Art news

10 Films to Get to Know Ukraine

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:20:54 +0200

From Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964), dir. Serghiy Paradzhanov (image courtesy Dovzhenko Centre)

The ongoing full-scale invasion by Russia began with the pretext from Russian president Vladimir Putin that Ukraine is an artificial nation and therefore an artificial country, created by Vladimir Lenin. The denial of Ukraine’s independence and the right to build its own future is a repetitive pattern in the Ukrainian-Russian relationship. For instance, policies that ban the Ukrainian language date back to the early 17th century.

Nevertheless, the Ukrainian intelligentsia has never stopped fighting back. Through different art forms, they have been establishing Ukrainian culture and identity. Cinema has played an important role in this fight, both in Soviet times and in independent Ukraine. The Ukrainian online cinema Takflix.com has collected ten films to showcase Ukrainian culture in its different aspects and genres, from music and architecture to comedy to horror. All films are available worldwide with English subtitles.

Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

Drama, director Serghiy Paradzhanov, 1964

In the 1960s, a period that was later known as the “Khrushchev Thaw,” Soviet policies towards the national cultures of the republics began to ease. Ukrainian artists felt this light breeze of freedom and began to step away from the strict principles of socialist realism. In film, this movement was consolidated in Ukrainian poetic cinema. Unlike any other USSR films, poetic cinema was full of symbolism and national Ukrainian motifs, which manifested in the choice of colors, costumes, songs, and plots.

The first, and perhaps the most famous illustrative of this trend was the film Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors. It is the love story of a Hutsul Romeo and Juliet, Ivanka and Marichka, who meet as children during a fight between their warring families. The two grow up together, exploring the Carpathian Mountains, and their friendship grows into a love that finds its climax in unforeseeable tragedy.

The Lost Letter

Comedy road movie, director Borys Ivchenko, 1972

From The Lost Letter (1972), dir. Borys Ivchenko (image courtesy Dovzhenko Centre)

The Lost Letter is representative of Ukrainian poetic cinema, but it is also one of the last films of the movement. The film depicts an adventure of the Cossack Vasyl, who was entrusted with the crucial task of delivering a letter from the hetman (military commander of the Cossacks) to the Russian tsaritsa (female monarch) as soon as possible. Within the format of a road movie, with comedic and often absurd sketches, unfolds Vasyl’s journey to the tsaritsa. On his way, he meets a chort (a servant of the devil), witches, and even a “talking stone.”

This film serves as an ethnographic study of Ukrainian culture. Traditional characters of folklore, Ukrainian cuisine, and costumes are included in the film. However, in the early 1970s, national culture was again severely censored and as the film did not “ideologically” meet the demands of the censorship, it only had the chance to reach audiences ten years after its making.

Hunt for the Cossack Gold

Comedy, director Vadym Kastelli, 1993

From Hunt for the Cossack Gold (1993), dir. Vadym Kastelli (image courtesy Dovzhenko Film Studios)

Legend has it that in 1723, hetman Pavlo Polubotok left an enormous amount of gold in an English bank on the condition that it would only be released upon the independence of Ukraine. The film’s creators based its plot around this tale. But in the film, the year is 1993, shortly after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and a suspected descendant of the hetman is phlegmatic and dimwitted Ivan. Nevertheless, the KGB (Committee for State Security in Russia) and other foreign spies have no doubt that Ivan is the one who knows the secret code to the gold.

Hunt for the Cossack Gold is a satirical comedy that aims to reinvent the patriotic adventure genre in Ukrainian cinema with cossacks in the center of the plot. However, cossacks — or one of their descendants — are unusually interpreted not as symbols of independence, but as comedic elements. Overall, the film reflects on the Ukrainian past in the Soviet Union and weaves it into the narration of Ukrainian identity.

The Living Fire

Documentary, director Ostap Kostyuk, 2016

From The Living Fire (2016), dir. Ostap Kostyuk (image courtesy 86PROKAT)

In the Carpathian Mountains, the profession of shepherding has long existed. But for the Hutsul people of the region, it is more than just a job — it’s a calling that is strongly linked to their way of life and culture. Every summer, shepherds go to the mountains for months to graze their sheep. There is an ancient tradition of lighting a “living fire,” which is believed to protect the shepherds and animals from evil.

For four years, the film director Ostap Kostyuk and his team researched this vocation and the people who chose the path of old traditions in a modern world. The Living Fire tells the stories of the lives of three men of different generations: 82-year-old Ivan who is already preparing for his funeral, 39-year-old Vasily who is trying to keep his animal farm in business, and ten-year-old Ivanko who has just begun to learn about life. The film examines the challenge of the preservation of old crafts in the modern world and gives the opportunity to admire the landscapes of the Carpathians to the tune of beautiful flute music.

