NOTE – TO SEE THE DISCUSSION CONCERNING THIS TOPIC, SCROLL TO END AND CLICK ON “COMMENTS”
A PROPOSAL by Curator Luis Camnitzer for an exhibition at Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts in March 2009
Luis Camnitzer:
This show intends to raise the issue of locality, frame of reference, ingrown resonance and tacit understandings that in art often are sacrificed for the sake of external conventions and expectations. Thus locality is often completely erased from the art repertoire, or is translated and misrepresented by the expectations of foreign visitors who look for the signals of exoticism.
Many years ago I took my 12 year-old son to Uruguay, the country where I was raised. We learned in school that our landscape was one undulated by rolling hills with gentle slopes. Uruguay is part of the flat pampas, something that was never underlined. The entrance to the port of Montevideo is flanked by one of our highest mountains, ca 1000 feet, with an old Spanish fort on top. From the other end of the bay I proudly showed my son our mountain, which is also drawn on the country’s coat of arms as one of our symbols of identity. Feigning interest my son’s eyes carefully scanned the horizon while he was saying “yeah, yeah.” Then suddenly he asked “where?” I had to carefully place the bump between tall buildings as a reference. I gathered then that the myth of our mountain was not transferable, no matter its local importance. We visited the fort and I became aware how tourist perception had obliterated the violence and violation of colonization by overlaying the quaintness of antiquity.
For this exhibition I would like to propose a review of these issues. Therefore this is a call to artists challenging them to face locality in two possible ways:
1) Critically: from the point of view of colonial symbolism (what does a fort mean in terms of representation of violation and abuse of power); syncretism (how are imported images digested to acquire a new useful meaning in local culture); cultural conditioning by the tourist trade (how local culture loses sight of itself to accommodate the expectations of the visitors); placement of power (local benefits of polluting industries, import-export relations).
2) A utopian constructive way: offering possibilities for a reaffirmation of locality by isolating and expanding on elements seen as inextricably connected with local everyday life. This second option can re-view issues from the first approach by defusing symbolism and underlining their absorption.
While these topics are more easily described and resolved through narrative and illustrative devices, the processes that operate are more insidious and often operate through formal and non-narrative devices. There are colors used in the Caribbean islands that are not used on the mainland. There are forms of exchange and communication that are not transferable to the U.S. There are definitions of “otherness” that deviate from the mainstream. One could say that the definition of community is and should be a local one. Art is one of the glues to achieve this.
PROSPECTUS
This show will be presented in St. Croix at Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts on March 6, 2009 and will hang for a month or longer. Information about the show will be forwarded to Artnexus, Artnews, Artes as well as the local press and magazines. If funding permits a catalog will be produced.
Virgin Islands and Puerto Rican artists as well as artists who have been residents of Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts Artist in Residence program are invited to submit proposals and images that reference historical buildings such as Fort Frederik, Forts Christian in St. Croix and St. Thomas, Annenberg in St. John and El Morro in San Juan. All media will be accepted – digital images, installation and performance art as well as painting, photography and sculpture. Interested artists should submit a detailed proposal of project with samples of work on CD, slides or e-mail. The artists’ statement about the work should be fully detailed regarding installation and presentation, along with a bio and exhibition history with contact information – NAME, MAILING ADDRESS, TELEPHONE NUMBERS: HOME, OFFICE, CELL. E-MAIL ADDRESS. None of these materials will be returned unless accompanied by a SASE.
All work should be presented in an envelope with the artists’ name, address and telephone numbers clearly marked on the outside and sent to Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts, PO Box 1371, Frederiksted, St. Croix, VI 00841-1371 or hand delivered no later than December 15, 2008. Notification will be sent out by January 15, 2009. Selected work will be due at Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts by Feb.18, 2009.
Artists wishing to participate who are working on proposals should give notice and a brief statement to the Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts by Sept. 15, 2008 – they may submit the full proposal at that time if they wish or before the final deadline of Dec. 15, 2008. Please call Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts for more information and hours of operation, 772-2622. The Museum Center is located on Strand Street in Frederiksted.
IN SUMMARY
In his words, Camnitzer says, “This show intends to raise the issue of locality, frame of reference, ingrown resonance and tacit understandings that in art often are sacrificed for the sake of external conventions and expectations. Thus locality is often completely erased from the art repertoire, or is translated and misrepresented by the expectations of foreign visitors who look for the signals of exoticism. For this exhibition I would like to propose a review of these issues. Therefore this is a call to artists challenging them to face locality in two possible ways: 1) Critically: from the point of view of colonial symbolism and cultural conditioning by the tourist trade…2) A utopian constructive way: offering possibilities for a reaffirmation of locality by isolating and expanding on elements seen as inextricably connected with local everyday life.”
