June Newsletter : Caribbean Contemporary Arts

The energy is rising as CCA welcomes new artists to their residency programme this month: Stary Mwaba (Zambia) and Brendan Fernandes (Canada/ Kenya) have joined us for June, and Wilfredo Prieto (Cuba) will be arriving in late June or early July. Please direct your feedback to Jaime Lee Loy’s new address at jleeloy@cca7.org. See the left margin for past postings.

Images from Stary Mwaba (below) and Brendan Fernandes's (further down). Read more about them under the Residency section.


Stary Works with kids who have Hiv/Aids



Brendan Fernandes




CCA Programmes
* Residency : Stary Mwaba, Brendan Fernandes, Wilfredo Prieto
* Education : Kids Create

Exhibitions, Events and Openings

Local
* Zuri
* Charity Art show for Goshen

International
* 15th Sydney Biennale
* 1st Singapore Biennial

Opportunities
Local/Regional
* 52 nights
* Jamaica Flux; Workspaces and Windows 2007

International
* Khoj Workshop, India

CCA Programmes

Residency Programme
For more information on the International Residency Programme please contact Jaime via email.

Puppeteers Alex Kahn and Sophia Michahelles have left Trinidad after 6 months at CCA7. To read more about their work please see April and May’s Art Papers.

Stary Mwaba

“I create my work in a context in which my culture can be seen, experienced and studied in depth or compared and contrasted across time and space. I have always wanted to say something strong and critical about issues that are important in the preservation of my culture, spirituality, and the development of my society. Owing to this fact I have realized the importance of rediscovering my identity in the practice of my art, as my recent work represents my unending restlessness as I search for material comfort, spiritual and emotional fulfilment as I undertake this journey into self discovery.”

When I set out for Trinidad and CCA7 in particular for my residency, I knew that I will have a time in which to create work, a time to experiment with different materials and mediums, a period of thinking and conscious situations with other people, with time to reflect and challenge my art practice.

My art work represents my culture and being at CCA7 will provide a chance for me to expose my work to the international audience, for it to be experienced and studied in depth therefore promoting cultural dialogue about contemporary art practice among artists internationally and raise awareness about visual culture which I believe is core to the development my art practice.

I have worked on several community projects and collaborative works with children and artists such as wall murals both in my country and internationally. I intend to work on a community project with other artists and the community at large while on my residency program.

I have had very interesting and inspiring talks with my fellow artists in residence from the USA, Alex Kahn and Sophia both who have been here for six months and have worked intensively with local groups such as Dragons Keylemanjahro Moko Jombis just to mention a few in relation to the Carnival and the masks. What interests me the most is the moko jombis themselves, in that we have such traditional characters that perform during a Luvale and lunda ceremonies called Makishi, one walks on stilts in back in country. It is this interesting relationship between the two different cultures that I intend to explore through my paintings by interacting with the group who I have had a chance already to meet. I intend to learn from them and also share my experiences of working with youths using art as tool to communicate on important issues such as HIV/Aids and family life education and many others.

Brendan Fernandes

Brendan Fernandes is of Indian Descent, born and raised in Kenya, and living in Canada since the early 1990’s. Brendan’s work is multidisciplinary, examining issues of cultural displacement and migration through installation, painting, and drawing. His current body of work investigates how tourism's sensationalized vacations, such as Safaris, contribute to the exploitation of societies and cultures and their subsequent transformations into forms of entertainment. Grounded in post-colonial theory, his work unpacks the manufacturing of culture - the numerous ideologies that surround the souvenir, the idea of the exotic, and the experience of travel as fantasy.

‘My work represents the investigation of the concept of “authenticity” as an ideological construct that both dominant and subordinate cultures use to their own ends. It is a word that shapes cultural experience and thereby also shapes concepts and formation of identity, including my own.

Safari-as-authentic-African-experience provides an evocative metaphor for the inscription of culture onto my own sense of identity (or, rather, my sense of identities). As a Goan who has never set food in India, much less Goa, and as a Goan-Kenyan who, having left Kenya at a young age and lived the greater portion of his life in Canada, I wonder what it means to call myself Canadian. After all, “Canadian” is a self-advertised descriptor of multi-culturalism. For me, being Canadian means experiencing my identities as informed by all the places I have lived and the cultures to which I have connections, threads that my family has striven to maintain while living in a country that is neither their birthplace nor mine. But nor was Kenya. Yet the cultures of Kenya and India continue to represent my family’s recognition of our cultural roots. As a result, I find myself caught between a habituated respect for the cultural traditions of my ancestors and an understanding of Kenyan culture from the perspective of a "native" (somebody who was born and lived in the country) as well as from the point of view of a Westerner and, therefore, a de facto tourist. These investigations into culture have yielded several important questions that guide my work, not the least of which is “who am I?”