Gateway

Mystical Drama, Horror, director Volodymyr Tykhyy, 2017

From Gateway (2017), dir. Volodymyr Tykhyy (image courtesy Multi Media Distribution)

In the center of the plot of the mystical drama Gateway is grandma Prisja, who lives in the Chornobyl Exclusion Zone. She shares a house with her daughter Slava, who was abandoned by her husband, and her adult grandson Vovtshyk, who has a mental disability. Grandma Prisja believes that she has extrasensory abilities and can talk to mermaids, who have told her that something horrible is about to happen, which must be prevented at all costs.

At first glance, Gateway is a family drama with elements of mysticism, horror, and conspiracy theories. However, the film explores how the Chornobyl disaster affected the lives of many families who were forced to flee their homes and could not adapt to their new location because they were forced to live with the Chornobyl label. It is also the story of the few who, despite the threat to their lives, decided to stay and become cut off from the world.

Heat Singers

Documentary, director Nadia Parfan, 2019

From Heat Singers (2019), dir. Nadia Parfan (image courtesy 86PROKAT)

One of the most successful documentaries at the Ukrainian box office, Heat Singers is a lyrical film about the daily life of the TeploKomunEnergo, a municipal heating company in Western Ukraine. The film documents the beginning of the heating season, the struggle of workers with worn-out Soviet heat systems, and the search for a common language with irritated and cranky people who are waiting for warm batteries.

The main character is Ivan Vasyliovych, who heads the trade union of the TeploKomunEnergo. He adores the trade union choir “Chornobryvtsi,” which represents the Soviet tradition of art groups within different companies, which was mandatory in Soviet times. However, all members of the choir are so sincere and dedicated to their work that it is impossible not to admire them. Heat Singers is a feel-good story about heat, in all its manifestations.

My Thoughts Are Silent

Tragicomedy, director Antonio Lukich, 2019

From My Thoughts Are Silent (2019), dir. Antonio Lukich (image courtesy Arthouse Тraffic)

Vadym Rott works as a freelance sound engineer and receives a work task that may change his life and help him emigrate to Canada. As he himself says: “This is my new dream.” To succeed, he only needs to record the sounds of Ukrainian animals and birds, including the singing of the semi-mythical wild mallard duck. On his hunt for these sounds, Vadym has unexpected company — his mother, who wants to persuade her son to stay in Ukraine.

The film is a tragicomedy about a mother-son relationship full of unconditional love, misunderstandings, and clashes between different generations and worldviews. Two close people, who in their efforts to talk honestly with each other, constantly get into comic situations. My Thoughts Are Silent examines modern Ukrainian young adults, their lives, and their search for themselves in the world.

Train: Kyiv-War

Documentary, director Korniy Grytsiuk, 2020

From Train: Kyiv-War (2020), dir. Korniy Grytsiuk (image courtesy EasyLiving Films)

The war in Ukraine has been ongoing since 2014 and during this time many films have been created based on this topic, examining aspects such as the lives of families in the grey zone, as well as the daily life of the military and their rehabilitation after returning from the front. Train: Kyiv-War is unique in that it depicts the attitude to the war of a large social group of Ukrainians: the passengers of the train that runs from Kyiv to the city of Kostiantynivka the eastern province of Donetsk Oblast.

Kostiantynivka is a small industrial town near the front line. In the film residents of Donbas, volunteers, the

Who Discovered Eva Hesse?

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:18:10 +0200

Photograph of Eva Hesse, ca. 1969. Allen Memorial Art Museum, gift of Helen Hesse Charash, 1977 (all images courtesy AMAM, unless otherwise noted)

OBERLIN, Ohio — “We like to think that we discovered Eva Hesse,” reads a line from a 1954 profile of the then-18-year-old artist in Seventeen magazine, before acknowledging that Hesse came on her own to intern at the magazine as a recent dropout from Pratt. But the sentiment feels relatable; I suspect that at one point or another, nearly everyone would like to think that they discovered Eva Hesse. She is one of those artists who feel like a well-kept secret, which is perhaps another way of saying that she made her mark as an artist during a time when few women succeeded in the field, and even fewer were championed. Thus, the first encounter with Hesse likely feels like a revelation — but as the article in Seventeen demonstrates, that seems to have always been the case, even before she carved out a niche for herself within the Abstract Expressionist dick-swinging of her time.

Another reason seeing Hesse’s work feels like a clandestine encounter is, of course, because there is ultimately so little of it. The artist died in 1970 at age 34, having just come into her own as a sculptor, and much speculation connects the aggressive brain tumor that ended her life to her trailblazing experimentation with resin compounds in her art. When someone who becomes so influential meets such an untimely demise, everything that person leaves behind feels precious.