Virgin Islands and Puerto Rican artists as well as artists who have been residents in the Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts artist in residence program are invited to submit proposals and images that reference the above theme. The use of historic buildings such as Fort Frederik, Forts Christian in St. Croix and St. Thomas, Annenberg in St. John, el Morro in San Juan is one possible interpretation. All media will be accepted – digital images, installation and performance art as well as painting, photography and sculpture. Artists are invited to contact Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts for a full description of the curatorial concept, the prospectus and the dates. Please call Caribbean Museum Center for the Arts, 772-2622 or e-mail: info@cmcarts.org for the curator’s proposal and the prospectus. The Museum Center is located on Strand Street in Frederiksted. The first deadline for submissions is Sept. 15, 2008.
Museumcenter's Weblog 
July 14, 2008 at 7:59 pm |
just to clarify – The use of images of historic buildings is just one way to interpret this theme and is in no way required.
I wrote and asked Luis Camnitzer about this & he said,>>> Historic buildings…”are probably just examples. But i am interested in the general cultural issue. Forts are just a narrow example of incoming violence…”
Basically as I see it we can choose one of 2 approaches:
1. a deconstructivist approach that might make images (including words) that are critical of over-used, tourist-induced iconography or take other post-colonial philosophies & communicate them, using your island as a point of departure. (see Wicipedia for quick-list of philosophical ideas on post-colonialism, which is HUGE.)
2. Constructivism – “an artistic and architectural movement in Russia from 1919 onward which rejected the idea of “art for art’s sake” in favour of art as a practice directed towards social purposes.”
The term Constructivism is used to define non-representational relief construction, sculpture, kinetics, and painting. As a response to changes in technology and contemporary life, it advocated a change in the art scene, aiming to create a new order in art and architecture that referenced social and economic problems.
Interestingly, Kandinsky was the first chairman of this group of artists and was removed from office for being “too mystical”! (uh oh – I’m not sure Constructivism is for me…mysticism is a LOT more appealing!)
technical & stylistic concerns: Seems Luis would prefer a non-illustrative, non-narrative approach as more interesting and might be especially looking for a modern use of formal elements here, though there is obviously not an exclusion written into the Prospectus.
Agree? Disagree?
Any comments? Anyone got an idea? (I do! …but I wonder if it’s at all mystical?)
July 15, 2008 at 1:51 pm |
To truly study our existence here, including reparation discussions, cruise ship influence, how we deal w ith our dwindling resources, and local government ideals of power, this should prove to be a challenging and exhilirating task for the Virgin Islands creative community.
Thanks for bringing this process to us and I look forward to the challenge.
July 15, 2008 at 2:32 pm |
oh good! a posting! CMC Arts will be pleased it’s happening, and personally you’re welcome. And thank YOU for setting up the blog site. So far it’s pretty easy!
YES this topic is serious and challenging. Part of the challenge in studying ourselves on our rock is to look honestly and create visually with communication as one goal….yet still to maintain a sense of aesthetics without “prettifying” the subject.
Nanna Buhl was interesting. In discussing “issues-based art” she maintained that the ability to show a sense of humor through it all is what keeps it palatable.
July 15, 2008 at 2:50 pm |
I need a little help understanding what it is that this show is looking for. Tell me if I’m on the right track.
So far, it seems to me, we have a set of interpretation problems having to do with what we consider to be a local culture that has somehow been changed or influenced by things that have come from other places.
These are a few examples and simple ones, of course.
Fast food is as popular as tradional food.
Modern music is more predominant that local music.
Historical buildings are painted and colors chosen according to outside
tastes.
The pictures that are made are generally done with buyers from other
places in mind.
From a critical approach I can try to illustrate the contrasts and tensions represented in some of these examples.
A utopian contructive approach, I can show how the true local culture endures, though changed, in its own way.
Am I getting warmer?……
Mike Walsh
July 17, 2008 at 1:10 am |
Mike, I think you’re understanding of this is right on. I like your choice of words ‘contrasts and tensions’….and ‘enduring, though changed’. Succint.
And your presentation of real examples helps give the topic substance instead of solely coming from the head.
Which perspective are you leaning toward? …and what visual images come to mind?
Another example that jumps out at me is – US…the people who now make up this culture. We, ALL of whom come from other places and impose ourselves on this place, changing it in spite of ourselves. Unable to see clearly what we’re doing and how we stand in relation to the past. – and the future too for that matter. …and each other.
This exhibit needs a title besides “Camnitzer’s Show” – how about “Facing Locality”?
