2018-2019

Art in the City: Tokyo 

Poster Presentation 

This is a poster piece of writing which looked at how a certain city impacted one artist, in this case it was how Tokyo influenced Jiro Yoshihara's art. If you want to a have a little read into art in Tokyo during the 50's then press on the icon below!​

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A look into the work of Ellen Gallagher

Deluxe, 2005-2005, Tate Liverpool 

Presentation 

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Themes: appropriation, stereotypes, identity 

The imagery for this print series is based on magazines dating from the 1930’s to the 1970’s aimed at African-American audiences, many of which feature advertisements for ‘improvements’ including wigs, hair pomades and skin bleaching creams. Gallagher transformed these images using a variety of printing techniques, combining traditional processes of etching and lithography with recent developments in digital technology. She also made modifications by cutting and layering images and text and adding a range of materials including plasticine, glitter, gold leaf, toy eyeballs and coconut oil.

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Ellen Gallagher, born in 1965, is an American artist who works with multiple medias and focuses on racism, gender inequality, stereotypes and colonisation in her work. A good example to look at to understand her better is her artwork called “Odalisque”, this was a self-portrait of her looking at one of the fathers of modern western thought, Freud. It looks like she’s questioning the ideas of everything. She was showing how she looks at western culture and that she has a voice. However, I am going to be looking at this piece, and in this piece she looks at magazine adverts for hair and beauty products and transforms them using materials such as etching, screen-print, lithograph with plasticine, velvet, toy eyeballs, glitter, gold leaf and coconut oil. Overall, there is a total of 60 works and it was created from 2004-2005.

The piece is based on magazine clippings dating from the 1930’s to the 1970’s which include racist comments and are aimed at African-American audiences. A lot of the magazine clippings try to advertise products that will “improve” the appearance of black women, for example, promoting bleaching creams, wigs, and hair extensions/weave. During the time that these advertisements were released, there wouldn’t have been a lot of controversy, in comparison to what there would be now. This is because of what was happening, specifically in America, at the time. Segregation and racism was at a high and the image of white women was forced upon every woman, this is shown due to the promotion of bleaching, straight hair, and long hair. These advertisements were aiming to take away the identity of black women, and force another culture/image on them. Ellen saw this idea that, in these adverts, black women were being trapped and not being able to appreciate their own culture and image. Therefore, she transforms them and breaks them free from white culture. She has described them as “The wig ladies are fugitives, conscripts from another time and place, liberated from the “race” magazines of the past. But again, I have transformed them, here on the pages that once held them captive.” – Ellen Gallagher.

For example, in this plate she has made the hair more natural rather than completely straight, long and “lovely” as it says in the advert. The advertisement is promoting longer hair and saying you aren’t lovely if you don’t have long hair. Next, if we look at this plate she uses plasticine to make curls and exhibits the complete opposite of what the advertisement is trying to sell. This advert is selling a cream that “culture grooms” your hair and makes it look more natural and straight. The advert is saying that you will be proud of your hair after using this cream. So basically, is saying that you can only be proud of your hair when it is straight and not when it is natural. The next two plates are also addressing the same issue, that your hair will be more beautiful when it is long and straight. One of them even says that it is “healthier” to have hair like this. Now moving on to a plate that addresses skin bleaching, the idea that having lighter, “snow white” skin is the way to go to be beautiful. It even says this in the advertisements: “So let this wonderful bleaching cream give you amazing beauty help!”. Ellen Gallagher is trying to rewrite these advertisements and show black women to be free with their appearance, not to adopt white culture because advertisements say that this is the way to be beautiful, and try and take black culture out of captivity.

She uses multiple materials to transform the adverts, for example in this plate she is using plasticine to make curls in the man’s hair. In another she uses etching to create natural curls in the woman’s hair, and in another she uses toy eyeballs and I believe this is related to the loss of identity advertised in these magazines. Overall, her techniques involved in this art piece help to portray the loss of identity for black women in the original advertisements, as well as to help show that they don’t have to be captive to white culture.

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Reflective Report 

How have museums and galleries met the challenges of curating new genres of art? Including examples from three artists/art movements. 