Eva Hesse, “Untitled” (1962), collage, charcoal, crayon, and graphite on paper. Allen Memorial Art Museum, gift of Helen Hesse Charash, 1983

This sentiment drives Forms Larger and Bolder: Eva Hesse and the Practice of Drawing at Oberlin College’s Allen Memorial Art Museum. Hesse came to Oberlin as a visiting artist in January of 1968. Though it was only a two-day trip, it was a significant meeting for both artist and institution. AMAM would go on to be the first museum to purchase a sculpture by Hesse — her milestone work “Laocoön” (1966) — the acquisition of which took place shortly after her death. Due to the purchase, and the artist’s lingering regard for her short time in Oberlin, AMAM also became the recipient of 1,500 items related to Hesse, including 300 artworks on paper, given in tribute by her sister, Helen Hesse Charash. Though “Laocoön” forms a natural centerpiece to the exhibition, its real focus are these works on paper, and the way they demonstrate the role of drawing in the famed sculptor’s process.

The works on display follow the artist through her first efforts in art school, first at Pratt, then Cooper Union, and eventually Yale. They include conventional watercolor still lifes and figure studies that show an aesthetic in the making, but little hint of the significance Hesse’s postminimalist works would go on to achieve. Yet even as early as 1954-55, sketchbook entries show meditations on industrial settings in graphite and ink, establishing the foundations of her work in the mid-1960s. During this time, Hesse returned to Germany, the native homeland her parents were forced to flee when she was two years old, due to the rise of Nazism. Hesse and her then-husband, sculptor Tom Doyle, were invited by the German industrialist Arnhard Scheidt for a protracted residency on the grounds of his disused textile factory in the small town of Kettwig. The post-industrial setting left a deep impression on Hesse, who began to create works she termed “wild space” collages in an expressionist mode, as well as so-called “machine drawings.” Perhaps most illuminating are a selection of working sketches and diagrams from 1967 to 1970, some of which directly connect to realized sculptures; others never evolved past the diagrammatic stage, either intentionally abandoned or thwarted by fate.

Eva Hesse, “Untitled” (1964), collage, gouache, ink, and graphite on paper. Allen Memorial Art Museum, gift of Helen Hesse Charash

Eva Hesse, “Untitled” (1963), watercolor and ink on paper. Allen Memorial Art Museum, gift of Helen Hesse Charash, 1998

Hesse is an artist’s artist, cited as influential by many, and embraced in her own time as a valued interlocutor with the likes of Josef Albers, Sol LeWitt, and Tom Doyle, to whom she was married from 1961 to 1966. The exhibition, co-curated by Andrea Gyorody and Barry Rosen, puts microcosmic focus on the details of Hesse’s work, making Forms Larger and Bolder catnip for art viewers who love to sink into these details of line, pattern, and color.

Because of the curators’ penchant for minutia, some aspects of the show feel overly precious, occasionally lavishing expensive matting and framing on scraps of paper that appear to be ripped from a telephone jot-pad, or containing little besides scribbled dimensions for speculative works. But for this same reason, it adapts beautifully to catalogue form, and the generous dimensions and production details of the 428-page Eva Hesse: Oberlin Drawings (2019, Hauser & Wirth Publishers) offer the opportunity to see even more of the collection, and examine the works at length and in aggregate. In fact, having seen the catalogue first, the show seemed smaller than expected, given the abundance of material — though it’s a testament to the curatorial abilities of Gyorody and Rosen that they were able to edit everything into an exhibition that can be absorbed in a single visit. This is especially important because Hesse’s work invites slow looking.

Eva Hesse, “Laocoön,” detail (photo Sarah Rose Sharp/Hyperallergic)

Hesse fans unable to travel to Oberlin will still find much to embrace in the catalogue, including the opportunity to revisit the work over time — though the bound-and-printed experience does lack the anchor of seeing “Laocoön” in person. The ladder-like construction, iced with dripping gray latex, stands alone as a strange, stately monument and witness not only to Hesse’s incredible aptitude for material and formal exploration, but to the results when the surrounding forms and figures step off the paper and into three-dimensional reality.

Forms Larger and Bolder: Eva Hesse Drawings continues at Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College through June 4. The exhibition was curated by Andrea Gyorody and Barry Rosen.

Queering the Archive, Tracing One’s History

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:13:48 +0200

Installation view of Satrang at 25: Queer South Asian Diaspora(s) in Context at ONE Archives at USC Libraries, 2022 (photo by Alexis Bard Johnson)

LOS ANGELES — Tucked into a small gallery in USC Library’s ONE Archives — self-described as the largest repository of LGBTQ materials in the world — is the second half of a multipart exhibition: Archival Intimacies: Queering South/East Asian Diasporas, a two-venue project curated by Aziz Sohail and Alexis Bard Johnson. While Stranger Intimacies I recently closed at the USC Pacific Asian Museum, Stranger Intimacies II remains on view at ONE Archives. Upstairs, viewers can also find the exhibition: Satrang at 25: Queer South Asian Diaspora(s) in Context, which features archives relating to Satrang, the principal queer South Asian community organization in Southern California. Both exhibitions at ONE are explorations in “queering” the archive, through propositions by contemporary artists and a display of queer archival material.