I wonder if Luis will join the discussion.
July 17, 2008 at 11:48 am |
excerpted from earlier essay by Luis Camnitzer [originally from Uruguay, emigrated to U.S.as a young man]
Given the different pressures, the artist on the periphery is faced with several choices. The artist can:
1. actively disregard the colonizing values and focus on the local audience; 2. produce for the international market in spite of the handicap;
3. or emigrate to the cultural center.
In the first case, even when focusing on the local audience, the artist will tend to produce in reaction to colonization. A direct link to the past is broken, interrupted or deflected by the presence of a filter that factors in the values promoted by imperial culture. As Albert Memmi observes in his “Portrait of the Colonized”, a loss of history takes place with the effect that “the colonized are kept out of the objective conditions of contemporary nationality”. Gramsci was reflecting on the same condition when he noted that “remembering takes the place of thinking” in the production of culture. Identity, under these conditions, easily becomes confused with an artificial folklore. Fossil memories, bleached and dry, usurp reality.[italics added] Much of indigenous art, from Sabogal in Peru to Rivera in Mexico, had this problem imbedded in the content of the work. A present generation of artists is contributing a more formal and sophisticated approach; Cesar Paternosto and Alejandro Puente, both from Argentina, and Esther Vainstein (Peru) connect pre-Columbian traditions with modern constructivism and minimalism.7
In its entirety, the essay is rather long to post. If interested…ask, & we’ll email it to you.
July 17, 2008 at 12:27 pm |
I agree with Cynthia, Mike is touching on the point. I like “Facing Locality” as a title (better than Camnitzer’s show, at any rate) and think it is an excellent suggestion. Locality is a complex ever changing issue. Stagnant locality is what generates the attempts to create tourist art and ultimately makes people try to fit an expected image rather than being who one is and have a true own image. It would be good if we all, wherever we live, understand what things we incorporate in our perception because they are useful to us and can enrich our personalities and abilities (individual and collective), and which things are imposed on us via violent impositions or via market enchantments, but that ultimately serve others and not us.
August 7, 2008 at 8:23 am |
I’d like to see that entire essay. Be so kind as to send it to my email.
Thanks
Mike
August 9, 2008 at 12:05 am |
Lovin’ this dialogue. As I see this assignment, or, as it explains itself within me, the need that its concerns fill within me, and perhaps my community, is one of definition. Definition of what we do because of who we are. For a culture to influence globally, it must know what it stands for locally. Historically, when an art form begins to discover new methods of being through doing, it does so classically. But, we ARE in the Caribbean. So. then, what is “the true local culture”, or more importantly, what does the true local culture represent.
Thanks.
August 10, 2008 at 3:16 pm |
Cool – that the “assignment” (I love it, spoken like a true art educator!) fills a need in you. Yes, it speaks to a need in me too and I find the opportunity to ponder some visual responses to Luis’ prompt really exciting.
Even MORE exciting – I’m curious as to what the artists here will make of it. I want to see the works by Mike, Thomas, you, Maude, Elroy, NiAhene, Luca, Tina, Kat, everyone!…well, the list goes on and can’t be exhausted because I want to see the work of people I don’t know yet too. I just hope the word is out and artists are engaged by this.
Interesting that you wish to see our culture be a global influence. Gosh – I’m not there anymore, I just want to see the culture more CLEARLY identify itself TO itself. It seems all muddied-up to me! I think this exhibition could be a move toward a more clear reflection first, then if it’s worthy of influencing anything else , that will happen of it’s own accord.
Cindy, would you be willing to define ‘classically’ in your above context of how art forms grow? This is an interesting statement, but I don’t understand your meaning and need an example. .
It seems to suppose an enduring aesthetic…something I would love to discover, but it morphs so much, I doubt it exists…like the Holy Grail.
Maybe it doesn’t matter if it exists. Could be the ideal that matters.
August 11, 2008 at 1:16 pm |
Kudos to Candia and Luis for this dialog and upcoming exhibition – thank you, thank you! now we really ART in the 21st century – it’s enough to make you want to take off your snorkel mask and go to the library! But oh those mystical starry nights full of intrigue and romance – those bright blue skies, the clouds so close you could touch them – the boat sitting under the palm tree, the waves gently lapping at the shore – hmmm – am i suffering from post colonial seduction? HELP! Luis, please e-mail me your essay excerpted above – thanks, Janet
August 16, 2008 at 11:05 pm |
Thank you Janet – you were instrumental in making this a premier event, as were La Vaughn Belle, Monica Marin and MIke Walsh – artist’s who have a global perspective. It is also wonderful to have an extended audience for this show!
