Five
women artist seemed like so much to do until I attended The Brooklyn Museum.
When finally approaching the Feminist wing I instantly had inspiration and
thought this post might not be that bad after all. In the feminist wing I found
my new obsession with Wangechi Mutu. When you step foot into Mutus exhibit you
instantly are taken back because the work jumps right out at you. I then had my
idea of which artist I would be using for my last post. Artist like Lorraine
Hansberry, Adrian Piper, Frida Kahlo and Marina Abramovic have something
strangely in common, each one of these women play on the fascination and
illusions of the mind while also pushing dead forward in there strong feminist
beliefs. They express there views in different ways but have the same goal in
common. So I wanted to investigate what makes these women great, and exotic.
Wangechi Mutu is a Kenyan artist out
of Brooklyn New, York that focuses her pieces on nature and visual cut outs
that create extreme imagery. “Mutu is best known for spectacular and
provocative collages depicting female figures, part human-animal, plant and
machine (Brooklyn Museum/Mutu)” The most interesting things about Mutu is her
creativity with the themes of each piece, her pieces had so much life and each
represented something morally deep. Not only did Mutu pose connections with
African American women I feel like she also gravitate to all women.
In some of her pieces she has woman as this alpha male figure
taking over the world or dominating the scene. She seems to always find away to
orchestrate abnormal scenes that seem normal when looking into her pieces. The
NY Times writer Holland Cotter says that “Each image in some way deals with
bodies being controlled, assigned passive functions and roles, as anatomical specimens,
models, native types, sex objects, and so on… Ms. Mutu asserted her own control by
taking this material and making something new from it: intensely aestheticized
cyborgs, bodies that won’t stand still, won’t be pinned down, colonized, won’t
behave in expected, unconfusing ways (Cotter)” Cotter is dead
on with his analysis Mutu somehow incorporates many things that tie woman down
in today’s society in her works. At the end of her exhibit shows a very
retrospective animated video that features Santigold called “The End of Eating
Everything”, at first the video makes your mind wonder but after re-watching it
I understand the goal of it. Mutu’s goal was to broadcast a state of mind and
how much one should be sharing. She wanted to contextualize the society curse
of the “obsession of having THINGS”.
After watching this video I instantly thought of Adrian Piper another
feminist artist that has a crystal clear image of what things should be. Pipers
very blunt approach on racism and sexism is appealing and something very
similar to Wangechi’s approach. Piper is another New York based artist who
struggled with being bi-racial. She was fairly light-skinned with straight
hair, she encountered the perception of being a white woman. In order to set
things straight, Piper decided to make a video called “Cornered”. She starts
the video with “I am Black” the video shocked many even me when I first started
my research on Piper. What was her intention? Well from the critics point of
view “Ms. Piper has not developed a very compelling way with form, which makes
it easier to shrug off her attempts at psychological manipulation (Johnson).
Adrian Piper "A nice White Lady"
Reading further into Pipers history I see that she’s a advocate for
the war against blackness if that’s even a word. I admire her work because she
speaks her mind verbally without a care of what anyone has to say about it. Her
straightforward tactic strikes me because all of her works that are somewhat
similar to “Cornered” feed off of the same struggle of finding equality. In her
other works such as “A nice White Lady” and “My Negroid Features” examine the
features of what a black or white person is “suppose” to look like. Piper plays
on the idea of color and race in mostly all of her pieces. Even though her
works were blunt and straight to the point they really got a point across about
ones true self, and self-awareness.
Another
blunt and straightforward artist is Frida Kahlo. You would think after her life
tragedy would have humble her but it did the total opposite. During her
mid-teens years Frida was involved in a tragic accident that left her paralyzed
with a major spine injury. Frida used this time of healing to her advantage and
began to paint in her room while on bed rest; because she was unable to move
her mother put mirrors throughout her room and that’s when the talent began to
emerge.