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When art has to be displayed in a gallery or museum, the process has to be thought about in depth as it can either enhance the excellence of a work or decrease it. As technology has progressed so has the access to other cultures and their art. Marcel Duchamp was one of the first to bring a new genre of artwork to the art world – to which he called ready-mades. Questions were being asked as to whether this even was considered art and how to display this was the main challenge. Since then, art has expanded and taken off from just painting and sculpture and talents aren’t restricted to just one practice. Exhibitions are constantly being put on that showcase works from other cultures but are being curated by people who don’t belong to that respective culture. A curator takes a piece and puts it into context and may put an alternate meaning on the piece of art. Does the meaning of African Art change if it is curated by an individual from European descent? Does it put a post-colonial reading on the works? The introduction of science into art is also being experimented with and is being shown in places like The Stedelijk Museum and Yorkshire Sculpture Park. In this paper, Marcel Duchamp’s ready-mades, Light Installation and African art are going to be investigated in relation to the problems museums and galleries might face when curating them as well as how the wider audience could comment. It is also addressed whether these museums have met the challenges of curating these types of art or if they haven’t.

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Until the 19th century, what encompassed being an artist came down to an individual having a defined profession, with the goal of creating something beautiful. Whether this be painting, sculpting still life, history pieces, or religious pieces (Cousijn, 2016). Marcel Duchamp was one of the first to introduce the unknown into the art world, his ready-mades raised questions that couldn’t be answered or critically analysed as they didn’t have a literal meaning. Duchamp constantly questioned what art should be and was challenging this through the development of his pieces by using everyday objects. One of his most popular pieces, in the MoMA collection (Figure 1), entitled Bicycle Wheel was made with an aim to redefine the idea of an artist through making a piece with everyday items (Temkin, 2017). By creating these pieces, he was challenging viewers, critics, artists, dealers and curators. Marcel Duchamp believed that curators were artists in their own right as they took an art piece and put a meaning on it by allowing it to interact and respond to and with the surrounding pieces. However, in regards to Marcel Duchamp’s ready-mades, they didn’t have an explicit meaning which meant the placement had to be curated in a way that wouldn’t comment on anything or connect with surrounding pieces. But at the same time comment on the stereotypes of art and what is classed as art. Bicycle Wheel (Figure 1) was originally in Duchamp’s studio and he wanted the piece to be interactive, meaning he encouraged individuals to spin the wheel as they pleased. In galleries and museums, pieces aren’t meant to be touched and Duchamp’s Bicycle Wheel is no exception to this. In MoMa, it is displayed on a white podium which gives the impression that it is not meant to be touched or played with. This would have been an important factor for the curator to consider, if the piece is spun on a regular basis the likelihood that it would be damaged is strong and if it is placed on a white podium not to be touched, it takes away Marcel Duchamp’s original idea for the piece. When curating the ready-mades, the ultimate meaning behind them is to question what art is and challenging the original art ideas which came from the 15th century when the hierarchy of genres was established. As the pieces are challenging the historic definition of what art is and what it is to be an artist, the way it is curated has to be done in a way that is different to what an art piece with common materials (painting, drawing, watercolours, canvas) are displayed. For example, would placing these ready-mades in a gallery back up Duchamp’s original meaning or would placing it in a gallery make it the same as the pieces accompanying it? Or is Duchamp succeeding with his original meaning as it is being shown in a highly well-known and respected art gallery amongst works by Vincent Van Gogh and Frida Kahlo? When galleries commission a piece it is thought that it would add value to the piece and therefore be classed as art. MoMa has met the challenges of curating the ready-mades by placing it amongst other pieces and treating it as a piece of art rather than an object. By having it in the museum they are challenging the stereotype of art and asking questions which can’t be answered which backs up Duchamp’s original thesis. Due to it being treated as any other piece by any other artist, it falls under the same classification as a cubist painting by Pablo Picasso or an impressionist piece by Jackson Pollock would fall under.