August 17, 2008 at 4:38 am |
Hi guys…
I am with hesitation putting in my 2 cents.
As some of you know I am currently in Denmark on a 2 month residency working on a project with Danish curator Jacob Fabricius.
A point of departure for the exhibition has been much of the architecture because for us living in the VI that is what is remains as a part of the visual iconography of colonialism in a very quotidian way.
However, walking through the streets of Copenhagen I was struck by how little of “us” is visible here. For 250 years of colonialism, enriching Danish society as we did, there is little… Rivert, my husband asked me < “But, what do you expect? Do you think in Spain there would be visually reminders of their influence on Cuba, Puerto Rico, Mexico?”
Perhaps no, I’ve never been to Spain…
But it’s an interesting question and reveals a lot of point of view. a couple pics of what i did find so far..
http://www.new.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=1248038&l=9c724&id=537343464
http://www.new.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=1247995&l=d5fbc&id=537343464
What I think is unique about Danish colonialsim is their amnesia that it happened at all. Here in Copenhagen, St. Croix seems like a fairy tale place. Something between fantasy and reality.
So part of my project that I am working on is pushing the extremes of memory and forgetting. What does it look like to remember everything? Like Borges’ Funes Memorious, does it make one incapable of abstraction?
Or, forgetting appears to be a passive actions with an “oops, sorry” effect. But could it be purposeful? Could I actively try to forget?
What would that be like or look like if we in the VI just forgot the whole slavery and colonialism thing ever happened? How then would we interact? How then would we see these brick buildings crumbling around us? Would we decide to just tear them all down?
Anyways,,
I too would like to see the essay. Please email to belle809@hotmail.com
Thanks or
Tak (danish)
August 17, 2008 at 9:33 am |
WOW – Does remembering everything make one incapable of abstraction.
beautiful question, LaVaugn.
August 17, 2008 at 7:43 pm |
La Vaughn’s point about abstraction is interesting because all this exercise could be mistaken as having an aesthetic bias, which it definitely doesn’t. I do believe that abstraction as we know it has been an internationalist movement consistent with the development of Esperanto and the idea of a League of Nations that would end in one World Government. It is also a fact that it later was misused by the U.S. to promote an alternative to Soviet Social Realism and possibly to Hitler’s taste in art (which was not that different to Churchill’s and Eisenhower’s taste, and all three of them painted). However, abstraction is also a way of organizing, not necessarily of leaving out things, but of creating synthetic symbols that include things, like the number 5 would include five things even if it is one image. And the exercise of creating these symbols, even if removed from any content, just to equip a community with new thinking skills, can be as un-international, or un-hegemonic, or neighborhood-focused as the literal narration of a local myth. (and it is that narration that would determine if one tears down the crumbling colonial buildings or not. However I think it is good to keep them, they lead to more significant abstractions).
August 21, 2008 at 11:14 pm |
Personally i think there is nothing passive about forgetting – forgetting requires intellect, will and intent – one must work very hard at forgetting (unless you are over 60 and of course none of us are). Memory on the other hand is volatile, random, ruminative and ultimately abstract – it has a strong sensual component and such emotional power that it can fuel hatred and violence for centuries as well as render us powerless and incapable of action – this is the challenge it poses – are the crumbling walls a sign of active forgetting or passive remembering – would tearing them down erase a painful history or would it just delete an architectural reference to a time and place.
August 25, 2008 at 11:34 pm |
I would like to read a copy of Luis’s essay in its entirety. Please send to christina(at)artfusionmagazine.com.
I’m glad to see a lively ongoing discussion here. There are clearly no simple definitions to live inside or to illustrate; Luis has presented an intricate and intensely personal problem for each artist to solve from within their own unique and complex position in time and space. This is a highly personally engaging show to curate, to solicit for, to create for and (I anticipate) to view.
I appreciate the opportunity to join the conversation and to take a stab at an answer to Luis’s query. The dialogue here with friends and colleagues is doubly valuable to me in its varied attempts to take the curator’s proposal out of an academic dialect and into a lingual territory that is easier to parse, even if each artist’s interpretation by its nature oversimplifies the theme in a given direction to some degree.
I am fascinated by the concept. This is a big one for all of us. Very challenging.
August 27, 2008 at 11:50 am |
may i also have a copy of luis’ essay? thanks – erik
August 30, 2008 at 4:43 pm |
Given that it is a somewhat new process for me to explain an art work before I’ve actually done it, I thought I would put some initial ideas on the blog to see what kind of response they would get and to see if I’m close to being relevant to the task as described in the prospectus. Feedback would be appreciated.