Frida Kahlo- The Column
As time progressed Frida began to make self-portraits of herself
but instead of it being her exact look she would make herself with her enormous
unibrow or another imperfection her mustache. It’s interesting to see a woman
that has been through her triumphs to make portraits of herself with
imperfections in her face. She also created pieces that showed her fractured
spine. "Since my subjects have always been my sensations, my states of mind and the profound reactions that life has been producing in me, I have frequently objectified all this in figures of myself, which were the most sincere and real thing that I could do in order to express what I felt inside and outside of myself.(Frida Kahlo/PBS)" Here Kahlo expresses the meaning of her freedoms and why its so important for her to express herself in the manner that she does. A lot of her work shows pain that has happened in her life. In the paining "The Broken Column"on the right shows Frida at her worst point still looking her best. The column in the middle of her body represented the her injury while the nails gave insight of the the pain she was experiencing physically and emotionally with her love life and her declining health. In Frida's works she still shows her feeling like the other artist presented in my post but revels it in a different way. She revels her feelings not in a pretty painting but in graphic scene so one can get her intention.
Marina Abravoic
Another favorite I have is Marina Abravoic her art intentions are unusual but so inviting and interesting. Marina is a visual artist that reforms herself as the actual art. This is so interesting because shows and exhibits can go on for months, and Marina still chooses this style of artistry. She indulges in her artistry everyday life things like sitting,thinking, dreaming and manifestation. Her life art makes you want to indulge more and more, I am no art critic but her stuff is so out of the ordinary its almost impossible not to gain interest in what she may be doing next.In her video below she discusses performance art into detail and how the body needs to be trained, in order to participate in this kind of work. Marina is another artist that looks behind the norm and pushes for the unconventional. Her voice stands out because its so different and strong by the actions in her visual art. Not too many women have exhibits where they are actually the show. She feels that geninue energy is the key to her performances she quotes "Through performance, I found the possibility of establishing a dialogue with the audience through an exchange of energy, which tended to transform the energy itself. I could not produce a single work without the presence of the audience, because the audience gave me the energy to be able, through a specific action, to assimilate it and return it, to create a genuine field of energy(Chatter)."
Lorriane Hansberry
Lastly Lorriane Hansberry founder of The Ladder magazine and also a lesbian who spoke openly about her sexuality something similar to Adrian Piper who still advocates embracing sexuality. In the Brooklyn Museum Lorriane had multiple pages of her journal as well as the ladder in glass cases, that told her story. What caught my attention was the fact that she openly spoke about her love towards women. During the time when Lorriane was publishing this type of works that lifestyle wasn't something anyone spoke about or publicized. "After joining the group, Hansberry wrote a series of provocative letters to two gay journals. Daughters of Bilitis began publishing its journal, the Ladder, in 1956. Hansberry chimed in to it in May and August of 1957, while she was writing A Raisin in the Sun. Hansberry is known for her drama, but she was a prolific political writer and speaker, dating back to her early 1950s activism and editorial work for Robeson. And in her essay-length 1957 letters to the editor, she challenged members to consider the feminist case against homophobia(Lorriane)"Not only were her action bold but they signified a strong African American woman, she wrote articles to educated people and also gain respect for all types of people. I admire her ambition and drive in this aspect.
I choose these 5 artist because they signify strong women that have made a mark in history. These feminist women pushed the envelope of what illusion is. I admire these women because I also see a lot of myself in them. Before this class I was want interested or aware of these artist and they have helped me become more cultured and to also push forward in my stride to push female unity in the African American community by translating art.
Bibliography
"Exhibitions:
Wangechi Mutu: A Fantastic Journey." Brooklyn Museum: Wangechi Mutu: A
Fantastic Journey. The Brooklyn Museum, n.d. Web. 03 Dec. 2013.
Johnson,
Ken. "ART IN REVIEW; Adrian Piper." The New York Times. The
New York Times, 17 Nov. 2000. Web. 04 Dec. 2013.
Cotter,
Holland. "A Survey of Wangchei Mutu at Brooklyn Museum." NYTimes.Com.
N.p., 10 Oct. 2013. Web. 4 Dec. 2013.
Strechler,
Amy. "The Life and Times of Frida Kahlo." PBS. PBS, n.d. Web.
03 Dec. 2013. "The Broken Column." Broken Column, La Columna Rota, Frida Kahlo, C0480. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013. "About Marina Abramović." Home. N.p., n.d. Web. 04 Dec. 2013. "Chatter Busy: Marina Abramovic Quotes." Chatter Busy: Marina Abramovic Quotes. Blogger, 21 June 2013. Web. 04 Dec. 2013. "Lorraine Hansberry Biography." Bio.com. A&E Networks Television, n.d. Web. 03 Dec. 2013.
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