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In the modern age, artwork has expanded from just paintings, sculpture and drawing to the development of installations, film and photography. These new genres of art have attracted both positive and negative reviews ranging from the harsh critique Marcel Duchamp’s ready-mades received in contrast with the positive interest Tracey Emin receives for her sculptures. Light art has been developed upon ever since László Moholy-Nagy’s “Light Space Modulator”, 1930, which was the first collaboration between light and art. Museums and galleries have had to face the advantages and disadvantages that come with exhibiting and curating light art for example should the piece be interactive? What angle do we want the viewers to see it from? How will the placement interact with other works? And more. The use of light formally came into the art world in 2015 and was also designated, by the United Nations, as the year of light based technologies (Dziekan, 2016). This was also when writer, Phillip Ball brought out a book as well as essay’s entitled Light Show which looks at the use of light in relation to art and curating. One complication Ball faced when curating his light exhibition was that “There are many tricks of art, and they force us to question the relationship between the world that impinges on the senses and the world that the sense reconstructs from that stimulus” (Dziekan, 2016).  In more recent years, The Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam held a light exhibition entitled Studio Drift: Coded Nature and was shown from April 2018 to August 2018. This museum has many light and technological installations which are very advanced curation wise. This exhibition featured light works by Dutch artists Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta also known as Studio Drift. These artists push the boundaries of technology, art and performance by creating limitless pieces. In the 2018 exhibition showcasing the artist’s works, the Stedelijk Museum was determined to curate and maintain the works “The Stedelijk Museum, in its pioneering role in the field of visual arts and design, would like to show such innovative art to the public. Even if that means that maintenance must be carried out at regular intervals” (Stedelijk.nl, 2018), already the museum is showing that the curation and maintenance of light installations is difficult but are willing to meet any conflicts they may face. Due to them having this mind-set they were willing to accept help with the curation to help the success of the exhibition. As this was the duo’s first solo exhibition, both the artists and the curators working within the museum would have faced difficulties. The curators of this exhibition were Ingeborg de Roode and Pao Lien Djie. One of the concerns about curating this exhibition would be the scale and complexity of the works (Kinsella, 2018), which the Stedelijk Museum adapted to. They were able to adjust their space to the needs of the installations, doing this by working with the artists as well as having technical support. The Dutch duo stated in an interview that for them it was very calm work “for the last two weeks, we’ve been in the museum nonstop to set everything up. It’s quiet and very nice to work there” (Kinsella, 2018). They had moved everything from their studio to the museum, including a shelving system which improves efficiency. The collaboration between the artists and the curators allows for the success of the exhibition and helps the curators to meet the challenges that may have risen if the support of the artists wasn’t available. The success of this exhibition came down to the curators being able to accept help from the artists who had a lot of experience with light installations as well as the ability to constantly maintain the pieces.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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African Art is popular in many museums all over England, with exhibitions at The World Museum in Liverpool to the British National Museum in London. As well as places in Paris and New York. Both these museums have large rooms dedicated to the display of artworks relating to African culture. The Benin Bronzes include a series of over a thousand bronze plaques, 300 of which have been shown at the British Museum since the acquisition of them in 1897 (Wood, 2012). The Benin Bronzes are shown in The Sainsbury African Galleries which focus on the cultural life of Africa. The Benin Bronzes were taken from Benin City after the Europeans invaded in 1897 along with various other objects. Due to these objects being taken by the Europeans from Nigeria, and being shown in the British National Museum, a colonial reading is immediately put upon how they are being curated. This is one of the problems when curating art, originally coming from Africa, especially when it has been taken or looted. Europe has a long history of colonization, specifically relating to Africa. As well as a long history of European artists using African art as inspirations for their own work, some of these artists include Pablo Picasso, Henry Moore and Henri Matisse. The issues with curating African art taken from its origin country are extensive, especially if the exhibitions haven’t been updating like the one at the World Museum in Liverpool.

 

The African exhibition at The World Museum hasn’t been updated for 10 years and includes items donated from Africa as well as items which have been taken during European voyages into Africa. Both the British Museum and The World Museum would have had to take a lot of factors into consideration before curating the works. For example, the way in which these items are displayed can be as either a work of art or an ethnographic artefact (Barker, 1999). The context in which the items are displayed ultimately depend on the type of gallery or museum the items are shown in as well as the items that are being shown around them. If we look at Sokari Douglas Camp’s work entitled “Blue Head”, shown in figure 7, this work would be displayed as a work of art. However, if we look at The Benin Bronzes, whether they will be displayed as a work of art or an ethnographic artefact can be up for debate. It can be classed as a work of art due to the intricate craftsmanship within each bronze plaque but can also be classed as an ethnographic artefact due to it being an important part of history and confirmation from the artist can’t be asked, so the decision lies with the curator. Which can be problematic in itself if the curator isn’t of African descent - how can an individual determine what a piece of work is going to be exhibited as if they don’t come from that respected culture? This isn’t to say that individuals of different descent can’t curate exhibitions on African Art, but that there wouldn’t be as many issues with this if they had a co-curator who was of African descent. This balances out the idea that there could be any colonial readings put onto the artworks or issues between the classification of a work (ethnographic artefact or work of art). When African Art first came to the attention of Europeans, it was exhibited in the 1920’s in New York and Paris, to which it fell under the category of art nègre (Barker, 1999). In 1935, there was an exhibition entitled African Negro Art at MoMa in New York curated by James Johnson Sweeney. Using the word Negro in the exhibition title immediately becomes problematic, but also reflects the time the exhibition was put on. In a publication by Johnson, he recognises the brilliance of African Art but then follows on to calling African people savages (Johnson Sweeney, 1935), and this would have been reflected in the context of the curation. Knives were placed next to sculptures of women with children and as the curator sees Africans as savages so would the viewers. As this publication accompanied the exhibition, it puts negative connotations onto the works and gives people the opinion that these works were made by savages from an unknown culture. If we look at another exhibition MoMa exhibited entitled Primitivism in 20th Century Art: Affinity of the Tribal and the Modern, which was curated by William Rubin (Barker, 1999) we also see the lack of acknowledgment.  This exhibition received a lot of critique due to the museum not acknowledging the colonial context on the objects. Many of the objects shown in this exhibition were those which were taken from Africa without permission, and this was not addressed in the exhibition. The colonial context is one of the main problems when curators, not of African descent, are in charge of an exhibition with no advice or guidance from an individual with African descent.