The focus of the first work is a plant: sugar cane. Its cultivation and processing into sugar and rum was cause for the largest forced migration of Africans as slaves in modern history, resulted in the deforesting of most of the Caribbean island chain, the murder of nearly every indigenous inhabitant of the islands and created the wealth that financed the industrial revolution of Europe and America.
In the years after slavery was abolish the sugar cane industry required a vast itinerant work force that moved through the region including Central America. The shared experience of extensive regional travel and the intimate knowledge that came through the hard work of agriculture of those different places that were physically isolated by water is a significant part of the Caribbean culture.
From sugar cane flowed the of building of forts, slave quarters, windmills, factories, and great houses as well as the social disjointedness that makes up the recent 400 year history St. Croix and the entire region. Sugar cane and its story had truly global impact long before the term or the idea is discussed today.
The second work is a sound piece consisting of Crucian stories told in the traditional manner of rambling tales that digress into any number of subjects and points of view on topics of local events. The stories were produced by a white man who spent his childhood and early adult life on St. Croix and has been living in Vermont for the last 10 years. As an astute observer of the culture, he recites these stories impromptu from memories of life on the islands. They were not made with the intention that they be part of a work of art but he has agreed to their use. I have combined them with one of the primal sounds of St. Croix’s recent and perhaps final exploitation: the diesel engine; memory contrasted with reality.
September 1, 2008 at 11:01 am |
Hi again + warm greetings from Denmark.
Our exhibition was great and it opened last Friday. I can’t wait to post some pics, but for now I will just leave a link to the space.
http://www.overgaden.org/exhibition/index/32
I think it would be interesting for you-us to see the works the Danish artists did while in the VI. They were very engaging.
I showed 2 pieces which were created since I’ve been here.
Collectibles, a series of drawings on paper plates that re-represent all the plates made from the Royal Copenhagen commemorative plates that reference the VI in some way. As many of you know in the VI we have these “chaney” pieces (creole work for china). We all know they come from from the Danish colonial era, but we see them in just fragments, little pieces of blue painted ceramic fragments. While walking down the pedestrian street I came across the Royal Copenhagen museum and upon entering was blown away. For the first time those fragments made sense, I was able to see the whole picture.
Here’s an example-
http://www.dphtrading.com/uk/products/Plates/Jubilee-and_Memorial_Pl/Royal_Copenhagen/RNR066_1906_Royal_Copenhagen_Memorial_plate_SOLI_DEO_GLORIA.aspx
Obviously the choice of medium, paper plates references to disposability (which we were), but also the fragility of memory, esp. poignant here since the Danes have a curious amnesia of the Virgin Islands.
The other piece was a handmade book project made with thick watercolor paper (white) titled “Hideaway”. Silly me, but I didn’t know that a large part of my childhood narrative thought was influenced by a Dane-Hans Christian Andersen (The Ugly Duckling, The Little Mermaid, Hansel & Gretel). Mr. Andersen in addition to writing did these lovely papercuts which in and of themselves are fairytales. Being here, the VI feels like a fairytale, like it doesn’t exist in some way. So this project is a white book of cut outs primarily of landscpaes. These landscapes are taken from real estate websites that advertise to sell the VI, which is always presented in a fairytale construct-escape, fantasy, adventure await you on the blue water type of thing…The “narrative” is constructed using some text from the same homes that are being sold or rented. And obviously the more the book is read, the less “virgin” is becomes.
Again, I’ll post pics later as we are waiting for the photographer to edit them.
and lastly to
Mike
the sugar can piece, what exactly did you plan on doing? Sorry but it wasn’t clear to me.
and the other one, the stories piece seems interesting, does this guy recite the stories in Crucian? Will his image be used? Will he be at the exhibition doing this piece? Im not sure about using the deisel engine to represent reality, why?
Stories can represent reality and memory?
September 2, 2008 at 11:06 am |
In answer to La Vaughn; I am thinking of using the sugar cane within a piece of sculpture.
As for the stories, they are currentyly recorded and the plan of presentation, if I get that far is not to have the image of the reader or to have it read live. The dialect is crucian. The diesel engines are being used because they are so ubiquitous on St. Croix right now and because they are the instruments of change and destruction.
A third possible piece would have to do with the C’sed by pass project, which supposedly will save the colonial buildings of the town from being shaken apart by the truck traffic (those deisel engines again, this time shaking the colonial foundations themselves) by re routing them around town. The scale of this effort in the changes it has done to the landscape and its cost (26 million I’ve heard) somehow seems at least ironical, if not absurd. Town will have a much more comfortable shopping environment though.