Installation view of Stranger Intimacy I at USC Pacific Asia Museum, 2022 (photo by Alexis Bard Johnson)

The first floor gallery focuses on a series of hanging works by Vinhay Keo and a video installation by Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai. Both artists are themselves members of the queer South Asian diaspora, and their work investigates the residue of their families’ fraught history of immigration from Cambodia and Thailand, respectively: Keo’s family hails from Cambodia, emigrating to the United States as a result of the Khmer Rouge genocide in the 1970s, and Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai’s great-granduncle fled Thailand in 1949, forced into exile, first in China, then France, after attempts at forming a democracy in monarchic Thailand.

Installation view of Stranger Intimacy II at ONE Archives at USC Libraries (photo by Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai, image courtesy the artist)

Unfortunately, information regarding these migratory histories — a critical framework for understanding both artists’ work, which investigates their families’ narratives of displacement instigated by the necessity of escape from violent regimes and inflected by the trauma of Western colonization — is not immediately accessible to viewers upon entering the exhibition. While a press release is available online, the gallery itself is adorned only with a short, elliptical wall text that doesn’t provide the kind of specific historical references necessary as an entry point into the rich, layered nature of the artists’ projects. Perhaps this obfuscation is intentional, a queering by way of illegibility, but the viewer is given no pointers to help guide them through the particular South Asian political, material, and familial histories referenced in the artists’ work, and is left instead to grapple in the dark for context.

Installation view of Stranger Intimacy II at ONE Archives at USC Libraries (photo by Vinhay Keo, image courtesy the artist)

For example, Vinhay Keo’s three embroidery works feature long, rectangular sampot fabric, a Cambodian garment and symbol of Khmer identity. The artist’s inclusion of the diverse materials of the sampot, ranging from silk to cotton to cork, traces its material and colonial history as a once unisex garment that became feminized under French colonial rule. “9” x 9” x 4”” (2021) is a cotton sampot in the form of a donut box, a replica of and reference to the pink donut boxes of Southern California, whose donut retail industry is largely dominated by members of the Cambodian diaspora — many of whom arrived here in the ‘70s to escape the Cambodian genocide under the Khmer Rouge regime. As Keo shared with me in an email exchange, “the donut industry became a model for economic upward mobility for Cambodian refugees and the latter generations. It’s also fraught with the fallacy of the American Dream narrative, the immigrant narrative of rags-to-riches.”

Vinhay Keo, “9” x 9″ x 4″” (2021), sampot, cotton, 9 x 9 x 4 inches (photo by Vinhay Keo, image courtesy the artist)

Similarly unraveling a string of references is Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai’s poetic cartography of their great-grand uncle’s multiple exiles from his home country of Thailand. Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai’s video installation, “Ocean Network Express”(2021), centers on the video “Appendix A: Ocean Gazing” (2021), which narrates their great-granduncle’s migratory patterns by boat while in exile. These movements are placed in dialogue with the Southern California littoral, particularly the San Pedro Harbor, with its cargo ships sailing in and out — the remnants of military paraphernalia of World War II, the Korean War, and the Vietnam War littering the coastline, imposing defunct canons and concrete structures that a voiceover reminds us were designed to be a barrage contre le Pacifique, in reference to the Marguerite Duras novel of the same name. The stoic voice, the artist’s own, continues in a matter-of-fact monotone: “the Pacific Ocean is the ultimate barrier between the East and the West. These defenses are no longer needed: the enemy has been defeated. The Yellow Peril has been neutralized. We are safe now.”

Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai, video still of “Appendix A: Ocean Gazing” (2021), video, TRT: 15:46 minutes (image courtesy the artist)

Yet in a time marked by the fanning of Asian hate fueled by dangerous rhetoric that continues to brand and persecute Asians as carriers of disease, it would seem that this barrage is still at work. History, we are told, repeats itself. The artists showcased in Archival Intimacies remind us that the violence of our colonial histories are still with us, haunting the ancestors of those who first made the perilous trip to this country, only to be faced with the fallacy of the American Dream and cast as crude stereotypes. To acknowledge these histories, to queer this archive by way of artistic representation, is to point to the lasting repercussions of colonial trauma on Asian-American bodies — and to begin to overcome it.

Prima Jalichandra-Sakuntabhai, video still of “Appendix A: Ocean Gazing” (2021), video, TRT: 15:46 minutes (image courtesy the artist)

Stranger Intimacies II, part of Archival Intimacies: Queering South/East Asian Diasporas continues at ONE Archives at USC (909 West Adams Boulevard, University Park, Los Angeles) through May 27. The exhibition was curated by Aziz Sohail and Alexis Bard Johnson.

