When I got this commission from the County of Sacramento and the Sacramento Airport, they requested a house—something consistent with my many previous house-shaped sculptures and installations. I began by conducting research, reading the letters of those who came to California during the Gold Rush.
BHM
“By the People”
WASHINGTON, DC Various locations In a city chockablock with monuments, “By the People” alternatively mounts ephemeral public art. Organized by the nonprofit organization Halcyon, which also sponsors residencies for social practice artists and social entrepreneurs, the 2019 “By the People” festival (its second installment) aimed to present “artwork that sparks dialogue and builds bridges within and across communities.”
Object Lessons: Melvin Edwards
Agricole, the suspended plow form, comes from the French for “agriculture.” Human beings didn’t start out in cities. Cities originated as places of exchange, and now they’ve gotten to the point where something that used to happen once a week or once a month—the trading of goods and services—becomes the dominator.
Simone Leigh in New York
Like the braided clay that adorns some of her ceramic sculptures, Leigh’s practice articulates a richly interwoven narrative of recuperation, resistance, restitution, and healing that directly addresses this core viewership even as it puts the broader public on notice.
Deeper Truths: A Conversation with Hank Willis Thomas
Hank Willis Thomas, who was recently awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, has emerged as one of the most prolific artists of his generation. Formally trained as a photographer, over the last 15 years, he has considered the relationship we have to images and what they say about our priorities and privileges, focusing primarily on popular, found imagery from history, sport, and fashion.
Martin Puryear
VENICE U.S. Pavilion, 58th Venice Biennale
“Liberty/Libertà,” Martin Puryear’s U.S. pavilion exhibition, uses subtle, disarming, and purposeful juxtapositions to create a mindful meditation on what it means to be an American artist and citizen today.
Nari Ward
NEW YORK New Museum
Amazing Grace (1993), an installation of fire hoses and nearly 300 abandoned baby strollers first shown at a firehouse in Harlem, originally referred to the crack epidemic, AIDS, and homelessness sweeping through that neighborhood. Now, as one walks through the strollers along a pathway formed from the hoses while listening to Mahalia Jackson sing the gospel song of the title, it is hard not to think of family separations and the ongoing humanitarian crisis at the border.
Wangechi Mutu On Her New Fifth Avenue Façade Commission at The Met
“The idea of a hybrid for me represents human potential, super-human powers, and the feeling of being in transition as well as being alienated.”
Critical Aspirations: A Conversation with Ilana Harris-Babou
Ilana Harris-Babou is often considered a video artist, but her practice fluidly negotiates sculpture, installation, performance, photography, and online platforms like Instagram.
Mixed Messages: Mark Bradford’s What Hath God Wrought
In the late fall of 2018, an odd delivery appeared on the campus of the University of California, San Diego. From the flatbed of a trailer, construction crews unloaded five precisely machined, nearly 40-foot-long tubes.