September 6, 2008 at 12:59 pm |
Candia,
I have a question about the submission process that came up in a conversation. Would it be possible to simply declare that we intend to submit work to the show with general descriptions and without the resume and exhibition lists, submitting that information instead by Dec. 15? I think that there are at least a few of us that are still working on ideas that may not be clear by next week.
September 10, 2008 at 5:29 pm |
please re-state the submission requirements due 15 september 2008 which would allow us to continue to work and clarify to ourselves our intentions., in other words, what do i need to submit to “keep the door open” for participation. thoughts are simply too raw to present in detail. thanks.
September 10, 2008 at 9:56 pm |
Hi Mike – perhaps your question was answered already – if not i believe the answer is YES – SUBMIT YOUR NAME AND INTEREST BY ‘SEPT 15 and then send proposal with the $25 fee by Dec. 15. My understanding is that the CMCArts needs to have some idea about the level of interest as grants must be written now for then, etc. Please correct me if i am mistaken but i think this is the intention – best to all, Janet
September 12, 2008 at 3:46 pm |
SUBMISSION requirements for SEPTEMBER 15 [after hearing from Candia and Luis – here’s what I get from them…]
1. brief description of art piece, size and space required
2. remember your name, address, phone and e-mail
2. $25 fee sent a.s.a.p. to indicate serious interest
[must be before Dec.15 – now would be very helpful]
send mail to
“Facing Locality” at CMCArts
P.O. Box 1371
Frederiksted, VI 00841
3. initial description/size/space may be e-mailed to info@cmcarts.org
please put “Facing Locality” in subject line
Hope this helps.
September 12, 2008 at 5:18 pm |
cynthian, thank you for the september submission requirements.
September 13, 2008 at 10:54 am |
Greetings All
I think the comments have been GREAT! In my view issues of locality are very complex ones. Locality involves many layers and levels of human perception both conscious and unconscious. They also involve strong social, economic and political elements which act as a type of under currents within or beneath a static structure. To that end the art work I intend to submit will a multimedia construction aimed at deconstructing various levels of colonial and neocolonial perceptions as it relates to a specific Cruzan locality.
September 13, 2008 at 7:49 pm |
We have received several submissions from Puerto Rican artists, which is extraordinarily rewarding. I would like to request that St. Croix artists, who have an extra room would be willing to house another artist so everyone off-island can come to the opening in March.
September 26, 2008 at 12:10 pm |
Hello all, (from Tomas Lanner)
Here are some useful comments from Anthony Lee, Anselm Richards and LaVaughn Belle that I was asked to post on this illuminating web log
Enjoy:
> From: ANTHONY LEE
> Date: Thu, Sep 11, 2008 at 11:47 PM
> Subject: Facing Locality
> To: camnitzer1@aol.com, Candia Atwater
>
> Greetings Candia!
>
>
> I hope that all is well with you and the CMC! Please include me in this effort spearheaded by Luis Camnitzer. I’m thrilled that someone has taken the initiative to tackle this issue amongst the art community in St. Croix. The works I completed during my March residency was based on this new shift, an erosion of cultural uniqueness caused by the effects of globalization.
>
>
> I was recently in Atlanta for a show and visited a restaurant that served only VI cuisine and was owned by a St.Thomian. An immediate surge of pride came over me to witness such preservation, as would be expected in New York City, in the American South. My insatiable tongue for saltfish pates was finally nourished! However, the very next day I felt ambiguous about the island territory I sometimes claim as “home.”
>
>
> I walked into a “Rastafarian” store in an Atlanta arts district… you know, the kind where you’re met with the fog of incense that clears to display a wall plastered with ubiquitous images of Marley. There was a VI Flag patch that I was considering for purchase, but as I contemplated about its design, then meaning, then cognizance, I reluctantly placed it back on the shelf. I no longer wanted to buy it- no longer wanted to demonstrate my half-heritage through this patch.
>
>
> My contemplation was that of St. Croix’s current state, or at least what I viewed in March. The spoiled stew of local politics, cultural apathy and American assimilation, and lack of respect for the island by its people (i.e.: littered beaches, junked cars) eclipsed my heart-strong nostalgia of a pre-Hugo St. Croix. I also considered the VI flag, a holdover design from the early years of Transfer during the US Navy’s intrusion, too American and simply bland. The image of the Eagle and Coat serves to be prophetic rather than symbolic- exchanging an interpretation of locality and uniqueness for one that boldly states Dependence. But then again, these islands have always been some nation’s burden, a terrestrial “baby” of sorts.