They Tried to Make a Sexy Movie About Eiffel Tower Engineer

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:11:37 +0200

From Eiffel (2021), dir. Martin Bourboulon (all images courtesy Blue Fox Entertainment)

The biopic format allows for so little spontaneity that the best Martin Bourboulon’s Eiffel can do to shake up the genre’s rigid structural demands is simply arrange the life of its subject, engineer Gustave Eiffel (Romain Duris) out of order. The constant movement back and forth in time does not offer compelling contrasts between periods, but simply confounds an otherwise-straightforward narrative. This buries important details — like, for instance, the fact that Eiffel did not actually design the iconic tower that bears his name, instead buying it from two other engineers after first mocking their idea as garish and too modern.

This detail would be a potentially interesting foundation for a film that undermines the usual tropes of biopics, revealing the overstated case for one man’s mark on the landscape of the City of Lights. But instead, Eiffel reaffirms all the common touchstones of the genre. There’s its depiction of the protagonist as an underdog struggling to realize a passion project in the face of copious objections from aesthetes, as well as the Catholic Church, which fears the proposed iron monstrosity will literally tower over Paris’s existing classical architecture and the majesty of Notre Dame. And because behind every great man is a woman, Eiffel only truly decides to build in the first place out of some kind of misplaced show of affection for an old flame, Adrienne Bourgès (Emma Mackey), to make a defiant gesture of self-worth to her aristocratic family for shunning him.

From Eiffel

Tying a 984-feet-tall vanity project to the romantic foibles of the man who owns the company that builds it verges on the parodic, and things only get more absurd when the film folds in further Euro cinema clichés. Eiffel, born to a middle-class family, constantly rails about class consciousness and how the tower will be accessible to all of Paris’s citizens, rich and poor. Yet for all this talk, the engineer conspicuously spends much of his time attempting to climb the ladder into the upper crust, largely ignoring the average person in a never-ending bid to impress his social betters.

From Eiffel

The usual biopic aesthetic is firmly in place here. The camera moves in stately, level motions through handsomely baroque interiors of rich wooden hues that contrast with the smoggy dreariness of the industrialized city outside. But the achronological ordering of the scenes, which teases out the “tragedy” of Eiffel and Adrienne’s doomed romance, does nothing more than prolong a dull love triangle that never builds any emotional resonance precisely because of the endless jumping around.

The fact that Eiffel is just as dull a historical figure as a romantic one only sinks the film further. This is the story of a man who buys a patent so he can slap his name on the final product, who talks a big game about utopianism while increasingly isolating himself among the elites, and whose artistic drive is inseparable from his hang-ups over women. Eiffel inadvertently paints its protagonist not as a great man worthy of scrutiny or praise, but as the Elon Musk of his day.

Eiffel opens in theaters June 3.

Margaret Atwood Protests Book Banning With Fireproof Copy of The Handmaid’s Tale

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:08:31 +0200

Margaret Atwood’s 1985 novel The Handmaid’s Tale has been counted among the most banned books in America, and the characters’ distinctive red and white uniform has been adopted by the pro-choice movement as a symbol of a dystopian society that feels increasingly familiar. After book bans reached an all-time high this year, Atwood is taking a stand by putting a fireproof version of the novel up for auction at Sotheby’s. The proceeds will go to PEN America, a nonprofit that advocates for freedom of expression, to fight censorship.

The Handmaid’s Tale paints the picture of a patriarchal totalitarian society in which women are relegated to the roles of obedient wife or sex slave. The book’s 2017 Hulu adaptation proved a major hit and Atwood’s wrote a sequel, The Testaments, that was published in 2019.

The project was the brainchild of public relations agency Rethink Creative and is a four-part collaboration with Atwood, her publisher Penguin Random House, and a specialty bookbinder called the Gas Company.

The Gas Company is based out of Toronto, where Atwood lives. They made the pages of the nonflammable book out of an aluminum product and bound it with nickel, a process that took the company two months to complete. The final product can withstand temperatures up to 1,220 degrees Fahrenheit.

The cover illustration was created by artist Noma Bar, whose use of negative space suggests a silhouetted face.

“In the face of a determined effort to censor and silence, this unburnable book is an emblem of our collective resolve to protect books, stories and ideas from those who fear and revile them,” PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel said in a statement.

The Handmaid’s Tale was the seventh most-banned book in the United States in 2019. The book is estimated to sell for up to $100,000 when it is auctioned off online on June 7.

In a Sotheby’s press release, Atwood stated: “I never thought I’d be trying to burn one of my own books … and failing.”

NEA Awards $91 Million to Over 1,200 Arts Organizations

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:05:11 +0200

An ex-voto in the New Mexico State University Art Museum’s Collection (image courtesy NMSU)

At the New Mexico State University (NMSU) Art Museum in Las Cruces, curator Emmanuel Ortega wants to do more than just exhibit the museum’s vast collection of Mexican ex-votos (traditionally Catholic devotional paintings) — the largest in the country at around 4,000. Ortega also wants to shift the narrative around Mexican art outside the canon. Instead of having visitors understand the works simply as “folk art,” Ortega hopes museum-goers will reflect on the larger themes these paintings explore.