With all these threads running through my explorations, it makes sense to take an interdisciplinary approach. For instance, in a piece entitled “On Safari,” a gallery space is inhabited by white ceramic deer and Kenyan spears, drums, and other artifacts. By installing these objects together, I re-stage the importation/exportation of a homogenized and tourist-ized version of “African” culture: the Heart of Darkness made light and accessible. This installation was my attempt to expose stereotypical notions of Africa-as-cultural-monolith and to question the ways in which “Africa” continues to be depicted as a land where the exotic and the primitive still exist, like animals at a zoo.

In another project, “Changing to Summer” (an installation comprised of a single channel video and photographs), I documented my own sessions at a tanning salon. In this project I applied stickers made from textile motifs (supposedly representing so-called Indian culture; paisleys, in particular, having become codified as an “Indian” design element) to my body. I registered the progress of my tan by comparing exposed skin to the skin hidden under the stickers. Tanned onto my torso, the paisley designs became both body decoration, like a skin textile, and camouflage. In time, of course, the tan faded, returning me to a uniform light brown that marks me as an outsider in both Canada and Kenya. Although skin colour as a signifier of racial/cultural difference is not new, a brown man getting a tan certainly tampers with expectations around the signified – a white person getting a tan is the expression of privilege at the expense of exotifying a culture, usually at a holiday resort within the country of the exoticized culture.

In my work I aim to question how culture is produced and distributed to others, while questioning my own hybrid identity. Through my work I am questioning the cultural codes that make up my identity.

See my website www.brendanfernandes.ca

Wilfredo Prieto

‘Wilfredo Prieto is one of the most talented artists of the last crop sprung up in Cuba, besides he is a paradigm of the new ways of visual arts in the island.
He is characterized by his net, simple, highly impacting, and meaningfully rich ideas. His work almost always comes out from the context, but it unchains senses that go beyond, opening themselves into a wide scope perspective. After the representational and symbolic redundancy that has threatened the Cuban art with the creation of stereotypes, Wilfredo personifies the most straightforward minimalist and international orientation of the new artists. And among them, he is the one that most accurately refers to the present-day life and affairs of his country’.

Gerardo Mosquera on Wilfredo Prieto
Critic and Co-Curator of the New Museum
of Contemporary Art, NY

Preview Wilfredo’s work with the following links:

• http://www.perpetuumm.com/qbtentoonst.htm
• http://www.madridabierto.com/eng/2006/wilfredo_prieto.html
• http://www.universes-in-universe.de/car/habana/bien8/cabana/e-tour-01.htm
• http://www.noguerasblanchard.com/wilfredo.html


‘KIDS CREATE’ : Art classes for Children
The children will be exposed to the elements of art (including line, shape, colour and texture), and the design principles and techniques, while being introduced to works of art and craft from around the world.

KIDS CREATE classes are held on Saturdays from 10am to 11:45am for children 6-9 years old and 12:15pm to 2:00pm for children 10-13 years old. The KIDS CREATE classes will also focus on artists or art movements, local and foreign, past or present so that the kids can evaluate the work through open discussion. Children will then explore the techniques and style of the artist, which will provide the stimulus for the creation of their own work.

These classes form part of CCA’s Art Education Programme, which offers comprehensive courses in Visual Arts, Cultural Education and Research. The children attending these classes will also have the opportunity to be exposed to the local and international artists in residence and CCA exhibitions.

Duration: 10 weeks
For more information: Tessa Alexander Sloane Seale at 745 6816 or CCA

Exhibitions, Openings, Talks

Local

Zuri
A Necessary Arts School Production at the Central Bank Auditorium Friday 2nd June to Sunday 4th.

Written by Naima Thompson
Directed by Penelope Spencer

Necessary Arts continues to showcase new talent while educating and entertaining its audiences. The last eight productions have all blatantly placed social issues before its audiences with no apologies. Zuri is quite different in this respect as we enter the realm of the supernatural characters and a folktale premise. First written and performed in Manhattan, New York at the Mint Theatre Space, Zuri is set in 1812 Trinidad, during the tale end of slavery. It is a simple story of love and acceptance, greed and intolerance, which depicts the life of a mulatto boy trapped in the body of a Beast who is placed in an enchanted rain forest for his evil ways toward slave children. This curse, set by an Obeah woman can only be broken if the Beast were to fall in love with and marry that which he once despised so much, a slave girl.