>
>
> Since Luis has introduced this discussion I now finally feel free to identify some problems, at least in regard to the local art community (my real list of opinionated peeves about the VI would match the standards of a short novel). As far as local art goes… where’s the beef!? Where’s the truly soul-stirring local artwork- that truthful visual statement that make viewers uneasy, causing the purposeful chin-pulling glance and glazing personal reflection? Where’s the mental arousing local artwork worthy of written criticism and commentary? The VI has a range of socio-political discrepancies, and even goals, for the artist to identify and then amplify. It’s too easy to discredit the local viewers with not having a capacity to understand; but even easier for the artist to just do it and let the viewers catch up. It seems to me that the local work is produced through the lens of a tourist, for the tourist.
>
>
> The CMC and local art professionals must get serious about critiquing each other’s work, even at the sake of hurting some egos, to improve the overall quality of work produced on the local art scene. Art needs to be smart and stimulating… not merely pretty (though a market exists for this). If an artist’s peers begin to raise standards, then will raise the standard of the artist.
>
>
> Candia, I commend Luis for initiating and you for supporting this discussion and exhibit. This is an exploration of our island culture long overdue.
>
> Count me in.
>
> Date: Fri, 12 Sep 2008 20:35:52 -0400
> From: candia.atwater@gmail.com
> To: smartworks@hotmail.com; niarus_art@yahoo.com; pbiddle.ghs@gmail.com; johnobafemi@hotmail.com
> Subject: Fwd: Facing Locality
>
>
> this is the comment from Anthony Lee, our AIR in April. What do your students think about culture?
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> From: smartworks@hotmail.com
> Subject: RE: Facing Locality
> Date: Mon, 15 Sep 2008 10:57:52 -0400
>
> Candia,
> I don’t know who this person is who is being critical of what they see here in St. Croix or the Virgin Islands! What he is seeing is pretty much happening in virtually every small town in America! Actually, in many cases the Virgin Islands is better.
>
> After going to the Whitney Biennial, MOMA, PS1, Dia Arts Center, and the Guggenheim and taking my students to 17 annual New York City art field trips, I’ve come to realize that there are different layers of aesthetic understanding throughout the country and different art styles can co-exist. I’ve gone into many small towns in America where there are still confederate flags woven through images (some people don’t even realize that that is popular in Maine!) and its affect on the art that is created in that area whether subtly or openly.
>
> Cultural art is popular in every state in the union, so lets not think that its just the Virgin Islands! Now we can try to effect the creation of a more popular approach of conceptual ideas but remember that many artists in every state create art to put food on the table so that is not going to stop! Often, those of us who create conceptual art on St. Croix can’t get them sold. I think, just as in other states, each can coexist most likely in different galleries although I have seen both in the same galleries in other states and I’ve been to at least 20 other states.
>
> I also noted that in galleries on other islands where culture is also very strong, that both co-exist in the galleries. People in small islands and small towns tend to hold on to their culture whether they are in the islands or in the states. Being critical of what you see down here is insulting to the people! Our culture is very important to us. Those who can’t handle it need to go somewhere else! Caribbean culture is STRONG and it will not change how it affects art. Even Caribbean kids in the states tend to graduate at a higher rate that stateside black kids. We have no intention of taking our culture out of our work! We can conceptualize how we do it, but its not going to go away! One can merge conceptual and cultural.
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> Anselm Richards
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ai dios mios!
are we a bit defensive?
anyway…first of all I think the term “cultural art” is redundant as art is and makes culture.
saying that, i don’t see anything “wrong” with the art produced in the vi. knowing my work, some of you may think that comment strange, but the art (all of it) is reflexive of our current condition and our culture!-the good, the bad and the ugly.
i agree with anselm, the majority of the art produced is not atypical to others who share our provinciality
however i think anthony davis’ comments are also needed, even though i don’t think they are based on a full grasp of the art produced in the region since he seems to have been living away for awhile…By that I mean there are artists that are producing work that is as you say, a “visual statement that make viewers uneasy, causing the purposeful chin-pulling glance and glazing personal reflection… worthy of written criticism and commentary”. It exists, but don’t expect to find that in a small gallery in C’sted . I mean really now. (no offense to Maufe Gallery who’s doing great things!). Mike Walsh at Walsh Metal Works Gallery has done a great job of supporting those of us that don’t produce work that can necessarily be inserted into our market (although i did sell i video at his gallery. can you believe that? ha hah)
But as I get ready to leave my studio in copenhagen (that sounds so cool), I just have to say that I am happy to have another opportunity to show my work AT HOME!