The museum is one of 1,240 organizations that received a total of $91 million in grants from the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) last week as part of the agency’s second round of 2022 funding. The recipients range from community arts centers to cities commissioning public artwork.

In the upcoming NMSU Art Museum exhibition Contemporary Ex-Votos: Devotion Beyond Medium, a selection of historical ex-votos, also called retablos, will be shown alongside works by 12 contemporary artists. Retablos were most popular in Mexico around the mid-19th to 20th centuries. After recovering from a misfortune, a person would commission a gratitude painting from a local artisan to show their devotion to the saint to which they prayed, displaying it at a reliquary or home chapel.

Yvette Mayorga, “Really Safe in America” (2017), installation and video at the Chicago Cultural Center (image courtesy NMSU)

Ortega commissioned four artists — Justin Favela, Guadalupe Maravilla, Yvette Mayorga, and Xochi Solis — to create new works focused on themes explored in the original ex-votos, including class, race, gender, and methodologies of resistance.

“I wanted the artists to teach the audience, and tell the audience, to look at ex-votos in a different way,” Ortega told Hyperallergic. “Every artists is thinking of ideas of devotion, resistance, and medium in a completely different way.” Mayorga, for example, will create a “sanctuary” filled with retablos. The work will reflect on a severe illness she suffered as a child and incorporate found objects from a pilgrimage to El Santuario de Chimayó church in Northern New Mexico.

Due to the NMSU Art Museum’s tiny budget, grants such as the NEA’s — which awarded the institution $40,000 — are what make exhibitions like Contemporary Ex-Votos possible.

The glowing interior of an in-progress sculpture in Infinite Essence (image courtesy Pittsburgh Glass Center)

In Pennsylvania, the Pittsburgh Glass Center received a $20,000 grant from the NEA for its Idea Furnace artist residency program, a novel initiative in which glass artists introduce other types of creators to the medium. In a current collaboration, Nigerian cosmologist Mikael Owunna and multimedia artist Marques Redd will produce life-size glass busts of Black figures. Each of the sculptures, collectively titled Infinite Essence, will appear to contain glowing stars, an effect that will be made possible when the exhibit’s ultraviolet lighting hits the glass shapes. The exhibition “strives to rebut media imagery that reduces the Black body to death,” a Pittsburgh Glass Center spokesperson told Hyperallergic in an email.

Installation view of Nitza Tufiño’s “La Llegada de Nuestro Pueblo” (2011), oil on canvas, 72 x 108 inches (image courtesy Taller Puertorriqueño)

Across the state in Philadelphia, the Taller Puertorriqueño, which seeks to preserve Puerto Rican and Latinx culture in the city, also received NEA funding. Next year, the organization will present an exhibition of works by Mexican-born artist Nitza Tufiño, just one of the projects made possible by a $20,000 grant from the agency. Tufiño, who now lives in New York, has been making art that explore Afro-Carribean and Latinx identity for decades, including public works across the city.

On the other side of the country, the Edith Kanakaole Foundation in Hilo, Hawai‘i received $25,000 in NEA funding to launch a collaboration between experienced hula musicians and dancers and other members of the hula tradition.

Dancers practicing the hula tradition (image courtesy Edith Kanakaole Foundation and Halau o Kekuhi)

A complete list of projects funded by the National Endowment for the Arts can be found on the agency’s website.

There’s No Place Like Court! “Dorothy Dress” at Center of Ownership Suit

Thu, 26 May 2022 00:02:00 +0200

An iconic piece of film history is now contested property in a legal struggle. (image courtesy Bonhams)

There’s no place like probate court! What was set to be a routine auction process for a special piece of Hollywood memorabilia has taken a cinematic plot twist, as legal questions have been raised regarding the ownership of the rare and recently rediscovered “Dorothy Dress” — one of a mere handful of remaining original costumes worn by Judy Garland in the 1939 film The Wizard of Oz.

The dress, expected to fetch up to $1.2 million, came to Bonhams Los Angeles last month by way of the Catholic University of America (CU) in Washington, DC. It had been gifted to the clearly beloved former head of the school’s drama department, Reverend Gilbert Hartke, by Mercedes McCambridge, a Hollywood actor and artist-in-residence at the University in 1973 and close friend of Garland’s. Lost in the school’s archives since the 1980s, the rediscovered dress was intended for sale to fund a faculty chair endowment and establish a new film acting program at the university.

Now those plans, and the auction, are on indefinite hold, as a lawsuit filed by Barbara Ann Hartke, the 81-year-old niece of Reverend Hartke, has raised the question of who exactly was the recipient of McCambridge’s gift — and who therefore retains ownership of the dress today.