 

The World Museum is currently in the process of updating their African Exhibition, on their website they have an introduction into the pieces in their African collection as well as where they come from. The website addresses the colonial ways in which some of the objects were acquired but also have objects which were donated by individuals from Southeast Nigeria and Yoruba Kingdom of Owo. Which balances out the works and doesn’t make the institution closed off as they are recognising where the objects are coming from. As well as museums acknowledging how these objects were acquired, there are also individuals of African descent curating African exhibitions. For example, Simon Njami curated the African Pavilion at the Venice Biennale in 2007 as well as Africa Remix which was an exhibition looking at contemporary African art. Africa Remix was a travelling exhibition for three years from 2004-2007, visiting cities like London, Paris, Düsseldorf, Tokyo and Johannesburg. This was a large exhibition with many visitors, in fact a record number of people visited the exhibition in Johannesburg in 2007. This exhibition was a success due to how it was curated, and this largely has to do with the fact that it was curated by someone of African descent. Simon Njami was the lead curator and had people who helped him which were from the galleries they were exhibited in. For example, this exhibition travelled to the Hayward Gallery in London to which Roger Malbert was one of the organisers, however Njami had the final say on how it was curated (Friedel, 2019). Simon Njami arranged the shown into three sections, Body and Soul which focused on the issues of representation and performance of the body, City and Land which looked at artists who show their environment and create work based off of that and Identity and History which looked at concepts of identity and stereotypes. All of these themes could be explored successfully without a colonial context due to the curator being African and the work being contemporary. The galleries involved with this exhibition helped meet the needs of the artists and curator by allowing them to show their work in the way they wanted it to be shown. However, galleries which are better known like The Tate Museum, MoMa, The White Cube, The MET, Louvre and more haven’t gone far enough to meet the challenges of curating African Art. African Art first came to the Louvre, Paris in the 1920’s and immediately artists like Pablo Picasso found inspiration from it and developed his own pieces based on the works from Africa. One of this famous pieces entitled Les Demoiselles d’Avignon,1907 (figure 9) features women with faces resembling the African masks shown in the Louvre at the time, this then started to be described as primitive art. Picasso’s main inspiration was an African mask entitled Fang shown in figure 8, which is redeveloped in Picasso’s 1907 piece (figure 9). More recently, curator Fred Lamp said that “in most of our museums, African art rests uneasily beside Western art” (Selby, 2010). And this is supported by another individual from the art world, Peter Mark who said that “the curators were clearly not interested in helping non-African viewers to understand the African culture” (Selby, 2010) at the Louvre. Curation wise, in relation to African Art, galleries and museums still have a lot of challenges they need to meet including acknowledging where the objects came from, what context is being put upon works depending on who’s curating the exhibition, having people of African descent curating, co-curating or advising exhibitions, as well as having help with the classification of objects.