La Vaughn Belle
PO Box 8513
Christiansted, St. Croix
Virgin Islands 00823
October 26, 2008 at 11:29 pm |
Just wanted to also join in on the artblog of the Camnitzer/”Facing Locality” exhibit. I am one of the Puertorriqueñas that would like to also participate. As a matter of fact I sort of got the ball rolling as to getting more representation of the local PR artist to participate. Unfortunately not all who said would participate did. I am not sure how many answered the prospectus..(Candia let me know this…)
I thank Candia for inviting me and Luis for this CHALLENGE/”RETO…” I believe the language has been a factor in that none of the Puerto Rico artist have participated in this blog. Nonetheless, the situations we are facing in the island promise to have a cause and effective voice/representation for ARTs sake. Besides, how better can we mean what we say and show what we mean by presenting what we truly believe…..regardless or who gets offended. We are living hard, cruel times. Puerto Rico is selling out…I myself had my diverse ideas about what I wanted to present. I believe I am clear now.
Artist, while they need to sell and get noticed, also need to communicate and show more than mere feelings through our art abstract or not…conceptual as it may be…. to be heard and of course seen. I personally enjoy when we get involved in these challenging times and when the artists have to think more….its critical art. — un pensamiento muy critico.
Gracias.
October 26, 2008 at 11:46 pm |
A todos los artístas puertorriqueños que van a participar en la exposición de Camnitzer titulada : “Facing Locality”, que en una buena traducción quiere decir: Confrontando Espacios (el local) (Camnitzer corijame por favor….) Aquí les doy un “LA” para que comienzen a escribir sus pensamientos sobre la obra/tema que tenemos encima. Recuerden, que la fecha limite es el 15 de diciembre. Deben de comunicarse directamente al museo con Candia y con Luis quienes están al tanto de todo lo que estamos haciendo para que esta actividad sea una para la história en todo el caribe. También me pueden comunicar si asi lo prefieren.
Espero que puedan aportar con sus pensamientos críticos sobre el tema, su obra y todo lo que esperen de esta exposición. Pueden hacer sus comentarios en español.
This is message intended to get the participation of the Puerto Rico artist involvied in “our” blog. Thanks all for this great opportunity.
Carmen G. Mojica
Club de Fotos y Artes Plasticas, Inc.
P.O. Box 5951
Caguas, PR 00726
carmen.mojica@gmail.com
PS. I would like a copy of Luis Essay as well or is this part of the prospectus we already received?
November 6, 2008 at 9:26 am |
Artists,
remember who we are and what we do.
we are only the “whoel in the flute that the BreATH MOVES THROUGH”…
listen to the music.
in this time and moment just feel the artist within and let’s share the essence of thecreative community from within. You are arguing about semantics, talk from your soul, which is why we are in this present.
alahu!!
December 14, 2008 at 5:04 pm |
I find this dialogue very interesting. It is related with some of the topics I explore in my blog- for example the separations between the “here and there,” the local and the global, and my questionnaire for islanders… etc.
December 14, 2008 at 7:07 pm |
I was away much and realize that I didn’t check the blog in over a month. Anyway, the more discussion and heat, the better. Carmen: Facing Locality would translate “Confrontando lo local” or “Confrontando la localidad.”
December 14, 2008 at 7:22 pm |
to Nini, I love the metaphor of artists being the hole in the flute which the breath moves through – I bet Kandinsky would’ve approved. It takes such practice to be empty enough to let this happen!!
However! The above discussion isn’t necessarily an argument. Each of us has differences, and there is room for all in this word-space.
“Semantics” – close in morphology to semiotics – where the “Word” has huge significance. Our words do power our thoughts, and thoughts can defend the soul’s music – or overshadow them – either way is possible. This blog is merely one aspect of Facing Locality – a place where it’s appropriate to stir the words around and see what bubbles to the surface.
Thank you – for yours! …and thanks to all who write herein.
Now – it is time to get to work! May all of us who have glimmerings of ideas be able to pry apart the time to manifest them. I hope our many colleagues in Puerto Rico are aware of this exhibition and will make the effort to join us!
[I wish I could write this in Spanish, like Carmen did.]
January 3, 2009 at 8:07 pm |
Me comunico por este medio y en español porque es MUY público y me dá verguenza hacerlo en inglés.
Quisiera saber si hay bastante participación de nosotros los puertorriqueños.
También si hemos sido escogidos algunos.
Ademas de comentar sobre unas fotos que vi de Camnitzer,
muy buenas ,parcas y por ello cautivantes, sobre los desaparecidos en Chile,su patria.Las partes por el todo.
Estoy pensándome la posibilidad de una residencia,pero aun no podría fijar fecha.Me encantaría.
Candia or Camnitzer,can you answer me
ciao,NQ