“She [McCambridge] was obviously a close confidant of Judy Garland and the gift of the dress to Gilbert V. Hartke was to thank Hartke for his counseling and support,” the lawsuit states, according to WTOP News. It is contended that McCambridge had a long-term personal relationship with Reverend Hartke and offered him the dress in appreciation for his help in the actress’s battle with alcohol and substance abuse — a struggle which also notoriously afflicted Garland and took her life just a couple weeks after her 47th birthday.

At the time of the donation, McCambridge told CU’s student newspaper Tower that Garland had often said “it all could have been different” if she’d attended college. McCambridge donated the costume in hopes that it would serve as “a source of hope, strength and courage to the students.”

While Barbara Ann Hartke’s claim on the dress is contentious, it has merited enough legitimacy to halt the sale of the iconic gingham pinafore and puff-sleeved shirt while the court investigates — a process that could take months or years to resolve.

Archive photo of Reverend Gilbert Hartke holding the dress (image courtesy Catholic University)

“I was just surprised after all this time, here it had been found, and here it is being rushed off to the auction house,” Hartke said in an interview. “I just want to know who has ownership over this … I’d like to see the documentation.”

Lawyers for the university argue that Gilbert Hartke took a vow of poverty, meaning he didn’t receive or accept any gifts as his own personal property, and that McCambridge donated the dress to Hartke in his capacity as the university’s drama teacher to benefit the students of the drama program. CU’s legal team is offering evidence that includes signed affidavits from a grandniece and grandnephew of Hartke that affirm that the priest would have wanted the dress to belong to and benefit the school, as well as a 1979 newspaper article that states gifts received by Hartke became the “monastery’s, the community’s or the drama school’s property (which includes Judy Garland’s dress in The Wizard of Oz and much of Claire Booth Luce’s library).”

“The Court’s decision to preserve the status quo was preliminary and did not get to the merits of Barbara Hartke’s claim to the dress,” Shawn Brenhouse, an attorney for Catholic University, told Hyperallergic. “We look forward to presenting our position, and the overwhelming evidence contradicting Ms. Hartke’s claim, to the Court in the course of this litigation.”

There’s no pot of gold over this rainbow: Excitement over finding a beloved piece of Wizard of Oz history has now dissolved into a situation that’s going to take a lot of brains, heart, courage — and most of all, lawyers — to resolve.

Don’t Look Down! The World’s Longest Suspension Bridge Opens in the Czech Republic

Wed, 25 May 2022 21:13:32 +0200

Sky Bridge 721 opened earlier this month in the Czech Republic and is claiming its title as the longest suspension walkway in the world, a record held previously by a similar design in Portugal. Strung between two peaks of the Kralicky Snezník mountain, the pedestrian path stretches an incredible 721 meters and reaches 95 meters above ground at its highest point. Two years in the making, the steel construction weighs 450 tons and relies on 66 ropes for support. For the fearless, height-loving adventurers wanting to take the nearly half-mile trek over the Mlýnský Stream valley, the Dolní Morava resort is coordinating access and tours. (via designboom)

Stanford Arts Hosts a Virtual Conversation With Amy Sherald and Calida Rawles

Wed, 25 May 2022 20:04:00 +0200

Stanford University is the home of interdisciplinary thinking that catalyzes innovation. Artists on the Future, The Komal Shah and Gaurav Garg Artist Conversation Series pairs renowned artists and cultural thought leaders to talk about issues vital to our society. The latest installment is a conversation between figurative painters Amy Sherald and Calida Rawles, who reimagine the representation of Black lives and envision new spaces for Black healing.

This free, virtual event will premiere on Monday, June 6 at 5pm (PT). Registration is required to receive a link.

Amy Sherald documents contemporary African American experience in the United States through arresting, otherworldly figurative paintings. Best known for painting First Lady Michelle Obama as an official commission for the National Portrait Gallery, Sherald engages with the history of photography and portraiture, inviting viewers to participate in a more complex debate about accepted notions of race and representation, and to situate Black heritage centrally in American art.

Calida Rawles’s paintings merge hyperrealism with poetic abstraction. Situating her subjects in dynamic spaces, her recent work employs water as a vital, organic, and historically charged space. For Rawles, water signifies both physical and spiritual healing as well as historical trauma and racial exclusion. Her work has been featured in galleries and museums across the country, and on the cover of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s novel The Water Dancer.

The conversation between Sherald and Rawles will be moderated by Matthew Tiews, Stanford’s Associate Vice President for Campus Engagement.

Watch the conversation on YouTube on Monday, June 6 at 5pm (PT). To receive the link to the premiere, RSVP at arts.stanford.edu.

A Pathway Through Modern & Contemporary Armenian Art Dives Into an Often Overlooked History

Wed, 25 May 2022 20:02:00 +0200

A Pathway Through Modern & Contemporary Armenian Art offers a broad and accessible introduction to the evolution of Armenian modern and contemporary art, highlighting its contribution to international modernism and more recent developments in global contemporary art. This book is a first-of-its-kind illustrated guide in English for those interested in 20th- and 21st-century Armenian art by artists from the republic and its diaspora, which the authors suggest has been largely overlooked until now.