The challenges of producing theatre in Trinidad are so monumental that one can certainly recognize that these efforts are not for financial gain, but rather, an effort to contribute to the social development of our youth while making a statement about our society and we look forward to a time when artists can receive the same respect and enthusiasm from Corporate and Government sponsors as our athletes do, when the whistle blows.
Please contact the Central Bank box office for more information or Necessary Arts at # 627 8130. Admission - $75.

Charity Art Show for Goshen
Goshen is a home for battered women and pregnant teens and five artists have come together to host an exhibition of paintings, part proceeds of which will go to the home. A mix of realism, abstract and social commentary the young participating artists are Michael Douglas, Justin Sobien, Jaime Lee Loy, Denise Badre, and Ryan Williams. Michael Douglas and Justin Sobien form Lalibela house: a collaborative that supports charity through art.

June 1st-June 8th at More Vino at day and night. 10am to 2am. Contact Jaime at 771 4113 for more information.

International

15th Biennale of Sydney
8 June - 27 August 2006

The 2006 Biennale of Sydney is organised around the conceptual framework Zones of Contact. It will include 85 artists and collaborations from 57 cities in 44 countries making it one of the most ambitious, daring and challenging Biennales ever. In 2006 the Biennale of Sydney will collaborate with arts organisations across Sydney, extending to more than 16 venues and sites.

Exciting new projects will be created for specific public sites and outdoor locations. A program of performances, public talks, symposia and workshops that will be held over the duration of the Biennale of Sydney. There is also an Australia-wide program involving galleries, art schools and organisations in a number of cities across Australia. Most events are free!
More information


1st Singapore Biennale
Date: 4 September - 12 November 2006
Vernissage: 1 - 3 September 2006

Singapore Biennale 2006
http://universes-in-universe.de/car/singapore/2006/english.htm

List of artists
85 artists and groups, with brief biographies

http://universes-in-universe.de/car/singapore/2006/eng/art/artists-list.htm

16 exhibition venues
Spectacular sites, including churches, temples, a mosque, a military camp
from colonial times. Photos and descriptions of all venues:

http://universes-in-universe.de/car/singapore/2006/eng/ort/index.htm

Encounters 12 to 15
Press conference; Discussion on Biennials; Briefing for volunteer helpers
and art teachers. Summaries and photos:

http://universes-in-universe.de/car/singapore/2006/eng/encounters/index.htm


Opportunities

Local / Regional
52 Nights
52 Nights is a new weekly open mic television show hosted by CNMG television, channels 9&13 and 6 on cable.
52 nights is led by the hilarious and inimitable Deborah Maillard, featuring, each week, a Guest Artiste, Guest DJ and Live Band. 52 Nights will be aired on CNMG Television. This programme was created essentially in response to the increasing numbers of young people seeking opportunities in alternative careers, such as the performing arts, and the absence of spaces and places for them to express these talents, get feedback, and grow within the field.
The show essentially provides a platform for ALL performers to express their hidden talents.

52 nights is also open for screenings weekly.
See their blogspot for more information: http://52nights.blogspot.com/


Jamaica Flux: Workspaces & Windows 2007
The Jamaica Center for Arts & Learning seeks creative proposals from visual artists for Jamaica Flux: Workspaces & Windows 2007. This multi-disciplinary and co-curatorial project, encourages artists to engage in a dialogue with the community, residences, and businesses of Jamaica, NY through their creative activities. The project focuses on site-specific, experimental and/or participatory art practices for both indoor and outdoor spaces, exploring the specific cultural geography of Jamaica, NY within the broad scope of the relationship between art, economy, and globalization. Works that are not site-inspired will not be considered. It is strongly recommended that you visit JCAL and Jamaica Avenue (148th Street – 168th Street) prior to your proposal.

Deadline for applications: June 15th 2006
Please contact Jaime at CCA if you wish for further details to be e-mailed to you.

International

Khoj Workshop, India International Artists’ Workshop is scheduled to take place sometime in the next half of the year in Kolkatta. Khoj encourages international contacts for artists and facilitates experimental practice in their workshops.
http://www.khojworkshop.org/opportunities/khojkal"

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© Copyright Caribbean Contemporary Arts 2005 - 2006
The information in this newsletter including all pictures shall in no way be copied or facilitated for use without the permission of Caribbean Contemporary Arts.

Newsletter edited by Jaime Lee Loy