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In conclusion, Marcel Duchamp, Light Installations and African Art all have challenges when they are being curated, and all are handled or not handled extremely different. If we look at how the MoMa curated Bicycle Wheel, they did it in a way that diminished Duchamp’s original idea, by not allowing people to interact with it. But they also supported his idea by showing it in such a highly respected museum. The Stedelijk in Amsterdam met the challenges of curating light installations by combining their knowledge with that of the artists. The artists worked with the curators and were able to create a successful exhibition because of this reason. Without the combination of the curators and the artists the technical aspects and placement of the pieces would have been harder to achieve. African Art is still a problematic subject due to how it is handled within institutions, many of the object were taken during the colonisation of countries within Africa and this is still not acknowledged when the art is on display. Many institutions called African art the work of savages (Johnson Sweeney, 1935), when it first came into European culture, and others refused to acknowledge that these objects were taken and not donated. The differences between Light Installation and the ready-mades compared to African Art is vast, as institutions have been committed to meeting the challenges of light installations (as we have seen from The Stedelijk) and the ready-mades (as we have seen at the MoMa). However, institutions exhibiting African Art are still in the process of meeting the challenges of curating this type of Art. Many perceive African art exhibition as uncomfortable next to western art (Selby, 2010) and others say that many exhibition refuse to acknowledge the colonial context in which many of the objects were taken (Barker, 1999). Overall, light installations and Duchamp’s ready-mades have technical and existential challenges with curation which have been met by institutions like The Stedelijk in Amsterdam and MoMa in New York, whereas African Art has more cultural and perception challenges which effect a whole culture if handled incorrectly.

 

 References:

 

Barker, E. (1999). Contemporary cultures of display. New Haven: Yale University Press, pages 147-171

 Chikukwa, R. (2010). Curating contemporary African art; questions of mega-exhibitions and Western Influences. African Identities. Vol. 9, No. 2, May 2011, 225-229

Cousijn, M. (2016). Marcel Duchamp and the art of exhibition making. Relief – Revue Électronique de Littérature Française.

Dziekan, V., 2016. Cultural Curating and the Practices of Light: Speculating Diffractively. Curator: The Museum Journal, 59(2), pp.177–193.

 Friedel, J. (2019). Africa Remix | Contemporary And. [online] Contemporaryand.com. Available at: https://www.contemporaryand.com/magazines/africa-remix/ [Accessed 29 Apr. 2019].

Goldsmith, S. (1983). The Ready-mades of Marcel Duchamp: The Ambiguities of an Aesthetic Revolution. The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, vol 45, no. 2

Groys, B. (2009). Politics of Installation. Journal 2, e-flux. Available at: https://www.e-flux.com/journal/02/68504/politics-of-installation/

Harding, A. (1997). Curating: The Contemporary Art Museum and Beyond. London: Academy Ed., pp.2-15.

 Hiller, S. and Martin, S. (2002). The Producers: Contemporary Curators in Conversation. 1st ed. Gateshead: Baltic.

 Hiller, S. and Martin, S. (2002). The Producers: Contemporary Curators in Conversation (2). 2nd ed. Gateshead: Baltic.

 Johnson Sweeney, J. (1935). African Negro Art. [online] MoMA. Available at: https://www.moma.org/documents/moma_catalogue_2937_300086871.pdf [Accessed 29 Apr. 2019].

Kinsella, E. (2018). ‘We haven’t even scratched the surface:’ Design Duo Studio Drift on Breaking Boundaries in Art and Technology. Available at: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/studio-drift-inspiration-collaboration-1303496 [Accessed 18 Apr. 2019]

Marincola, P. and Storr, R. (2001). Curating Now: Imaginative Practice/Public Responsibility. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Exhibitions Initiative.

 Selby, H. (2000). African Art Sits Uncomfortably at the Louvre. [online] SFGate. Available at: https://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/article/African-Art-Sits-Uncomfortably-at-the-Louvre-2702782.php [Accessed 29 Apr. 2019].

 Stedelijk.nl. (2018). Studio Drift. [online] Available at: https://www.stedelijk.nl/en/exhibitions/studio-drift [Accessed 7 Apr. 2019].

Temkin, A. (2017), Marcel Duchamp How to see ‘Ready-mades’ with MoMA curator Ann Temkin, Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqySnbbyB2U [Accessed on 18 Apr. 2019].

Thea, C. and Micchelli, T. (2010). On Curating: Interviews with Ten International Curators. New York: ARTBOOK DIGITAL.

 Wainwright, L. (2009). New Provincialisms: Curating Art of the African Diaspora. Radical History Review, 2009(103), pp.203–213.

 Wood. P. (2012). Display, Restitution and World Art History: The Case of the ‘Benin Bronzes’, Visual Culture in Britain

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Japanese Brochure Art and Culture 

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I did a huge research project into Japanese Art and Culture for one of my University assignments and we were asked to make it into a brochure. Below I've attached the document into a PDF format, if you'd like to have a look then press on the icon below!