbanism that have been ignored in the accepted historiography of architecture.

David was on a panel with Peter Cook of Davis Brody Bond Aedas, and Rodney Leon. Thelma Golden, Director of the Studio Museum in Harlem was moderator at the Pratt Institute’s “Designing an Enduring Legacy,” in February. David Adjaye’s firm is also part of the architectural team that includes Peter Cook and the late Max Bond of Davis Brody Bond Aedas, to design the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington D.C.

photo by m. washington

Read more on David Adjaye in FT online: http://www.ft.com/
Listen to an interview with David on BBC WORLD SERVICE .

Check out a few of the proposed renderings of the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington D.C.

Art Against Empire, is a collection of over 100 political posters shown in the LACE galleries spanning 60 years of opposition to U.S. Intervention in the domestic affairs of sovereign nations. The show is curated by Carol. A Wells features posters from the archives of the Center for Study of Political Graphics. Featuring works by Josh MacPhee, Corita Kent, Jay Belloli, Cedomic Kostivic, Stephen Kroniger and more.
Check out a video of Adolfo Mexiac talking, in Spanish, about his “Freedom of Expression” poster.