Written by Dr. Iain Robertson — a specialist on emerging art markets and an honorary Fellow to Sotheby’s Institute of Art — with a contribution from Nazareth Karoyan — a founder and first president of the Armenia Institute for Contemporary Art — the book provides an overview of Armenia’s modern art developments and the era’s key artists. In it, they argue that Armenian modern art contains particular qualities different from other nations at the time and from the mainstream modernist tendencies emanating out of Western Europe. The publication examines how artists responded and sought to survive the social and political environment stretching through the Soviet period and into the post-Communist era, helping shape the Armenian art seen today.

Armenia Art Fair will be hosting a book presentation on May 28 at 12pm. For more information, visit armeniaartfair.com.

To learn more and purchase the book, email book@armeniaartfair.com.

A Pathway Through Modern and Contemporary Armenian Art is published by the “Armenia Art Fair” Art Foundation with support from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.

Apply for the MFA Program in Book Arts & Printmaking at University of the Arts

Wed, 25 May 2022 20:00:00 +0200

The Book Arts and Printmaking MFA program at University of the Arts (UArts) consists of an interdisciplinary curriculum committed to facilitating the exploration of the relationship between image and text, material and process, and the vast potential in the multiple.

Students develop contemporary studio practices that are uniquely grounded at the intersection of printmaking, book arts, and papermaking. The program champions the union of the head and the hand, and of the technical and the conceptual, promoting critical contemporary discourse while providing an understanding of historic precedents in the disciplines of paper, book, and print. Moreover, it advances the practice of new media and digital technologies.

Masterclasses and critiques conducted by renowned professionals in the field take place annually. Among the roster are Julie Chen, Erin Zona, Daniel Kelm, Karen Kunc, Julia Miller, Mark Thomas Gibson, Judith Brodsky, Betty Bright, Mindell Dubansky, Lesley Dill, Ruth Fine, Johanna Drucker, and Willie Cole.

Located in Center City Philadelphia, the program takes advantage of the city’s resources through visits to museums and special collections, off-campus courses, and internships. Our accomplished faculty comprises professionals in their field, and their work has been exhibited nationally and internationally. UArts alumni are a diverse group who excel in careers in museums and nonprofits, independent studios, conservation labs, universities, and publishing.

Learn more about University of the Arts’ Book Arts and Printmaking MFA program.

Influential Artworks Find Wearable Reinterpretations in Handmade Garments by Ariel Adkins

Wed, 25 May 2022 17:37:03 +0200

Ariel Adkins in a skirt inspired by Hilma af Klint, “The Ten Largest” (1907) at the Guggenheim Museum. Image by Allison Chipak. All images courtesy of Ariel Adkins, shared with permission

After a museum visit, we might pick up a postcard or T-shirt as a memento of the artworks we’ve enjoyed most. Brooklyn-based blogger Ariel Adkins, who is also Curator of Art, Culture & Community at Twitter, takes her love of masterpieces to the next level by creating one-of-a-kind apparel inspired by some of the world’s most influential artists. Donning capes, dresses, and coveralls in bright colors and bold patterns, Adkins draws inspiration from a variety of aesthetics and eras to make garments for herself and for people she meets who share a similar love for the power of expression. Painting directly onto the fabric of the clothing, she translates the forms and hues of specific artworks into wearable compositions.

Adkins is the creator of Artfully Awear, which began as a way of responding to grief and healing in response to the loss of her mother, who was an artist. Through the language of fashion, both a personal and public assertion of identity and style, she continues the project as an embodiment of joy and a unique way of kindling togetherness. She also admires iconic fashion like designer Michelle Smith’s dress worn by Michelle Obama in Amy Sherald’s portrait, utilizing her platform to share stories of groundbreaking moments in art history.

You can follow more of Adkins’ apparel adventures on Instagram.

A cape inspired by Etel Adnan, “Mont Tamalpaïs” (1970/2017) at the Guggenheim Museum. Image by Olivia Manno

Dress by Michelle Smith worn by God-is Rivera in front of Amy Sherald’s “First Lady Michelle Obama” (2018) at the National Portrait Gallery. Image by Ariel Adkins

Dress inspired by Yayoi Kusama, “Yellow Pumpkin” (1994) at Benesse Art Site. Image by Meri Feir

Dress inspired by Seward Johnson, “Welcome Home” (2014) at Grounds for Sculpture. Image by Will Sealy

Coveralls worn by Chet Gold inspired by Claude Monet, “Water Lilies” (1914-26) at the Museum of Modern Art. Image by Gina Tatianna

Top inspired by OSGEMEOS exhibition ‘Portal’ at Lehmann Maupin Gallery. Image by Will Sealy

Image by Will Sealy

Influential Artworks Find Wearable Interpretations in Handmade Garments by Ariel Adkins