I haven’t done a juxtapose post in a long time (link will take you to past posts that feature two artists in the same post). Working in multiple media, French born Anne Marie Jugnet and Alain Clairet direct their attention to the fringes of the image where information is scarce and often unnoticed, focusing on subjects as varied as the desert and television static noise. Pie Projects represents the duo.
#jugnetclairet
Throughout paintings, works on paper, ceramics, and site-specific mural and sound installations, Michaela Yearwood-Dan (b. 1994; London, UK) endeavors to build spaces of queer community, abundance, and joy. Yearwood-Dan’s singular visual language draws on a diverse range of influences, including Blackness, queerness, femininity, healing rituals, and carnival culture.
#michaelayearwooddan
Joe Fyfe from Two Coats covers Fergus (who like Robert is from Ireland) noting that the piece includes writing about his writing.
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#fergusfeehily
Here is the beginning of a list of some of the exhibitions that have addressed the contributions of black artists to the canon over the last decade or so. I hope the critical community will add to this list over time and please leave me a comment if there is one I’ve missed.
Four Generations, at The Baltimore Museum of Art, featured the Joyner Giuffrida Collection of Abstract Art which is widely recognized as one of the most significant collections of modern and contemporary work by African and African Diasporan artists. The show drew upon the collection’s unparalleled holdings to explore the critical contributions made by black artists to the evolution of visual art.
Abstraction in the Black Diaspora at False Flag featured Tariku Shiferaw, Adebunmi Gbadebo, Alteronce Gumby, & Ashanté Kindle.
Black Abstractionists: From Then ‘til Now, curated by Dexter Wimberly focused on Black abstract artists spanning multiple generations, starting in the 1960’s and ending with young artists working today.
Beyond the Spectrum: Abstraction in African American Art, 1950-1975 at Michael Rosenfield Gallery presented abstract painting and sculpture by a group of American artists working in the years just before, during, and after the Civil Rights Movement. It took its queue from Kenkebala House which hosted The Search For Freedom: African American Abstract Painting 1945-1975 in 1991 (which, like several of these, has a catalog).
There are also, often online-only “exhibits” available from time to time, such as 10 Black British Artists Working in Abstraction organized by Allyssia Alleyne over on Artsy. Black Abstract Artists: Exploring Innovative Techniques from Swann Auction house covers many of the artists noted in the exhibits above and focuses on their technical contributions.
I have been spending more time on Substack of late and one of my discoveries is Exponential View. I followed this “publication” because I’m an energy nerd (clean energy specifically) and they are covering the AI energy arms race closely.
AI is relevant to my practice both because I’m trying to be more intentional about the overlap of my mostly separate career in energy, and because it’s part of the cultural context in which we are making Art (as I’ve pointed to via the curatorial elements of my practice).
In that spirit I wanted to share a little more about the impact of AI via one of Azeem Azhar’s recent posts. The article was written to point to rapid- exponential– change in the world of technology and energy. The chart below is the one that jumped out the most to me. It is not about energy but instead the impact of the pace of change on workers. Regular readers will know I will always look for possibly contradictory truths and the ones I see here are possibly obvious. They are, I think, that a) the changes to the scope of working for many if not all of us seem to be coming without a lot if any strategic input from the non-technocratic class (IE happening to us with a pointed lack of agency), and, b) the concept of “inevitable change” is a mindset which actually robs us of agency. BTW, “yes” Artists are workers (which actually is another essay).
One of the reasons I want to point this out is that it’s hard for me not to see the potential of AI -based tools to rapidly expand the skills and capabilities of us all. Not without a price of course as the energy/power costs to deploy AI at scale are nontrivial. If you google “energy + AI” you’ll get an unsurprising amount of histrionics because well… algorithms (IE AI) so I suggest if you want to dig deep on energy and AI you should just follow Latitude Media because they are literally the best platform in this space atm, bank on that. The thought I’m entertaining out loud is that this trend can have negative and positive implications. I’ve certainly been trying to understand how to use it better at the same time that I go to work to solve growing demand with new generation (more on that in a few weeks). I don’t love irony in the same way I love contradictions although sure let’s call them cousins- so in that spirit I’ll just float the thought that maybe the most capitalist endeavor in several generations (AI) could have some pretty leftist outcomes if it accelerates the power and access to information of millions and give humanity the bandwidth and tools to solve our most pressing problems. Babies, bathwater, etc.
Perhaps the reason I ask that we not resign ourselves to bemoaning as inevitable ground that may be lost via the technocratic class’s war on labor is that despondency ain’t a winning mindset. I’m being harsh as I sometimes do for effect. No one should dismiss what a serious situation the polycrisis is (also why doesn’t spell correct know that word yet…). AND, being in a time of change means we aren’t at an end point, yet. Said differently- who wants to work on change that makes the world better? I do.
BTW, one of the features of Substack is that creators can have paid and unpaid followers. Which is a cool feature. And, there are challenges with this platform (like almost all social media platforms) as About Half pointed out some time ago, because money ruins everything it touches, but that is also another essay.
Kenneth Victor Young (1933–2017), was an American artist, educator, and designer. He is associated with the Washington Color School art movement (along with Sam and Alma).
#kennethvictoryoung
Jonathan Stevenson does a studio visit with this Irish painter and hits the highlights over on Two Coats. Lots of aesthetic resonance to Turner and Elliot Green.
#robertarmstrong
An African-American sculptor who at age 33 became an expatriate in Paris from America, Harold Cousins worked in a variety of mediums including stone, wood, metal and terra cotta, and in a variety of styles from realism to total abstraction.
More (gallery that represents his estate)
#haroldcousins
shows with Addis Fine Art which has outposts in London and Ababa (Ethiopia), and is a black-owned gallery (which I know about thanks to Artsy).
#tesfayebekele
If you are curious about the impact black artists are having on abstraction, you can use the hashtag function on the website (link).
Familiarize yourself and lift up these practices, particularly those that have been mostly ignored in the canon to date, such as
Juxtapoz takes us overseas to look at Tunjia’s newest at White Cube’s Seoul outpost, in which the NYC-based Brit “explores the diasporic body, African subjecthood and autonomy.” The figuration in the work peeks through, similar to earlier work by fellow Brit Cecily.
#tunjiadeniyijones
along with Dean Semashima is part of a two-person, intergenerational display which, according to Quingyan Deng at Hyperallergic, represents two drastically opposed approaches to queer history. While Hunter’s pieces in this show do sometimes dissolve into something abstract, it was not the only work they made (Hunter left us in 2022).
#hunterreynolds
Elizabeth Buhe at The Brooklyn Rail has words about Ada’s Performance Proposal, Helen Rides VII: Wing and Wheel 3 (2020–24), at David Peter Francis, saying the works “propose that these thresholds are flexible, emphasizing valuable insights drawn from pre-industrial worldviews, vernacular belief systems, private magic, and seasonal rites.” One may since a shared spirit with Hilma.
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#adafriedman
Painting After Art is Dead 